When things go bump in the night.....

7:24 am - Wednesday - February 12th - Borrego Springs, CA - 34° F, 56% humidity, wind 5 mph out of the west by northwest.....clear, blue, windless skies today with a forecast high of 73° F.  The view this morning......↴

Once again we awoke to the dreaded Borrego winds....we thought they were gone Monday evening when we had our sunset fire, but they returned with a vengeance around midnight and continued all the day long Tuesday.  Our Jello plans to hike Tuesday morning were dashed, but we had plenty of sun gracing our solar panels, so we knew we would get a good charge into the batteries.

It's been a while since one of our readers contacted us for a meetup, but Monday afternoon I received a message from Doug and Michelle who planned to be in the Borrego Springs area beginning Tuesday for a few days and wanted to now if they could drop by our home, to which I quickly replied "Yes!".  On Tuesday morning I got another message with their phone number saying they would like to stop by Tuesday afternoon, and that they had driven by our location on their way into town (they are staying at a local RV park).  I sent them a text that the afternoon would be fine, and we went on about our day which mainly consisted of huddling inside out of the fierce winds.

Around 1 pm they arrived, and after a quick tour of the trailer we retired inside to get acquainted.  We had such a lovely time talking, and sharing our nomadic experiences that we agreed to meet again for dinner in town at Pablito's at 5 pm for Mexican.  Sadly, we arrived at Pablito's to see them closed....who closes a restaurant on Wednesday?  I had no plan 'B', but quickly suggested Kesling's Kitchen for pizza and brews, but Michelle had just had pizza, so we walked across the street to check out Carlee's Place (Yelp gives them 4 stars on 331 reviews!).  We have walked and driven by Carlee's Place dozens of times over the years, but never thought to check it out....what a pleasant surprise!  I ordered their 'Black-N-Bleu Burger' and can, with extreme confidence, pronounce it one of the top three I have ever had.  TLE ordered their Jerk Chicken Salad, while Doug their Jalapeño Burger, and Michelle their Rueben Sandwich.  We all thoroughly enjoyed our entrees, which equaled the great conversation.  Over the course of the day we learned we had loved and visited so many of the same places.....

At the surprisingly good Carlee's Place

.....it never ceases to amaze me that there is this immediate camaraderie with other vagabonds, but there almost always is, and I am so grateful.  We had an immediate connection with our guests, and within minutes of meeting them it felt like we had known them for a long time.  As we said our 'until next times' I glanced at my watch to see that almost two hours had elapsed since we met for dinner.

When we left the Newell to drive into town at 4:45 pm it was still daylight.  We have never driven back to the Newell at our current boondocking spot at night, but I assumed the almost full moon would be up when we returned so we could see the Newell from the road, but it wasn't.  It was, instead, pitch black as we passed the Rockhouse Road exit.  At night distances are difficult to judge, and after a couple of minutes I thought we had passed the entrance to our location, so we turned around heading back toward Rockhouse Road.  Well, we hadn't gone too far....it just seemed that we had.  Suddenly TLE says she can see the Rockhouse Road sign, and we know we're at least ¼ to ½ mile past that sign, so we turn around again.  All of the sudden I'm thinking "How are we going to find the coach in this pitch darkness?  Are we going to drive up and down S-22 for hours looking for something that can't be seen?  Are we going to be reduced to getting out of the car and walking along the shoulder hoping to see the Newell?".  I had left one inside light on, but I knew I could not see that from the highway.  We turned into two likely entrances, but no RV's.  I'm beginning to think we may be driving in circles trying to find our home in the inky blackness indefinitely.  We continue to creep along the highway about 10 mph going north straining our eyes to see any source of light....finally we come over a small rise and I see the lights of the Class A motorhome of Brandon, our neighbor.......we both sigh audibly as we finally pull into the correct entrance and see the Newell sitting there regally in the darkness awaiting our return.  Normally, our flag pole with a very bright LED light on top would have made this much easier, but I had taken down the flagpole due to the high winds, so that one landmark was not there to guide us home....crazy, huh?

We spent what remained of Tuesday watching a recorded Hallmark movie, and were in bed by 9:30 pm enjoying the fact that we had made it home, and were hearing NO wind this night.....thanks for stopping by!

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