I have completed posting all the photos from California. The most recent additions are from April 23rd (which includes the visit to Oregon), April 24th, and April 25th.
I left Nevada today. I had been there far longer than I intended though it was definitely enjoyable. There is a new map linked in the upper right corner for April 25 - 30, 2010, showing my route around Nevada.
Friday, April 30, 2010
April 26, 2010: Carson City, Nevada
Carson City is the capital of Nevada. This is a quiet little city separated from the hustle and bustle of Las Vegas and Reno (but within forty minutes of Reno). It's easy to get around and all the state government buildings are fairly close together, yet without the congestion found in Albany, NY.
My first stop was the Nevada Railroad Museum. I took numerous photos. They are apparently restoring a particular train just in time for the 100th anniversary of its first run. They hope to have it running by the anniversary date in mid May. Engines are also available to be run for movies (provided the studio forks over a lot of money). They had numerous cars, engines, and models. I was fortunate to be visiting on a Monday since the museum is only open Fridays through Mondays.
My next stop was the capitol. This is a fairly small building with a silver dome. The people are very friendly inside. Once you get inside and go through the metal detectors, you are free to roam around. For the most part, only the governor's staff and a few other small offices (such as the state treasurer) are in the building. The attorney general's office is across the road, and state agencies have their own separate buildings. The State Assembly and State Senate used to be housed in the capitol building but these rooms are now set up as museums. The State Assembly and State Senate now have their own shared building adjacent to the capitol.
People are free to walk right into the governor's office. The current governor, Jim Gibbons, has a banner over the office which reads "The people of Nevada deserve a government that works for them, not AGAINST them." I certainly agree with that statement (applying it to people of every state, of course). It's refreshing to see something like that over a chief executive's office.
The old State Senate room is now a museum on the founding of Nevada. Nevada was originally part of the Utah territory, but the people of Nevada wanted to be their own territory and eventually their own state. They began a territorial government before the Federal government recognized them as a separate territory. The discovery of silver gave them more pull to demand this status. In the waning days of the James Buchanan administration (1857 - 1861), Buchanan signed the act to make a separate territory of Nevada. In 1864, Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Nevada a state. Nevada points out that it is "battle born" since it became a state during the Civil War.
This trip marks my third trip involving a visit to Nevada. Between the trip to Virginia City and now the capitol, I've really become fascinated with Nevada history. Most people know of Nevada as the state that includes Las Vegas. They think of gambling and not much else when it comes to Nevada. But Nevada is so much more. The state is vast and has beautiful scenery. It has a very colorful history relating to mining and the Old West. I definitely want to study more about Nevada (not including the gambling) when I get back home.
I briefly visited the state library to look through some books related to Nevada history. There is quite a bit about Mark Twain, of course. I also tried to visit the state museum, but it happened to be closed that day.
I had to keep moving east (getting all the bonus points required a stay at a different hotel each night, plus I wanted to make progress in getting home). My next hotel was not too far away. It was in a small city named Fernley. I wanted to take US 50 (note there is no I-50), which cuts across the upper middle section of Nevada. The Nevada portion of this road is hyped as "the loneliest road in the lower 48." I'll have more commentary about this in tomorrow's report, but suffice to say it's all hype. There are other US routes in Nevada (like US 93) and other states that are far more deserving of that title. And yes, I've been on those roads which I would consider even lonelier. California itself (the most populous state in the country) certainly has some of what I would consider lonelier roads.
Fernley is about an hour away from Carson City. It's a stop along I-80, and in order to get to it via US 50 (the "loneliest road in the lower 48") I had to plug in Silver Springs, NV. Otherwise, the GPS would have put me back on I-80. The city has a post office, a few restaurants, some outlying areas, etc., but it is very small in terms of the main part of the city. There are truck stops along I-80. My hotel was a brand new Comfort Suites which charged very reasonable rates since it was new. Parts of it were still under construction. If it was not for the exit on I-80, this hotel definitely would not be needed for such a small city.
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Despite being a small city, there were at least two Mexican restaurants (maybe more), plus even a grocery store specializing in Mexican food. Throughout the west, of course Mexican food is extremely popular. I relented from my diet and had a taco salad. It was good, but I regretted it. I was not used to eating that much, and I felt like I ate far more than I could handle. (In prior years, I would constantly have Mexican food. That was not good for my weight or my wallet.) I decided I would go back to Subway for future meals.
My first stop was the Nevada Railroad Museum. I took numerous photos. They are apparently restoring a particular train just in time for the 100th anniversary of its first run. They hope to have it running by the anniversary date in mid May. Engines are also available to be run for movies (provided the studio forks over a lot of money). They had numerous cars, engines, and models. I was fortunate to be visiting on a Monday since the museum is only open Fridays through Mondays.
My next stop was the capitol. This is a fairly small building with a silver dome. The people are very friendly inside. Once you get inside and go through the metal detectors, you are free to roam around. For the most part, only the governor's staff and a few other small offices (such as the state treasurer) are in the building. The attorney general's office is across the road, and state agencies have their own separate buildings. The State Assembly and State Senate used to be housed in the capitol building but these rooms are now set up as museums. The State Assembly and State Senate now have their own shared building adjacent to the capitol.
People are free to walk right into the governor's office. The current governor, Jim Gibbons, has a banner over the office which reads "The people of Nevada deserve a government that works for them, not AGAINST them." I certainly agree with that statement (applying it to people of every state, of course). It's refreshing to see something like that over a chief executive's office.
The old State Senate room is now a museum on the founding of Nevada. Nevada was originally part of the Utah territory, but the people of Nevada wanted to be their own territory and eventually their own state. They began a territorial government before the Federal government recognized them as a separate territory. The discovery of silver gave them more pull to demand this status. In the waning days of the James Buchanan administration (1857 - 1861), Buchanan signed the act to make a separate territory of Nevada. In 1864, Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Nevada a state. Nevada points out that it is "battle born" since it became a state during the Civil War.
This trip marks my third trip involving a visit to Nevada. Between the trip to Virginia City and now the capitol, I've really become fascinated with Nevada history. Most people know of Nevada as the state that includes Las Vegas. They think of gambling and not much else when it comes to Nevada. But Nevada is so much more. The state is vast and has beautiful scenery. It has a very colorful history relating to mining and the Old West. I definitely want to study more about Nevada (not including the gambling) when I get back home.
I briefly visited the state library to look through some books related to Nevada history. There is quite a bit about Mark Twain, of course. I also tried to visit the state museum, but it happened to be closed that day.
I had to keep moving east (getting all the bonus points required a stay at a different hotel each night, plus I wanted to make progress in getting home). My next hotel was not too far away. It was in a small city named Fernley. I wanted to take US 50 (note there is no I-50), which cuts across the upper middle section of Nevada. The Nevada portion of this road is hyped as "the loneliest road in the lower 48." I'll have more commentary about this in tomorrow's report, but suffice to say it's all hype. There are other US routes in Nevada (like US 93) and other states that are far more deserving of that title. And yes, I've been on those roads which I would consider even lonelier. California itself (the most populous state in the country) certainly has some of what I would consider lonelier roads.
Fernley is about an hour away from Carson City. It's a stop along I-80, and in order to get to it via US 50 (the "loneliest road in the lower 48") I had to plug in Silver Springs, NV. Otherwise, the GPS would have put me back on I-80. The city has a post office, a few restaurants, some outlying areas, etc., but it is very small in terms of the main part of the city. There are truck stops along I-80. My hotel was a brand new Comfort Suites which charged very reasonable rates since it was new. Parts of it were still under construction. If it was not for the exit on I-80, this hotel definitely would not be needed for such a small city.
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Despite being a small city, there were at least two Mexican restaurants (maybe more), plus even a grocery store specializing in Mexican food. Throughout the west, of course Mexican food is extremely popular. I relented from my diet and had a taco salad. It was good, but I regretted it. I was not used to eating that much, and I felt like I ate far more than I could handle. (In prior years, I would constantly have Mexican food. That was not good for my weight or my wallet.) I decided I would go back to Subway for future meals.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Photos for April 22, 2010 posted
The photos for April 22, 2010 include scenery from a twisty road leading to the coast, a few sets of Northern California beach photos, and the first set of Redwood photos (from Humboldt Redwood State Park on the Avenue of the Giants).
April 25, 2010: Leaving California, Visiting Virginia City, Nevada
This was my last morning in California. Virginia City, Nevada was a little over three hours away. The weather was beautiful and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.
Much of the drive was on California Route 20, with a little bit on I-80. About sixty miles east of Yuba City is historic Nevada City, CA. This is set up to look like the set on an old west movie. Historically, Nevada City was a mining area where gold was discovered. Now it's a place with restaurants and sourvenir shops. The Nevada City Chamber of Commerce and Nevada City Hall web sites have more information.
I stopped into Nevada City briefly. I drove around to look at the shops. Parking was limited and to park outside the main street took some walking. In looking at the shop names, I simply could not really find any reason to stop. I also wanted to get to Virginia City quickly. Had it not been for that, I might have stopped in Nevada City even if I didn't find anything terribly interesting there.
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As I continued east past Nevada City, California Route 20 entered the Tahoe National Forest. There were lots of extremely tall trees. I started seeing bits of snow in the forest, though thankfully nothing on the road. As I drove further, there were lots of snowbanks along the road. Within the forest, there was snow everywhere.
Finally, I got to I-80. The pavement on I-80 was like nothing I had ever seen before on an interstate. It seemed like concrete. It was very loud driving on it and the surface seemed to make it difficult to accelerate. The speed limit was 65. There were mountains on either side of the interstate. They looked gorgeous covered in snow.
As I drove further, there was an electronic sign indicating a major accident further east. The sign said that people would have to take a detour off the interstate at Soda Springs, CA. A tractor-trailer must have turned over to make them actually send people off the interstate. As I got closer, there was a traffic jam and police were directing people to the Soda Springs exit.
One thing I forgot to mention about California is that motorcycle riders seem to be very arrogant during traffic jams. I've seen a little of this in New York, but never to the extent I have seen it in California. They drive up the white broken line separating the lanes, trying to thread themselves through traffic jams. They should be stuck just like regular cars. I can understand passing slow vehicles when traffic is moving, but they should not give themselves special privileges just because they are thinner and smaller than a normal car.
Getting off in Soda Springs, I started to see really high snow banks along the road. In fact, there was even a car smashed into one of the snow banks. There were warning signs about avalanches. The GPS kept trying to make me turn around to get back on the interstate. Of course, I couldn't do that when the police had just sent everyone off the interstate.
View Larger Map
I drove the Donner Pass road through some spectacular mountain scenery. I passed a ski resort where people were skiing. The road wound around a mountain and there were many places to stop off and take pictures. The light was not the best so the pictures are not great. But, you'll be able to have an idea of what I saw.
Once I got back onto I-80, beyond the accident, the mountain scenery began to change. Instead of forests, it became more rocky. It became more of a desert environment. Sagebrush was everywhere and there were few trees. I was definitely getting into the West (even though I was heading east).
View Larger Map
A short time later, I entered Nevada. Immediately I could begin to see the billboards for casinos and other gambling facilities in Reno. Virginia City is not on the interstate. I had to get off at the exit for Carson City (where I would be staying that night) and work my way to Virginia City.
Virginia City is a historical city --- and tourist trap --- like Nevada City in California. However, it is more authentic than Nevada City. The buildings have been around since the 1850s and some of the businesses have the same name as they did then (though I'd venture to guess that ownership has changed over time).
Getting to Nevada City requires driving around steep mountains. The city is located at the top of a mountain, over 6,000 feet above sea level. For the most part, the historic part is just a main street. There are residential sections on either side. While some of the buildings are historical even in the residential sections, most look like average houses.
As it was a weekend, there were lots of tourists present. People could either park at meters or pay to park in a lot. Many of the lots were full.
My first stop was the historic St. Mary's Church, which was one of the earliest Catholic Churches in the area. It was recently refurbished. The church is nice on the inside, but dark. Photographs did not turn out well, even with the flasg turned on. The church had a parking area for people to visit the rest of Virginia City. It was cheaper than the other lots and even better, it went to help the church. It wasn't that much farther to walk either.
There were several saloons and other restaurants. Some people were dressed in period clothing. There were singers in some of the saloons. I visited the "Bucket of Blood" saloon, but the singing was so loud and you could not get anyone's attention to order anything. I quickly left there and went to a quieter restaurant. I had sasparilla (of course) and a guacamole burger.
In looking around the stores, there were both new and used trinkets. I'm not totally sure how some of these people could stay in business because I didn't see a lot of people buying things. There were several stores selling rocks and gems. There were at least two turquoise stores. Nevada has a history related to mining and Virginia City's entire history is focused on mining. So, there would need to be several stores selling rocks.
There were museums for Mark Twain and Ulysses Grant. I didn't see the actual museums. I had no idea Mark Twain came to Virginia City. I mostly associated him with Missouri and never thought he came this far west.
I went off the diet a bit and had an ice cream cone. While the ice cream was good, I basically started to realize I no longer like this kind of food. So, I hopefully won't be getting any more ice cream on this trip. Unfortunately, along with the ice cream cone I had purchased a truffle. It was a Mexican chocolate truffle. I had never heard of Mexican chocolate so I wanted to try it. That was a total waste of calories and money. It had practically no taste to it. Even the texture wasn't good. There were so many other flavors I knew I liked which I could have chosen instead.
After I finished up with Virginia City, I headed to Carson City where my hotel for the night was located. Surprisingly enough, I did not have to go around mountains this time. The road smoothed out and gradually went lower and lower. Although this is the capital city of Nevada, it's a very small and quiet city. It's easy to get around. My hotel was on the same street as the capitol building. I planned to explore Carson City a bit more the next day.
Much of the drive was on California Route 20, with a little bit on I-80. About sixty miles east of Yuba City is historic Nevada City, CA. This is set up to look like the set on an old west movie. Historically, Nevada City was a mining area where gold was discovered. Now it's a place with restaurants and sourvenir shops. The Nevada City Chamber of Commerce and Nevada City Hall web sites have more information.
I stopped into Nevada City briefly. I drove around to look at the shops. Parking was limited and to park outside the main street took some walking. In looking at the shop names, I simply could not really find any reason to stop. I also wanted to get to Virginia City quickly. Had it not been for that, I might have stopped in Nevada City even if I didn't find anything terribly interesting there.
View Larger Map
As I continued east past Nevada City, California Route 20 entered the Tahoe National Forest. There were lots of extremely tall trees. I started seeing bits of snow in the forest, though thankfully nothing on the road. As I drove further, there were lots of snowbanks along the road. Within the forest, there was snow everywhere.
