Day 275

275/365, originally uploaded by Aaron LaRue.

Today was the last day of my road trip and I was flying solo. 

We woke up and had a kind of lazy morning. We didn't have any adventures planned like the rest of the days, so Jaimie and I just chilled at her house for a bit. We drove around Mill Valley, where she lives, saw what there was to see. Some of the houses in that area are ridiculous, one day when I'm a millionaire I'll own a home there. Then we went and got Punjabi burritos, which I didn't even know existed, but were incredibly delicious. Curried lamb, vegetables, sweet potatoes and rice all wrapped up in some flat bread, it was so tasty. I wish there were somewhere near home that made food like this, it would definitely be my new addiction. 


After lunch, Jaimie and I parted ways. It was actually kind of sad, I was not looking forward to driving home alone. I had phantom limb syndrome the whole way back, at times I think I started talking to myself not realizing she was gone. The trip home turned out to be quite the adventure, too, so she missed out. I missed a freeway interchange that I was supposed to take, and I ended up going in the wrong direction for a bit. And by a bit I mean close to an hour. Had I had any sort of smart phone this wouldn't have been an issue, I could have just looked up the directions, but my phone is a dumb apparently and was of no use to me in that regard. So I ended up having to call my brother, who had to find out where the hell I was on a map and then tell me how to get home. We figured it out, and I actually got to take another weird little offshoot freeway that was a beautiful drive. I was in the middle of nowhere, cruising along, and then all of a sudden I came up on another body of water.




I don't know how these places keep sneaking up on me. It's even more crazy to think that this lush, green lake exists in the same state as the Salton Sea, but I digress. 


When I finally hit the 5 freeway, my home stretch, I made a little pit stop at the Iron Zoo. The Iron Zoo, in a nutshell, is an operating oil field that people went into and painted a bunch of the oil pumps to look like animals. The first person to do this was trying to drum up business for her motel down the road from the oil field, and the town embraced the idea. Chevron, who owns the field, was apparently cool with it too, and the place was littered with these weird little artworks. My favorite one was by far the zebra, which I decided to use as today's picture. 


The oil field itself was kind of eerie. There was no one around, I was alone, the sky was dark and ominous and there were warning signs about poisonous gasses and dangerous wildlife everywhere. The oil pumps are creepy too, ceaselessly bobbing up an down. The apocalypse could come, and as long as no one shut those puppies off, I think they'd be creaking up and down for centuries. 


After I left the Iron Zoo it was a straight shot home. The weather was getting worse and worse the closer I got to the Grapevine, and as I went over the top it started to snow on me. 




I only got one blurry picture because, well, driving down a freeway while it's snowing is dangerous enough, trying to take pictures while doing it just seemed reckless. I actually enjoyed the snow though, it was a nice change of pace. What sucked was when the sun went down, and a think fog rolled in.




Also another dangerous picture. No idea what that black thing in the corner is. After I got through the fog, I dropped down the Grapevine and I was home. It only took me close to 8 hours to get back, that's pretty good right?


Overall, this was an awesome way to spend my break. It was far from relaxing, but it was a total blast and exactly what I needed to recover from last quarter. I've been all over California in the last few days and it amazes me how diverse this place is. There are untouched rolling green hills, desert wastelands, a coastline that stretches for days, huge cities, we have it all. I can now confidently say this is one of the most beautiful places in the world. The crazy part is, I still have a lot more to see. Maybe next spring break?