Saturday at Slabs was quiet. I’d shot a note off to the guys at East Jesus on Friday (requests to visit/stay) with them needing to be sent in advance, and I was sort of hanging around waiting for a reply.
I was happy to chill for a few days and do nothing – a quick trip down to Niland for some provisions, and I was happy in my campchair, feet up, contemplating the universe, sipping on a cold one.
Travelling is fun, but can get a bit hectic, so some downtime was nice. A few chats with neighbours and passers by broke up the day, but my cavetime wasn’t interrupted to any real degreee.
The only real problem was that I was starting to run out of sealable bottles to pee in – there are no toilets here, and I was trying to be responsible and adopt the “pack it in, pack it out mantra”. It’s surprising just how much pee one man can produce in three days (minus two trips to toilet at the Range on friday night) – we are talking multiple litres here.
Sunday morning provided an answer – I got a text from Siri, asking about my plans – was I staying, leaving etc. I hadn’t heard back from East Jesus, so I replied that I was open to leaving – did she want a lift anywhere? Siri quickly took me up on the offer, so we arranged to meet in a few hours at the library.
Siri arrived, and once she had taken the precaution of taking a photo of me by Charlotte’s number plate and sent it off to her boyfriend back home, we threw her bike in the back and headed out.
First stop was East Jesus – Siri, being an artist herself wanted to check out the art garden, which was open to the public, and I thought I’d at least chat to them about my request to stay/check out the community.
We got there, to be greeted with a firm hello from a figure at the top of a three storey tower, offering us a tour of the art garden. We gladly accepted, and Tracey popped down from what he was doing to say Hi and show us around.
Tracey had been here for about 3 years, was one of only 3 people at the community at the moment (the moderators of the website being away for travel and health reasons, explaining the no reply without me even having to raise it), with no current live in guests but quite a few expected for Xmas and NY
Tracey was a knowledgeable guide, giving us a history lesson on both the community and each art piece. Part way through he was joined by The Wizard, another member of the community. Clearly one of his good mates, the exchanged some banter, and TW joined us for a bit, adding his input before disappearing to go do something else.
As there were only 2 of us, and no live in guests, we were also offered us a look at the private community section – it’s a brilliant setup with everything from bathrooms and showers, to bars, multiple accommodations, a mud pit, petting zoo, and full of offbeat eclectic art pieces and installations. Everything is made from re-purposed items and the focus is on sustainability – powered by solar panels and discarded corporate batteries.
Afterwards, Trace took us up to the top of the tower he was working on – a three level home where he was adding chairs and railings to the rooftop, so he and The Wizard could sit up there sharing a drink and a chat.
We thanked Tracey and left him to his work – East Jesus is a fascinating place – it would be great to go and spend more time with them, but I got to see and experience most of what I wanted. Siri said she would love to go back for an artist’s residence. If you ever get to Slabs, make sure to get to these guys – I think they more properly reflect what the original intent and culture of the place was like than anywhere else.
Leaving Slabs, we made a quick stop at Salvation Mountain for Siri, before heading South.
It was great to have a travelling companion, some-one to talk to whilst driving instead of listening to podcasts and audiobooks. Siri is an artist, originally from Philadelphia, but studying in Cincinatti, she had decided to ride from Long Beach, CA to Austin, TX on a meet people, soul searching, muse locating journey (my words not hers). Looking to ride 50 miles a day to get to Austin by Jan 26 (its at least a 1500 mile journey), she was clearly not your average traveller!
She told me about her stay with John on the first night, and then at one of Slab’s AirBnB (Really!) stays with Ray. As we talked we worked out that I must have missed running into her on Thursday as she pushed her bike through the gravel – she was picked up by John on the road to the Fo untain of Youth RV park about 10 mins from the time I was there (as told here). Our paths must have meant to have crossed.
First stop of the day was at Desert View Tower – it involved backtracking west a little bit, and we had to backtrack a couple of miles after making a wrong turn at the exit. Fantastic views for miles, and some really interesting rock formations made into art works. I thought I read somewhere you could see into Mexico from here!
