Anza-Borrego State Park California | Ep. 48

Today, we have a fantastic location to talk about, the one and only Anza-Borrego State Park. So grab your camping gear, and let’s dive into this beautiful desert oasis!

Anza-Borrego State Park, located in sunny Southern California, is the largest state park in the Golden State. It’s a vast, sprawling natural wonderland that covers over 600,000 acres, with the vibrant colors of the desert landscape providing a captivating backdrop for your camping adventure. The park is famous for its fascinating geological formations, rich history, and, of course, the stunning spring wildflower blooms that bring a riot of color to the desert floor.

Now, let’s talk campgrounds! There are several wonderful options to choose from within the park, with the most popular being Borrego Palm Canyon Campground and Tamarisk Grove Campground. Both offer a range of amenities to make your stay comfortable, including restrooms, potable water, picnic tables, and fire rings for that cozy evening campfire. Plus, the park offers numerous primitive, backcountry sites for the more adventurous campers who prefer a more remote and rugged experience.

But there’s more to Anza-Borrego than just the campgrounds! As you explore the park, you’ll find plenty of opportunities for outdoor activities such as hiking, birdwatching, and stargazing. There are over 500 miles of trails, catering to all skill levels, and the park is home to some of the darkest skies in Southern California, perfect for an unforgettable night of stargazing.

And let’s not forget about the unique opportunity to spot the park’s most famous residents, the bighorn sheep, or “borrego” in Spanish, which gave the park its name. Anza-Borrego State Park is truly a gem, and I cannot recommend it enough for your next camping adventure. RSSVERIFY

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Transcript

Melina (5s): Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of the RV Canucks podcast. Today is episode 48 and we have a fantastic location to talk about today in my favorite state, the Sunshine State. We are taking a trip to California and we are going to talk today about Anza Borrego State Park. It is a beautiful oasis. We had a great trip there in September and we can’t wait to dive in to what it has to offer from an RVers perspective. If you’re new to the show or just recently joined us, welcome I am Molina and over here is my handsome husband Diane. Hello. And together we are the RV Connects, a Wiley band of Canadian misfits who travel all over North America in our 30 foot travel trailer on a part-time basis. Melina (54s): And we are here to show you how far you can go on your vacations from work and take you along for the ride. So let’s get started talking about Anza Borrego State Park. As I said before, it is located in sunny southern California. It is the largest state park in the golden State. It is a vast sprawling natural wonderland that covers over 600,000 acres with the vibrant colors of the desert landscape providing a captivating backdrop for your camping adventure. The park is actually famous for its fascinating geological formations, which we’ll talk about in a little while. It’s rich history and of course the stunning spring wildflower blooms that bring a riot of color to the desert floor and which is something that I would definitely recommend going back for it in the springtime because one of the things we are going to talk about regarding our September trip is the weather. Melina (1m 47s): So before we get into Dan’s initial impressions of the desert, which I absolutely loved, I would say it’s probably in all the trips we’ve ever taken in our married life. Probably in my top two for sure. But before we get there, I wanna detail the campgrounds available in the park. There are several, but the most popular in the park are Borrego, Palm Canyon Campground and Tamas Grove Campground, which are both state run campgrounds within the park. They both offer a range of amenities to make your stay comfortable, restrooms, potable water, picnic tables, firings, all of that jazz. And the park also offers a bunch of primitive backcountry boondocking opportunities for adventurous campers for people who wanna take their trailer a little bit off the beaten path or just tent it. Melina (2m 30s): So before we get into the specifics of the amenities, the activities, et cetera, Dan, what were your impressions of the park? Dan (2m 38s): I really liked Borrego Palm Campground. It was nice and cozy. You know, it’s not for our, our Canadian listeners, there’s probably not a lot of tree cover, but it was just a really nice feel. You’re right up against the mountains. It’s almost like you can jump right off into the wilderness right from there. And it just had really unique architectural features that you wouldn’t find in a Canadian campground. The stones and the picnic shelter covers over your picnic table, stuff like that. Melina (3m 8s): Yeah, there was definitely kind of an old west vibe about the whole area. I think very wild, very desolate almost. And I mean, you won’t find better sunrises in sunsets than the desert. It just, it highlights everything and just really illuminates all of the natural colors. I do wanna start off and and just be super clear that we weren’t actually camping on this trip. We visited the desert specifically to go to an abrigo state park as part of our 20th anniversary trip. We took a short vacation so we did fly and then we into San Diego and then we drove into the desert for this vacation and then we spent a lot of time in the state park just to get a feel for it, try some of the activities, you know, write down some good campsites that we might wanna come back to. Melina (3m 51s): So we spent a lot of time actually in the campgrounds itself checking out all of the amenities Dan (3m 56s): And that was kind of good cuz it let us do a lot more exploring. While we were there. Melina (4m 1s): One of the campgrounds that we went to, which is Borrego Palm Canyon Campground, it’s located just a few miles outside of the, the town which is Borrego Springs and it’s just at the Parks Visitor Center. So it’s a perfect base for exploring. The campground itself has 120 campsites, they’ve got tent RV sites, there’s something for everyone. There is a few full hookup sites available which include water, sewer and either 30 or 50 amp electrical. And there’s a lot of other sites that were just electrical hookups. And the electrical hookups were more like, they were good sites, they were concrete pads and like Dan said, really no shade. There were some ones that had sort of like stone gazebo type things and they were building some new gazebos but I think those were primarily tent campgrounds that had the actual covers. Melina (4m 49s): Everybody else in the trailer side is probably just relying on their awnings. Dan (4m 53s): Well, and the gazebos were really cool because if I recall correctly, I think some of them were built back in the thirties and they’re kind of reached the end of their natural lifespan, which it’s unfortunate they have to be replaced but they have to be replaced. So there’s kind of two styles there. But it was really cool. Campsites are nice and level, easy to back in, lots of good sight lines shouldn’t be a problem for anybody. Melina (5m 16s): So the restroom facilities, there was a lot of them actually for the size of the campground. Pretty clean, well maintained, you know, buildings with flush toilets. The showers are all coin operated though. That’s one thing I did note when we were there. So you know, make sure you have, you know, change available or I’m sure they would change it up at the gatehouse. I didn’t see any change machines when we were Dan (5m 37s): There. No, I was pretty quiet anyways, but I don’t think you’re gonna have trouble finding a roller quarters. Melina (5m 42s): So the operating season is one of the reasons it was quiet. There was nobody manning the gate booth. I don’t think we saw anybody camping in that campground. There were certainly people boondocking while we were there, but not in Brigham Palm Campground proper. And that is because of the weather. So Dan (6m 1s): Listen, if you’re from southwestern United States, you’re probably gonna laugh at us, but like we can make it till about 10 30, 11 o’clock in the morning there and then it gets too hot. And as Canadians we have to hide. So we would get a good early start on the day we go out, we do some really cool stuff, come back in for lunch and then maybe early in the evening we’d venture out again into the weather. But it like, it’s hot and this is kind of our second trip through Southwestern us and we feel the heat, Melina (6m 32s): Well cuz it’s dry, right? Like it just, it’s it’s, I don’t know, it’s different. It’s different than your, your humid summer Ontario heat. It’s super dry and I think the days we were there, like it was something around like it was hitting like 112, 114 degrees even in the couple of days that we were, that we were there in the desert. So definitely too hot to go out hiking, you know, like almost dangerous hot and we’ll talk about that a little bit later. So yeah, definitely I would say a spring, A spring sojourn would probably be your best bet if, if heading out in that direction. But we were almost the only one at every place we went to so it was kind of cool too to have no crowds. Dan (7m 13s): Yeah, it was nice and quiet and wasn’t a lot of bustling or people getting in your way. That was neat. Melina (7m 18s): So costs for the campgrounds pretty typical for state park costs. Obviously it varies on the, on the campground and the type of campsite at the time of year, however it ranges. Borgo Palm Campground and Tamars Grove, which is the other main campground in the park. They range from anywhere between, you know, 25 and $50 US per night. Which if you’re gonna roll a Canadian conversion onto that as of today, which is April, 2023, roughly about 35 bucks to about $70 Canadian, which is pretty typical to like a provincial park Dan (7m 51s): Here. Yeah, even probably a little bit cheaper than a lot of places at a provincial parking Ontario. Melina (7m 57s): So obviously check the website before you go cuz these are always subject to change but for what you’re getting, you know, really a really reasonable deal in my Dan (8m 7s): Opinion. Yep, definitely. Melina (8m 9s): So boondocking obviously we didn’t boondock, we did stay in a hotel, but there’s a ton of boondocking opportunities. I mean 600,000 acres, it’s a massive, massive park. There’s a lot of just kind of BLM style camping where you’re kind of gonna go off and find your own trails and just set up camp. But we did notice all throughout the desert state park there’s a, you’ll just come across random like billboards kind of, you know, roofed, what