VA to CA, day six

At around ten this morning the phone rang, and our realtor asked if we were in California.  “No,” said Lydia, looking at the desert all around us, “not yet.”  “But we are in California,” I insisted, “we crossed an hour ago.”

The reason Lydia did not think we were in California was that the first two hundred miles do not look like any part of California she has seen:  nothing but mile after mile of uninhabited desert.  We stopped for lunch in Barstow, at a McDonald’s there.  It was far too hot to leave the dog in the car, so Lydia went in, got food, and then I went in, used the restroom.

From Barstow onwards we had lots of traffic, moving very rapidly at first, alarmingly so as we ascended and descended the mountains.  At the point that route 15 met route 91, we came to a stop; even on a Saturday afternoon there is so much traffic the freeway comes to a stop.  We could probably see more cars, at one point, than we saw in the first four hours today.

We have arrived at my parents’ house in Newport Beach, where we will stay till we buy our own house in a few days, and until the furniture arrives in a few more days.