Finally, I got to I-80. The pavement on I-80 was like nothing I had ever seen before on an interstate. It seemed like concrete. It was very loud driving on it and the surface seemed to make it difficult to accelerate. The speed limit was 65. There were mountains on either side of the interstate. They looked gorgeous covered in snow.
As I drove further, there was an electronic sign indicating a major accident further east. The sign said that people would have to take a detour off the interstate at Soda Springs, CA. A tractor-trailer must have turned over to make them actually send people off the interstate. As I got closer, there was a traffic jam and police were directing people to the Soda Springs exit.
One thing I forgot to mention about California is that motorcycle riders seem to be very arrogant during traffic jams. I've seen a little of this in New York, but never to the extent I have seen it in California. They drive up the white broken line separating the lanes, trying to thread themselves through traffic jams. They should be stuck just like regular cars. I can understand passing slow vehicles when traffic is moving, but they should not give themselves special privileges just because they are thinner and smaller than a normal car.
Getting off in Soda Springs, I started to see really high snow banks along the road. In fact, there was even a car smashed into one of the snow banks. There were warning signs about avalanches. The GPS kept trying to make me turn around to get back on the interstate. Of course, I couldn't do that when the police had just sent everyone off the interstate.
View Larger Map
I drove the Donner Pass road through some spectacular mountain scenery. I passed a ski resort where people were skiing. The road wound around a mountain and there were many places to stop off and take pictures. The light was not the best so the pictures are not great. But, you'll be able to have an idea of what I saw.
Once I got back onto I-80, beyond the accident, the mountain scenery began to change. Instead of forests, it became more rocky. It became more of a desert environment. Sagebrush was everywhere and there were few trees. I was definitely getting into the West (even though I was heading east).
View Larger Map
A short time later, I entered Nevada. Immediately I could begin to see the billboards for casinos and other gambling facilities in Reno. Virginia City is not on the interstate. I had to get off at the exit for Carson City (where I would be staying that night) and work my way to Virginia City.
Virginia City is a historical city --- and tourist trap --- like Nevada City in California. However, it is more authentic than Nevada City. The buildings have been around since the 1850s and some of the businesses have the same name as they did then (though I'd venture to guess that ownership has changed over time).
Getting to Nevada City requires driving around steep mountains. The city is located at the top of a mountain, over 6,000 feet above sea level. For the most part, the historic part is just a main street. There are residential sections on either side. While some of the buildings are historical even in the residential sections, most look like average houses.
As it was a weekend, there were lots of tourists present. People could either park at meters or pay to park in a lot. Many of the lots were full.
My first stop was the historic St. Mary's Church, which was one of the earliest Catholic Churches in the area. It was recently refurbished. The church is nice on the inside, but dark. Photographs did not turn out well, even with the flasg turned on. The church had a parking area for people to visit the rest of Virginia City. It was cheaper than the other lots and even better, it went to help the church. It wasn't that much farther to walk either.
There were several saloons and other restaurants. Some people were dressed in period clothing. There were singers in some of the saloons. I visited the "Bucket of Blood" saloon, but the singing was so loud and you could not get anyone's attention to order anything. I quickly left there and went to a quieter restaurant. I had sasparilla (of course) and a guacamole burger.
In looking around the stores, there were both new and used trinkets. I'm not totally sure how some of these people could stay in business because I didn't see a lot of people buying things. There were several stores selling rocks and gems. There were at least two turquoise stores. Nevada has a history related to mining and Virginia City's entire history is focused on mining. So, there would need to be several stores selling rocks.
There were museums for Mark Twain and Ulysses Grant. I didn't see the actual museums. I had no idea Mark Twain came to Virginia City. I mostly associated him with Missouri and never thought he came this far west.
I went off the diet a bit and had an ice cream cone. While the ice cream was good, I basically started to realize I no longer like this kind of food. So, I hopefully won't be getting any more ice cream on this trip. Unfortunately, along with the ice cream cone I had purchased a truffle. It was a Mexican chocolate truffle. I had never heard of Mexican chocolate so I wanted to try it. That was a total waste of calories and money. It had practically no taste to it. Even the texture wasn't good. There were so many other flavors I knew I liked which I could have chosen instead.
After I finished up with Virginia City, I headed to Carson City where my hotel for the night was located. Surprisingly enough, I did not have to go around mountains this time. The road smoothed out and gradually went lower and lower. Although this is the capital city of Nevada, it's a very small and quiet city. It's easy to get around. My hotel was on the same street as the capitol building. I planned to explore Carson City a bit more the next day.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Photos from April 17 - 18 added
I've added pictures from the Ronald Reagan Library, San Buenaventura Mission (from 1782), and photos from April 18, 2010 which include the San Buenaventura Beach, and palm trees.
The photos from the Reagan Library are not that great because I was quite tired. But for indoor photos, flash was not allowed and lighting was not that great. I've adjusted some of the darker ones in Photoshop, but if it was a bad picture to begin with, Photoshop can only do so much.
The photos from the Reagan Library are not that great because I was quite tired. But for indoor photos, flash was not allowed and lighting was not that great. I've adjusted some of the darker ones in Photoshop, but if it was a bad picture to begin with, Photoshop can only do so much.
April 24, 2010: Heading East, Officially on the Way Home
After having some enjoyable times along the California (and briefly Oregon) Coast, it was now time to officially turn around and begin the long journey east. In one sense the trip really begins now. The hard deadline for the conference is now over. While I did set a return date for May 22nd and I do have something I want to see in Oklahoma on May 14th, these are "soft" deadlines. I could always miss the OK event and I could always extend the rental car, though it's expensive to do that.
One thing I forgot to mention in previous posts was that I could somewhat see the allure of the Redwoods as an idea for the second half of the movie Return of the Jedi (1983). The premise was ridiculous: people riding flying "speeder bikes" at super high speed through dense forests of giant trees (obviously with the actors sitting on a model bike with a blue screen background). But I could still see the allure of moving a camera through the Redwood forests and then speeding up the film to keep viewers on the edge of their seats.
I also forgot to note in yesterday's post that I did fall for the tourist trap of driving through a live Redwood tree. It was only $5. For all the hype, it was underwhelming. The tree also was not nearly as big as I expected, particularly compared to other trees. In fact, despite having a small car, I was really afraid my mirrors would get scratched or even taken off when trying to squeeze through. After I finished, someone went through with an SUV and just made it.
Fortuna is inland. I did plan to take one last look at the Pacific Ocean. It would be a forty minute ride north to do that. Then I'd add an extra forty minutes to my destination. However, the day was so dreary and overcast that I figured it would be a waste of time as the beaches would probably either have a lot of fog or just be too dreary. It was better to remember what I saw from the previous days.
My destination was Yuba City, CA. Beyond going to church, there was nothing particular that I wanted to see there. It was simply a reasonably priced hotel. I did recall many times seeing the name Yuba City on the map and thinking it was an interesting name. Yuba City is 4 1/2 hours from Fortuna. My next tourist attraction was Virginia City, Nevada (staying in Carson City, the state capital), but it was just too much to go all the way there in one day. And, as you'll see in the report for April 25th, it's a good thing I didn't try it.
View Larger Map
Much of the ride to Yuba City involved going south on US 101, covering the same territory I had covered Thursday. However, the sun was out (on Thursday it was mostly overcast) and I somehow saw a lot more than I had seen going up. There were spots where there were Redwood trees along US 101. Somehow, I didn't notice that going north.
The road twisted and turned quite a bit and cell phone service was generally not available. I noticed signs for other tourist traps allowing people to drive through a living Redwood tree. So, the one I saw was not the only one despite some of the advertising to the contrary.
Gas became significantly cheaper as I left the coastal area. It ranged from $3.05 to $3.11 rather than $3.25 or $3.29 along the CA coast.
One thing I noticed throughout my time in California, particularly in the north, were the number of hitchhikers. I have seen hitchhikers throughout my travels, but never this many.
As I left US 101, there were various small towns and at least one very beautiful lake along the way. The mountains I passed through were gorgeous. Abruptly, the mountains went away and I came into totally flat land with farms. Things didn't smooth out to rolling hills first; it was just very abrupt.
Yuba City is a fairly flat area. Apparently, Yuba City and Marysville next door were part of the gold mining area. However, the modern tourist area related to mining is Nevada City, about sixty miles east of Yuba City. For the most part, Yuba City (the parts that I saw) were just a series of shopping areas with big box stores. The only thing lacking was a Walmart. I wanted to find a Walmart and looked it up in the GPS. The GPS took me to a now vacant building which looked like it could have once housed a Walmart supercenter.
This would be my last night in California. The next day I would be heading further east into Nevada.
One thing I forgot to mention in previous posts was that I could somewhat see the allure of the Redwoods as an idea for the second half of the movie Return of the Jedi (1983). The premise was ridiculous: people riding flying "speeder bikes" at super high speed through dense forests of giant trees (obviously with the actors sitting on a model bike with a blue screen background). But I could still see the allure of moving a camera through the Redwood forests and then speeding up the film to keep viewers on the edge of their seats.
I also forgot to note in yesterday's post that I did fall for the tourist trap of driving through a live Redwood tree. It was only $5. For all the hype, it was underwhelming. The tree also was not nearly as big as I expected, particularly compared to other trees. In fact, despite having a small car, I was really afraid my mirrors would get scratched or even taken off when trying to squeeze through. After I finished, someone went through with an SUV and just made it.
Fortuna is inland. I did plan to take one last look at the Pacific Ocean. It would be a forty minute ride north to do that. Then I'd add an extra forty minutes to my destination. However, the day was so dreary and overcast that I figured it would be a waste of time as the beaches would probably either have a lot of fog or just be too dreary. It was better to remember what I saw from the previous days.
My destination was Yuba City, CA. Beyond going to church, there was nothing particular that I wanted to see there. It was simply a reasonably priced hotel. I did recall many times seeing the name Yuba City on the map and thinking it was an interesting name. Yuba City is 4 1/2 hours from Fortuna. My next tourist attraction was Virginia City, Nevada (staying in Carson City, the state capital), but it was just too much to go all the way there in one day. And, as you'll see in the report for April 25th, it's a good thing I didn't try it.
View Larger Map
Much of the ride to Yuba City involved going south on US 101, covering the same territory I had covered Thursday. However, the sun was out (on Thursday it was mostly overcast) and I somehow saw a lot more than I had seen going up. There were spots where there were Redwood trees along US 101. Somehow, I didn't notice that going north.
The road twisted and turned quite a bit and cell phone service was generally not available. I noticed signs for other tourist traps allowing people to drive through a living Redwood tree. So, the one I saw was not the only one despite some of the advertising to the contrary.
Gas became significantly cheaper as I left the coastal area. It ranged from $3.05 to $3.11 rather than $3.25 or $3.29 along the CA coast.
One thing I noticed throughout my time in California, particularly in the north, were the number of hitchhikers. I have seen hitchhikers throughout my travels, but never this many.
As I left US 101, there were various small towns and at least one very beautiful lake along the way. The mountains I passed through were gorgeous. Abruptly, the mountains went away and I came into totally flat land with farms. Things didn't smooth out to rolling hills first; it was just very abrupt.
Yuba City is a fairly flat area. Apparently, Yuba City and Marysville next door were part of the gold mining area. However, the modern tourist area related to mining is Nevada City, about sixty miles east of Yuba City. For the most part, Yuba City (the parts that I saw) were just a series of shopping areas with big box stores. The only thing lacking was a Walmart. I wanted to find a Walmart and looked it up in the GPS. The GPS took me to a now vacant building which looked like it could have once housed a Walmart supercenter.
This would be my last night in California. The next day I would be heading further east into Nevada.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
April 23, 2010: Southern Oregon and Redwood National Park
While I did not originally plan to visit Oregon in this trip, I was only about twenty miles from the California/Oregon line and about 26 miles from the nearest city in Oregon. I knew from researching the state for my 2008 visit that southern Oregon's beaches are beautiful. So, I had to visit Oregon in the morning. In the afternoon, I would see the Redwood National Park.
View Larger Map
As I drove up US 101, near the state line but still on the California side, the southbound lanes of the road were blocked off with traffic cones and people had to proceed through what looked like toll booths. Was California THAT broke that they were going to make people pay a toll to enter the state via a rural US route? I'd find out when I left Oregon.
As I entered Oregon, one thing I immediately noticed was the sudden decrease in gas prices. Gas was around $3.25/gallon in CA, but only $3.02 to $3.07 per gallon in Oregon. And, like New Jersey, Oregon even requires gas stations to have their employees pump the gas for the customer. Too bad I had recently filled up in expensive California.
This is my second visit to Oregon. It could be referred to as a "token visit" since I did not go far into the state, but at least I did have a destination....a beach. This is better than my brief visits to Iowa in 2007 where I bought gas, postcards, and ate dinner. Eventually I'll need to make a real visit to Iowa with an actual purpose.
I found a state beach in Brookings. As I had known from my research, it was beautiful. There was deep blue water and large rocks. The parking area was on a cliff with a paved walking path leading down to the beach. This worked well because you could get nice pictures from the top.
As is usual for the beaches in Oregon (as well as Washington), there were numerous logs and pieces of logs to walk through as one first enters the beach. Unlike northern California beaches, the wood was not odd shaped.
Of course the water was very cold, but I did wade in it a bit. It was probably the most beautiful beach I had seen so far on my trip. According to the signs, there were crabs living around the rocks, but despite looking quite a bit I found none.
After spending some time at the beach and taking lots of pictures, I had to get moving in order to see the Redwoods. But, I had trouble finding my way back. The cliff was covered in foliage and the walkway was well hidden because of it. After walking around quite a bit and going beyond the location of the walkway, I finally remembered the configuration of the logs near the path.
After getting back into California, I was able to find out why all vehicles were directed off the road. I was anticipating having to pay anywhere from $1 to $5 to reenter California. However, it had nothing to do with money. This was an agriculture inspection. I was asked if I had any plants, fruits, or vegetables in the car. Since I didn't have anything, I said that I didn't. But then I remembered I did have lemons that I brought from NY. The inspector seemed annoyed when I mentioned lemons, saying they were safe this time of year and that I could move on.
I did not do my research properly about Redwood National Park. Unlike a national park such as Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, Arches, etc., it is not a place where you have various staffed entrances and have to pay or show a pass. It is simply a geographic area where certain parts are protected and there are information stations. I had asked the GPS to find an entrance location. As I saw signs for Redwood National Park, I was nervous about actually entering without having some sort of receipt or paper that I had permission to enter. That wasted a lot of time as I later found out that this was not necessary.
