Joshua - Laughlin

We arrive at the entrance to the Joshua National park. Dean expalains to the, nice young man (read flamboyant) on the gate that we are all together and he lets us all through, without the need to show our passes, with a very limp wristed wave! Dean confirmed later, it was indeed a male ;-)

Inside the park we follow the road, there is only one, through this beige landscape, liberally sprinkled with Joshua trees. These seem to be a cross between a proper tree and a cactus. The older/bigger they are, the more tree like they become. We stop off at one of the rest points to take a drink and admire the huge rocks surrounding us, one of which is being climbed and then descended by a group of climbers.

Moving on, we are soon out of the park and heading for our scheduled fuel stop. Once we are all fueled up, we drive a little way up the road and pull over for another break and this time, an ice cream. This is a small town called 29 Palms. I can't see where this place gets it name, as there are a lot more than 29! Our next stop will be on Route 66, at Amboy and the famous stop at Roy's.

Dean had said that the sun out here at this time can be brutal. An apt description of the conditions today. As we head out of 29 Palms, we take a dead straight road, not unusual around these parts, that last s for about 12 miles, before a bend appears. I take this opportunity to set myself a new record, beating my previous set on the Route 66 tour. I travel 10 miles, with the cruise control set and my hands on my lap! Yes, I kid you not, 10 miles without laying so much as a finger on the handlebars! Only in America, eh? Having done that, I give the RK the beans for a quick blast up to 90mph, whilst I catch back up to the pack.

As we get close to Amboy we cross the salt flats and the temperature gets noticeably hotter. We are soon at Amboy and Roy's though, taking on more water and being sprayed by Dean and Larry to cool us down. Those of us with the cool vest douse them in water and put them on. Then it is back on the road. That cool vest really did the trick too, as my upper body felt cool for the remainder of the day.

We were still on Route 66, a path a few of us had trodden before, though in the opposite direction. For me though, having done it before, it had lost a lot of its magic, the onlybright spots in this section being the passing through the 'Mojave Moon' spot (see R66 blog) and the long goods trains, one of which we 'raced' to a level crossing.

We had another stop to take on more fluids, before starting our final stint on the bikes, for the run into Laughlin, leaving R66 and heading north on highway 95. As we started our decent into Laughlin, the temperature rose notably. As if it wasn't hot enough. It really was the proverbial oven out there. I felt vindicated at not having brought Cath on this trip. If she could have put up with the mileage, this heat would have done for her. She's much better off in the cold and rain back home!

We parked up in a multi storey car park and made our way to our home for the night, The Aquarius Casino resort. Laughlin is a poor man's Vegas, consisting of 3 or so casinos and not much else. Its only redeaming feature being that it sits on the banks of the Colarado river. The hotel/rooms are ok but downstairs it is typical casino. Rows and rows of electronic gaming machines, flashing wildly, beeping madly, with row upon row of elderly, obese or obsessive Americans. It's not a pretty sight.

Dud and I have a beer and meet up with Graham, Jan, Sally and Alex for a meal. As usual, the portions are larger than life and in this case, matched by the prices. It seems worth it though, as everyone enjoys their meals. We say goodnight and prepare for bed. We have another long hot ride tomorrow, to the Grand Canyon, with some more Route 66 to traverse. Rather than straight though, the stretch out fo Oatman is twisty and mountainous. I can't wait to run that in reverse :-)

One thing I forgot to mention. Earlier in the evening, I went searching for the gym. The irony is surely lost on the Americans that it sits right alongside McDonalds!!  Needless to say, the gym was empty.