American Southwest 1: Kwaaymii Point to the Grand Canyon

American Southwest 1: Kwaaymii Point to the Grand Canyon

Kwaaymii Point

We entered the US at Tecate – a small Mexican Pueblo Magico border town. We chose this border as people had told us it was a lot calmer that Tiajuana. Once in the US we headed to Kwaaymii Point and camped the night on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land. BLM land covers large swathes of the countryside in the southwest of the USA and camping is allowed at no cost (mostly). We have used very few paid campsites in our first month. The next day we did our first (of many) USA hikes (11.5 km) to Garnet Peak.

Anza-Borrego Desert State Park

This was a quaint desert town surrounded by metal sculptures of animals (past, present and mythical) scattered across the desert. It was good fun driving around trying to find them. Because of unusual recent rains, parts of the desert were in bloom. We did our first shopping here and gasped at the prices!

Joshua Tree

Our first National Park and we spent a lovely day in good weather exploring it in BB and by foot (8 km). We camped for the next couple of days at a casino outside Twenty Nine Palms and visited the winning house for the Christmas decorations competition.

Route 66

Leaving the park, we joined the famed ‘Route 66’ which crosses America from coast to coast. It is very well celebrated with old cars, signs, cafes, fuel stations etc and you felt you had gone back in time to the 50s. Unfortunately, the fuel prices were current.

Mojave Desert

We then travelled onto Mojave National Reserve where we spent Christmas Day. Exploring an underground lave flow tube was good fun.

Oatman

Oatman is a historic town that we diverted to visit on our way to the Grand Canyon. Francine read that they staged a shoot out in the high street at 3pm each afternoon. We explored the town, complete with wandering burros, and then watched the gun fight (again, with wandering burros delaying the show!).

The Grand Canyon

We drove a loop through Sedona on our way to the Grand Canyon. We didn’t stop, but it would definitely be worthy of a visit. Leaving Sedona, we climbed up a road through a canyon which was spectacular. There is no sense of the Grand Canyon as you approach it from the south. There are signs at the visitor centre pointing ‘this way’ to the canyon, and having walked a path through some trees you are suddenly presented with the vast chasm. It is quite breath-taking and must be seen, but it is maybe not as inspiring as some of the other parks yet to come. We arrived late afternoon and watched the sunset before leaving the park to camp outside. It was -12c overnight and the next morning we went into the park early to watch the sunrise. It was cold! We were very glad of our Antarctic coats and thermal trousers. A bitter wind was blowing and other visitors were definitely suffering! (Many hotel beds were without blankets, as the guests had taken them to the Grand Canyon!) We explored the rest of the southern rim over the course of the day and left after another sunset.