do you call it? Information boards like with the roof on it. Yeah. And a lot of those would have maps of the area. They would show you little, you could kind of see the kind of rough roads that you could go down. They would tell you where you could camp, where you couldn’t camp in terms of the boondocking. Melina (8m 49s): But I would say in terms of, of where you wanna camp, just be aware it is the desert, you know, storms will roll in at any time wherever you choose to go. You know, everywhere is subject to flash floods I guess is what I would say. So don’t venture so deep that you’ll get yourself in trouble or dug in but a ton of opportunity to boondock for sure. And maybe on that note we can talk about one of the things that we did while we’re there and then kind of roll into kind of maybe the top five choices or the top five highlights to see in Anza Borgo State Park. But one of the things that we did when we’re talking about the roads, the back roads, roads is I really, really wanted to hike the slot canyon in the park, which was amazing. Melina (9m 35s): A lot of the information that I found prior to going there was that you know, don’t even attempt to head to the slot canyon without a four-wheel drive vehicle. So we did rent a four-wheel drive suv but when we went there, I mean it was a dry day, there was no chance of rain in the forecast. It certainly was a bumpy road, I would say it’s kind of reminiscent of the Moab, the roads in Moab where we, we went into the back country. Dan (10m 2s): Yeah, very similar even backing up to like blm, the signage was the same, organization was the same. So yeah it has the same kind of feel kind of gravels road, the road deer cottage probably on that day you could have got a minivan up there but if you are an RV or and you’ve got a sport utility and a pickup truck, chances are you have four-wheel or all-wheel drive. I think you would’ve been fine no Melina (10m 27s): Problem. Yeah, I think for sure that road in particularly was flat enough and I mean you, you went up a small kind of hill right up at the end just towards the parking area. But other than that I would say for sure like you could do that in a, in a like dance at a mi minivan or or even a two-wheel drive Dan (10m 44s): Vehicle on. Yeah I feel like it was only like maybe five, 10 minutes off the main highway wasn’t a big distance. Melina (10m 48s): Yeah it wasn’t, it wasn’t big at all. One of the positive points. Now maybe first we should back up and preface that by saying I do happen to know there’s other areas in the park, I know there’s some mud caves, there’s some wind caves, there’s some really neat hoodoos like really off the beaten path things and we have looked a lot of them up on YouTube and those roads are definitely like, you know, you need a Jeep, you need a four wheel drive. So like Dan (11m 12s): Use your brain Melina (11m 13s): Basically have a look at the satellite map before you go down the roads. But going to the Slop Canyon, first of all I would say it’s absolutely amazing and I don’t know if that was just the fact that we were literally the only people there and it felt like we were the only people on earth at that particular time. So that part in itself was really, really cool. But you know when you kind of take this road and you round up around by the parking area, which by the way you do have to pay to park there. However, they do have an app and there was still service there. You download the app that’s specific to the, the state parks, it’s a third party app but they book all of the parking spots for the California state park. Melina (11m 55s): So I will put that up on our Instagram so that you can all see what we used and you just kind of pick the parking lot where you’re at and how long you’re gonna be there and pay your fee, which is probably good that one people know, somebody knows you’re there that way you’re kind of registering your existence. And two, I can’t remember what it cost but it was, it was only like seven or $8 or something to park. Dan (12m 16s): Yeah, it was pretty cheap. Yeah like I’m a cheap skate. It would’ve stood out in my head if it was a lot of Melina (12m 21s): Money. Yeah. So the other great thing about the parking area for the slot canyons is that there was bathrooms there and I actually wasn’t expecting that. So that was really cool. They were drop toilets, they were clean, but it was nice to have, especially when you’re starting and ending that hike of note I would say. Because we talked previously about the temperature and how warm it was. Let’s talk about the signs, the hiking signs. Remember when we pulled up to the trail and there was like the skull and crossbones sign? Dan (12m 49s): Oh yeah. I have a vague recollection like a skull and crossbones sign’s not gonna stop me. That’s just gonna make me wanna find out what’s on the other side. Melina (12m 55s): Okay badass. Anyway, this, the gist of the signs were that basically it is like dangerous to be hiking in this weather, make sure you bring enough water. Like this is like this is, this is no joke, right? So we happen to start this hike at like seven 30 or eight o’clock in the morning. So it was reasonable. We were going into a slot canyon so we weren’t in direct sun so we did have a ton of water, we had some salt snacks, all of that great stuff. So I would say it took us about two hours to do the slot canyon but we were going super slow. Like