Day 1
Th Oct 6
Oxnard CA to Bullhead City AZ
We left Oxnard at 8:00 am and immediately hit traffic on our first street. Oh, people go to work! Once we got on Highway 126 we made good time.
The wind started kicking up the dust. We think that some of it was from the mountains burned last June. Still, the wind did not stop the people from farming and working in the fields of Ventura County.
At our first pit stop at a gas station we discovered a nice fish habitat. It was very soothing and nice experience. They must have had three dozen koi. After lunch at a Denny’s in Barstow (they have two Denny’s restaurants a block apart?!?) we drove over to the local Harvey House.
The Harvey House is located by the railroad station in Barstow. During the company’s hey day, Harvey Houses served the best food at 83 railroad stops throughout the United States during the 19th century. The Barstow house served the public until the early 1970’s.
NASA and the Barstow Harvey House
The Barstow Chamber of Commerce has an office at the Harvey House. NASA selected them to house their small Voyager Magnetometer exhibit. The other places are in Spain and Australia. Somebody in Barstow has great contacts!
Unfortunately, we missed the big lecture and tour which was provided the day before…we were at the World Famous Oxnard Dulcimer Jam. However, we did see some stuff.
From the Harvey House we headed to see the Cars from Hell. We drove through some very interesting and worn down parts of Barstow.
On the way we saw an old drive-in theater. The sign in front stated that it was opened every night. However, there was no advertising about what was showing. It was probably abandoned a long time ago.
We found the Cars from Hell. They were interesting. That’s about it. So, we headed to Bullhead City AZ and witnessed some great desert scape.
In March 1864 the current site of Bullhead City was the location of a settlement called Hardyville (after a local politician named William Harrison Hardy. In the the 1940’s it was renamed after the Davis Dam (called Bullhead Dam after "Bull's Head Rock", a well-known rock formation along the Colorado River.) In their honor, we visited the Hardyville Pioneer Cemetery.
