The Great American Road Trip: Day 8

6:15AM
Today is a new day! We've just set out from Joshua Tree and we are headed to Jalama Beach. Nothing too exciting has happened yet other than Peter Rabbit himself watching us pack up the tent this morning. The rabbits in Joshua Tree are surprisingly cute with their big ears sticking up and their fluffy white tails.

Oh, an important point I forgot to mention, our beloved GPS woman has changed her name from Melanie to Victoria. Somewhere in Texas, Tyler decided she should have a British accent and the name Melanie just didn't seem to fit anymore. I'm just happy to have another girl in the car with all this testosterone.

6:52AM
We must be in the land of wind turbines. They are everywhere. Note to self: Look up how wind turbines generate energy so the next time I'm driving in a car and see them I have something more intelligent to say than, "Ooo pretty pinwheels!"

5:56PM
I'm currently sitting in what I've deemed to be the safest location on our current campsite--the car. but let me start from the beginning. Today we drove through Southern Cali, through LA and up the coast. While I didn't see a while lot through the haze, I got good vibes that make me think I'll end up living somewhere in CA at some point. The palm tree cell phone towers were the real selling point for me.

Anyway, after a few hours in LA traffic and then through winding roads, we finally arrived at our camping destination: Jalama Beach. We were immediately greeted with a sign that said "Campground Full." Since you can't make reservations, we were banking on pure luck. After reading the sign, we decided to resort to plan B- begging. As we pulled up to the gate, Tyler prepared to tug on the heart strings of the woman behind the glass. Tyler did his best and said to the woman, "Is there ANY way we can camp here tonight? Please? We came all the way from VIRGINIA!" Her response, "Campground's full. It's been full since Wednesday." However, somewhere deep down, the woman had a soft spot for us Virginians so far from home and she gave us a free 90 minute pass to park near the beach. So we decided to hang out and eat lunch at the beach--during which time I made an effort to not freak out about not having a place to sleep tonight.

The beach was beautiful and judging from Tyler's goosebumps after his quick dip in the ocean, the water was frigid. After our nice 90 minute break, we talked to the guard on duty at the gate, who gave us uplifting news: all campsites within 250 miles were all full. However, he did give us one small sliver of hope to cling to when he mentioned a city park nearby that might have a few sites open. Might.

Hoping that our luck would kick in, we followed his vague directions and made it to the River City campground in Lompoc, CA. After thankfully finding an open site, we set up our tent... and that's when Tyler pointed out the mouse's tail sticking out from one of the holes on our site. After surveying the area and realizing our plot was covered a hundred similar looking holes, I realized there was no way I will be getting any sleep tonight.

This fear growing inside me was exacerbated by our campsite neighbor who saw me freaking out about the mouse and came over to visit and tell me about the 7 ft snakes that are prevalent on the campsites as well as several other rodents that I've tried to block out. She assured me that they won't come in our tent and that they are much more afraid of me than I am of them. To which I agreed to disagree.