we were just kind of really, we were just really taking our time. There’s a couple of other canyons that kind of branch off there. Melina (13m 37s): So if I was going to give somebody tips for the first time doing this one is that when you enter the canyon you kind of go over the crest of a hill and a very unmarked trail basically that goes down to the bottom when you hit the bottom of that trail go left, we went right assuming that the canyon kind of we, we figured the topography as we could see it, the canyon looked like it was to the right and it was not. So we went quite a ways to the right and then turned around and went back to the left and then that’s when we found the actual slot canyons. And I would say if you’re going to take any of those tertiary canyon trails, like nothing is marked down there. So make sure you find some way to market. I know Dan, you were marking Dan (14m 17s): Yeah like listen, know where you made a turn and if you made a turn it’s maybe not a bad idea to like draw a line in the dirt with your foot or stack a few rocks up or, or one good tip you can do a lot and and this goes for walking down any trail every so often, turn around and look behind you because when you come back down the trail you will at least have some recollection of what the trail looks like when you’re coming back cuz it will look completely different going back than it does going there as you’re walking down a trail. Melina (14m 48s): And I would say the other thing to be aware of is the narrowness of the canyon. It wasn’t as narrow as I actually expected that it would be in some points but definitely there was one spot I think we had to take off the backpack and then shimmy through but it was like probably 18 inches, two feet. Dan (15m 3s): Yeah it was no problem, you know and you know, good set of running shoes, backpack with some waters and some snacks and we poked along. I even ran my GPS watch cuz you know I like to get my steps in and so I knew how far we went down and then when we were walking back I knew we were getting close because you know, basic math will tell you that if you walk a kilometer out and you need to walk back it’s another kilometer back and if you’ve gone too kilometers you’ve gone too far. Melina (15m 28s): Yeah. So I would say the slot canyons itself weren’t as like colorful as like some of the ones you would see in Utah, Arizona where they’re kind of like that streaky bacon look where they’ve got all the pink rock. It was more kind of like grayish rocks but still super, super cool. No noise from anywhere. Like you’re nowhere near, I mean the highway is what it is, but it’s like a two lane road. Like there was no noise, you just felt like you were the only people on the planet. So it was kind of cool and kind of neat to see it in a time of year that isn’t packed with people, which was really cool. So definitely if you’re going out that way, that would be, that should be like in your top two things to do hands down. Melina (16m 8s): Yeah, Dan (16m 8s): For sure. Melina (16m 9s): So other than that there’s a ton of hiking opportunities in the park. One of the other things that I actually wanted to do, but we did not do because of said heat was the Palm Canyon Trail. So that is in the Borrego Palm Canyon campground and it’s right up near the tent sites where Dan was talking about those kind of 1930s style, really cool stone and wood, you know veranda style coverage areas. And in that part of the loop is where the start of the trail is. They do warn you about rattlesnakes on the trail. But essentially this trail is a three mile loop trail and kind of at the tip of the loop is essentially a palm tree oasis. Melina (16m 51s): It’s it’s gen, it’s basically an oasis in the desert and I really, really wanted to do that. But we did, we only had so many mornings and, and at that time of year you’d have to go early, early mornings so we didn’t, but we did go to the trail head to have a look around, there’s a really great info board with a lot of information on it, calculations of how much water you need when you’re hiking, talking about rattlesnakes, all of that kind of stuff. But one of the neat things for us is that when we stopped there there was actually a couple of big horn sheep just wandering through the campground, which there’s a ton of them and, and Borrego is of course Spanish for those big horn sheep. So it was kind of neat to see one just kind of wandering around, you know, a couple of feet away from where we were. Dan (17m 31s): Yeah, those were cool. Like I just love seeing that kind of stuff. So the, the wildlife was cool, the trailhead is like really close to the campground, like probably almost walking distance to the campground. So that’s nice and convenient too. Melina (17m 43s): And I would say the one thing that was like a delightful surprise and probably because we were the only people in the park park was those like roofless to toilets, which if you follow us on Instagram and TikTok you’ve seen it, I’ve posted photos and videos of it. But essentially it’s, it’s two flush toilets which are in a little, you know, stone enclosure with no roof on it. So I mean it’s nice and sunny, it’s warm in there, you can kind of go in and take your time. But I’m not quite sure how it wor how it would work if the park was at full capacity. Well Dan (18m 15s): You went in and checked it out and gave it a go and I think you liked stonework