Day 2 of the 2023 California Trip

 4/3/2023

The winds were relentless today, sustained winds an average of 30mph and gusts of 40-50 for sure throughout the day today between El Paso and Phoenix. I took an alternate route up into about 3,000 ft of elevation which basically followed the Gila River. The pink line was my route. 

The climb along the Gila River to Globe is super cool, and it's definitely interesting to see how thick the foliage can get in that little valley, but it's really only in pockets. There are really large Desert Willows, what looks to me like Sycamore...maybe, and for sure a few odd Pines, but I am no expert in this area's flora, that's  also for sure. I filmed a snippet of that part of the ride.  

Unfortunately I didn't film the descent from Globe to Phoenix, which is amazing, truly truly amazing, and that's just because I'm dumb and didn't make sure the camera was recording.  Oops.  I've taken the route on I-10 and I-8 from San Antonio to California a few times in the last decade, and I've never seen some of the rock formations I did today up close and personal.  It was a beautiful, twisty canyon descent, and I was overjoyed and a little nerve-wracked with all the wind gusts blowing at me while leaning into corners.  The enjoyment far, far outweighed any nerves. 

However, I did wait in a long line of cars for about twenty minutes without moving at all, on the western edge of the Tonto National Forest as the descent was finally tapering out into the flatlands again.  I took the opportunity to strip off the thermal undershirt I had put on for the cool El Paso morning and the highish altitude of the climb into Globe.  When we finally started moving again, slowly I realized that unfortunately someone had flipped their car off the side, poor souls. The car looked like a crushed aluminum can.  Pretty rowdy. 

The rest of the trip into Phoenix was just a straight line through the desert, but man the desert is in full bloom, and I mean it.  There are wildflowers all over the place, even up on some of the higher hillsides, little gold flowers that look like Dahlberg Daises and some kind of red flowers that remind me of Firecracker Ferns, but again, I'm no expert on the flora of this area.  It was really surprising and pleasant to look at.  Even the medians were loaded with all this natural color.

I had an uneventful dinner, did some serious yoga, and now it's finally time to wind down.  I've got one more day of travel, and I'm going to try to make it as exciting as possible, and with any luck the winds will slow just a lil bit for me.