Last night we camped in Afton Canyon Campground.  This is a BLM operated campground  with fire pits and sheltered picnic tables on each site. 

I woke up at 3am and realized I still haven’t seen the stars in the desert yet!  It has either been rainy or cloudy.  This evening was extremely windy.  Twenty-two MPH winds rocked our motorhome until after dinner.  Then I helped Cal with some overdue homework.   Cal doesn’t need a lot of homework help but he needed some motivation and encouragement for this one. 

Cal finished at about 9:30 and we brought out our mochi from Little Tokyo.  We all tried it except for Esme.  Then we counted down to Wisconsin New Years which was 10pm for us.  We all went to bed after that and the wind died down.

I woke up Nole, Cal and Asa to let them know I was going out to look at the stars at 3am. Nole and Asa decided to come with but went back in almost right away. We saw Orion and lots of other constellations. No Milky Way. Apparently it’s not Milky Way “season”. I took the best picture I could with my phone.

We were up fairly early and I made pancakes and sausage for our New Years breakfast. We thought about exploring Afton Canyon this morning but the road had a steep grade and decided against it with the RV. It was only 1.9 miles so we could have just walked but no one felt like walking so we drove on. We stopped in Barker for gas and while we were there, we also visited the World’s Tallest Thermometer. Nova was really excited to be at the “gateway to Death Valley” because she had learned about what kinds of plants can grow there in science class.

Then we made an impulse stop at Alien Fresh Jerky.  It turned out to be an amazing place to stop.  All the kids loved it and we found a couple of gifts for Ray who fixed our dryer while we were gone (THANKS RAY!).  The kids all found things they wanted too.

These Biden and Trump aliens talked about barbeque sauce and jerky. 

We went back to Mojave National Preserve again today to do the lava tube hike.  Remember that road in Mojave that we despised so much?  There was another one to the lava tubes that was just like it only it was 5 miles long instead of 3 miles.  We made it even though the parking area was very small, we found a spot that fit the RV.

We did the short hike to the tube.  There was ice in a puddle that the kids removed and had a bit of fun with. 

There is a ladderish-stair thing that you climb down about 15 feet.  We read some info online that suggested headlamps.  There were other visitors there too and the cave wasn’t huge but it wasn’t crowded. 

We were there in the morning but if you’re there at the right time of day (noonish?) the light streams in from the holes in the ceiling making spotlights on the floor or walls. 

After we had a look around we climbed back out.  Nova hit her head on a rock overhang on our way out of the cave.  It was a pretty sharp rock but luckily with it being pretty cold and windy out, she was wearing a thick winter hat.  She has a little bump there but seems to be recovering. 

We went back for lunch where we attempted to eat all the things for lunch.  I may have overbought at the grocery store the other day…  Then we headed back down that washboard road.  There were lots of jeeps coming in when we were going out so they probably knew the right time to see the spotlight was just after lunch.  It’s for the best that we went early though because parking would have been impossible if we came in the afternoon. 

Our campsite tonight is a free one on BLM land.  It’s on Ivanpah dry lake which is exactly what it sounds like.  A big flat dry dusty place known for its winds.  It’s our last night in the RV.  Tomorrow we return the RV to Tobias in Las Vegas.