was amazing. I don’t know, it’s just really neat and and interesting and there is no worries about your privacy. You can do your business and be private. Well Melina (18m 28s): That’s not necessarily true. There’s two toilets side by side and if you’re going to the far one you have to walk past the first one which doesn’t have a door. So if you’re ever using those, go to the second toilet I guess is my tip. So we did visit the visitor center which was there and it was, it was closed but there’s actually a really cool trail around the visitor center that had a ton of different signs on the different flora and fauna and plants that were around as well as the visitor center kind of has a living roof on it and if you walk up on top of that there’s a info board that tells you what mountain ranges you’re looking at. So it was, it was, it was a really cool visitor center. Melina (19m 8s): We peeked through the windows but it seems like a really good educational stop that you could probably spend an hour at just kind of poking around. Dan (19m 15s): Yep, definitely. For sure. Melina (19m 17s): And speaking of the flora and fauna, one of the top five things to do in that area is wildflower viewing. So in the spring months it’s a very popular thing to do between February and April the, the is just full of wildflowers. So if you are a photographer it’s definitely the time of year to go. It’s a photographer’s dream. So let’s talk maybe about stargazing because Anza, Borrego State Park and actually Borrego Springs, the town is a designated dark stick guy preserve. So what this means is is that the, the ambient light in the city or in the town is limited, you’ll see a lot of like the street lights and things have covers on them so the light is kind of shining down but it’s kind of blocked from going up. Melina (20m 3s): Although the lights are very dim at night. And I will tell you like I, we have seen some dark skies like these stars were absolutely incredible. Like we would just lay there at night and you could see the Milky Way and I’ve never seen a display of stars like this in my entire 42 years on Dan (20m 21s): The planet. Yeah, they do a really awesome job of the light pollution and keeping that to a minimum. And then you had a really cool app on your phone that the name eludes me but we kind of shoot it up and it would tell you what you were looking at. So it was really, really awesome. Melina (20m 35s): Yeah and one of the great things about, you know that particular area is you are very near San Diego, which is where you know you’re gonna get a lot of fighter jets and helicopters and they’re doing training and we experienced that a couple of times which you know, in the daytime they would fly by and and you would say Wow that’s really cool. But at night they were running some night missions or training and you could kind of hear them but couldn’t see them, especially the helicopters, which I thought was kind of cool. Dan (21m 4s): Yeah, the helicopters are cool, like who doesn’t like a good helicopter show or an air show? So that was really neat. The whole area’s just really, really awesome. Listen, we, we tried to find the name of the app we were using. I’m sure everybody here’s smart like you can find something on your, your phone and figure it out. Melina (21m 20s): Yeah, it’s, I’m sure there’s a ton of them but I like the one that we have cuz it’s specifically, we’ll show you the name of all the constellations but it’ll also show you which satellites are in the sky and who they’re registered to. So we kind of played that game for a little Dan (21m 32s): While. Yeah like listen, I raised the thing about the app, not because you need to find a specific app, but if you’re gonna do it with kids or it’s kind of neat to sit there and they’ll ask a question, oh what’s that star? And then that star is not actually a star something else and so you can answer some questions and really pique their curiosity and foster that love of science. Melina (21m 52s): One thing also that I wanna mention too, which we spent a little bit of time going to, and you can do this by car, you can do this by foot, you can kind of pull over at the sign of the road and walk or in and around them you’ll find you know little dirt roads that you can navigate with the car. But there’s these amazing metal sculptures that are just kind of neat art installations that are throughout the desert and you’ll find everything from like a giant scorpion to almost a full size elephant to you know, fucking Broncos. Like it was just a really cool, cool thing to see and depending on where the light is in the sky makes a really cool photo opportunity. Just they’re entirely rusty so you know, make sure your tetanus shots are up to date if you’re gonna go touch them. Melina (22m 34s): But yeah, it was a really cool addition. Dan (22m 37s): They’re neat because they’ll, if you’re there for a couple of days, you’re gonna see a few every single day or driving around. It’s not the kind of tour. I’m sure there is a tour where you could see them all, but they’re probably best appreciated just by letting them get plugged into your day as you’re doing your business. Melina (22m 53s): Yeah, in fact there’s actually over 130 of them so you could literally make that kind of, like Dan said, do a couple a day. There is maps that you can get at the visitors center in the park as well if you’re interested in, in taking the