Mt. San JacintoI left L.A. in a fairly easy trip to Cathedral City just east of Palm Springs in the Coachella Valley. The mountains there are spectacular, because the valley floor is relatively low, and there are no foothills. Mt. San Jacinto to the west has the longest direct vertical drop in the country. The San Bernardino Mountains that form the other side of the valley are even higher. My friend, Fr. David Burgdorf lives there, where he is director of the training program at the Betty Ford Center. I must get them in touch with Opora in Moscow ~ the outfit that trains chemical dependency counselors all over the former USSR.
After a very pleasant two days in the desert spring weather, I went on to the end of the valley, and down to the east side of the Salton Sea, which is an inland salt lake, about the size of Mille Lacs. Like the Dead Sea or the Great Salt Lake, it is formed by the water that flows down from the surrounding mountains with no outlet.
It lies in the middle of the Imperial Valley, just east of San Diego and the Anza Borega Desert. Because of irrigation, this is a very large part of California’s agricultural industry.
I spent the night in a nice motel/restaurant in a town with the strange name of Calipatria. I was glad I did, because the restaurant walls were covered with the photographs of Dorothea Lange. It sems the great chronicler of Depression misery and the brave, desperate migrants we call “Okies” did all her work within five miles of Calipatria. As Woody Guthrie sang,
California’s a Garden of Eden,
A paradise to live in or see.
But, believe it or not,
You won’t find it so hot,
If you ain’t got the do-re-mi.
East of the Imperial Valley
No comments:
Post a Comment