Eastward Bound

Today we left California to begin our journey towards Florida.  Just before we left, Pam was picking oranges when she received a phone call to learn that Bill's mother was unable to catch a flight to Florida this morning due to extreme cold and snow conditions back east.  It is so nice to be in warm climates!

One oddity about Los Angeles area gas stations we stopped at is that they wouldn't take credit cards! This absolutely blew us away. We use credit cards as a convenience, not to borrow the money and pay the bill over time, but to consolidate the purchases and then pay once per month.  In Los Angeles, the gas stations take cash or debit cards only.  One Arco AM/PM gas station in Downey only took cash.  We drove a 1/2 mile down the street another Arco AM/PM gas station where they accept both cash and debit cards.  You have to pay a transaction fee to use the debit card to boot.  Both these Arco stations were charging $3.49/gallon.  We did see some stations charging $.20-30 more per gallon.  Perhaps those stations accepted credit cards.

Our eastward journey began down I-5 along the Pacific Ocean coast to San Diego during rush hour (ugh!).  Then we traveled east on I-8 through California's ever changing landscape including 
very rocky mountains: 

desert:

and farmland:

We finally decided that one of the green crops being harvested was Romaine lettuce but could not decide about any of the others.  Farmland area was at or below sea level.  That probably helps with directing the water to the fields.  

We crossed high on a bridge over the Colorado River (I swear I saw no water) and descended into Yuma, AZ.  After a short time we began to see cactus.  A cactus plant like the one below usually is 75 years old before it sprouts its first arm! 

As we climbed in the mountains we continued to see cactus even on the mountains.

After passing Tucson, we headed south on I-19 to Green Valley, AZ., our locale for a few days.  We enjoyed a magnificent sunset that spanned the entire horizon from west to east as we drove south.  The picture below, taken from a moving car of the view to the west, does not do the spectacular mother nature show justice.