Best places to be a desert rat?

[DFW]

30. I've done my long road trip. Did it back in the good old USA, in fact.

Boston to San Francisco, northern route on the way there, southern route on the way back. Did it in about a month, stopping in places along the way. Hot springs (small "s" ) in Wyoming, desert towns in Nevada, Highway 101, Hot Springs (the town) in Arkansas, Natural Bridge, Virginia. We missed only about 5,000 neat things along the way, but got in what we could.

Here in Europe, traffic is so thick, it's torture doing it by car. I'm in a different country every day for work anyway. Mostly train if it's a neighboring country (Holland, Belgium, Lux, France), plane if it's too far (I can get down to Madrid in about 2 hours, but it's a 24 hour train trip). These days, a road trip is the last thing I need!