Day 141, November 24, 51km and 673m climb, Oasis Palm RV park to freedom camp outside Joshua Tree National Park
Today was a tough day! Sunny but a solid headwind all day. We had one of our earliest starts leaving camp at 0730 only to find we couldn't get out the gate as our bikes didn't trigger the mechanism lol! Finally on our way we had a gentle 15km flat ride to Mecca where we stopped at the supermarket. The supermarket was Mexican and not a word of English was spoken. The checkout man had great pleasure in getting me to repeat after him happy Thanksgiving in Mexican and the bakery was a very cool experience as well. We will be eating Mexican for the next few days which is no great hardship. (Although the Mexican Ramen noodles for dinner tonight were an interesting experience).
After leaving Mecca we started our climb up Box Canyon. We had originally intended to come down this way but local knowledge suggested coming down the So Cal route rather than up it would be wise. So here we are camped just outside Joshua Tree National Park on BLM land which is free of course! We couldn't get a booking at any of the Joshua Tree campsites so have adjusted our destinations accordingly as well.
Box Canyon was beautiful but why is it that a sandy, gravelly dirt bash up a canyon is a fun adventure but climbing up one on a perfectly good sealed road becomes a slog? I guess the headwind didn't help!
So we set the tent up in the howling wind and have had to put rocks over all the pegs to stop them pulling out in the wind. The good news is the wind is due to die down later tonight and be light tomorrow.
PS Gordon says he will never trust my reassurances about Ramen noodles again, our lips are still burning from the jalapeños!
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