Although they may look like it, these photos were not taken in the Sahara Desert. We were skirting the Mexico/U.S. border on our way to Yuma, Arizona. This 40 mile stretch of paradise is called either the Imperial Sand Dunes, or Los Algodones Sand Dunes. As if that isn't harsh enough, they are sitting in the middle of the Sonoran Desert. I'm not complaining though. After all, we have nice roads to get us through here.
Like this one...
Even with the wind blowing sand hard enough to take your paint off. I'm still not complaining. We could be driving on...
This!
Oh yes, now that road would be some smooth driving... NOT!
Although there was a crummy road going through the desert, until 1914 there wasn't any way to get through these dunes. That is the year a seven mile wooden plank road was laid out across the worst of the dunes. It was a constant battle to keep it from being buried by the shifting sands. The road was used until 1927, when it was replaced by a paved road. Imagine just you and your Model T Ford crawling your way across the desert. Oh yeah, it's about 112 degrees, and you don't have air conditioning. Now that would be an adventure! NOT! People really were made of tougher stuff back then.
Unfortunately, this is the last surviving bit of the old plank road.
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