My friend Nemo wanted to celebrate her birthday lounging in a pool with a drink in hand. Once she mentioned that, I said I’m so down.

We were supposed to leave at noon to arrive by 2:30ish, but the day flew by and I ended up leaving at 3:00 pm. Big mistake—the traffic was horrible. I don’t mind driving, especially on road trips; in fact, I love it. But when it’s stop-and-go traffic, it completely sucks. I even had to make a pit stop to grab a Red Bull just to wake up. Once we left the city, roads were clear.

Once we got close to our destination, we stopped by a grocery store. After grabbing some things, we didn’t arrive at the Airbnb until 8:00 PM. Nemo had barely gotten there 20 minutes earlier. I was starving, so we set up the grill and started cooking. More friends started to arrive, and once we were done eating, we got in the pool. We stayed up playing a card game and then finally called it a night.

The next day was spent in and out of the pool—drinking, eating, and playing video games, with a nap here and there. What a wonderful day of just being lazy.

The next day was checkout. After cleaning up and making a quick breakfast, it was time to leave. My friend ended up heading straight home, but since we were close to the Salton Sea, we figured we might as well check it out.

We were the only ones at the visitor center, but we got a nice, personal history lesson from the park ranger. I would have loved to drive further south to check out the artwork in Bombay Beach, but I didn’t want to get stuck in the afternoon traffic heading back home. That just means I need to come back during the winter, just like the park ranger said.