In Which We Visit A Giant Metal Spider

As longtime readers of our blog probably know, each year we travel to California to hike, wine taste, and eat at every single restaurant we encounter. We generally stay around the Central Coast, but I do have a very serious emotional connection to the desert, so I try my hardest to talk husband into spending a day or two there each year as well.

Well. This year, I talked him into THREE DAYS IN THE DESERT.

Oh yes. Three. Days. Over the next week, I will be telling you our tales of adventure, sunburn, stargazing, and of course, ROADSIDE AMERICA.

Starting with the Roadside America parts.

Because we were beginning our trip in the desert this year, rather than fly into San Luis Obispo like usual, we flew into Palm Springs. (Palm Springs has the most BEAUTIFUL airport I have ever been in. More than half of it is outdoors!! Like, past the TSA checkpoint, you are outdoors!)

Our first destination of the trip was Joshua Tree National Park (my favourite place on earth). But we made a few stops on the way there.

(Yes, In-N-Out Burger was one of those stops. But I digress.)

After my mum and I traveled to Great Smoky Mountains National Park last summer to watch the solar eclipse, I got kind of obsessed with the website RoadsideAmerica.com. On our 8-hour drive down to Tennessee, we stopped to see the gravesite of Dr. Pepper, the Bush’s Baked Beans factory, and a whole bunch of large animals on tops of buildings in Pigeon Forge. And now, I am the tiniest bit obsessed with visiting weird roadside attractions while on trips.

Enter, the giant spider made out of a VW bug.

Yes, this Nature Goth loves her spiders. And because I have a small stuffed spider named Spider who likes to travel the desert with me, I just had to bring him along.

As you can see, Spider was very pleased to meet his larger cousin.

And so was I!!!! VW Spider lived up to the hype!

The VW Spider is actually on the opposite end of a parking lot for a Jack in the Box just like ten minutes or so from the Palm Springs airport. We were starving from a morning of flying, so we got some chicken nuggets from the Jack in the Box and enjoyed them in the parking lot, whilst looking at the magnificent spider. This seems to be the most logical plan of action for viewing the spider, because he is otherwise just kind of on someone’s property in the middle of a desert highway.

And as an added bonus, there are LITERALLY BILLIONS of large creepy windmills in the area. Basically this was a really perfect Roadside America stop in my book.

Where did we head next on our desert adventure? MORE ROADSIDE AMERICA ATTRACTIONS!!! Stay tuned to see what’s next!