On the way to finding a park entry station, I stopped at a beach near Crescent City to take pictures. I got pictures of seagulls plus a red squirrel with a very thin tail (very different from the gray squirrels we have with very bushy tails). I chatted with a couple visiting from Nebraska. (This is now the second time I've come across a couple from Nebraska. The first time was at EWTN in Alabama.) They saw the east coast license plate on my car and I explained I had been to a conference in San Francisco. They were a little surprised that my job would let me take the time to drive out, but I explained that I have my own business and was able to give myself permission. They thought that was pretty good. They deduced that I was not married and pointed out that once I am, there won't be any more trips like this, so I should enjoy it while I can. In talking further, apparently they are really interested in light houses. They did their research and drove out to see a particular lighthouse....only to find it was closed that day for cleaning purposes.
When I finally got to a ranger station for the park, I was given a map and told where the best places were to find big Redwood trees. One particular area was named for LadyBird Johnson, wife of President Lyndon Johnson. That area had some very impressive tall trees. Not all of them were thick; some were very thin but very tall. The road twisted and turned, with very steep climbs. As I'd stop in turn out areas to take pictures, I'd watch other vehicles flooring it going uphill amongst the twists and turns. Thankfully, I did not hear any sounds of vehicles crashing into trees.
People were free to hike into the forest, but there were also warning signs for bears and mountain lions. As I was alone, I decided to just stick to the main road.
After spending quite a bit of time at the area named for LadyBird Johnson, I visited the Prairie Creek State Park, which is both part of Redwood National Park and a California State Park. This area had trees that were about the same height, but most were much rounder and wider. The forest was thick. Once the sky became overcast, even when I set the flash to its highest power, I could not get very good photos.
Prairie Creek also had an area to view the ocean from a very high cliff. I briefly visited that area. However, because everything had clouded over, photos were not good and even the view itself wasn't that nice. However, it was still interesting to look at the ocean from that far up.
I decided to stay in Fortuna, CA, for the night. This was around ninety minutes from where I was. That's a fairly short ride as I usually go at least three or four hours to the next hotel. However, I wanted to get some rest and not drive in the dark, particularly knowing that the road twists and turns so much. It's pretty during the day, but could be problematic at night.
View Larger Map
Heading south toward Fortuna, I noticed that California decided not to put an exit on US 101 South for the city. They have multiple exits on US 101 North. This is a city of 10,000 people, so it really makes sense to have exits on both directions of the road. I had to drive eight miles further south, then get back on US 101 North to get to Fortuna. While I understand building exits costs money, for a state that is focused on the environment, driving an extra sixteen miles (eight miles south and then doubling back eight miles north again) wastes a lot of fuel when spread over a lot of people. It's not environmentally friendly.
View Larger Map
As I drove up US 101, near the state line but still on the California side, the southbound lanes of the road were blocked off with traffic cones and people had to proceed through what looked like toll booths. Was California THAT broke that they were going to make people pay a toll to enter the state via a rural US route? I'd find out when I left Oregon.
As I entered Oregon, one thing I immediately noticed was the sudden decrease in gas prices. Gas was around $3.25/gallon in CA, but only $3.02 to $3.07 per gallon in Oregon. And, like New Jersey, Oregon even requires gas stations to have their employees pump the gas for the customer. Too bad I had recently filled up in expensive California.
This is my second visit to Oregon. It could be referred to as a "token visit" since I did not go far into the state, but at least I did have a destination....a beach. This is better than my brief visits to Iowa in 2007 where I bought gas, postcards, and ate dinner. Eventually I'll need to make a real visit to Iowa with an actual purpose.
I found a state beach in Brookings. As I had known from my research, it was beautiful. There was deep blue water and large rocks. The parking area was on a cliff with a paved walking path leading down to the beach. This worked well because you could get nice pictures from the top.
As is usual for the beaches in Oregon (as well as Washington), there were numerous logs and pieces of logs to walk through as one first enters the beach. Unlike northern California beaches, the wood was not odd shaped.
Of course the water was very cold, but I did wade in it a bit. It was probably the most beautiful beach I had seen so far on my trip. According to the signs, there were crabs living around the rocks, but despite looking quite a bit I found none.
After spending some time at the beach and taking lots of pictures, I had to get moving in order to see the Redwoods. But, I had trouble finding my way back. The cliff was covered in foliage and the walkway was well hidden because of it. After walking around quite a bit and going beyond the location of the walkway, I finally remembered the configuration of the logs near the path.
After getting back into California, I was able to find out why all vehicles were directed off the road. I was anticipating having to pay anywhere from $1 to $5 to reenter California. However, it had nothing to do with money. This was an agriculture inspection. I was asked if I had any plants, fruits, or vegetables in the car. Since I didn't have anything, I said that I didn't. But then I remembered I did have lemons that I brought from NY. The inspector seemed annoyed when I mentioned lemons, saying they were safe this time of year and that I could move on.
I did not do my research properly about Redwood National Park. Unlike a national park such as Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, Arches, etc., it is not a place where you have various staffed entrances and have to pay or show a pass. It is simply a geographic area where certain parts are protected and there are information stations. I had asked the GPS to find an entrance location. As I saw signs for Redwood National Park, I was nervous about actually entering without having some sort of receipt or paper that I had permission to enter. That wasted a lot of time as I later found out that this was not necessary.
On the way to finding a park entry station, I stopped at a beach near Crescent City to take pictures. I got pictures of seagulls plus a red squirrel with a very thin tail (very different from the gray squirrels we have with very bushy tails). I chatted with a couple visiting from Nebraska. (This is now the second time I've come across a couple from Nebraska. The first time was at EWTN in Alabama.) They saw the east coast license plate on my car and I explained I had been to a conference in San Francisco. They were a little surprised that my job would let me take the time to drive out, but I explained that I have my own business and was able to give myself permission. They thought that was pretty good. They deduced that I was not married and pointed out that once I am, there won't be any more trips like this, so I should enjoy it while I can. In talking further, apparently they are really interested in light houses. They did their research and drove out to see a particular lighthouse....only to find it was closed that day for cleaning purposes.
When I finally got to a ranger station for the park, I was given a map and told where the best places were to find big Redwood trees. One particular area was named for LadyBird Johnson, wife of President Lyndon Johnson. That area had some very impressive tall trees. Not all of them were thick; some were very thin but very tall. The road twisted and turned, with very steep climbs. As I'd stop in turn out areas to take pictures, I'd watch other vehicles flooring it going uphill amongst the twists and turns. Thankfully, I did not hear any sounds of vehicles crashing into trees.
People were free to hike into the forest, but there were also warning signs for bears and mountain lions. As I was alone, I decided to just stick to the main road.
After spending quite a bit of time at the area named for LadyBird Johnson, I visited the Prairie Creek State Park, which is both part of Redwood National Park and a California State Park. This area had trees that were about the same height, but most were much rounder and wider. The forest was thick. Once the sky became overcast, even when I set the flash to its highest power, I could not get very good photos.
Prairie Creek also had an area to view the ocean from a very high cliff. I briefly visited that area. However, because everything had clouded over, photos were not good and even the view itself wasn't that nice. However, it was still interesting to look at the ocean from that far up.
I decided to stay in Fortuna, CA, for the night. This was around ninety minutes from where I was. That's a fairly short ride as I usually go at least three or four hours to the next hotel. However, I wanted to get some rest and not drive in the dark, particularly knowing that the road twists and turns so much. It's pretty during the day, but could be problematic at night.
View Larger Map
Heading south toward Fortuna, I noticed that California decided not to put an exit on US 101 South for the city. They have multiple exits on US 101 North. This is a city of 10,000 people, so it really makes sense to have exits on both directions of the road. I had to drive eight miles further south, then get back on US 101 North to get to Fortuna. While I understand building exits costs money, for a state that is focused on the environment, driving an extra sixteen miles (eight miles south and then doubling back eight miles north again) wastes a lot of fuel when spread over a lot of people. It's not environmentally friendly.
Kolob Canyon Photos Found, Death Valley Photos Added
I located and have posted the Kolob Canyon/Zion National Park photos.
I also posted photos from California's Death Valley National Park. There are still many more sets of photos to post from California.
I also posted photos from California's Death Valley National Park. There are still many more sets of photos to post from California.
Monday, April 26, 2010
April 22, 2010: Northern CA Coast and Redwoods (Ukiah, CA to Crescent City, CA)
Today was intended to be a rest day though it turned out to be another day with lots to see and do. I did at least get to sleep until 7:30am instead of getting up at 6am as I had the previous three days.
As I didn't have Internet access, I had to pick my next hotel "blindly" and make plans for the day based on the brochures at the hotel. I chose an Econolodge in Crescent City, CA since it was close to Redwood National Park.
I wanted to drive along the coast on the way up. I needed to get to California Route 1. It was only about 30+ miles to the coast, but because the road twisted and turned so much, it took an hour. There were spectacular mountain views along the way. This was the first of many drives with numerous sharp turns. I used to think the twists and turns of West Virginia, Virginia, and the Ozarks in Missouri were tough. Those states have nothing on the twists and turns in Northern California.
View Larger Map
The first few beaches I saw were state parks. They wanted $8 (cash only) just to park there. I decided not to do this because I would probably only be a few minutes and that was quite a lot. As I continued north, I found plenty of parking areas along the road with free access to the beach.
The water was freezing cold and of course nobody was swimming. On a number of beaches I visited, there were typically large rock formations in the water, plus chunks of odd shaped wood. The wood is typically white or gray in color.
After seeing a few beaches, I decided to visit the Humboldt State Park, which was along the Avenue of the Giants. The road is named for the Redwood trees. I took a number of pictures of very tall and wide Redwood trees and the photos will hopefully be posted soon.
View Larger Map
I passed through a few cities along the way such as Eureka, Fortuna, etc. I had planned on staying in one of these cities on Wednesday night but ruled them out because they were so far away. Beyond that, US 101 (after being joined by California 1) twisted and turned so much that it would have been difficult driving these roads at night.
View Larger Map
There were a number of beautiful views of the ocean from US 101. In particular, there was one I really liked. The road angled in just the right way and it seemed as though 3/4 of what I could see was ocean. Often, US 101 was along cliffs with great ocean views. But, it also moved inland fairly often too. Sometimes it would run right through groves of tall Redwood trees.
As I drove further, I noticed something familiar to my 2008 visit to Washington state. There were all sorts of signs for "Bigfoot" plus various shops selling chainsaw carvings. These are very intricate designs, typically in the shape of animals such as bears. These were all over the Washington state coast and their popularity evidently extends into northern California.
I saw a number of tourist traps along the way, such as ads to drive through a hollowed out but still living Redwood tree, the "mystery trees," the "tree house" (in a Redwood), etc.
It was fairly cold and sometimes windy all the way up. When I got to the hotel, it seemed very cold inside. I needed to turn on the heat, but the heat wasn't working. I had to get the hotel staff to fix the heater. However, in fixing it, there was no way to turn it off. By the next morning, it was 80 degrees in the room.
As I didn't have Internet access, I had to pick my next hotel "blindly" and make plans for the day based on the brochures at the hotel. I chose an Econolodge in Crescent City, CA since it was close to Redwood National Park.
I wanted to drive along the coast on the way up. I needed to get to California Route 1. It was only about 30+ miles to the coast, but because the road twisted and turned so much, it took an hour. There were spectacular mountain views along the way. This was the first of many drives with numerous sharp turns. I used to think the twists and turns of West Virginia, Virginia, and the Ozarks in Missouri were tough. Those states have nothing on the twists and turns in Northern California.
View Larger Map
The first few beaches I saw were state parks. They wanted $8 (cash only) just to park there. I decided not to do this because I would probably only be a few minutes and that was quite a lot. As I continued north, I found plenty of parking areas along the road with free access to the beach.
The water was freezing cold and of course nobody was swimming. On a number of beaches I visited, there were typically large rock formations in the water, plus chunks of odd shaped wood. The wood is typically white or gray in color.
After seeing a few beaches, I decided to visit the Humboldt State Park, which was along the Avenue of the Giants. The road is named for the Redwood trees. I took a number of pictures of very tall and wide Redwood trees and the photos will hopefully be posted soon.
View Larger Map
I passed through a few cities along the way such as Eureka, Fortuna, etc. I had planned on staying in one of these cities on Wednesday night but ruled them out because they were so far away. Beyond that, US 101 (after being joined by California 1) twisted and turned so much that it would have been difficult driving these roads at night.
View Larger Map
There were a number of beautiful views of the ocean from US 101. In particular, there was one I really liked. The road angled in just the right way and it seemed as though 3/4 of what I could see was ocean. Often, US 101 was along cliffs with great ocean views. But, it also moved inland fairly often too. Sometimes it would run right through groves of tall Redwood trees.
As I drove further, I noticed something familiar to my 2008 visit to Washington state. There were all sorts of signs for "Bigfoot" plus various shops selling chainsaw carvings. These are very intricate designs, typically in the shape of animals such as bears. These were all over the Washington state coast and their popularity evidently extends into northern California.
I saw a number of tourist traps along the way, such as ads to drive through a hollowed out but still living Redwood tree, the "mystery trees," the "tree house" (in a Redwood), etc.
It was fairly cold and sometimes windy all the way up. When I got to the hotel, it seemed very cold inside. I needed to turn on the heat, but the heat wasn't working. I had to get the hotel staff to fix the heater. However, in fixing it, there was no way to turn it off. By the next morning, it was 80 degrees in the room.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Trip Maps
On the right side (below the photo album link), you'll see links for maps. These are the maps of the trip broken down into groups of days. Google will not allow a large number of points on a map so I have to separate these into sets. Keep checking that area for more maps.
April 21, 2010: Conference Day 3 and Leaving San Francisco
Once again today it took about two hours to get out of the hotel. It was cold again today, though it wasn't raining in the morning, at least. As I was going to be at the conference for a full day, I was prepared to have another big parking bill.
I came to the realization that I liked being inspired at this conference with non-technical discussions. I could always learn the technical aspects via web sites, books, and YouTube videos. But I needed inspiration to make use of the technical items I would learn. There were two competing first sessions about business related areas. I'm glad they were posting the audio so I could hear the one I missed.
