the stretch of road from the Grand Canyon to San Diego boasted the greatest variety of weather and road that I’ve ever seen. First off, we were hit with a huge rainstorm. We had to pull off and grab lunch while we waited for it to pass. Next, the sun came out and the temperatures were climbing up, but an even bigger rain storm hit that was so bad all the cars on the highway had to pull off. We even were hit by falling hail.

After sitting for thirty minutes, just in awe of the massive storm, we started climbing up large rolling hills. The thermometer in the car kept rising to over 110 degrees, forcing us to pull the car over again and wait for sunset to offer a break in the heat.

We had planned on sleeping somewhere in the desert, but it was clear that it was going to be much too hot to get any rest, so we talked to Grant about getting into San Diego around 2 am.

Through the blistering heat and into the night we rode, listening to book 3 of the Harry Potter series. There were stretches of hills where we would have to drive 30 miles uphill, in which the Subaru was getting swamped. We had to turn the heater on because the engine was working so hard.

but we made it, and it’s been a great break from driving and even better getting to hang out with my brother. San Diego is calling us to hang around, but we have places to go. We don’t have much of a plan for driving up California, but we plan to put some miles on and sleep when we can.