Cadillac Ranch - Amarillo TX

We had a stopover in Amarillo, TX and our RV park was 5 minutes from Cadillac Ranch. 

Lest you not know of Cadillac Ranch, it's Another Roadside Attraction to see when you're traveling. From Wikipedia: 

Cadillac Ranch is not a ranch but a public art installation and sculpture in Amarillo, Texas, USA. It was created in 1974 by Chip Lord, Hudson Marquez and Doug Michels, who were a part of the art group Ant Farm. It consists of what were (when originally installed during 1974) either older running used or junk Cadillac automobiles, representing a number of evolutions of the car line (most notably the birth and death of the defining feature of mid twentieth century Cadillacs: the tailfins) from 1949 to 1963, half-buried nose-first in the ground, at an angle corresponding to that of the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt.

It has become very colorful over the years, and the ground around it is littered with used and half-used spraypaint cans, so one can leave their mark if they like. 

Up close the texture of the thousands of layers of spraypaint is fascinating to see. 

These are the tires, so covered in spraypaint they've become another thing altogether. 

What used to be the axle. 

Another tire. 

Layers of spraypaint turned into stalagtites. Stalagmites? The ones that drip down. 

It's difficult to tell anymore if the car is still underneath or if it is just layers of spraypaint holding together the shapes of cars. 

Either way, it's delightfully colorful and fascinating. 

And makes for some great photos, especially against the sky we were treated to this day. 

K was shy to spraypaint at first, but he really got into it once he started and made his mark on several of the cars. 

The row of colorful art cars. 

Mi familia. 

This sky! This art installation in a cornfield!

And of course, the obligatory gift shop down the way, which we did not visit. 

Another view of the cars against the most amazing sky. 

White Sands National Park

While driving from Arizona to New Mexico, we found out from a fellow RVer about White Sands National Monument. We'd never even heard of it before he told us. He said, "You have to stop at White Sands, you're going right by it! You can even park your RV in the parking lot."

And so to break up the long drive that day, we did. After we parked our RV in the parking lot and got sleds from the gift shop, we unhooked our tow car and drove in.

On the way in, we were treated to beautiful views like this.

From the National Parks website:

"Rising from the heart of the Tularosa Basin is one of the world's great natural wonders - the glistening white sands of New Mexico. Great wave-like dunes of gypsum sand have engulfed 275 square miles of desert, creating the world's largest gypsum dunefield. White Sands National Monument preserves a major portion of this unique dunefield, along with the plants and animals that live here." 

The gypsum sands look like snow! But make no mistake, the sunny heat let us know we were undoubtedly in the desert. 

The gypsum is so white and vast! Despite it looking desolate, White Sands actually houses quite and ecosystem of plants, mammals, amphibians, fish and birds. You can read more on their website if you're curious. We didn't see any, but our visit was also quite short because of the heat. 

In the gift shop they also sold wax to wax the bottoms of the sleds. Sand isn't exactly the smoothest thing to slide down - lots of friction in sand! 

Long walks up the hill in the desert heat!

View of the parking lot from where I was taking phots of them sledding.

Marching back up that hill!

Many walks up this hill in the heat and dry made for a much shorter visit. We quickly finished our water and were wanting more, which was back in the RV. We were not exactly prepared enough. 

But our short visit was a beautiful one nonetheless. We were really glad we made this stop. 

There's a missile testing site right next to it and White Sands is often closed because of missile testing. Luckily on this day it was open to the public. 

Here are some videos. Sledding the white sands. Please ignore the sound in the background, that's Muffins the Pug trying to release some of the heat. She sounds terrible, I know. 

Universal Studios Hollywood - Spoonie Perspective

The good thing is that my son had a (mostly) good time the first time we went, particularly in the Simpsons and Minionsareas. But it was super crowded, they do not ever ask people to make way for wheelchairs or other differently abled humans, they pump in scents everywhere (I could NOT take off my mask even outside). I didn't see it the first time we went because my husband dropped us off at the front, but the second time we went, I noticed this at the tollbooth for parking. In California (and I love this) Prop 65 requires anyone using toxic chemicals to post this warning. 

 Every shop smelled like "cake" (no food being sold in them though), and outside and inside everywhere else smelled like fabric softener. We didn't go into most of the shops or restaurants. I thought I was going to see the inside of Hogwarts, but all I got to see was all the ways Universal is scheming to take even more money from people. Because charging $119 per person per day isn't enough somehow. This place was a chronically ill human's nightmare. I'm glad my son had a good time, though. 