Lunch was not fun. I wanted to go to the Tex Mex restaurant I couldn't find on Monday. I got totally lost. It started to rain and I was carrying my laptop. Fortunately, I had a plastic bag in my pocket to shield the laptop (I didn't have an umbrella). My second choice was a Thai restaurant. When I found that, I noticed a line going out the door for people waiting to be seated. I skipped that one and then located the Tex Mex restaurant. They too had a line. Had I waited, there is no way I would have gotten back to the conference in time. After walking around and asking people for directions, I found myself in some very seedy sections of the city. I was not really comfortable holding a laptop and being a stranger. Finally, a city construction worker explained how to get back to the convention center. I found a Subway restaurant for a quick meal.
In the middle of the day, the sessions stop and there are speakers in a large auditorium intended for all participants of the conference. Today, the Director of New Media for the White House spoke, along with the CIO of the New York State Senate. Drupal is being used for both the White House and NYS Senate sites. While Drupal is already in use for major media companies (LucasArts, Lifetime Channel, MTV, etc.), having two big government web sites is a major coup. The CIO of the NYS Senate pointed out that in the next few years, many state agencies across the country, along with many municipalities, will be overhauling their web sites. The opportunities are endless for people who want to focus on these areas. Among other niches, I would be interested in local government sites, being that I work on the Round Lake web site. But, aside from just doing government sites, I want to create sites about areas that might integrate information from local government sites. While there are others doing this sort of thing for metropolitan areas, I would of course develop something unique that would complement rather than compete. But, I also have other niches in mind as well.
The final sessions were not very remarkable. As I had gotten no more than 5 1/2 to six hours of sleep each night, I was getting exhausted and looking forward to the end of the conference. There was supposed to be a group meeting for freelancers to share ideas, but it never seemed to materialize. The last session ended at 5:15, while sessions the previous days when until 6:30. Even though I spent one less hour at the parking garage than I did on Monday, the final bill still came up to $28. So, all in all, I paid $77 in parking fees for the three days at the conference. This was really quite a bit. In fact, even with taxes, no individual hotel stay for the three days cost that much.
I was definitely looking forward to getting away from SF and its expensive parking fees. I am sure there are a number of great museums and other places to see, but I couldn't justify the cost of parking beyond what I had already paid (and even that was difficult to justify).
I typed the address for the next hotel into the GPS while still in the parking garage. The GPS is unable to receive satellite signals inside a parking garage. But, by being in a garage, it seems to be unable to get a signal for a long time after leaving the garage. I knew how to navigate to US 101 and head north. I basically had to follow US 101 north for my next hotel. It seemed the GPS got a signal just after I got on US 101. It instructed me to get off US 101. I stupidly complied, even though I had looked at this route on Google maps and saw that I could take US 101 most of the way. The GPS took me all over San Francisco, adding lots of time to the trip. At one point I got caught in gridlock traffic along with a number of other cars. The light was green when I went, but I got stuck in the intersection because nothing was moving. The cars who could travel were headed right towards me, blaring their horns, ready to slam right into the passenger side of the car. I was able to angle the car and just move forward enough to be out of the intersection....but the red light had a giant camera on it. I certainly do not like going through red lights, but obviously in this case it was either do it or risk injury to myself or someone else. I'm wondering if SF will give me a ticket for a minimum of $370 for that? (On the other hand, there were so many cars that my license plate was likely obscured from the camera.) If they do, I probably would go back to SF to fight it in court. This whole mess could have been avoided if I had just ignored the obnoxious GPS and stayed on US 101.
In the end, after taking me through more of SF than I ever wanted to see, the GPS brought me right back to US 101, just in time to travel over the Golden Gate Bridge. As I was heading northbound, there was thankfully no toll.
While SF is fairly flat, the surrounding land (after crossing the Golden Gate Bridge) is mountainous. It's quite a sudden change. I had decided to eat at a Mexican restaurant. The GPS directed me to an exit for San Rafael (I think) which involved taking a very twisty road to the bottom of the mountain. I was very concerned about whether this car could successfully go back up the mountain once I wanted to get back to US 101.
After getting to the bottom, of course it turned out that the Mexican restaurant was no longer in business (or had moved). I needed to turn around to get back to US 101. I had to take a side road to make a turn. The side road suddenly became very steep. It was so steep that it was as if I was looking straight up. It was so steep that I could not back down. I was getting very nervous about whether the car would be able to climb this or not. But then it got worse. The street I was on was a dead end and the only way to go was to take a left turn. I had visions of the car toppling over as I tried this. Thankfully, it did not. I was driving at such an angle that I really was surprised that all four wheels stayed on the pavement. (Of course, other cars were actually parked on this road, though they likely were using their parking brakes.) Anyway, at the next turn I was able to easily go down the hill and get back to the main road.
On the way back to US 101, I found a Chinese restaurant. I decided to try it. In looking over the menu, I decided to try something different...Mongolian food. They had a few Mongolian dishes and warned that these are VERY spicy. I tried it anyway. I like spicy food. This was a pricy restaurant. While many Chinese meals come with rice (either plain or pork fried), this restaurant wanted $6.00 just for a side of rice. The waitress tried to get me to order rice but I told her I'd pass if it was not included. She gave me rice anyway (I noticed the noodles that supposedly came with the meal were not present, so likely they were out of them and had to give me rice instead). Thankfully, I did not get charged for the rice. But, the meal was delicious. It was bits of beef with vegetables. It definitely was spicy, but not too spicy for me. It was perfect. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone who has a problem with spicy foods, though. Personally, just as I love Thai food, I definitely want to try more Mongolian food.
As I got back to US 101, things became more flat. I did not have to go up another mountain to get on. The main road basically went right into US 101.
Normally, I stay at hotels at least three or four hours away from the place I had been during the day. But in this case, I was running on very little sleep. I got a hotel in Ukiah, CA. This was just over two hours away from San Francisco. It allowed me to have a reasonable travel time and get some much needed rest. When I arrived there, it was just about 9pm. The clerk said he hoped I had had dinner because everything was closed by then.
View Larger Map
I had a very good signal for the Internet, but for whatever reason, my computer did not want to get online. Although this was annoying in terms of determining the hotel for the next night, it was good in that I had an excuse to catch up on sleep. If I had Internet access, I'd have spent at least two or three more hours between email, blogging, uploading photos, looking at maps, etc.
I came to the realization that I liked being inspired at this conference with non-technical discussions. I could always learn the technical aspects via web sites, books, and YouTube videos. But I needed inspiration to make use of the technical items I would learn. There were two competing first sessions about business related areas. I'm glad they were posting the audio so I could hear the one I missed.
Lunch was not fun. I wanted to go to the Tex Mex restaurant I couldn't find on Monday. I got totally lost. It started to rain and I was carrying my laptop. Fortunately, I had a plastic bag in my pocket to shield the laptop (I didn't have an umbrella). My second choice was a Thai restaurant. When I found that, I noticed a line going out the door for people waiting to be seated. I skipped that one and then located the Tex Mex restaurant. They too had a line. Had I waited, there is no way I would have gotten back to the conference in time. After walking around and asking people for directions, I found myself in some very seedy sections of the city. I was not really comfortable holding a laptop and being a stranger. Finally, a city construction worker explained how to get back to the convention center. I found a Subway restaurant for a quick meal.
In the middle of the day, the sessions stop and there are speakers in a large auditorium intended for all participants of the conference. Today, the Director of New Media for the White House spoke, along with the CIO of the New York State Senate. Drupal is being used for both the White House and NYS Senate sites. While Drupal is already in use for major media companies (LucasArts, Lifetime Channel, MTV, etc.), having two big government web sites is a major coup. The CIO of the NYS Senate pointed out that in the next few years, many state agencies across the country, along with many municipalities, will be overhauling their web sites. The opportunities are endless for people who want to focus on these areas. Among other niches, I would be interested in local government sites, being that I work on the Round Lake web site. But, aside from just doing government sites, I want to create sites about areas that might integrate information from local government sites. While there are others doing this sort of thing for metropolitan areas, I would of course develop something unique that would complement rather than compete. But, I also have other niches in mind as well.
The final sessions were not very remarkable. As I had gotten no more than 5 1/2 to six hours of sleep each night, I was getting exhausted and looking forward to the end of the conference. There was supposed to be a group meeting for freelancers to share ideas, but it never seemed to materialize. The last session ended at 5:15, while sessions the previous days when until 6:30. Even though I spent one less hour at the parking garage than I did on Monday, the final bill still came up to $28. So, all in all, I paid $77 in parking fees for the three days at the conference. This was really quite a bit. In fact, even with taxes, no individual hotel stay for the three days cost that much.
I was definitely looking forward to getting away from SF and its expensive parking fees. I am sure there are a number of great museums and other places to see, but I couldn't justify the cost of parking beyond what I had already paid (and even that was difficult to justify).
I typed the address for the next hotel into the GPS while still in the parking garage. The GPS is unable to receive satellite signals inside a parking garage. But, by being in a garage, it seems to be unable to get a signal for a long time after leaving the garage. I knew how to navigate to US 101 and head north. I basically had to follow US 101 north for my next hotel. It seemed the GPS got a signal just after I got on US 101. It instructed me to get off US 101. I stupidly complied, even though I had looked at this route on Google maps and saw that I could take US 101 most of the way. The GPS took me all over San Francisco, adding lots of time to the trip. At one point I got caught in gridlock traffic along with a number of other cars. The light was green when I went, but I got stuck in the intersection because nothing was moving. The cars who could travel were headed right towards me, blaring their horns, ready to slam right into the passenger side of the car. I was able to angle the car and just move forward enough to be out of the intersection....but the red light had a giant camera on it. I certainly do not like going through red lights, but obviously in this case it was either do it or risk injury to myself or someone else. I'm wondering if SF will give me a ticket for a minimum of $370 for that? (On the other hand, there were so many cars that my license plate was likely obscured from the camera.) If they do, I probably would go back to SF to fight it in court. This whole mess could have been avoided if I had just ignored the obnoxious GPS and stayed on US 101.
In the end, after taking me through more of SF than I ever wanted to see, the GPS brought me right back to US 101, just in time to travel over the Golden Gate Bridge. As I was heading northbound, there was thankfully no toll.
While SF is fairly flat, the surrounding land (after crossing the Golden Gate Bridge) is mountainous. It's quite a sudden change. I had decided to eat at a Mexican restaurant. The GPS directed me to an exit for San Rafael (I think) which involved taking a very twisty road to the bottom of the mountain. I was very concerned about whether this car could successfully go back up the mountain once I wanted to get back to US 101.
After getting to the bottom, of course it turned out that the Mexican restaurant was no longer in business (or had moved). I needed to turn around to get back to US 101. I had to take a side road to make a turn. The side road suddenly became very steep. It was so steep that it was as if I was looking straight up. It was so steep that I could not back down. I was getting very nervous about whether the car would be able to climb this or not. But then it got worse. The street I was on was a dead end and the only way to go was to take a left turn. I had visions of the car toppling over as I tried this. Thankfully, it did not. I was driving at such an angle that I really was surprised that all four wheels stayed on the pavement. (Of course, other cars were actually parked on this road, though they likely were using their parking brakes.) Anyway, at the next turn I was able to easily go down the hill and get back to the main road.
On the way back to US 101, I found a Chinese restaurant. I decided to try it. In looking over the menu, I decided to try something different...Mongolian food. They had a few Mongolian dishes and warned that these are VERY spicy. I tried it anyway. I like spicy food. This was a pricy restaurant. While many Chinese meals come with rice (either plain or pork fried), this restaurant wanted $6.00 just for a side of rice. The waitress tried to get me to order rice but I told her I'd pass if it was not included. She gave me rice anyway (I noticed the noodles that supposedly came with the meal were not present, so likely they were out of them and had to give me rice instead). Thankfully, I did not get charged for the rice. But, the meal was delicious. It was bits of beef with vegetables. It definitely was spicy, but not too spicy for me. It was perfect. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone who has a problem with spicy foods, though. Personally, just as I love Thai food, I definitely want to try more Mongolian food.
As I got back to US 101, things became more flat. I did not have to go up another mountain to get on. The main road basically went right into US 101.
Normally, I stay at hotels at least three or four hours away from the place I had been during the day. But in this case, I was running on very little sleep. I got a hotel in Ukiah, CA. This was just over two hours away from San Francisco. It allowed me to have a reasonable travel time and get some much needed rest. When I arrived there, it was just about 9pm. The clerk said he hoped I had had dinner because everything was closed by then.
View Larger Map
I had a very good signal for the Internet, but for whatever reason, my computer did not want to get online. Although this was annoying in terms of determining the hotel for the next night, it was good in that I had an excuse to catch up on sleep. If I had Internet access, I'd have spent at least two or three more hours between email, blogging, uploading photos, looking at maps, etc.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
April 20, 2010: New Car and Conference Day 2
As usual I woke up at 6am and still had trouble getting out of the hotel before 8am. Yesterday had been a lot cooler than what I had been used to over the last couple of weeks. But today was even worse. It was in the high 40s (while New York was in the 60s!) and raining. As I turned the key in the ignition of the car, it began to warn me that the tire pressure was too low. I checked all the tires. Three were at 30 and the right front tire was at 26. I wasn't going to risk taking this on a 65 mph road. This was the worst possible time for this to happen. The sessions I was looking forward to the most (search engine optimization, customer conversion, and Facebook applications powered by Drupal) were happening that morning. I knew I would miss the search engine optimization session while this problem was resolved but hoped I could catch the other two.
The hotel clerk recommended Sears as the closest place to deal with tire problems. This particular Sears had an Avis rental office right next door. I probably should have just began the process of swapping the vehicle right then and there. But, I figured if I could just have Sears fix the problem it would be easier. After an hour, they came back and told me the rim had a problem and would not hold air. The mechanic urged me to get it swapped at Avis since I was going to be driving across the country to get home.
I was frustrated with this at first. I had gotten used to the car and didn't feel like going through the trouble of moving my stuff from one car to another. However, I should be thankful to God that it happened in San Francisco rather than in an area without a major airport. I could be faced with not having a car to swap out without going out of the way (e.g. having to go to Las Vegas, Portland, Spokane, Seattle, Reno, or Salt Lake City). The problem could have occurred in some place where cell phone service was not available too.
One hour down, and I was now cutting into the time for the second session. When I went to the Avis office, the clerk informed me that she had no cars and directed me to the San Francisco Airport. Her directions did not work and neither did those from the GPS. So, it took about a half hour to get to the airport when it was really only about ten minutes away. As I approached the airport, I remembered that when swapping a car (or returning it), the gas tank must be at full. Of course, being right near the airport, the gas stations gouge. I paid $3.49/gallon. Elsewhere, gas could be found for $3.29/gallon.
When I got to the airport, I had to drive the car to the return area first. An attendant took the car information but seemed unconcerned about the rim problem. For me, it's important that they actually fix this rather than just clean the car and send it on its way. Since it has a New York license plate, the practice would be to send it back to the Northeast....via a person who is driving cross country from San Francisco. Driving a vehicle which can't hold air in its tires through desolate areas in eastern rural parts of California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, the Dakotas, etc., is asking for trouble.
When I went to the rental counter to be assigned a new car, that was a mess. I asked about an oil change. They were unable to tell me when the vehicle had its last oil change. While I knew I would be having to get the oil changed along the way (and Avis will reimburse me for that), I really needed to know when it had its last change. After waiting on the phone with the service department for a while, the clerk told me that had "2,000 miles left." I asked if that meant 2,000 or 2,500, or something else. She then said "around 2,900 miles left." There's a real difference between 2,000 and 2,900. I'm going to have to check the oil once it gets above 1,800 or so. If I'm near a populated area I may get it changed around 2,400 miles as long as there are no problems before that. The vehicle I got was the exact same model as the one I turned in, and it also had a Northeast plate again. I was going to be one of the people with which they would be sending a Northeast plated car back to the Northeast.
Avis is very nonchalant about turning in vehicles. You don't even have to tell them where you left the vehicle. They want the keys left in the car and of course the car is to be left unlocked. While people can't easily steal the vehicles (there are spikes at the exit and an attendant must lower them), a prankster could steal keys.
After an hour of transferring all my stuff between cars (I always pack way too much), I went back to the staffer who checked the vehicle in. I reminded her that the vehicle had a problem. She still didn't take it seriously. Finally, she said she would call someone to bring the car in for service. As I was finishing up arranging my things in the new car, I noticed the staffer drove the vehicle away.
After missing all the morning sessions, I was into the ninety minute lunch period. I was about fifteen miles from the convention center so I decided to have lunch near the airport. It would reduce my time in the parking garage and save on parking fees.
The afternoon sessions were fairly unremarkable. Fortunately, I learned that the audio from the presentations would be posted online. I started to realize that while the content of the presentation is important, when you have this many sessions in a day, presentation is important. If a speaker is not confident, and does not present the information in an exciting way, it's not going to sink in as easily.
In some of the non-technical sessions I attended, they were again emphasizing niches. One speaker pointed out that simply having haphazard volume without any kind of targetting toward niches a person enjoys can be destructive to a person's ability to do a job well. On the other hand, if they truly target niches, they will end up getting quite a bit of work that they will enjoy and with which they will do a good job.
Despite using much less time in the parking garage than yesterday, the parking bill for today was $21. That's ridiculous.
Getting to my final San Francisco area hotel was an adventure in itself. I was south of the airport this time in the city of San Mateo, and about fifteen miles away from the convention center. US 101 in California is obnoxious when it comes to exits. While there is occasionally a time when an exit cannot be built on both the northbound and southbound (or eastbound/westbound) lanes of a freeway type road, this is a too frequent occurrence on US 101. I missed several turns and took way too long to get to my hotel.
View Larger Map
When I got to the hotel, I asked the clerk if there was a Subway nearby. She wanted a sandwich too, so she asked me to buy one for her and she'd pay me back. The Subway was supposed to be about one mile away. The GPS took me on a full tour of the area, making me drive three miles to get there. After a long line at Subway, the GPS was equally obnoxious getting me back. What should have been a few minutes for an errand turned into an hour long trip. Thankfully, the hotel clerk was not angry when I brought her sandwich to her after an hour.
The hotel clerk recommended Sears as the closest place to deal with tire problems. This particular Sears had an Avis rental office right next door. I probably should have just began the process of swapping the vehicle right then and there. But, I figured if I could just have Sears fix the problem it would be easier. After an hour, they came back and told me the rim had a problem and would not hold air. The mechanic urged me to get it swapped at Avis since I was going to be driving across the country to get home.
I was frustrated with this at first. I had gotten used to the car and didn't feel like going through the trouble of moving my stuff from one car to another. However, I should be thankful to God that it happened in San Francisco rather than in an area without a major airport. I could be faced with not having a car to swap out without going out of the way (e.g. having to go to Las Vegas, Portland, Spokane, Seattle, Reno, or Salt Lake City). The problem could have occurred in some place where cell phone service was not available too.
One hour down, and I was now cutting into the time for the second session. When I went to the Avis office, the clerk informed me that she had no cars and directed me to the San Francisco Airport. Her directions did not work and neither did those from the GPS. So, it took about a half hour to get to the airport when it was really only about ten minutes away. As I approached the airport, I remembered that when swapping a car (or returning it), the gas tank must be at full. Of course, being right near the airport, the gas stations gouge. I paid $3.49/gallon. Elsewhere, gas could be found for $3.29/gallon.
When I got to the airport, I had to drive the car to the return area first. An attendant took the car information but seemed unconcerned about the rim problem. For me, it's important that they actually fix this rather than just clean the car and send it on its way. Since it has a New York license plate, the practice would be to send it back to the Northeast....via a person who is driving cross country from San Francisco. Driving a vehicle which can't hold air in its tires through desolate areas in eastern rural parts of California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, the Dakotas, etc., is asking for trouble.
When I went to the rental counter to be assigned a new car, that was a mess. I asked about an oil change. They were unable to tell me when the vehicle had its last oil change. While I knew I would be having to get the oil changed along the way (and Avis will reimburse me for that), I really needed to know when it had its last change. After waiting on the phone with the service department for a while, the clerk told me that had "2,000 miles left." I asked if that meant 2,000 or 2,500, or something else. She then said "around 2,900 miles left." There's a real difference between 2,000 and 2,900. I'm going to have to check the oil once it gets above 1,800 or so. If I'm near a populated area I may get it changed around 2,400 miles as long as there are no problems before that. The vehicle I got was the exact same model as the one I turned in, and it also had a Northeast plate again. I was going to be one of the people with which they would be sending a Northeast plated car back to the Northeast.
Avis is very nonchalant about turning in vehicles. You don't even have to tell them where you left the vehicle. They want the keys left in the car and of course the car is to be left unlocked. While people can't easily steal the vehicles (there are spikes at the exit and an attendant must lower them), a prankster could steal keys.
After an hour of transferring all my stuff between cars (I always pack way too much), I went back to the staffer who checked the vehicle in. I reminded her that the vehicle had a problem. She still didn't take it seriously. Finally, she said she would call someone to bring the car in for service. As I was finishing up arranging my things in the new car, I noticed the staffer drove the vehicle away.
After missing all the morning sessions, I was into the ninety minute lunch period. I was about fifteen miles from the convention center so I decided to have lunch near the airport. It would reduce my time in the parking garage and save on parking fees.
The afternoon sessions were fairly unremarkable. Fortunately, I learned that the audio from the presentations would be posted online. I started to realize that while the content of the presentation is important, when you have this many sessions in a day, presentation is important. If a speaker is not confident, and does not present the information in an exciting way, it's not going to sink in as easily.
In some of the non-technical sessions I attended, they were again emphasizing niches. One speaker pointed out that simply having haphazard volume without any kind of targetting toward niches a person enjoys can be destructive to a person's ability to do a job well. On the other hand, if they truly target niches, they will end up getting quite a bit of work that they will enjoy and with which they will do a good job.
Despite using much less time in the parking garage than yesterday, the parking bill for today was $21. That's ridiculous.
Getting to my final San Francisco area hotel was an adventure in itself. I was south of the airport this time in the city of San Mateo, and about fifteen miles away from the convention center. US 101 in California is obnoxious when it comes to exits. While there is occasionally a time when an exit cannot be built on both the northbound and southbound (or eastbound/westbound) lanes of a freeway type road, this is a too frequent occurrence on US 101. I missed several turns and took way too long to get to my hotel.
View Larger Map
When I got to the hotel, I asked the clerk if there was a Subway nearby. She wanted a sandwich too, so she asked me to buy one for her and she'd pay me back. The Subway was supposed to be about one mile away. The GPS took me on a full tour of the area, making me drive three miles to get there. After a long line at Subway, the GPS was equally obnoxious getting me back. What should have been a few minutes for an errand turned into an hour long trip. Thankfully, the hotel clerk was not angry when I brought her sandwich to her after an hour.
Friday, April 23, 2010
April 19, 2010: San Francisco and Drupal Conference Day 1
The next three days worth of entries are going to cover the conference, my opinions of San Francisco, and other adventures that happened (specifically on Tuesday, April 20th). Some of it may get technical and business related, but if that part is boring there are still the non-conference related parts. Ultimately, this was the event which gave me the impetus to make my first ever visit to California.
In reading about parking for the conference center, I learned that SF generally discourages individual vehicle travel. They try to encourage public transportation. Public transportation might be an option if one is paying an inflated price for a hotel inside the city (I see a hotel as a place to sleep at night....I expect cleanliness and security and don't care about extras). But it doesn't work when one is staying in the next city in order to get reasonable hotel prices. Either the Drupal site or the convention center site basically hinted at the fact that the costs to park individual vehicles was out of sight to enforce SF's vision.
Although I got up at 6am and tried to get everthing done quickly (including breakfast), somehow, I did not seem to get out of the hotel until after 8am. The first session was at 8:30. Being about thirteen miles from the convention center, I was obviously going to be late for the first session.
Most of the ride was on US 101, which is an interstate like road. And, like most interstates leading into big cities, there were traffic jams in the morning. US 101 gives some nice brief views of the San Francisco Bay.
View Larger Map
As I got into the city, I noticed that on some streets the right lane was reserved for buses and taxis. I'm not sure what might have happened (in terms of potential tickets and fines) if you needed to get into that lane to make a right turn. I saw some trolley cars but they did not look like the images I've seen; instead they were just buses powered by electric.
Basically, I'm just not one for big, congested cities. I try to avoid them on these trips. I can do okay if a city has a population of half a million or less, but all bets are off after that. SF has close to 800,000.
I chose a parking garage fairly close to the Moscone Convention Center. When entering, you had to take a ticket. The ticket had to be kept with the driver and the driver had to pay before going back to their car. Then, they would have fifteen minutes to return to their car, drive through the maze of the parking garage, and put the stamped ticket into a machine to be able to leave. If they exceeded fifteen minutes, there would be extra charges. My solution is to just have staff and/or machines on the exits where people could pay (and if they couldn't afford that many staff people, machines would be fine). It's just an extra level of stress to worry about whether you're going to get out of the garage (particularly if you're on the top level and leaving when many others are leaving) within fifteen minutes.
When I got to the convention center area, there was not one but THREE convention centers with that name. The West Moscone Center was brand new and nothing was happening there for three weeks. One down. Then I had to decide between North or South. I tried North next. Of course, the Drupal conference was in Moscone South.
Thoroughly late, I got into an overflow room for the first session. It was just about the basics of Drupal, so I found I didn't miss much. This was the only session happening. For the rest of the time, there were five to six sessions going on at any given time slot.
The booklet of sessions listed only the session title, room number, and time. It did not include a description. Most people were carrying laptops around with them. I had left mine in my trunk for lighter travel on foot to the convention center. Besides, I had no idea what kind of people I might meet in SF and really didn't want to be carrying a laptop around the downtown area. But, it became apparent that I would need my laptop to be able to read the descriptions of the sessions and determine which I wanted to attend.
I attended a session about Drupal Views (I know this is meaningless to anyone who is not familiar with the workings of Drupal). It was pretty good and certainly gave me the impetus to make more use of Views. It allows the blocks or side panels to be different for each web page, rather than having the same ones on every page. There are many other possibilities with Views.
The conference rate did not include meals. If people wanted a boxed lunch for three days, it would cost $150. The alternative was to find restaurants within walking distance of the convention center. I decided to go to actual restaurants and not just Subway during the conference. I wanted to try Tex Mex (I've tried Mexican many times, but never outright Tex Mex). But, after walking in the wrong direction, I found a restaurant called Mel's Drive In. It reminded me of that show called Alice which was on in the late 70s/early 80s. Despite this not being an official Mexican restaurant, I was still able to get a delicious taco salad. The nice part about this was that although it was a real restaurant, the food was delivered fast and the wait staff were great. They even gave a 10% off coupon if you returned the next day. After lunch, I retrieved my laptop from the car.
The keynote speaker was Dries Buytaert, who created Drupal ten years ago....in his college dorm room. It was designed to make it easier for people to make web pages without having technical knowledge. He expected ten people would use it. He recalled how in previous years, the conferences consisted of about forty people. This conference had 3,000+ people. Some had planned to come from Europe, but could not do so because of the volcanic eruption in Iceland. They were instead having user group meetings at the same time throughout Europe. The whole point of his speech was to never underestimate how a simple idea can blossom into a phenomenon. As Drupal is open source, there are thousands of people working on improvements, modules, documentation, etc. There is a huge user community waiting to help anyone that runs into problems. Best of all, the software is free (though people charge to set it up, customize it, write documentation targetted to specific types of users, etc.). It was revealed that the next Drupal convention would be in Copenhagen, Denmark. In that case, I won't be attending the next Drupal convention.
There were a few boring technical sessions in the afternoon. People continued to walk out and the speakers did not make the presentations very interesting. I can probably learn more by looking up the information online.
The last session of the day was VERY inspiring, however. It was not technical; it was business oriented. The presenter was from Boise, Idaho. He talked about the need to avoid being a generalist and instead to focus on niches. Find one or more industries, or even parts of a particular industry that you know very well or in which you have a strong interest, and target said segments. The speaker called them "verticals." In this case, you must also try to offer all services related to their online presence. Don't merely offer web design. Offer hosting, content development, online marketing, and anything else unique to the industry that fits within their online presence. If you are unable to do all of these things, subcontract out the parts you can't do (obviously reflecting the subcontractor's fee in your estimate). Develop unique services. As an example, the speaker focuses on photocopy stores. He provides two sites with continuously updated information about the industry. His clients can have feeds from these two sites automatically placed on their own sites...for a price. These non-client sites he developed also serve as free advertising for his services. In some cases, you can get into a niche where there is simply no competition. Or, your services can be unique enough that either they complement others' work or drive clients to you. He pointed out that there is plenty of opportunity as long as people try to develop something unique for an existing "vertical." When asked about whether he has to worry about no compete clauses (e.g. not being allowed to develop sites for two stores within the same city), he explained that he will only accept such a term if the company pays for it. He does have some companies that pay him simply not to develop web sites for their local competitors.
Overall, the last presentation really brightened things up and got me excited for the conference. It gave me a lot of ideas.
When I got to the parking garage and presented my ticket, I was in for a real shock. The fee was $28 for one day of parking. I was not looking forward to two more days of this.
My next hotel was again in South San Francisco. All of the hotels were surrounding the San Francisco International Airport (located in South San Francisco). In Choice Hotel brands, it seems the hotels near the airports are typically inexpensive, yet clean and secure. But this one came with an added bonus. It was near a railroad. Thankfully, neither the planes nor the trains kept me awake at night.
In reading about parking for the conference center, I learned that SF generally discourages individual vehicle travel. They try to encourage public transportation. Public transportation might be an option if one is paying an inflated price for a hotel inside the city (I see a hotel as a place to sleep at night....I expect cleanliness and security and don't care about extras). But it doesn't work when one is staying in the next city in order to get reasonable hotel prices. Either the Drupal site or the convention center site basically hinted at the fact that the costs to park individual vehicles was out of sight to enforce SF's vision.
Although I got up at 6am and tried to get everthing done quickly (including breakfast), somehow, I did not seem to get out of the hotel until after 8am. The first session was at 8:30. Being about thirteen miles from the convention center, I was obviously going to be late for the first session.
Most of the ride was on US 101, which is an interstate like road. And, like most interstates leading into big cities, there were traffic jams in the morning. US 101 gives some nice brief views of the San Francisco Bay.
View Larger Map
As I got into the city, I noticed that on some streets the right lane was reserved for buses and taxis. I'm not sure what might have happened (in terms of potential tickets and fines) if you needed to get into that lane to make a right turn. I saw some trolley cars but they did not look like the images I've seen; instead they were just buses powered by electric.
Basically, I'm just not one for big, congested cities. I try to avoid them on these trips. I can do okay if a city has a population of half a million or less, but all bets are off after that. SF has close to 800,000.
I chose a parking garage fairly close to the Moscone Convention Center. When entering, you had to take a ticket. The ticket had to be kept with the driver and the driver had to pay before going back to their car. Then, they would have fifteen minutes to return to their car, drive through the maze of the parking garage, and put the stamped ticket into a machine to be able to leave. If they exceeded fifteen minutes, there would be extra charges. My solution is to just have staff and/or machines on the exits where people could pay (and if they couldn't afford that many staff people, machines would be fine). It's just an extra level of stress to worry about whether you're going to get out of the garage (particularly if you're on the top level and leaving when many others are leaving) within fifteen minutes.
When I got to the convention center area, there was not one but THREE convention centers with that name. The West Moscone Center was brand new and nothing was happening there for three weeks. One down. Then I had to decide between North or South. I tried North next. Of course, the Drupal conference was in Moscone South.
Thoroughly late, I got into an overflow room for the first session. It was just about the basics of Drupal, so I found I didn't miss much. This was the only session happening. For the rest of the time, there were five to six sessions going on at any given time slot.
The booklet of sessions listed only the session title, room number, and time. It did not include a description. Most people were carrying laptops around with them. I had left mine in my trunk for lighter travel on foot to the convention center. Besides, I had no idea what kind of people I might meet in SF and really didn't want to be carrying a laptop around the downtown area. But, it became apparent that I would need my laptop to be able to read the descriptions of the sessions and determine which I wanted to attend.
I attended a session about Drupal Views (I know this is meaningless to anyone who is not familiar with the workings of Drupal). It was pretty good and certainly gave me the impetus to make more use of Views. It allows the blocks or side panels to be different for each web page, rather than having the same ones on every page. There are many other possibilities with Views.
The conference rate did not include meals. If people wanted a boxed lunch for three days, it would cost $150. The alternative was to find restaurants within walking distance of the convention center. I decided to go to actual restaurants and not just Subway during the conference. I wanted to try Tex Mex (I've tried Mexican many times, but never outright Tex Mex). But, after walking in the wrong direction, I found a restaurant called Mel's Drive In. It reminded me of that show called Alice which was on in the late 70s/early 80s. Despite this not being an official Mexican restaurant, I was still able to get a delicious taco salad. The nice part about this was that although it was a real restaurant, the food was delivered fast and the wait staff were great. They even gave a 10% off coupon if you returned the next day. After lunch, I retrieved my laptop from the car.
The keynote speaker was Dries Buytaert, who created Drupal ten years ago....in his college dorm room. It was designed to make it easier for people to make web pages without having technical knowledge. He expected ten people would use it. He recalled how in previous years, the conferences consisted of about forty people. This conference had 3,000+ people. Some had planned to come from Europe, but could not do so because of the volcanic eruption in Iceland. They were instead having user group meetings at the same time throughout Europe. The whole point of his speech was to never underestimate how a simple idea can blossom into a phenomenon. As Drupal is open source, there are thousands of people working on improvements, modules, documentation, etc. There is a huge user community waiting to help anyone that runs into problems. Best of all, the software is free (though people charge to set it up, customize it, write documentation targetted to specific types of users, etc.). It was revealed that the next Drupal convention would be in Copenhagen, Denmark. In that case, I won't be attending the next Drupal convention.
There were a few boring technical sessions in the afternoon. People continued to walk out and the speakers did not make the presentations very interesting. I can probably learn more by looking up the information online.
The last session of the day was VERY inspiring, however. It was not technical; it was business oriented. The presenter was from Boise, Idaho. He talked about the need to avoid being a generalist and instead to focus on niches. Find one or more industries, or even parts of a particular industry that you know very well or in which you have a strong interest, and target said segments. The speaker called them "verticals." In this case, you must also try to offer all services related to their online presence. Don't merely offer web design. Offer hosting, content development, online marketing, and anything else unique to the industry that fits within their online presence. If you are unable to do all of these things, subcontract out the parts you can't do (obviously reflecting the subcontractor's fee in your estimate). Develop unique services. As an example, the speaker focuses on photocopy stores. He provides two sites with continuously updated information about the industry. His clients can have feeds from these two sites automatically placed on their own sites...for a price. These non-client sites he developed also serve as free advertising for his services. In some cases, you can get into a niche where there is simply no competition. Or, your services can be unique enough that either they complement others' work or drive clients to you. He pointed out that there is plenty of opportunity as long as people try to develop something unique for an existing "vertical." When asked about whether he has to worry about no compete clauses (e.g. not being allowed to develop sites for two stores within the same city), he explained that he will only accept such a term if the company pays for it. He does have some companies that pay him simply not to develop web sites for their local competitors.
Overall, the last presentation really brightened things up and got me excited for the conference. It gave me a lot of ideas.
When I got to the parking garage and presented my ticket, I was in for a real shock. The fee was $28 for one day of parking. I was not looking forward to two more days of this.
My next hotel was again in South San Francisco. All of the hotels were surrounding the San Francisco International Airport (located in South San Francisco). In Choice Hotel brands, it seems the hotels near the airports are typically inexpensive, yet clean and secure. But this one came with an added bonus. It was near a railroad. Thankfully, neither the planes nor the trains kept me awake at night.
More photos added
Flickr has been cooperating better and I was able to set up a collection of albums related to this trip. You can find that collection at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/seethestates/collections/72157623781675389/
I've added this to the links on the upper right side of the page. You can check it periodically, but I will also announce when I've added new sets.
New photos include the last three sets under New Mexico (Chimayo Shrine, scenery after Chimayo, and snow).
I have also added photos from Utah. Note that Utah's photos are divided by the day. So, you'll have to click on the day to get the sets of photos under it. For whatever reason, the camera "lost" all the pictures of Kolob Canyons/Zion National Park. I had some very nice photos of that area and they're gone.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/seethestates/collections/72157623781675389/
I've added this to the links on the upper right side of the page. You can check it periodically, but I will also announce when I've added new sets.
New photos include the last three sets under New Mexico (Chimayo Shrine, scenery after Chimayo, and snow).
I have also added photos from Utah. Note that Utah's photos are divided by the day. So, you'll have to click on the day to get the sets of photos under it. For whatever reason, the camera "lost" all the pictures of Kolob Canyons/Zion National Park. I had some very nice photos of that area and they're gone.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
April 18, 2010: San BuenaVentura Beach and the Drive to San Francisco
It was good that I went to Mass Saturday evening, and also that I didn't bother with the beach the evening before. Yesterday it was overcast and cold in the evening. Today was absolutely beautiful. It was still a little cool in the morning, but there wasn't a single cloud in the sky. I went to the beach and had a nice relaxing time watching the gentle waves come in. There was a group of rocks to sit on. The beach itself was mostly sand though there were patches with stones.
The water was quite cold. The only people who were actually swimming were wearing wet suits. I walked in the water a bit, but remembered my experience in Washington and Oregon in mid August 2008. It was so cold then that I developed cuts on my legs and feet from walking in the water.
When I had left the Oregon Coast back in 2008, I took one last look at the Pacific Ocean, thinking I might never see it again. (And I really didn't get to enjoy it because by that point it was foggy and cold along most of the coast in Washington and the northern part of Oregon.) I expected between costs and other things, I might never get to the West Coast again. Never say never. It was great to see the Pacific Ocean once again, and this time with absolutely no fog and a picture perfect sky.
I could have easily spent all day there, enjoying the ocean. It may have even warmed up enough to go swimming in the afternoon. But, the Drupal (a web content management system) conference in San Francisco began bright and early Monday morning. That was the whole reason I took this trip. San Francisco is about 6.5 hours from Ventura. I wanted to try to get into my next hotel before it got dark.
The drive was mostly up US 101 North. This is an interstate-like road. I chose this route and stayed in Ventura because I wanted to avoid I-5. I-5 likely would have traffic jams and it was too far inland. I wanted to drive near the ocean.
View Larger Map
For the first couple of hours, US 101 generally followed the coast. Sometimes it was not visible, but most of the time the coast could be seen. Where it didn't follow the coast, the large hills/small mountains were beautiful. Unfortunately, at a certain point the GPS "saved time" by taking me on a road further inland. There were some nice views here too, but I would have rather taken the extra time to have seen the coast line. When US 101 met with this other route, I decided to see the coast just a little bit and drove on US 101 South. The GPS went ballistic and constantly told me to take a U-turn. (There are specific turning lanes on US 101 for U-turns.) The mountain scenes in this area were beautiful. At one point, US 101 North briefly went in a tunnel through one of the mountains.
As I saw the coast line, I noticed that much of it has a railroad track between US 101 South and the actual beach. There are parking spaces right off the road (US 101 is not officially a freeway at that point) and people must cross the railroad tracks to get to the beach.
California is the most populous state in the country. However, there are many areas where there are just no people and no signs of people living in the area such as houses, buildings, or even crops. This is true both in the east (to be expected as there is a lot of desert) and in the west. Sometimes I'd see a city limit sign noting a population of 300 people or so. I think I even saw one noting a population of 67.
An hour or two after getting back onto US 101 North, I was in the wine country. Some wineries had driveways going out into US 101 North (not a freeway at that point, though it was still 65 mph) and invited people to stop in. By that time, however, it was a bit too late. But the most interesting thing I noticed is that many of the wineries had signs with cut outs of people. One of them was designed to show people picking grapes. As I saw it from a distance, it looked like the people were actually moving. I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing. But I realized that the people were much larger than real people. When I got up to it, they were just still pictures.
There had been beautiful mountain scenery in the first two or three hours of my drive. There were many twists and turns in the road. However, as I got closer to San Francisco, things flattened out quite a bit.
At a certain point, I was suddenly in bumper to bumper traffic. It was like that for at least 45 minutes, perhaps even an hour. As it was Sunday, I assumed this was like I-87 going south on Sunday late afternoon (people go to the Adirondacks and then the Thruway is busy as they head back downstate). I figured people from San Francisco had spent the weekend in the south and then were moving north for the work week. However, as I got into Monterey County, the backup suddenly stopped and traffic was moving again. The change came in an area that did not seem to be all that populated. There were no further backups, even going into the city of South San Francisco (different from San Francisco itself).
I picked three different hotels for the three nights I'd be in the San Francisco area. The reason was that Choice Hotels has their 1+1 = free (as in enough points for a free night) promotion as long as you stay at two different hotels. I stayed outside the city of San Francisco because the prices were much higher there. (At a non-Choice Hotel, the Drupal "conference rate" was $159/night! I think my three nights totaled just over $159.)
The water was quite cold. The only people who were actually swimming were wearing wet suits. I walked in the water a bit, but remembered my experience in Washington and Oregon in mid August 2008. It was so cold then that I developed cuts on my legs and feet from walking in the water.
When I had left the Oregon Coast back in 2008, I took one last look at the Pacific Ocean, thinking I might never see it again. (And I really didn't get to enjoy it because by that point it was foggy and cold along most of the coast in Washington and the northern part of Oregon.) I expected between costs and other things, I might never get to the West Coast again. Never say never. It was great to see the Pacific Ocean once again, and this time with absolutely no fog and a picture perfect sky.
I could have easily spent all day there, enjoying the ocean. It may have even warmed up enough to go swimming in the afternoon. But, the Drupal (a web content management system) conference in San Francisco began bright and early Monday morning. That was the whole reason I took this trip. San Francisco is about 6.5 hours from Ventura. I wanted to try to get into my next hotel before it got dark.
The drive was mostly up US 101 North. This is an interstate-like road. I chose this route and stayed in Ventura because I wanted to avoid I-5. I-5 likely would have traffic jams and it was too far inland. I wanted to drive near the ocean.
View Larger Map
For the first couple of hours, US 101 generally followed the coast. Sometimes it was not visible, but most of the time the coast could be seen. Where it didn't follow the coast, the large hills/small mountains were beautiful. Unfortunately, at a certain point the GPS "saved time" by taking me on a road further inland. There were some nice views here too, but I would have rather taken the extra time to have seen the coast line. When US 101 met with this other route, I decided to see the coast just a little bit and drove on US 101 South. The GPS went ballistic and constantly told me to take a U-turn. (There are specific turning lanes on US 101 for U-turns.) The mountain scenes in this area were beautiful. At one point, US 101 North briefly went in a tunnel through one of the mountains.
As I saw the coast line, I noticed that much of it has a railroad track between US 101 South and the actual beach. There are parking spaces right off the road (US 101 is not officially a freeway at that point) and people must cross the railroad tracks to get to the beach.
California is the most populous state in the country. However, there are many areas where there are just no people and no signs of people living in the area such as houses, buildings, or even crops. This is true both in the east (to be expected as there is a lot of desert) and in the west. Sometimes I'd see a city limit sign noting a population of 300 people or so. I think I even saw one noting a population of 67.
