I spent the night at the Jojoba Hills Escapee park and at 8am Mike and Lisa Sylvester stopped by to check out my Seal Level Gauge.  It works great except those times where I am plugged in to the campground electricity.  They worked on it for 2 hours and concluded after speaking with Lazy Daze that the problem was caused by the method Lazy Daze used in the wiring bundles.  Both the AC and DC wiring were bundled together thus causing interference  with the Sea Level gauge when it was plugged in to the campground.  They could fix that problem but it would require direct wiring from the gauge to each tank.  This would be an expensive fix.  They showed me how I could get around the problem and still utilize the gauge.

Mike and Lisa hand completely gone through my rig trying to locate the problem.  They spent over 2 hours working on it and my total bill came to $0.00.  What a deal !!!  They didn’t charge me anything since they had originally installed it at the 2010 Balloon Fiesta.  It was warranty work.  If anyone is looking for a team that does quality work and backs up everything they do then I would suggest giving them a call at (502) 228-1381.  You can also look up their website at http://thervguynm.com On top of that they are just really nice people.

I left Jojoba Hills about noon and headed off to the Anza-Borrego desert where I planned to stay at least a week in the dispersed camping area.  Since I got my solar panels I love to boondock.  It usually costs you nothing to stay and you have everything on board to enable you to live off the land. I found a spot east of Borrego Springs off highway 22.  There were lots of folks out here but very spread out.

The next day I checked out the Anza-Borrego Visitor Center.  It was underground and built into the side of a hill.  Good idea to keep it cool in the summer as it can get up to 115 degrees or hotter.  This is a view from the bridge that goes over the visitor center.  They have a nice area you can walk through that identifies all the different plants and trees.  While there I also went on a tour with a volunteer that explained all the trees in the desert.

Be sure to click and then click again to enlarge all photos.

This is a photo of the mountains from my campsite.  As you can see my nearest neighbor was quite a distance away.

The following morning I decide to hike over to a spot where it looked to be a canyon.  From where I was camped it didn’t look that far.  But was I ever in for a surprise.  It is hard to judge distance in the desert.  What looks very close to the eye can be very far.  This is the road I went down before I came upon a dry lake bed.

This is the dry lake bed.  It was actually very hard and easy to walk on.  But the lake bed was at least a mile across.

Finally I reached my destination.  By that time I estimated I had hiked about 5 miles based on the length of time it took me to get there.  I was hoping I could find some shade.  It wasn’t really too hot (low 80’s) but walking in the sun the entire distance seemed hotter then it was.

I found this little shaded spot from the sun and took a break there.  It was very cool and refreshing.

After plenty of rest I started back the same way I came from.  I found these flowers at the side of the dirt road.

I was very happy to return to my little home on wheels.  I felt very good that I had hiked 10 miles but was ready to kick back for the rest of the day.  I took a pic of the sunset.  The California sunsets are nothing compared to the Arizona and New Mexico sunsets but beautiful in it’s own regard.

I am glad I took a hike that day.  For the next 4 days it has been very windy and not good hiking weather.  There were huge gusts both at night and during the day.  It was supposed to rain yesterday but it sailed right over us.  Even though it didn’t rain Mother Nature did give me a beautiful rainbow.  The bottom of the mountain to the left of the rainbow was where I had hiked to.

I used the following pic to create my new header which you probably noticed at the top of the page.  I finally found the “Pot of Gold” at the end of the rainbow.  It is my wonderful little Lazy Daze house on wheels.  How cool!!!!

This shows the clouds I had most of the day yesterday.  It did threaten to rain but passed over.

I will probably be here a few more days and then move on.  I love this area and it’s complete freedom.