Turns out that the camping idea was not so good. I had just remarked to Cindy at 7:30PM 104* how cool it was to watch rain fall from clouds and not reach the ground. I thought it was just afternoon atmospheric instability that would disappear after sunset. . . wrongo. This was actually monsoon moisture from Phoenix that was only too happy to condense out of the sky as temperatures plummeted to 99* at midnight.
So, I am at my "campsite" up in the hills (just past where the road disappears from view here),
and the shadows thrown from the headlamp beams have me already skittish about sand traps (last year's Arizona debacle, for example) and it looks like some 4X4s have had issues based on canyon deep tire tracks, so I bailed into this little turn-around and parked with a worrisome scrunch into the sand. Man, it was hot and I was sticky from the humidity, and bingo, clattering rain starts to fall, the wind picks up, and guess what? There is a dust storm in the midst of the rain storm that is throwing dirt splats all along the passenger side of the bus where I PLANNED to have the sliding door open for badly needed ventilation. 99* and muggy and desert biting flies and wondering about how deep the wheels would be ensconsed in the sand by morning, and wondering too, if I would allow the interior to take water damage in the name of ventilation. Really now, the stupid rain was dumping little bombs of dust against me as I examined the parking situation, and the sand was blowing dust through the car with bits of water droplets and I was furiously miserable like a little toddler tantrum, " I need to get some sleep!" It was sooooo hot and muggy that I was short shortless and damn close to Calvinless too. I was trying to lay on the floor and it was too hot to even do that. I did not trust my driving in the dark in an unfamiliar setting either. So I sat in the driver's seat with the driver's side window down just enough to pant some fresh air without rain coming in, and I thought, "it is supposed to be dry and clear, I hate this stupid old planet with its stupid rain." Finally found a semi-workable across-the-front-seats perch with a little ventilation under me due to the aisle and a little from the cracked passenger window and slightly more open driver's window, my back was bitching at me for having to play suspension bridge after the hottest day of my life driving across Death Valley, and I pondered my fiftieth year . . . "I could have been a banker."
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles