Big Truck Across America - day 8

Day 8 began without a Randy Quaid, but with a goodbye and thank you to the Whitlocks and a trek southeast toward Legoland in Carlsbad, CA.  The route there took us through some Redlands canyon roads that were so much more suited for this than for a lumbering RV:

About an hour and a half later we were rolling into Legoland, and although I was inwardly extremely excited, Jordan started getting giddy as we pulled into the parking lot and started seeing 10' tall Lego constructions. Here she is right before both of us started saying "Come look at this!" to Kim for the next 6hrs.

From that point it was pretty much a whirlwind, from the miniature Manhattan (Kim's old stomping grounds) to the Castle,



to the playground, where Jordan turned into an American Gladiator, tackling whatever obstacle she could find.

That brought us to my personal favorite, the Star Wars exhibit. The only shots I'll include are from actual Star Wars movies, not the JarJar Binks happy meal toy-generators that most of the Legos represented. I enjoyed the Hoth battle scene (yep - huge nerd) and the giant Millenium Falcon (more on that in a second):

Yes, that is about a 6' replica of the Millenium Falcon, and if it were for sale, it would be strapped to the top of the RV right now.  There were also life sized versions of Threepio, R2D2, Chewy, Vader, etc. Jordan didn't quite understand the appeal, but she was willing to roll with it. I was even able to get my favorite character as the Big Truck's new keychain.  Here he is in his brief but lasting role:

From there we made it to Jordan's first driving experience at a Volvo-sponsored track for 3-5 year olds. Jordan has never driven a motorized vehicle, so the sight of her realizing that she could make the car go, steer, and crash into anything was something to behold. Here she is getting her inner Stig on.

Kimberly also satisfied some inner nerdery with a quick shot of her with Hagrid (no idea, had to get that from her).

After a mad dash through the Legoland store (think consumerism at nearly Mad Max levels - people were literally running around grabbing stuff like it was the last food available), we set out for our campground, which was 5 minutes away. As we pulled in, my neck beard and Detroit Lions hat must have made us look trustworthy, as the campground hosts gave us the good site across from theirs. Here is our view:

We walked down to the beach, and saw a group of surfers. No Johnny Utah or Bode, but some pretty talented guys. Then we caught Jordan's first Pacific Ocean experience on camera.

We played for a while, discovered that the rocks make a very unique sound when the surf comes in and pulls them back into the ocean. The sand was a mixture, about the same colors as a well-poured Black & Tan.

Then we got a quick family shot of our first visit to the coast. Yes, I am getting sunburned in this photo.

Jordan had made it the entire day through Legoland, the beach, etc without a nap, so about 10 minutes after getting back to the campsite, this was the scene inside the RV.

Overall this was one of the best days of the trip, just in a different way than the national parks. As I'm sitting here writing this listening to the waves crash, I'm also assembling this - and it's not for Jordan.

Day 9 - off to somewhere in AZ, travelling along the Mexican border through Yuma up to the Sedona/Flagstaff area. This is the official start of the return voyage.