Days 222 & 223: Brawley, CA

Things got off to a (quite literally) rocky start on Thursday.  The road we were on was being chip sealed, and within a mile of where we started out a dump truck tossed a rock up in the air that impacted the upper corner of the passenger side of the windshield.  Fortunately, after the last rock ding we lowered the deductible on our insurance from $500 to $250.  So it wasn't quite the "Ah, crap!" moment that we had experienced last year.

The Chocolate Mountains.

There was plenty of heavy truck traffic on State Hwy 78, but the road construction made it much easier to deal with, especially on the long stretches with hardly any shoulder.  The construction caused the traffic to funnel down to just one lane, with an interval of about 20 minutes between traffic on opposing sides being let through.  So for about 20 minutes the road was traffic free, followed by a couple of minutes of traffic rushing by.

Once we crested the Chocolate Mountains the winds started up.  I did one stretch on a very gradual descent, where for more than five miles I maintained a speed between 30 and 36 mph.

Alea rode the first 10 miles of the day, then I took over for the 27 miles into Glamis, the "Sand Toy Capital of the World," which is located at the base of the Algodones Dunes.  The wind was blowing sand over the roadway in places, and it only takes a couple of inches of sand to make the road a treacherous place for bicycles like ours.  The wind was generally following us (and thus favorable), but in places Alea was leaning sideways into it to keep from getting blown into the travel lane. 

After the dunes, things flattened out and we entered the Imperial Valley, where date palms and fig trees at times broke the monotony of field after field of leafy green vegetables.  The wind gradually swung around, becoming a side wind and then a quartering headwind as Alea wrapped up her final 27 miles of the day in Brawley.

A reminder of days past in Brawley, CA.

We are camped at Wiest Lake County Park ($20, power, water, push button showers).  This place is showing its age, and the facilities aren't the cleanest, but it is a good enough place for us to linger and get the rest of our chores done before entering Mexico.  That included lining up appointments with all of our doctors, and making the decision to stick with our current health plan.  We also had Safelite come out and repair our rock chip for free, so we were happy that got resolved the same day that it happened.

We were a bit perplexed about how to register at the campground, but fortunately Andy and Beatrice Banuelos were setting up just as we arrived.  They had been here before, and assured us that we could set up at any empty site, and that someone would come around later to collect the fees.

Since my last job was working as a county planner, I love the irony of this place.  It is clear that at one time this little park was an attractive little oasis, but now is showing its age and is fairly run down.  That is likely due to a large degree because there is a "confined animal feeding operation" (CAFO) next door (more commonly known as a feedlot).  I can only imagine the public hearing for a conditional use permit to allow that CAFO to locate next door.  I suspect corporate agriculture has a significant role in who gets elected here, so it shouldn't be any surprise that the elected officials would choose to ignore the obvious negative impacts on a county park.

Our four-legged neighbors...

Our second day in Brawley we drove into El Centro, where two new van tires were waiting for us.  We first did our grocery shopping at Aldi, and then went to Walmart to get our tires installed.  Then it was off to Staples to get copies of our Mexican auto insurance policy made, and a trip to Petco to stock up on food for Lana.  There were a few other minor errands to run, then we did laundry and gassed up, since this area has the cheapest gas before we reach Mexico early next week. 

Waiting for the tires to be installed...