 I think if one really makes an effort to go on a less crowded day it would be slightly better. But according to Google, less crowded only happens if you get there at 8 AM, which we just weren't willing to try and do when it already makes for such a long day even being in the park. Also bear in mind that in a wheelchair I'm about crotch height to overyone else and it really does make it a lot worse for me. Even with my mask, the petrochemical scents overwhelm my nervous system and cause brain fog, anxiety and general overwhelm, not to mention physical symptoms like pain. 

We did go back a second time to try and get our money's worth out of the tickets. Having the wheelchair does bump you up in the lines for the rides - even if the wheelchair user doesn't go on the rides, members of their party can still go through the wheelchair part of the line and just wait at the exit for them, which makes it easier because not as much waiting around, which also drains energy resources. (Spoons). But trying to push a wheelchair through the crowds is rather brutal. ESPECIALLY over cobblestone. People don't necessarily move out of your way or let you through, and they will even do things like run in front of you if they see space. 

The first time we went, we made some rookie mistakes - partly because my nervous system was so overwhelmed, my brain forgot to tell my body it had needs other than "shut down", or "escape this nightmare". Among them, that were correctable the second time, were:

1. Not checking the busy times on Google first. ApparentlyMondays (the first time we went) are a super busy time, but also so are any days around the holiday. So we were kind of SOL there. 
2. Not having a hat with a visor. When the sun is high, it's brutal and shines in your eyes, making it unpleasant. They seem to know this and sell baseball hats and other hats with brims at every gift shop, but BYO is so much cheaper. Which we of course did the second time. 
3. Staying too long. We just wanted to see so much, and I think for our first day we just stayed longer than was good. The second time we didn't stay as long, but we also didn't get to do but one ride. This was largely due to an accident (that's all you'll get from me on that -  everyone is fine) that cut our visit short (but the whole visit was still beyond overwhelming). 
4. Not eating regularly enough. This is for me personally. I need an infusion of fruit and greens (lettuce, celery, whatever) every hour or hour and a half. I've posted about the 16 adrenal snacks before, and I REALLY need to be eating those on the regular. I only ate once in the 3-4 hours we were there, and it was not enough. I did better the second time, makind sure to eat the adrenal snack rather than just a piece of fruit. It makes a difference, believe me. 
5. I also should have been drinking ALL the liquids I brought (lemon water) instead of practically forgetting I'd brought any. The second time I did way better on this. 
6. Also, extra supplements like B12, which I did bring but forgot to use - because B12 gets depleted really quickly when the nervous system is under stress. The second time I literally set alarms on my phone for all of this and FOLLOWED THEM. If I am properly supported nutritionally, I do MUCH better. At home this is so much easier, of course. I need to learn how to do it outside of my home now. Bringing the food/drinks/supplements isn't enough, I have to actually ingest them. This is a learning process.

The scents aren't anything I can change, so I still very much needed to wear the mask to be there. Even my husband said that the shops "smelled like cake" when there was no cake anywhere, and the rest of the place "smelled like fabric softener" so even Muggles can smell this stuff around. I wish when they have the toxic chemical warning at the tollbooth that they would also have a list of what chemicals are used, so you know what you're getting into. Had I had my wits about me, I'd have asked. I wonder if they are required to have a list? If you know, please comment and tell me.

Today I'm okay again with the help of a lot of cleansing foods and supplemental support. I don't want to gloss over what hapened, because it was a big deal, and I SO wish Universal would have "sensory sensitive days" without all of the extra sensory input or scents, because everything was VERY LOUD (one might even do well to have a pair of earplugs to help filter it out, too). It  wasn't the crowds so much as the loud music playing everywhere  - the noise of the park itself - and there was nowhere to go to get away from it. Or the scents.

I am not at all used to going out into crowds anymore, having been homebound for the past couple of years, and at the most going to a quiet grocery store with almost no people in it, or a Target, which is about as busy a situation as I've been in. So that bears mentioning as well. Someone more accustomed to crowds might fare better.

Pismo Beach

Pismo Beach  - I'd call it a must stop if you're traveling through California anywhere nearby. It's on the edge of an adorable little beach town that I didn't have the stamina to explore. I'm still healing, and my energy gets used in only the most important places - like on the sand and in the water. Not IN the water, but my feet in the water.

But I DID have the stamina to spend a couple of hours with my family on the beach, letting the gentle waves caress our feet, watching Muffins running in and out of the water, laughing and allowing the healing that the ocean and sand provide. A true gift. 