metal metal sculpture tour I guess it was, it was really, really neat. So day trips, there’s even opportunities for day trips and I was actually pretty amazed by this town called Julian California, which some of you might know. It’s actually really famous for its apple pie. There’s a ton of apple orchards there and we took a day trip there and what a difference even in the, in the geography like they get snow there, you know, it’s, it was a lot of like deciduous trees, it was very green compared to the desert and it was like 45 minutes from Anza Borrego. Dan (23m 40s): Yeah, it’s almost the same feeling we had when we went through Arizona. One minute there’s all kinds of trees and you blink and now you’re back into the desert in a totally different kind of geography. Melina (23m 50s): So ton of stuff to do there as well. We were there on a Friday. It was, it was pretty busy downtown. There’s a lot of like great little shops, restaurants, just, it’s like an old mining town. There’s a lot of old historical architecture, museum, all of that jazz and it was, it was great to spend like you could spend three or four or six hours there even even including the downtown museum. One of the things that we went there for actually was to see a, an old mine and it’s called the Eagle Mining Company and it’s just right, I don’t know, it’s like three blocks from downtown basically up the Dan (24m 25s): Hill. Oh for sure. Like less than five minutes. Melina (24m 27s): Yeah. And when we pulled up again we, it’s off season so I think we were the only people there when we pulled up and there’s just a couple of people milling around who worked there and essentially what it is is you know a family who has purchased this mine and I think it was a silver mine back in the day and this family purchased this mine like 40, 45 years ago and, and all of the equipment is there and they run tours and super friendly place. It was really enjoyable. Like they started the tour outside and showed us Dan (24m 58s): Yeah it was really informative. You started panning for silver gold or whatever and that was cool and then they had a really good personal touch but when you got into the mind it was like you felt like you were in a real mind. They explained how things happened, why things happened. It was really money well spent and whether you’re taking your kids or just a couple adults, I think I would recommend it. Melina (25m 22s): So yeah it was a gold mine obviously cuz I forgot that we panned for gold and Dan and I had a bit of a competition when we were panning for gold because like literally I’m from the west coast, I’m from Vancouver and like the amount of times we would have to go to school trips and like we could pan for gold at like these, these mines and things and I was like yeah I’ve got this and Dan totally blew me away. His panning technique is second to none. Dan (25m 46s): Yep. First time I ever did it too. She’s a real gold digger. Melina (25m 53s): W w one thing that was cool about this mine, so there’s several levels in the mine but you only get to see two, two of the levels I think some of the lower levels they haven’t been to in decades if ever. And I’m sure they’re probably flooded out and everything but what I thought was kind of cool was these, there’s two minds actually that were eventually connected together back in the day. So the two men who owned it on either side of the mountain kind of you know, formed a bit of a friendship and and an alliance Dan (26m 23s): And Melina (26m 24s): Partnership partnership. Well it wasn’t, yeah anyway, they formed a bit of an alliance and eventually bore the two mines together so that they ended up being one mine which was kind of cool. One thing that I loved and I remember the same thing when I was in the Oregon caves when I was about 10 years old is that like once you’re in the middle they shut the lights off so that you would see what it was like kind of first BLANs when they were going in the caves. They actually did this in this tour which I thought was cool when they talked about you know hair, this is what you would’ve seen if you were working here and he lit kind of one candle that was like in his hat and then shut the rest of the lights off. Which was, which was Dan (27m 1s): Awesome. Yeah I forgot about that. That’s cool now that you remember it. Yeah that’s neat. Yeah Melina (27m 5s): So in Julian, like I said it’s famous for apple pie so there is like 5, 6, 7, 10 places to get apple pie. We chose the apli named Julian Pie company which was delightful. It’s in like a small little house on the other side of like the far side of town and the most delicious pie and they have like so many different types of pie. We just got classic apple. Dan and I have this standing debate in our house and we’ve talked about this on the show before but I was like so excited to go to Julian cuz I was like listen man, these, these are like apple pie specialists, like they know how apple pie is supposed to be served and Dan is firmly and team cold apple pie. Melina (27m 45s): He believes apple pie should be served cold. I think it should always be served warm. So I thought we will go to Julian, we will just ask for pie and we will just get it the way they serve it to us. No like would you like it heated? Nothing. I’m like, we’re just gonna see what they put on the plate. And of course it was heated and so I say that I win and forevermore we know how