Having ticked this off my list, we turned around and headed East on the same road we had come in on. We were headed for Holtville, where there was meant to be a natural Hot Spring just off the side of the road that I wanted to check out and have a dip in. 50 Miles further down the interstate, we followed the Garmin directions, took the exit, turned onto the parallel Old road and arrived at the address, only to be in the middle of nowhere. Nothing to see for miles. Definitely no hot spring.
We chugged on the road trying to spot anywhere a hot spring would be. No luck.
After some muddling about we got a mobile signal, I found the reference to it on Yelp, and the directions seemed to indicate it was further down the road – about 10 miles from where we were. More backtracking! Finally just as we were about to give up we spotted it – a little nest of palm tress lying between the interstate and the old road.
A quick change, we each grabbed towels and toiletries and made our way down to the spa. I’d been expecting a natural rock formation with a pool, but instead we found this:
Clearly augmented by man this was not what I expected, but was nonetheless fantastic. After a few days of nothing but baby wipe showers, this was a very welcome dip. There was an adjustable “shower” – think of an industrial irrigator spray type setup (visible in the top of the pic) as well as the pools. Shampoos and soap were definitely banned, but the water was wonderfully, blissfully, relaxingly warm. Being natural spring water it had a little mineral feel to it, but nothing could dampen the exquisite feeling of it running over your head and shoulders before sliding into the perfectly hot enough pool, which was about 5 foot deep.
What i didn’t know was that it was Siri’s first ever time at a hot spring. To say she enjoyed it is an understatement – all she could do was bemoan the fact that she had missed out on this bliss until now.
There were a few locals there – it happens that there is an RV park a couple of hundred metres away and the residents all come here to relax. Noone was under 60 but everyone was happy to have a chat in that wonderful elderly patient way. We met a wonderful older guy who had been coming here for 19 years – he, like Siri, was a rider, so he shared with us his tales of cycling. From tandems with his wife to building and riding recliners, he had such an easy to listen voice that we could have stayed for hours, but eventually we had to get back on the road.
Refreshed, relaxed, in dry clean clothes, we had one more stop to make – The Official Centre of the World in Felicity – about 40 miles away. We got there, only to find that it was closed – appointments were needed during the week, with it only being manned on weekends!
So close….
it was getting dark – the nearest town was Yuma, so we headed there. Siri scoured the interweb for a craft beer place (a shared interest) and ended up at Prison Hill Brewing in downtown Yuma. A somewhat botched reverse parking manoeuvre later and we were relaxing with beers and food.
It was here we met a guy somehow stuck in Yuma in a groundhog day sort of way. He and his girlfriend had sold up and were driving North West to set up WOOFing somewhere. They had come to Yuma to visit a friend of his in the nearby military base. His friend had gone back to the relos for Xmas, leaving them to babysit his dogs. His girlfriend (who gave valium to the dogs so as not to have to walk them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (which he allowed!!!!)) had done the same and he was on his Pat Malone. We briefly chatted about slabs, recommended he get there for New Years, but eventually extracted ourselves just as he looked like he was about to extend an invitation to go back to his place for a drink.
I’d already offered Siri accommodation for the evening with a promise to take her further East tomorrow, so we trotted back to Charlotte and tried to find a locale to stay. The first park we stopped in lasted about an hour before police came and asked us to move – the side of the Yuma bridge we were on was Indian land so no overnighting. He happily recommended a park on the other side of the bridge, which we duly drove to and set up at.
An hour later, another policeman came calling – we told him we were here on his colleague’s advice. He explained his colleague was from a different area (the dividing line being the bridge) so had effectively just handballed his problem over the fence. Still he took pity on us- told us that though overnighting was illegal, he wouldn’t be back to patrol the park again that night and that there was no other police scheduled to come and check either. So with a bit of a wink and a nod he left us to make the inevitable choice to simply stay put.
I introduced Siri to Adam Hills stand up performance featuring a sign language translator (she wears hearing aides due to an early childhood illness) before we unloaded the bike a second time, and organised sleeping arrangements (me out back, her in the middle section on the floor).
Hopefully my snoring won’t keep her awake.
