Heading East. EAST??? Yes. East.

November 4, 2008 - Tuesday. Election Day.

We arose and confronted the reality that we didn't know WHAT we were doing for the day - or week. We had a few ideas of how to spend another week in Southern California, but most of them had to do with warm weather and L.A. is having a cold snap - highs of 60's - sooo we looked at our list and pruned. And pruned. Decided that the joys of going to Mexico - just to do so while we're here - didn't outweigh the risks. So. We loaded up "Monroe" and waved goodbye to the Pacific and headed East - officially beginning our trip "home" rather than still mentally being on our way "out".

Kathy did some poking around online and decided that we should visit London Bridge in Lake Havasu, Arizona. So that's the way we headed. And she consulted the "Diners, Drive-in's and Dive's" list and aimed us at Victorville, California - on the way - to stop at "Emma Jean's Holland Burgers" - one of the places that had been featured on the show.

It was a bit of a "treasure hunt" to find "Emma Jean's" - not because it is hidden, but because GPS systems don't believe that the address exists. We tried to tell Leila to go there, but she insisted that no such address existed. So once we got to Victorville (passing some impressive mountains in the Santa Barbara area on the way out of Los Angeles), we had to *phone* the Diner and find out where they were. Right there on "D Street", but Leila continues to insist that no such address even exists.

Update on Nov 5: I poked around on the mapping systems and found out that they insist that *that* end of "D St, Victorville, CA" - is actually "Historic Route 66, Victorville, CA" - so if you want to find it, you'll have to tell your GPS system to look for *that* street instead. I even called Emma Jean's to tell them, but they seemed unimpressed with my research. Anyway....

The place is small

- a truck-stop on old Route 66 (we just keep paralleling Route 66) and had one friendly, very-hard-working waitress "stepping and fetching" to keep everybody served - so she didn't have time to really talk to us - but she *did* play a little practical joke on us and kept the feel fun as she took our order and got us (and everybody else) served. No. I won't tell you what joke she played - since she might want to play it on *you* when you go there someday.

Kathy, as usual, picked the best thing on the menu, so my "Mushroom Burger" was quite good, but Kathy's Patty Melt (with peppers) was better. And we couldn't resist the cherry cobbler - with ice cream - which was truly outstanding. That said, we *waddled* back out to "Monroe" to continue our "RVanning". We *do* recommend EmmaJean's: a great lunch was less than half what we paid for our lunch at "Joe's Cable Car" in San Francisco - and the ice tea was good - AND there was no cobbler at Joe's.

We listened to an investment book on tape while we drove - finally really enjoying being able to just lay back and *cruise* at 75MPH again: Los Angeles driving requires "active participation" at ALL times - so it was quite calming to get back to the OPEN road. We passed a number of *long* freight trains on the way: this is wide open country where it is best to load it up and let it roll - on a train.

We crossed the 7000-mile mark - total - for our trip - shortly before crossing back into Mountain Time - so we're only 2 hours ahead of Eastern time - again - working our way back.

Pulled into our Super 8 in Lake Havasu City by 5PM and settled in, then picked out "Papa Leone's" for dinner - from "Streets & Trips" on the computer. There is a long story about my encounter with the very-famous "Mama Leone's" in New York City - many many years ago, so I thot it would be nice to try *Papa* Leone's here. But after driving around in circles for about 20 minutes we concluded that this was yet-another destination which had changed since the maps were loaded - and "Papa Leone's" didn't exist. Phone calls just got a busy signal.

Update Nov 5: I asked around and found out that "Papa Leone's" - the Italian Restaurant listed in "Steets and Trips" - was just a pizza parlor in the "English Village" under London Bridge. Sooo we really hadn't missed anything, but it *does* exist.

So we found a Chinese buffet which was very good. We were the only customers there - which can't be a good sign for someone trying to run a restaurant, but we departed full - and with little origami birds presented to us by our waitress - that she had folded just for us.

This promises to be an interesting week as we semi-randomly zig-zag our way back East. No telling *what* will grab our fancies as we traverse the South.

7277 miles total. Enough to have gone round-trip and half-way back again - if we'd done it "straight-line". But this is much more fun.