apple pie is supposed to be Dan (28m 6s): Served. Press two outta three. Melina (28m 9s): We also grabbed lunch at a place called Minor’s Diner, which I do want to mention because it was actually the coolest restaurant they have. It’s like a upstairs, it’s almost like a turn of this slash like 50 style diner. Like they have original turn of the last century I guess like soda pop machines and you pick your flavor of soda pop and they will like throw it together and mix the syrups and carbonate it really tasty. Great home cooking. Our waitress was amazing, super friendly people in the basement of this restaurant they have what’s called a candy mine and it’s literally like a little candy shop that sells candy but it’s all like done up like a mine shaft. It’s very cool. Melina (28m 51s): There is a little, what do you Dan (28m 54s): Call him? There’s like a model train that goes around the edges of the ceiling sorta, Melina (28m 58s): Yeah. Which the owner built but he’s, he’s got the model train track but everything else he’s built with like scrap stuff like to make the bridges and the things just really ingenious. Great place to stop for lunch. So if you are ever there, the Min’s diner is the place to go. Dan (29m 14s): Really friendly portions are generous, you’re not gonna go hungry Melina (29m 17s): For sure. And speaking of generous portions, I want to talk about dinner. So great dining options in Borgo Springs. When we got back one night after hiking, we were very, very hungry and we, when the sun went down and it was, it was cool enough, we headed into Borrego Springs to grab some dinner and we really felt like some Mexican food so we stopped at a place called Carmelitas, which is in like a strip mall. Again, not a lot of places were open cuz it was the off season and when we went into Carmelitas and ordered, I don’t know, we were one of like maybe two or three people in the place and they had said that they had just opened up that week, this was mid-September and they normally don’t start getting busy again until kind of mid-November. Melina (30m 3s): So it was great we caught them when they were just back but oh my gosh. Dan (30m 7s): Well so like you have to understand that Mexican food where we live consists of two taco bells and when like one of them is a brand new Taco Bell so we don’t have a lot of options when it comes to authentic Mexican food. So when we went in they were very friendly and we really just asked the waitress to recommend what we should get so we could have a good little taste of everything. And that’s what I would recommend if you go there like unless you really know what you’re ordering authentic, like in terms of authentic food, regardless of what the cuisine is, just kind of tell ’em what you kind of, things you kind of like and let them put it together for you Melina (30m 47s): And it was delicious. Just kind of like uncomplicated, slow cooked, like just like comfort food. Dan (30m 54s): Yeah. The best Mexican food we’ve ever Melina (30m 57s): Eaten. Yeah, I would say for sure. One thing I do want to mention as it relates to RVing specifically is the road. So as Dan and I mentioned, we flew in to San Diego and we drove to Anza Borgo State Park. So it’s about two and a half hours-ish from San Diego. I feel like I’m gonna take this part to describe the drive because I will tell you that as soon as we got in the rental car, Dan fell asleep and he didn’t wake up until we got to Ango State Park. So I was kind of on my own beautiful scenery. Dan (31m 29s): I tried, I’d been up like since two in the morning as Melina (31m 33s): Had Dan (31m 34s): I my, my time, whatever time that was California time. Yes I was not a good husband. I tried, it’s Melina (31m 40s): Fine, I was happy to let you sleep. And I was like, listen the, the drive is gorgeous. I just turned on the tunes and like turned it up just a little bit to drown out the snoring and hit the road, put my sunglasses on and it was an awesome drive. But I did find myself really thinking at a lot of parts through the drive. I was kind of, you know, navigating, I mean it’s very mountainous so I was navigating the roads, they’re quite narrow and I kept looking in the rear view mirror thinking, would I do this with our trailer? Like could we get through this comfortably with you know, our truck and our 30 foot trailer which makes us what like 54 feet probably driving through and the road we took was interstate east, then we take California 79 north and then you take that until you hit 78 east. Melina (32m 28s): So that is the town or that’s the road that goes through Julian, that’s the road that goes through all of these beautiful mountainous areas. But I would be worried, and I mean there’s not many, many places that we don’t take our trailer, but the roads are so narrow that I would be concerned about the length of our truck and our rig together and I don’t know, we took the same route on the way back and Dan was awake. So what were your thoughts? Dan (32m 55s): Yeah, like I think my thought is, and and like Melina said, there aren’t many places we won’t go. If I was towing I would not want to take that route with the trailer and the truck. If you have like a class B rv, you’re probably fine. Something the size of a FedEx truck, you’re fine if you’ve got a pop-up camper. But when you think about construction and tight turns and everything else, I would not be doing it with a big