Odometer: 18,471

Marco wakes up at 5:15am and kicks me out of bed as well. We are on the road with some breakfast and a coffee in our hands at 6:15am, just before sunrise.

We first get some gasoline as it is a lot cheaper here ($2.59 per gallon vs. $2.97 in California). We take HWY 10 east for a few miles and then HWY 347 towards Maricopa and eventually join HWY 8 West towards San Diego (401 Miles).

Out of town in the desert the temperature is just 57 Fahrenheit (14 Celsius) but at 9:00am in Yuma the thermometer already shows 87 (30 Celsius), quite nice considering that it is almost mid October.

Between Tempe and Yuma we pass endless fields of cotton, grass and citrus plantations and we also see some cattle stations where they have thousands of cattle (I think they are called cattle collection stations, it’s basically living meet stock. This makes us think twice about having beef for dinner).

After Yuma, where we fill up on gas again and have a Starbucks, we get stopped at the Californian “border”, where they usually want to know if you carry any fruits from out of state or any other goods that are prohibited in California, then we drive past the Imperial Sand Dunes, before we get stopped by the Border Patrol. They have a glimpse into the back of our car (to see if we are hiding any Mexicans) and then let us pass without even checking our green cards.

All in all the last 400 Miles as well as the whole trip are a smooth ride, without any incidents. Our car has been running reliably and without any issues (besides the drop of the tire pressure after the second day – which was due to the temperature change, by the way), not even a crack in the windshield, nothing!

Marco has been driving the whole 3,750 miles (6,000 km) of our trip and has brought us back to San Diego safely – thank you Sweety, I love you!