Santa Ana winds...

Of course.  Coming out of the northeast.  We are heading northeast.  Of course.

Winding our way through the populated stuff, the wind wasn't bad.  We did Interstates to start out, looking forward to some two-lane roads today, too.  The traffic wasn't bad at all (windshield photo tour ahead)...

Over the hills...

Occasional clumps of bright flowers...

This one is for Steph and Dan: I thought we made a wrong turn and were back in Arizona...

What looked like a 2-lane road on the GPS turned out to be this...

It did finally drop down to a two-lane for a few miles, then we were back to an Interstate.  Before getting to the Interstate, Joan found us a decent price for gas on her Gas Buddy app.  It wasn't a huge station, but we fit in there OK... and saved about 50¢ per gallon compared to the prices along the Interstate.  Yeah, no gouging there.

Once on I-10 East, we discovered we were going the right direction... not because of the wind, but check out the traffic heading the other direction (towards LA)...

Bumper-to-bumper and moving slow.  I'd hate to think it is that way all the way to Los Angeles (110 miles or so to the west).

Before we got to the park we are staying in, we reminisced a bit: Catalina Spa and RV Resort - it used to be a membership park, and we had a membership here.  Before we discovered the Tropical Tip of Texas.  We remembered the park being nice (great hot springs), but sandy sites that weren't particularly level.  Yep, that hasn't changed.  We remembered it being a ways outside of Desert Hot Springs.  Yep, the population growth hasn't caught up with it - still out in the boonies.  We remembered that you drove around and picked out your own site.  Yep, you still do that - kinda do a "once around" then make a choice; get settled in, then go back to the office to check in.

So, we are settled in here.  It is hot; as in: 87º and breezy.  Santa Ana winds.  Oh, yeah - we remembered that this was the first place we ever saw the big windmills for generating electricity...

 I think I'll spend some time in the hot springs; they are supposed to be "healing"... these creaky ol' bones could use some of that.