Muffins loves the water and the ocean so much that as soon as she smelled the sea air she started crying to get out of the car -  while we were still moving and nowhere near the parking lot. She was ready to go!

Muffins, my husband and my son play a game where they chase the waves as they wash out, then run away as they wash in. Muffins usually doesn't go in beyond the depth of her legs, but this time she felt bold and went in all the way past her belly, to 
where the water was halfway up her sides before she decided to run back onto land. It was hilarious to watch, and she had us laughing SO hard.

She was also particularly interested in those birds. 

Laughing! Now even there is something I had done so rarely in my life with chronic illness, if ever. It's not easy to laugh when a person is in so much pain that it's all they can do to breathe, or when they're so exhausted that they can't see straight.

And here I was, laughing joyfully. Happythankyoumoreplease! This day, this beach, so much healing, so much life. 

So much life! The bird life was abundant at the beach. I don't know them all but we saw plovers, gulls, pigeons, pelicans, hawks....and those are just the ones I was able to recognize.

I think these birds are western snowy plovers. I'm no bird expert but I sure am fascinated by them. Birds have such grace and personality, and they are so funny to watch sometimes. 

These little guys would run in as the tide washed out and start eating something - brine shrimp or brine fly larvae perhaps. Something too small for us to see, but clearly a delicious treat for them. It was like a meditation watching them over and over as the tide washed in and out.

The pier against the sky. What contrast! There were so many beautiful visuals here. And apparently the water gets pretty high at times, we just lucked out with a lower tide day.

The water made these ripples in the sand. The sand itself was so fine it felt velvety on our feet rather than sand-papery. This beach just made me want to live here.

After a couple of hours (on my feet the whole time, go me!) we decided it was time to go, so I climbed the stiars to the pier to sit on the bench with Muffins while my guys enjoyed swinging on the beach.

So to recap: I spent almost two hole hours on my feet in the sand and water, and I don't remember it hurting until the end - whoa! That is unheard of for me. Then I walked UP THE STAIRS of the pier to sit on a bench to recover a bit - pretty impressive after already being on my feet all that time!

 Now, I'm not saying that it will only get better every day from here on in, because let's face it - flares happen. My body still has a great deal of healing to do from the onslaught of viruses it's been carrying around all its life, and the damage they have done. My liver has a lot of cleansing and healing to do yet. And that's okay with me. 

I know I AM healing now, finally, after years of seeking answers. I see the difference and how each outing shows me that I AM moving forward, I do keep improving, and sometimes I am blown away at what I can do now. Things I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to do again. It feels amazing.Talking with a dear friend tonight I realized that when I was first on this healing path, trying the Medical Medium recommendations, if a flare would happen sometimes I'd get that panicky feeling like, "No, it's not working, it's all coming back, nothing can heal this." It would terrify me to have a flare of my symptoms or feel more pain or even have a day of grumpiness from not enough sleep.

But I'm noticing now that it doesn't scare me anymore, because it's a part of the process, and I really KNOW that I am healing, and if I just do the things I need to do to keep that going, it will keep happening. And that's pretty amazing in and of itself.

I had been watching the hawks soaring over the beach, just gliding, circling, flowing so gracefully back and forth. I have been thrilled be the sheer number of raptors I've seen in the skies everywhere we've been in California - I think hawk must be one of my spirit animals, because I have been so completely drawn to them these last few years. I really wanted to get a good photo, but my lens isn't very long, and I didn't know if I could. 

As we were leaving, however, the hawk must have heard my wishes, because it literally flew right above our heads, over the pier we were walking down, and I took as many photos as my camera would allow as it flew over. I could have cried with joy. So close! I was actually calling out thanks to the hawk as it flew overhead and I was clicking away.

I'm not exactly sure the type of hawk - I tried to look it up and maybe it's a Ferruginous Hawk? If you know more about birds than I do (likely), and know what kind this is, please educate me, I really want to know!

Asilomar Beach in Pacific Grove, California

When we went to the Monarch Butterfly Santcuary in Pacific Grove, we knew we were right by the beach, so we decided to have a look while we were just right there.

We found ourselves on Asilomar Beach, which was as windy as it was beautiful. We climbed around on the rocks a bit, exploring and enjoying the view. 

At first the beach was sandy, but as we got closer to the water, it became instead of sand, remnents of seashells and pebbles and beach glass and rocks. 

We looked around and collected a few cool pebbles and shells. 

And then, just views.

And the wind washing the waves against the rocks.

Foliage, what I believe to be Aster. 

Information about the great tide pool.

Ocean meets sky.