Our daughter takes the 'Grands' every other weekend over to Apline, CA (outside San Diego in the Laguna Mountains) for their visit with their dad. After the storms we have had, plus the fact my car needed serviced and hers needs brakes, I suggested Hubby and I drive them over in the truck.
When we left Yuma, the skies looked like this...
Then the batteries on my camera died. I usually always grab the spare, but this trip I didn't think I would need it. WRONG!
Just a few minutes later, the skies opened up and created some beautiful rainbows. Not one but two, side by side. I wished I had my camera.
Just before we began the drive out of the desert and up the mountain, we stopped for a potty break and a guy asked if we were going up or coming down. When we told him of our direction, he responded with, "It's snowing up there!" I want my camera working for this! Of course the little gas station in no where land doesn't carry the type of batteries my camera uses, so on the road we go.
At 3000 feet there is snow on the side of the road, but no camera to take pictures of it.
At 3500 feet there is more snow on the road and it begins to blow some furious rain down on us. By 4000 feet, no more thoughts of the camera. It was dark, we were in white out conditions and the rain was freezing down on us, sleet! NO CAMERA could have caught this scene. A trip that usually takes one hour from the bottom of the mountain to our meeting place is now creeping along. We could only go about 25-30 mph at the most. Cars were spinning out around us. A dozen or so were facing the wrong way in the median and some were hanging off the embankment, stopping inches from going over the edge. It was a very tense drive, but the kids, they are in the back excited. The snow or sleet coming down was like being in space. 'Ellie Bellie' says, "grams, look up like this it's really cool!" The sleet was getting thick in the road and the off ramps were even worse. Hubby thought of stopping once but felt it would be worse trying to get off and even back on again, so we forged forward. After 2 hours, we made it to our destination with ice built up on the truck. A few other cars in the parking lot had snow on them so we engaged in a small snowball fight.
We decide not to drive back through it and got a hotel room. Since we had no overnight supplies we went to the Albertsons down the road and acquired our needed items. On our way back to the hotel the radio interupts with, "Interstate 8 over Laguna Mountains has receive a foot of snow making driving conditions unsafe, the plows can't keep up with clearing the road and only vehicles with chains or 4 wheel drive are being allowed by." We are so glad of our choice!
This morning, we woke up to the trickling of water from this...
Got on the road to head home and saw all this...
I know for some this is peanuts, but for us desert dwellers, this was awesome! I wouldn't want to ever drive in this again but I sure did enjoy the beauty the next day. I wish I could have gotten my hubby to pull off to take better still pitcures but he could see that they hadn't fully cleared them, consentrating on the main highway. By Sunday, when my daughter goes over to pick the kids up, she plans to leave early so she can stop and take some pictures.
Once again, Our Journey Through LIFE included an adventure!
Just gorgeous pictures. I'll never see this scenery in my lifetime so it's nice to see it here!
ReplyDeleteVery pretty little waterfall too!