An hour or two after getting back onto US 101 North, I was in the wine country. Some wineries had driveways going out into US 101 North (not a freeway at that point, though it was still 65 mph) and invited people to stop in. By that time, however, it was a bit too late. But the most interesting thing I noticed is that many of the wineries had signs with cut outs of people. One of them was designed to show people picking grapes. As I saw it from a distance, it looked like the people were actually moving. I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing. But I realized that the people were much larger than real people. When I got up to it, they were just still pictures.
There had been beautiful mountain scenery in the first two or three hours of my drive. There were many twists and turns in the road. However, as I got closer to San Francisco, things flattened out quite a bit.
At a certain point, I was suddenly in bumper to bumper traffic. It was like that for at least 45 minutes, perhaps even an hour. As it was Sunday, I assumed this was like I-87 going south on Sunday late afternoon (people go to the Adirondacks and then the Thruway is busy as they head back downstate). I figured people from San Francisco had spent the weekend in the south and then were moving north for the work week. However, as I got into Monterey County, the backup suddenly stopped and traffic was moving again. The change came in an area that did not seem to be all that populated. There were no further backups, even going into the city of South San Francisco (different from San Francisco itself).
I picked three different hotels for the three nights I'd be in the San Francisco area. The reason was that Choice Hotels has their 1+1 = free (as in enough points for a free night) promotion as long as you stay at two different hotels. I stayed outside the city of San Francisco because the prices were much higher there. (At a non-Choice Hotel, the Drupal "conference rate" was $159/night! I think my three nights totaled just over $159.)
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Some Photos Posted
I finally have some photos available from the trip. Flickr is giving trouble in grouping all of these together, so I'm going to have to temporarily do it via the blog.
Virginia (April 5-6, 2010):
Alabama (April 7-9, 2010):
Mississippi (April 9, 2010):
Texas (April 10-12, 2010):
New Mexico (April 12-13, 2010):
Virginia (April 5-6, 2010):
Alabama (April 7-9, 2010):
- Cullman: Our Lady's Grotto (miniature sculptures)
- Irondale: EWTN Studio - Life on the Rock show
Mississippi (April 9, 2010):
Texas (April 10-12, 2010):
New Mexico (April 12-13, 2010):
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
April 17, 2010: Ronald Reagan Library and Mass at Mission Church
Today, the main focus was to see the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. I had chosen the Econolodge for the previous day because it was less than two hours from Simi Valley, where the library is located. The scenery going into this area was beautiful with mountains, hills, cacti, palm trees, etc. I would have taken lots of pictures if the roads did not have "Emergency Stopping Only" signs (of course I was also pressed for time as usual). Also, I had said in a previous blog that Birmingham, AL was the furthest point south I'd go in this trip. It appears Simi Valley is slightly further south than Birmingham. So, that's the furthest south I plan to be on this trip.
The route from Mojave, CA to Simi Valley took me on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Having watched the occasional police chase and seen how people drive around L.A., I was a little nervous. Fortunately, I was only on I-5 for about three or four miles and at that point it was only a four lane road, not nine lanes.
View Larger Map
The library is at the top of a large hill with gorgeous views. I took pictures of the surrounding area. As you enter, there is a lengthy winding drive up the hill with banners for each president up to the 20th, James Garfield. As you drive out, there are banners for the remaining presidents on the backs of the first twenty. The second set excluded Reagan, since there is a special banner for him. Other spaces included banners for the military as well as the Constitution.
This is the first presidential site I've visited for a president who was alive in my lifetime. Prior to this, the last chronological president whose site I had visited (in September 2008) was Harry Truman (#33). He died a few years before I was born. (Prior to Harry Truman, the only presidents who have sites available that I have not seen are Ulysses Grant (#18) and Herbert Hoover (#31). Zachary Taylor (#12) and Grover Cleveland (#22 and #24) do not have any homes or birthplace sites available to the public. There is a statue of Cleveland in Buffalo, NY, that I have seen.)
When I arrived, I was wearing a blue button shirt with a square pattern on it that was close to a western style shirt. I had a belt buckle I purchased in Texas. Some people who were dressed like they were from the old west spotted me and asked if I would like to be an extra in an amateur movie they were doing for a church. Several groups were assigned on a "video scavenger hunt" at various historical places focusing on different historical eras. These people had the Old West. I had to hold a sign asking "Where is Joaquin Murrietta?" They gave me a vest to wear and a hat, but the hat was too small. I had a cowboy hat so I used my own. They liked it better. They're not sure if this will wind up on the Internet or not, but they took my email address down to let me know if it's there.
I began by seeing the grave of Ronald Reagan, who died in 2004. After that, I got into a long line for admission. I saw a replica of the Oval Office during Reagan's time, including a small number of pieces that were in the office at that time. Apparently the Clinton Museum in Arkansas has a similar replica from his time in office. These are the only two presidential libraries with replicas of the Oval Office.
After the Oval Office replica, I saw and walked through the Air Force One plane used by Reagan. This particular plane was also used by Presidents Ford, Carter, both Bushes, and Clinton. It was retired and moved to the Reagan library during George W. Bush's term. Photographs were not allowed inside the plane. Although it was comfortably set up, it still gave me a claustrophobic feeling walking through. The style of the inside was made to look like the 1980s, during Reagan's term. Of course it likely had changed a bit for the 90s and into the early part of George W. Bush's presidency. There were jars of jelly beans everywhere since this was one of Reagan's trademarks. The kitchen area had fake chocolate cake, which was another one of Reagan's favorites. One of the docents explained that on February 6th (Reagan's birthday), all visitors get a slice of chocolate cake.
After seeing the plane, you could see the outside of the Marine One helicopter used by Reagan, along with the limousine and police vehicles used in his motorcade. After seeing these vehicles and the souvenir shops, I exited the building while talking on the cell phone. I basically forgot where I exited from, and could not find a way to get back in. There were steps to various parts of the building from the outside, but they all had chains across them. None of the doors worked. I couldn't find any employees around to find out how to get back in. Finally, I followed a bus up a hill and was able to get back to the museum area.
When I got inside the museum area, I was told that the museum exhibits were being refurbished and were not available. Friends of mine had seen the exhibits back in the 1990s and spoke highly of them, so I had been looking forward to them. However, this is no problem as it's an excuse to go back for Reagan's 100th anniversary in 2011. I've been to three presidential sites for 200th anniversaries (Franklin Pierce (14th president) in New Hampshire - 2004, Andrew Johnson (17th president) in Tennessee - 2008, and Abraham Lincoln (16th president) in Illinois - 2009).
Although the museum exhibits were not available, the "Inside the White House" exhibit was available. This is a highly detailed miniature of the White House. It has been maintained by a particular family for four decades. Whenever anything changes at the White House, the WH staff alert this family so they can update their model. Ronald Reagan had seen it and there was a picture of him posing next to it. When I first heard of this, I immediately thought of a doll house. This is much bigger and far more detailed than any doll house. It's at least fifteen feet long. Moving this and setting it up must take a tremendous amount of work. The White House model itself is just one part. There were numerous models of historical rooms in the White House also on display, including rooms from Lincoln's days, the Oval Office during Taft's (#27) administration, and even an animated model of workers initially building the White House (which was not known by that name at the time).
After I finished in Simi Valley, I headed to a hotel in Ventura. On most days, I have a two or three hour minimum drive to the next hotel. This time, it was about forty minutes. I wanted one hotel near the beach and this happened to be less expensive than others, even those far away from the beach. When I arrived at the hotel, I had to show my ID. When the clerk saw that I was from New York and heard that I drove to Ventura, CA, she was amazed. When I explained that this is my second cross country trip, she was even more amazed. She had done one cross country trip after college to Virginia. We talked for quite a while.
View Larger Map
I went to Mass at a mission church in San Buenavista, only about two miles away. The church was built in 1782. It was beautiful inside, though a little dark (meaning pictures are not so great). Outside, I liked the landscaping with cacti and lots of other plants not seen in the Northeast.
I thought about going to the beach after that, but it was getting cold and the beach was ten or fifteen minutes away on foot. It was also overcast and getting dark. I wasn't going to park my car there because that would cost $10 just for a few minutes. I decided to spend some time at the beach the next day before heading up to San Francisco.
The route from Mojave, CA to Simi Valley took me on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Having watched the occasional police chase and seen how people drive around L.A., I was a little nervous. Fortunately, I was only on I-5 for about three or four miles and at that point it was only a four lane road, not nine lanes.
View Larger Map
The library is at the top of a large hill with gorgeous views. I took pictures of the surrounding area. As you enter, there is a lengthy winding drive up the hill with banners for each president up to the 20th, James Garfield. As you drive out, there are banners for the remaining presidents on the backs of the first twenty. The second set excluded Reagan, since there is a special banner for him. Other spaces included banners for the military as well as the Constitution.
This is the first presidential site I've visited for a president who was alive in my lifetime. Prior to this, the last chronological president whose site I had visited (in September 2008) was Harry Truman (#33). He died a few years before I was born. (Prior to Harry Truman, the only presidents who have sites available that I have not seen are Ulysses Grant (#18) and Herbert Hoover (#31). Zachary Taylor (#12) and Grover Cleveland (#22 and #24) do not have any homes or birthplace sites available to the public. There is a statue of Cleveland in Buffalo, NY, that I have seen.)
When I arrived, I was wearing a blue button shirt with a square pattern on it that was close to a western style shirt. I had a belt buckle I purchased in Texas. Some people who were dressed like they were from the old west spotted me and asked if I would like to be an extra in an amateur movie they were doing for a church. Several groups were assigned on a "video scavenger hunt" at various historical places focusing on different historical eras. These people had the Old West. I had to hold a sign asking "Where is Joaquin Murrietta?" They gave me a vest to wear and a hat, but the hat was too small. I had a cowboy hat so I used my own. They liked it better. They're not sure if this will wind up on the Internet or not, but they took my email address down to let me know if it's there.
I began by seeing the grave of Ronald Reagan, who died in 2004. After that, I got into a long line for admission. I saw a replica of the Oval Office during Reagan's time, including a small number of pieces that were in the office at that time. Apparently the Clinton Museum in Arkansas has a similar replica from his time in office. These are the only two presidential libraries with replicas of the Oval Office.
After the Oval Office replica, I saw and walked through the Air Force One plane used by Reagan. This particular plane was also used by Presidents Ford, Carter, both Bushes, and Clinton. It was retired and moved to the Reagan library during George W. Bush's term. Photographs were not allowed inside the plane. Although it was comfortably set up, it still gave me a claustrophobic feeling walking through. The style of the inside was made to look like the 1980s, during Reagan's term. Of course it likely had changed a bit for the 90s and into the early part of George W. Bush's presidency. There were jars of jelly beans everywhere since this was one of Reagan's trademarks. The kitchen area had fake chocolate cake, which was another one of Reagan's favorites. One of the docents explained that on February 6th (Reagan's birthday), all visitors get a slice of chocolate cake.
After seeing the plane, you could see the outside of the Marine One helicopter used by Reagan, along with the limousine and police vehicles used in his motorcade. After seeing these vehicles and the souvenir shops, I exited the building while talking on the cell phone. I basically forgot where I exited from, and could not find a way to get back in. There were steps to various parts of the building from the outside, but they all had chains across them. None of the doors worked. I couldn't find any employees around to find out how to get back in. Finally, I followed a bus up a hill and was able to get back to the museum area.
When I got inside the museum area, I was told that the museum exhibits were being refurbished and were not available. Friends of mine had seen the exhibits back in the 1990s and spoke highly of them, so I had been looking forward to them. However, this is no problem as it's an excuse to go back for Reagan's 100th anniversary in 2011. I've been to three presidential sites for 200th anniversaries (Franklin Pierce (14th president) in New Hampshire - 2004, Andrew Johnson (17th president) in Tennessee - 2008, and Abraham Lincoln (16th president) in Illinois - 2009).
Although the museum exhibits were not available, the "Inside the White House" exhibit was available. This is a highly detailed miniature of the White House. It has been maintained by a particular family for four decades. Whenever anything changes at the White House, the WH staff alert this family so they can update their model. Ronald Reagan had seen it and there was a picture of him posing next to it. When I first heard of this, I immediately thought of a doll house. This is much bigger and far more detailed than any doll house. It's at least fifteen feet long. Moving this and setting it up must take a tremendous amount of work. The White House model itself is just one part. There were numerous models of historical rooms in the White House also on display, including rooms from Lincoln's days, the Oval Office during Taft's (#27) administration, and even an animated model of workers initially building the White House (which was not known by that name at the time).
After I finished in Simi Valley, I headed to a hotel in Ventura. On most days, I have a two or three hour minimum drive to the next hotel. This time, it was about forty minutes. I wanted one hotel near the beach and this happened to be less expensive than others, even those far away from the beach. When I arrived at the hotel, I had to show my ID. When the clerk saw that I was from New York and heard that I drove to Ventura, CA, she was amazed. When I explained that this is my second cross country trip, she was even more amazed. She had done one cross country trip after college to Virginia. We talked for quite a while.
View Larger Map
I went to Mass at a mission church in San Buenavista, only about two miles away. The church was built in 1782. It was beautiful inside, though a little dark (meaning pictures are not so great). Outside, I liked the landscaping with cacti and lots of other plants not seen in the Northeast.
I thought about going to the beach after that, but it was getting cold and the beach was ten or fifteen minutes away on foot. It was also overcast and getting dark. I wasn't going to park my car there because that would cost $10 just for a few minutes. I decided to spend some time at the beach the next day before heading up to San Francisco.
Monday, April 19, 2010
April 16, 2010: First Visit to California and Death Valley National Park
My first stop today was Death Valley National Park. It's about 2 1/2 hours from Henderson, Nevada. After I got off the interstate (I-515), the GPS took me through the desert. Again, there were lush green plants. The road took me through the Palute Las Vegas Indian Reservation. There was a sign pointing to the tribal police building. The funny thing is that what it pointed to were scrub trees, sand, mountains, and a few other plants. There was no evidence that a building was ever present.
It was quite a long drive and the speed limit on these non-interstate roads was 70. In Nevada, there were lots of small joshua trees. Finally, I saw a small sign welcoming me to California. California is the first and only unvisited state on this trip. It is the 47th state I've seen, leaving only Louisiana, Alaska, and Hawaii unvisited. Shortly after I entered the state, I reminded myself that this is my 47th state. A couple of minutes later, I noticed I passed by mile marker 47 on the road I was traveling. That was an odd coincidence.
