Update: Disclaimer: While we are, and will always be The Desert Way, sometimes the Pacific calls to us, especially in the dog days of summer, and we must go. Anyway, as the rock group, America, told us in 1972, “The ocean is a desert with its life underground.” Okay, it’s a stretch, but we hope…
Now, if you’re thinking this might be a story about the storied ‘Highwaymen’ of years long passed, you might want to read on and become elucidated a bit on southwest lore. Because this, dear friends, is a story about those desert dwellers who built and maintained the roads between Needles, California, and all points west…
On March 20, 2015, the Stars and Stripes rose over the Hinkley Post Office for the very last time. We stood there as the flag came down, marking the end of a chapter for the tiny desert town 14 miles west‑northwest of Barstow, California. Hinkley’s post office had been serving residents since 1908, but like…
In 1915, Stephen “Desert Steve” Albert Ragsdale, originally from Coffeyville, Kansas, rattled his way west, coaxing an early‑model automobile across the Mojave as if stubbornness alone could substitute for horsepower. He was bound for a business conference in Los Angeles, because apparently the best route to professional success was straight through a sun‑scorched nowhere, but…
There are currently 649 Cracker Barrel locations across the United States. But California was not one of them.
If you lived in California’s high desert, and got a craving for Cracker Barrel’s Southern specialties, you had to plan for a long road trip. The closest ones were in Kingman and in Yuma, Arizona, both respectfully over 200 miles away.
We know, because we’ve done it. More than once. Until now…
In the midst of the Roaring Twenties, a stout young man was an attorney by trade in Ventura, California. Although Erle Stanley Gardner immersed himself in juris prudence, he needed what millennials nowadays call a “side hustle” to make ends meet. Writing fiction suited the gent’s keen wit, colorful oration and flair for the dramatic,…
When Roy’s Hotel is not ground zero for multiple thriller film shoots or welcoming the throngs of dusty tourists getting their fair share of the Route 66 experience, the quiet of Amboy settles in all around.
The solitude is so profound it’s almost deafening. The peace of the ghost town with its long-abandoned St. Raymond Church and nearby pioneer graveyard consumes you. It invites you to explore and renew.
Give yourself time to absorb this little time capsule of a town and its cemetery just a bit east on Route 66…
No one can deny that Southern California’s 2018 Monsoon Season has been one heck of a lalapalooza. When retired school principal Tom left his home in the high desert on July 12, 2018 to visit his adult son at his other home in Big Bear City, he had no idea he would soon face nature’s fury on State Highway 18.
It was cloudy, especially towards the top of the mountain, but Tom wasn’t concerned as it wasn’t raining yet where he was. However, a stationary thunderstorm cell was dumping over Big Bear City and Baldwin Lake for over an hour.
After Tom passed by the Mitsubishi Cement Plant on his right at about 12:30 p.m. and followed his well-beaten path, he was suddenly confronted with an astonishing sight. A surreal wall of mud and debris careened down the road toward him…
Take a drive through Lake Havasu City today and it is hard to imagine a time when Jet Skis and speed boats weren’t racing through the wide expanse of blue water, or when Spring breakers and snow birds weren’t making it a prime destination in the desert. The London Bridge was purchased by Robert McCulloch…
Remember, some of the graves are hard to see until you get almost right on top of them. Never drive your vehicle where graves may be present. Please do not walk on top of graves. Some have soft earth on them and the unforgiving desert may want to swallow you up…