trailer or an rv. Melina (33m 19s): Yeah, so to be clear though, like I actually did look it up when we got home because I was, I was interested if there was like length restrictions or whatever. So there is no official length restrictions but I am just saying as a seasoned RV or as somebody who toes, the grades were steep enough and the roads were curvy enough that I would think twice or I would look for an easier route and there is an easier route for sure that’s less mountainous and that’s to take interstate 15 north from San Diego, then go to 76 East, 79 South and 78 east. So by the time you hit 78 east you’re past Julian and it’s basically just straight road from there into the desert. Melina (34m 0s): So that route in particular that I just mentioned, you know there’s, there’s fewer mountainous sanctions. So I think if you have a larger rig you would probably be more comfortable with that alternate route. In terms of rig length within the state park, there’s really no restrictions. Borrego, Palm Canyon Campground, like most state parks will take up to say like 35 feet in length, but there’s a couple of sites that can take up to 45 feet. So if that’s something that you’re interested in, make sure you get your reservations in early, just like any other RV park to try to get the site that you need. Tams Grove Campground, which is the other campground that I mentioned is the sites are a little bit smaller, it’s more suited for tent camping or small RVs, trailers, et cetera. Melina (34m 43s): So the maximum length at that campground is about 25 feet. Now what I would say is if you have a massive rig, there’s enough boondocking spots that are like just off the road where you don’t have to go too far that you could have any length Dan (34m 54s): You want. So the other thing I’ll tell you if you’re not into the state park type camping, there’s a place called Borrego Springs Resort, which is essentially an RV resort. So I would recommend that if you’re really not into the state park kind of camping or if you’re looking for your traditional RV resort hookups, because that’s another option if you have a really big rig. The thing to know about this area Borrego Springs is that you’re never really more than 10 or 15 minutes from anywhere. The RV resort itself is not, can’t be more than 10 minutes from the state park and the trailhead to go into the mountain. So you’re never too far from everything and you’ll get to experience what you want and stay in some accommodations that suit your lifestyle and and what you’re, you’re camping or glamping in. Melina (35m 37s): Yeah, that’s a great point. So we actually did drive to the RV resort, which like Dan said is the springs at our Borrego RV resort and it’s gated. Like we couldn’t totally get in but we saw from a little overlook. It is definitely big rig friendly. I would say it’s more of like a premium type RV resort where you’re gonna get a lot of class A buses, spa facilities, all of that kind of thing. And I believe there’s also a golf course there, so if that’s your jam, absolutely hit it. You’re not gonna be disappointed. It was actually kind of ritzy, it reminded me a little bit of oasis in the desert. Is that the one we stayed at in Las Vegas? Dan (36m 13s): Yeah, probably similar to that. Like gated like hey I want to go in there. That kind of feeling. Yeah, Melina (36m 18s): But they wouldn’t Dan (36m 19s): Let us in but they wouldn’t let us in. Melina (36m 21s): Listen, I think, like I said at the beginning of this podcast, 100% this should be on everybody’s bucket list. Like you will not experience the type of things you experience anywhere else like this. The desert is amazing, the sunrises, sunsets, the amenities, the activities, the people. It is like I cannot wait to take the trailer back Dan (36m 43s): There. Listen, it’s a really cool trip, it’s a really neat area. I know I missed the drive up the first time. The drive back was really cool the second time. There’s a lot of stuff to do. Go up there, bring a book, take it easy, do something cool in the morning if you’re doing it in, you know, the hot season and then take it easy in the afternoon and look at some stars in the evening. Kid friendly. So you know, if you’ve got kids or grandkids, it’s a great spot to bring them. Whether they’re little kids or teenagers really like I think the girls would’ve had an awesome time. Oh Melina (37m 13s): For sure they would in the, in the on season I guess or the busy season. There’s also like a farmer’s market that’s downtown Borrego Springs, you know, weekly and yeah, it’s just, it’s an excellent home base to even just branch out and do other things in that area of California. Dan (37m 29s): Yeah, was awesome. Okay. Melina (37m 31s): All right, well that’s it for us and we will be back in a couple of weeks with another episode. Maybe Dan will dive into some RV maintenance Dan (37m 39s): Stuff. Yeah, so I’ve been saving up like some things we need to talk about people about RV maintenance and it’s not the stuff that should scare you, but things you should have in the back of your mind, especially, you know, when you own a trailer for a couple years, it’s, it’s fine, but like getting into 3, 4, 5, 7, 10 years, there’s things that need to be done. So maybe we’ll talk about a few of those things. Melina (38m 0s): Okay folks, we will see you again next time and thanks as always for joining us. Dan (38m 5s): Bye-bye bye.