This is a black bird of a kind I haven't seen around here. It might be a grackle or something like that. On the far right is the south tip of San Elijo State Beach Campground and the lifeguard building which was just demolished. It's not there anymore!

So, instead of a perfectly suitable landmark, now we only have the "dorky surfer" statue to look out. The next photo shows some surfing dolphins.

Road Trip to Arizona!

We decided to take the scenic (sort of) route to Phoenix by way Temecula, over the pass to Palm Desert to I-10 and stopping for the night in Joshua Tree NP. First we stopped for a picnic lunch near Santa Rosa Mountain. The snow-capped peak in the background is San Jacinto which towers above Palm Springs.

We left I-10 at the south entrance to JTNP and drove the 7 or 8 miles to the Cottonwood Visitor Center and Campground.

We found a decent camp site and then took a hike toward Jurassic Peak (or something like that)  but we never got that far. We did see a couple kids up on top of a nearby rock outcropping so that was good enough.  

The highlight of our stay was an early visit from the Easter Bunny!

We Play in Peoria!

We met our friends Tom & Patty at the luxurious and conveniently located Marriott Springhill Suites on Monday afternoon and promptly headed over to the Peoria Sports Complex parking lot for some tailgating in anticipation of the 7:00 PM game against the San Francisco Giants (they didn't look so big to me!)

Here we are tailgating! Lorri was having a ball!

To prove we were actually at the game, I took a few baseball photos.

I'm sure all you fans out there will know who all these guys are. 

Our seats were directly behind the Giants dugout and since the game was televised in San Diego, we were on TV a lot. We didn't know that though.

Did I mention it was a night game?

The Padres won 7-1!

Here we are catching home run balls. I actually did catch a ball and treasured it for a little while but Lorri lost it.