Sunday is our motorcycling day; the day we do our Sunday morning coffee thing and the day we do some touring of some of the surrounding countryside. This morning we had a late start because Rick was committed to helping someone with their RV but by 11:00 we were on the bike and heading to the town of Joshua Tree (not the National Park).

When we left, it was so hot, 32C (89.6F), that we dreaded every stop sign and red light because as long as we were moving, the breeze helped to keep us from overheating. However, Joshua Tree is at a higher elevation than Desert Hot Springs and by the time we stopped up there the temperature had dropped to 28C (82.4). You wouldn’t think it, but with the breeze caused from being on a moving motorcycle it felt cool so we both put on our denim jackets. We headed north on Highway 247 (climbing higher again) and then took Highway 18 to Big Bear City. Before we arrived there, we stopped on the side of the road so I could put on my leather jacket and Rick, his gloves.

Big Bear City is actually a quaint town up in the mountains in the San Bernardino National Forest. It is an all-seasons destination with beautiful Big Bear Lake for boating on in the summer months and Big Bear Mountain for skiing on in the winter (as well as for hiking and mountain biking on from spring till when the snow flies). Today there was snow (obviously man-made) on one hill where a snow-tubing park was in full operation. The temperature had dropped to 19C (66.2F) there (where I added leather chaps and a scarf to my attire and Rick put on his leather jacket) and then we headed south again climbing even higher (8443 feet). By then the temperature dropped to 16C (60.8F) and we were in the shadow of the mountains so we were definitely c-c-cold!

However it wasn’t long before we were once again in the valley and by the time we reached the Moho at 5:00 PM, it was 28C. When we stopped for gas near Redlands I had put away my extras, as did Rick, and we now welcomed the hot air! It was certainly a day of extremes.