On the Road - Joshua Tree to San Diego

Sorry it's been so long since our last post - and we've some catching up to do, but, we're currently in Hawai'i and have not stopped to catch a breath.  Anyway we've a few things to tell y'all about our travels before we get to Hawai'i.

We left Joshua Tree National Park crossing it from North to South and headed cross country to San Diego.

The southern side of the park looked very different to the northern side, no trees but some odd looking cactus-like plants;

After leaving the park we drove through Box Canyon - slab sided cliff walls with amazing rock structures that tower over the road on both sides;

As we got to the Salton Sea the winds picked up over the desert creating a sand storm.  At points it was so bad we couldn't see the lines painted on the road.

And as quickly as it came the winds died and the sand stopped blowing.  We're heading for those mountains in the distance.

Leaving the desert behind we started climbing into the hills becoming greener and lusher the higher we went;

And then we hit the clouds, fog and rain;

At the top of the mountain is a somewhat out of place 'Alpine village' of Julian which could easily fit-in in Switzerland or Austria;

It took less than 30 minutes to drive from the sand-storm of the desert to the alpine mountain fogs.  The temperature in the desert was about 90deg F dropping to about 52deg F in Julian - all in all a very odd days drive.