Day 1 (June 19th) - Los Angeles, California to Kingman, Arizona

We started our little adventure today. The destination for today was Kingman Arizona and we made it here in about 6 hours, and that isn't bad on a Friday afternoon/evening through Los Angeles. Of course, it didn't take use long to run into our first accident. It happened only a half-an-hour in to the trip. There were a couple of cars that thought it would be fun to see if the law physics could some, how cease to exist on an LA freeway. Time and time again this little experiment is played out on the freeways. Lets be clear here. Two objects cannot occupy the same space. I know some of you will start talking about sub space, etc. But in real space it just cannot be done.

Once we got past that little experiment, we soon ran into another little experiment that someone was conducting. In this experiment, someone wanted to find out if a truck went up a hill sideways would it stay upright or roll down the hill. Well, the answer was roll down the hill and back onto the freeway with it finally resting on its side. I can't tell you what makes a person decide that its a good idea to try these little experiments, but I do know that its getting real old because it took us 2 hours to get to the El Cajon pass.

From that point on we had a very good ride. That is if you don't count the number of times that the truckers decided to swerve into other lanes and almost wipe out the car next to them. Again someone wanting to test physics on the freeway. One trucker was so bad that he couldn't decide which lane on a two lane high way he liked the best. I was guessing he liked the middle lane since that is where he spent most of his time. He eventually went into the right shoulder and then looks flabbergasted as we passed on the far left lane. He looked like how did I end up here. I want to be in the middle lane.

We made one stop today if you don't count the stop-and-go-and-stop-and-go caused by LA traffic and the many experiments. When we head east to Las Vegas, Colorado River or somewhere beyond like now, we make a stop at Lynwood which is better known as fast food heaven. Lynwood for those who don't know is a little town (take that with a grain of salt) just outside of Barstow. The little town has every known fast food chain known to man and every gas station known to man. It seems the city council (who are they kidding) want people to come and go as quickly as possible. Lynwood is also known for one other thing, and that is an outlet mall. Anyway we did as the city council demands, buy some food and fill up the car and leave.

The kids settled in to the trip pretty well. They really didn't fight today. I'm looking forward to some really good matches tomorrow. Miles misplaced his headphones which isn't surprising. He has a knack for putting things down and not remembering where he put them. He wears glasses for reading and at school. Lisa and I find them everywhere but on his face or his glasses case. It is hard to say who he takes after in this regard. I can be messy but I know where things are. Lisa is almost always neat and organized and she has her lists. If we look at other family members, we can't say that they have the same trait as Miles, so in this regard he is branching out on his own. I'm all for him branching out, but I wish that he just remember to put his dirty socks in the hamper. As for the headphones, I did have to lay down the law on the headphones, because I don't think that I will be able to handle five times a day. In a panic voice... "Where's my headphones?" We will see how long it takes before he misplaces them.

We arrived late in Kingman so we didn't see any sights. We are staying at the Blake Ranch RV Park (picture to your left), which Lisa thinks is a really nice RV park. She thinks that the trees just need to grow some more. We are in a desert without any major source of water running though the town, so I don't think they are going to grow very large or very fast. Who starts a town in the middle of nowhere? The railroad did it. The town of Kingman was founded in 1882. It was built to support mining operations in this part of Arizona. Route 66 goes through Kingman as well.

We drove a total of 364 miles today and paid $90 for gas. Tomorrow is a long day of driving as we try to get as far east as we can so no sightseeing tomorrow. We hope to get to Moriarty, NM, but I'm shooting to go even further than that.