5:34 am… Its dark outside…time for sleep but Steph
and I are up, showering.
It is time to
leave… check email one last time… stuff a couple of things into the packed
bags…
It is time to let the road do its magic.
Gina is here, we are off at 6:20, a few minutes
later than planned, but still early… We
point south on Hwy 101, through San Jose, then eastbound over 152, Pacheco
Pass, into the San Joaquin Valley… We
stopped at Starbucks for coffee, having agreed that they were not subject rule
2, “No Corporate Fast Food” rule… Again, headed south, the traffic on I-5 was
clumpy, dominated by large trucks, frequently trying to pass one another,
blocking the fast lane, then having passed moving over, releasing the cars to
surge past. When you add a the Winnebago
tribe (aka, large recreational vehicles), some U-hauls who have no idea how
slow they are going (or where) and the occasional fast lane bandit (driving
slow in the fast lane because they think we are all driving too fast…) and we
not making the progress we expected.
We spend much time exploring each other’s music… we multiple
Ipods and an Ipad loaded with play lists as well as a handful of CD’s… Gina’s is late 60’s and 70’s rock,
interspersed with children’s songs (there was one about a beluga whale) while
Steph’s has current rock and stuff a high school student would have listened to
10 years ago, while mine is heavily into Americana, and is organize as albums… We seem to have sufficient music for any
situation.
We leave I-5 to cut across the valley to Hwy 99 at
Wasco, where we saw our first train…
down to Bakersfield and the junction with Hwy 58 over the Tehachapi,
again, trucks passing trucks dominating
the climb over the top. We saw a few
more trains… across the southern San Joaquin the field hands were harvesting
table grapes… white shade umbrellas and structures over white packing tables, grapes
being carefully laid into cardboard boxed, placed on pallets protected by white
shrink wrap… even the porta-potties were white.
It was a bit weird, a cross between old school hand farm labor and a
society party…. Elsewhere, Alfalfa was
being mowed, baled and moved… Tomato
trucks were everywhere…
Climbing the Tehachapi, we saw another train, got
off the Highway for a bit to look at the Tehachapi loop, an railroad engineering
marvel where the tracks in their hard climb loop over themselves. Sadly no trains passed during our inspection,
and we did not have time to wait…
Downhill now, eastbound again, into the desert. The road bypasses Mojave, but off to the west
we could see the field of stored commercial aircraft , in storage, waiting for
an upturn in business, or a new owner.
Most seemed to be in United Airlines paint…
Across the desert, Edwards Air Force bas e to the west,
the right, into Boron, a center of Borax mining. Steph keeps chanting “Borax, the magical
element” in an Indian accent, mimicking a (non-Indian) organic chemistry professor… (Borax being very reactive, facilitating
reactions in other elements in marvelous ways, at least if you are interested
in organic chemistry, who knew today’s blog would have included a reference to
organic chemistry?) We leave the highway
seeking the 20-Mule Team Museum (and chamber of commerce office and visitor’s
center) We discover the desert lawn
mower, and a fighter plane next door… We were not overwhelmed, but photos were
taken…
Back to the vehicle, back to the highway, soon
turning south again, now on Hwy 395, better known as the road along the east
side of the Sierra, but here, just a 2 lane black top in the desert. Down to I-15, through Cajon pass, and into
San Bernardino, at the eastern edge of the Los Angeles basin.
Here we stop for lunch, at Mitla Cafe on North Mount Vernon Avenue… we found it on roadfood.com…
It was an old school Mexican place in a Mexican neighborhood near the Santa Fe
Station…
We arrived in San Bernardino about an hour behind our planned schedule…
we left about 45 minutes behind… Now on I-10, we are finally headed truly headed
east… it has taken us 7 hours to reach the road that will define our cross
country adventure.
Climbing up out of the LA basin, towards Beaumont pass the trucks again
become an issue… based on trucks and trains seen so far there
is an active economy, and based on the number of trains and trucks, possibly a healthy
one…
Over Beaumont hill, then down into Palm Desert and
Palm Springs, the landscape dominated by wind mills… again in the desert, but
to our surprise it rains…not a lot of rain, just enough to turn on the wipers,
and open the windows to smell the wet asphalt.
We picked up fuel in Indio, and changed drivers… there were no obvious
date milkshakes to be found… then headed up the hill, past Joshua Tree… Past
Indio we started to make up time… down into the strip of green which is the Colorado
at Blithe… across the border into Arizona… Then we put the hammer down.
We change drivers again an hour into Arizona, by now
we have a chance to arrive on time… on to Buckeye, then south away from I-10
towards Gila Bend, for gas, then eastward on I-8 to Casa Grande and I-10 to
Tucson and family…
We were greeted by Tina’s brother, his wife, Tina’s
sister, and husband, two nieces, one with husband, and 5 great nieces and
nephews… a house full… I suspect Gina was overwhelmed… dinner, talk, then to
bed…
Up early to blog with coffee, say goodbye, then on
the road again
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