Weather's here, wish you were beautiful...

White man came to desert and brought rain. Lots of rain actually, complete with thunder and lightning. It's not the tragedy that it might initially appear as the rain is needed in this part of Arizona and so far, we have managed to keep the to-do list ticked and up to date in the dry spells. So seeing as I am stuck inside right now waiting for the sun to re-appear, I'll give you a quick update.

Yesterday morning we paid a visit to San Diego Zoo and as zoos go, it is a very good one. Very well laid out with a variety of walks and enclosures exhibiting almost every kind of animal you would wish to see.

The problem I find with zoos is that once you have seen a few good ones it's hard to find something new, but here of course I got to see pandas for what I'm quite sure is the first time.



Three pandas in fact; one sleeping in his tree, another munching through his bamboo breakfast and the new arrival via the Panda Cam that you can also see here. All wrapped up in around three hours and then time to hit the road again and wave goodbye to California.

Seeing as Pete had done most of the driving to L.A. and back the previous day, I thought it only fair to take the lion's share of the journey from San Diego to Tucson. It started of predictably as a pleasant drive through a 107 degree California desert, but as we crossed the border into Arizona we hit rain and dusts storms - an unexpected module of my international driving skills course. There's little you can do really other than slow down and get on with it, but I'll admit it was a relief to come out of the third consecutive storm intact.

Bright weather again this morning so we headed off to the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson. I've never been much of a plane spotter, but the huge array of aircraft on display coupled with the fascinating commentary of our guide made for a fascinating trip out.

Well it looks like the sun has appeared again and there's still plenty to get done before we leave Arizona Tuesday morning and head for Texas ...