“Today," I told my blushing bride, "will be a much easier day than yesterday. Yesterday was the longest drive of the trip. Today is a good 50 miles shorter, and we don’t have the winding roads of the redwoods to negotiate.” And so began a day that will live in infamy!
We checked out from the Aurora RV Park with some regret. The place is beautiful, and Elena, the “helper” was delightful and wonderfully accommodating. But we have a reservation in King City for a space at the San Lorenzo Regional Park. We pulled out about 9:00 an headed back to US 101 at Calpella, having learned from Elena that the southern route to Hopland is tortuous and narrow. I quickly remembered last year’s adventure going up and down a “direct route” that had 16% grades!! Yikes.
When we got on US 101, we were cruising along quite nicely, although I was reminded, once again, of how bad the pavement is from Ukiah south. We made it as far as Santa Rosa, where the traffic began to back up. I turned on the GPS, which I had programmed before we left, to help guide us through the awful maze that is the San Francisco Bay area.
Well, I don’t know what I told that GPS but she took us way to the east on I580, before depositing us back on I680 headed west to US 101 again. I’m pretty much convinced she did this in order to get me to write a letter to the California DOT about their amazingly terrible freeways. The pavement is buckled and reminiscent of a washboard and there are huge discrepancies between the trajectory of the pavement and the trajectory of the surface of every bridge we crossed. I thought we were going to break Red Ryder’s suspension.
The traffic was pretty much bumper to bumper from north of Oakland all the way to the Cal 156 exit to the Monterey Peninsula. And of course there are the California darters, some of whom missed my front fenders by inches, weaving in and out of the lanes. They were only to be topped by all the care free drivers who wander up the on ramp at 45 mph and only look over their shoulder or in the rear view mirror when they are about to merge with my vehicle, instead of the flow of traffic.
Once we got past the 156, traffic thinned out and the pavement was smoother in most places. So, the weather decided to heat up to 107 degrees! Thank God for a good AC unit in Red Ryder. My recently installed transmission temperature gauge was a comfort. Even in the heat and stop and go traffic, the tranny never topped 185 degrees, and when we got moving again, the temp fell back to 175. I do love my transmission cooler.
At long last the “easy day” of driving ended at San Lorenzo Regional Park campground, which is lovely, has many large eucalyptus trees to shade us and best of all, full hookups! For you non RVers, that means we have water (for showers!!), electricity (for Air Conditioning!!!) and a sewer hook up (so we can dump all that shower water, wink, wink, nudge, nudge, knowwhatImean?).
When the cool of the evening comes (it’s already down to 96), I will go for a stroll and investigate all the interesting things in this park. Until then, I am content to sip a cold drink under the AC…and listen to my lovely wife praise me for adding it (the AC, not the drink), when we bought the camper.
Sorry, no pictures today. It is hard to click the shutter with white knuckles. Perhaps, tomorrow. Do come back.
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