View Larger Map
While I did not have trouble talking on the cell phone in the Nevada desert, connections did not hold more than three minutes after I entered California. After a short time, I entered Death Valley (though not yet the actual national park) and there was absolutely no cell phone service.
Death Valley is beautiful with mountain ranges fairly close to the road. The temperature was in the mid 80s and flowers were in bloom. When I got to the fee area, it was a self-pay station. This annoyed me at first because I wondered how I'd use my national parks pass. The entrance fee was $20 and I'd hate to have to pay since I already bought the annual pass for $80. The instructions said nothing about annual passes. There was no cell phone signal so I could not call the park office. I tried to use a pay phone, but it would not accept quarters. Finally, I decided that since I came this far I'd pay and find a human being to argue with. The system did at least take credit cards (translating to hotel points). Thankfully, within the electronic system, there was an option to slide in the annual pass instead of a credit card. So, I was able to avoid double payment.
The first section I visited was Dante's View. It takes you up to the top of a mountain where you can see for miles in the park. The salt flats look amazing from that far up, as do the cliffs. I did get a cell phone signal, but it would typically cut out after thirty seconds if I tried to make a call.
After leaving that area and getting back on the main road, I stopped for more photos. One area had what looked like small rocks on the ground. As I got closer, I saw that these were actual plants clustered together and colored in such a way that they looked like rocks.
Driving further, I encountered the badlands. These were beautiful, though they still don't come close to the beauty and diverse scenery of Makoshika State Park in Montana that I visited in Summer, 2008.
I started to get very nervous about gas. I had half a tank (there were no stations around the east entrance of the park). But I had no idea how far I'd have to drive within the park and how far it would be once I left the park before I found a gas station. While I would never want to run out of gas in general, lack of cell phone service would only make the situation worse.
I arrived at Furnace Creek. This is a combination campground and tourist trap. One section has a hotel and then if you drive further, you see the restaurants, souvenir shops, golf area, etc. Just around the corner was a gas station.....selling gas at $4.09. This was really gouging as CA has gas around $3.13/gallon. But, I had to buy at least one gallon to be safe.
I visited the Badwater area, which is the salt flats. These were very interesting and created some very unique mud formations. With the salt on the edges, the mud formations are hard as a rock. There were areas with a little bit of water completely covered with salt, as if it was ice.
Many miles later, I came across Stovepipe Wells, which has apparently been a tiny town/village in the park since 1926. At this point it's just a tourist trap with a general store, restaurant, motel, and gas station. Gas went for $3.56/gallon. I didn't like that either, but I came close to filling up to be safe.
The temperature went up to 96. As I headed towards the west entrance, I saw some interesting sand dunes. People could go up to them, but with a three hour drive ahead of me to get to the next hotel, I simply lacked the energy. Beyond that, when I visited sand dunes in Idaho in 2008, sand got into the camera.
As I was driving further, I saw a warning sign that encouraged drivers not to turn on the air conditioner in order to avoid overheating. This suggestion was for the next twenty miles. I'm sure it was referring to summer, but I think it's probably not a good idea to be in this park at all during the summer.
The drive took me through some really steep mountain roads with spectacular scenery. Unfortunately, there was no place to stop off and take pictures. There was also such low light that the photos would not have been any good.
After leaving the park, it seemed like an interminable drive in the middle of nowhere during the dark. I had at least two hours to get to my hotel in Mojave, CA after leaving the western exit from the park. Often there were no other vehicles. Once in a while there was a gas station, but not that often. I'm glad I fueled up in the park, even at $3.56/gallon.
View Larger Map
When I got into Mojave, I found a gas station with a price of $3.05/gallon. Every other station was at least $3.13/gallon. If it's too good to be true... When I pulled up to a pump, they did not have the credit card readers. I went inside and was told to swipe my card. When the attendant found it was a credit card and not a debit card, she explained that they only take cash or debit. I have never heard of a gas station that does not take credit cards. Anyway, I told her I would have to go elsewhere (I want the points for this and every other purchase I make on this trip) and she continued to argue with me about why I wasn't using my debit card. I had to explain I don't have one.
When I finally arrived at the hotel, I was exhausted. This was an Econo Lodge. It both saved some money, and more importantly, was one of the closest and least expensive (at 3 hours and 20 minutes from Furnace Creek) Choice Hotel affiliates from the park. More importantly, it was closer than others to my next stop which was Simi Valley, CA. While this hotel had good ratings, it definitely looked old and had stains all over the rug. There were almost no electric plugs available in the room. I had to be very creative with my laptop to be able to plug it in. On a full charge, the battery typically lasts about twenty minutes before dying.
It was quite a long drive and the speed limit on these non-interstate roads was 70. In Nevada, there were lots of small joshua trees. Finally, I saw a small sign welcoming me to California. California is the first and only unvisited state on this trip. It is the 47th state I've seen, leaving only Louisiana, Alaska, and Hawaii unvisited. Shortly after I entered the state, I reminded myself that this is my 47th state. A couple of minutes later, I noticed I passed by mile marker 47 on the road I was traveling. That was an odd coincidence.
View Larger Map
While I did not have trouble talking on the cell phone in the Nevada desert, connections did not hold more than three minutes after I entered California. After a short time, I entered Death Valley (though not yet the actual national park) and there was absolutely no cell phone service.
Death Valley is beautiful with mountain ranges fairly close to the road. The temperature was in the mid 80s and flowers were in bloom. When I got to the fee area, it was a self-pay station. This annoyed me at first because I wondered how I'd use my national parks pass. The entrance fee was $20 and I'd hate to have to pay since I already bought the annual pass for $80. The instructions said nothing about annual passes. There was no cell phone signal so I could not call the park office. I tried to use a pay phone, but it would not accept quarters. Finally, I decided that since I came this far I'd pay and find a human being to argue with. The system did at least take credit cards (translating to hotel points). Thankfully, within the electronic system, there was an option to slide in the annual pass instead of a credit card. So, I was able to avoid double payment.
The first section I visited was Dante's View. It takes you up to the top of a mountain where you can see for miles in the park. The salt flats look amazing from that far up, as do the cliffs. I did get a cell phone signal, but it would typically cut out after thirty seconds if I tried to make a call.
After leaving that area and getting back on the main road, I stopped for more photos. One area had what looked like small rocks on the ground. As I got closer, I saw that these were actual plants clustered together and colored in such a way that they looked like rocks.
Driving further, I encountered the badlands. These were beautiful, though they still don't come close to the beauty and diverse scenery of Makoshika State Park in Montana that I visited in Summer, 2008.
I started to get very nervous about gas. I had half a tank (there were no stations around the east entrance of the park). But I had no idea how far I'd have to drive within the park and how far it would be once I left the park before I found a gas station. While I would never want to run out of gas in general, lack of cell phone service would only make the situation worse.
I arrived at Furnace Creek. This is a combination campground and tourist trap. One section has a hotel and then if you drive further, you see the restaurants, souvenir shops, golf area, etc. Just around the corner was a gas station.....selling gas at $4.09. This was really gouging as CA has gas around $3.13/gallon. But, I had to buy at least one gallon to be safe.
I visited the Badwater area, which is the salt flats. These were very interesting and created some very unique mud formations. With the salt on the edges, the mud formations are hard as a rock. There were areas with a little bit of water completely covered with salt, as if it was ice.
Many miles later, I came across Stovepipe Wells, which has apparently been a tiny town/village in the park since 1926. At this point it's just a tourist trap with a general store, restaurant, motel, and gas station. Gas went for $3.56/gallon. I didn't like that either, but I came close to filling up to be safe.
The temperature went up to 96. As I headed towards the west entrance, I saw some interesting sand dunes. People could go up to them, but with a three hour drive ahead of me to get to the next hotel, I simply lacked the energy. Beyond that, when I visited sand dunes in Idaho in 2008, sand got into the camera.
As I was driving further, I saw a warning sign that encouraged drivers not to turn on the air conditioner in order to avoid overheating. This suggestion was for the next twenty miles. I'm sure it was referring to summer, but I think it's probably not a good idea to be in this park at all during the summer.
The drive took me through some really steep mountain roads with spectacular scenery. Unfortunately, there was no place to stop off and take pictures. There was also such low light that the photos would not have been any good.
After leaving the park, it seemed like an interminable drive in the middle of nowhere during the dark. I had at least two hours to get to my hotel in Mojave, CA after leaving the western exit from the park. Often there were no other vehicles. Once in a while there was a gas station, but not that often. I'm glad I fueled up in the park, even at $3.56/gallon.
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When I got into Mojave, I found a gas station with a price of $3.05/gallon. Every other station was at least $3.13/gallon. If it's too good to be true... When I pulled up to a pump, they did not have the credit card readers. I went inside and was told to swipe my card. When the attendant found it was a credit card and not a debit card, she explained that they only take cash or debit. I have never heard of a gas station that does not take credit cards. Anyway, I told her I would have to go elsewhere (I want the points for this and every other purchase I make on this trip) and she continued to argue with me about why I wasn't using my debit card. I had to explain I don't have one.
When I finally arrived at the hotel, I was exhausted. This was an Econo Lodge. It both saved some money, and more importantly, was one of the closest and least expensive (at 3 hours and 20 minutes from Furnace Creek) Choice Hotel affiliates from the park. More importantly, it was closer than others to my next stop which was Simi Valley, CA. While this hotel had good ratings, it definitely looked old and had stains all over the rug. There were almost no electric plugs available in the room. I had to be very creative with my laptop to be able to plug it in. On a full charge, the battery typically lasts about twenty minutes before dying.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
April 15, 2010: I-70 in Utah and Zion National Park
This was my third visit to Utah. The original plan for today was to head east to briefly see Canyonlands and then head west again to get to the next hotel in Henderson, Nevada (just outside Las Vegas). Since I bought the national parks pass, the entrance fee was covered and I could spend three hours or so there without feeling like I wasted the entrance fee. However, since it would take more than an hour to get there, and then it would be seven hours to get to the hotel in Nevada, I decided to save Canyonlands for another time. I was to exhausted to have eight hours of driving today.
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Oil Change
I also decided to have the oil changed today. When I rented the car, the Avis agent told me to get the oil changed when I got up to 4,000 miles. (I normally change my own car's oil at 3,000 miles.) I was getting close. Finding a place to change oil in southeast Utah is an adventure. In looking at the phonebook, I only found places ninety minutes east of the hotel. That was worse than trying to visit Canyonlands. In speaking to one of the garages, the guy nonchalantly suggested I go up to Salt Lake City when I said I was heading west. Out here, people truly think nothing of a four or five hour drive. However, Salt Lake City is four hours NORTH (and slightly west) and into the I-80 corridor. I needed to get to Las Vegas, which is west via I-70 and then southwest via I-15. I saw Salt Lake City on my 2008 cross country trip and don't plan to include it on this trip.
In searching around online, I found that after going two hours west on I-70 (which was the interstate I needed to take), there were several cities with Walmarts that could change oil. No appointment was necessary. Problem solved in terms of finding a place (though getting the oil changed still wasn't smooth).
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As soon as I got on I-70 from Green River, there was a warning sign indicating that there were no services for the next 100 miles. It's good that my gas tank was full. There were few exits and each one had a "No services" sign on it.
Scenery Along I-70
I-70 in southeast Utah is basically like its own national park. The rock formations are beautiful. There is a section called the "reef" and the road passes through a narrow area between giant rock formations. I-70 was extended into southern Utah in the late 50s/early 60s and they of course had to blast through the rocks. It was quite an expensive project. There are numerous viewing points along the interstate and even trails to look at canyons nearby. Obviously, unlike a national park there are no park rangers or anyone else to help, so it's best to be very careful. Cell phone service is very limited. In one of the viewing areas, there was a sign indicating no soliciting or vending. The funny part is that literally below that sign were table cloths featuring turquoise jewelry, pottery, and other items for sale.
The viewing points had the usual signs explaining the area. In one case, they talked about some of the more infamous old west outlaws using the canyons to hide out. They unfortunately even took Native Americans into slavery and sold them for $200 apiece.
Getting the Oil Changed
Getting the oil changed was an adventure. First, the GPS sent me down some service road along I-70 to a business that was clearly not Walmart. Finally, I drove around a bit and found Walmart on my own. The vehicle was so new that the make and model (despite this being a model that has been around for a while) was not in their system for the 2010 year. A manager decided to just list it as a 2009 even though it was a 2010 vehicle. At first they were suggesting I might have to purchase oil filters at a garage somewhere else for them to do the work. All of this for a simple oil change. (During my 2008 trip, I do recall being turned away by a garage in Wichita, Kansas --- a city of 350,000 and the largest city in the state --- because the vehicle was too new.) Then I had to sign a waiver that they were not responsible for loss of any items in the car. So, I hauled the various electronic items out of the car and watched the vehicle like a hawk as they did the oil change. After the experience with my friend Dan having his laptop stolen at the hotel in Birmingham, I was not taking any chances. They may have felt I was rude, but too bad.
After finally having the oil changed, I decided to see Zion Canyon so I could at least see something else before the hotel. This would be my first return visit to a big national park in the West. (I've visited the Adams and Van Buren Presidential homes --- which are national parks in the Northeast --- multiple times.) My previous visit to Zion was in August, 2007.
Kolob Canyons/Zion National Park
When I arrived, I noticed the more prominent name was Kolob Canyons. I didn't remember the park being called anything other than Zion National Park last time I visited. Things looked very different from what I remember. Still, the scenery was nice and some of the rock formations had snow on them. I remember Zion had two entrances last time I visited. I expected to drive through one and come out the other side. However, what I found instead was a road that ended in a cul-de-sac and visitors left from the same entrance they entered. Evidently, this is a subunit of Zion NP not connected with the main part of the park. I set the GPS to get me to the main section of the park. However, it was getting later in the day. It would be a half hour of driving after the exit from I-15 just to get to the park entrance. Then there would be time in the park plus another half hour drive to get back to I-15. I decided to skip it. I just wanted to get to my hotel.
Getting to Nevada
As I saw that I crossed the Utah state line on I-15, I kept wondering why I was not seeing a sign welcoming me to Nevada. As I turned a corner, I noticed a sign welcoming me to Arizona! I hadn't planned on visiting Arizona at all in this trip. I had forgotten that I-15 runs through AZ. In my 2007 trip, I drove this route heading towards Utah. This was another case where they had to blast through mountains to build the interstate. But the scenery looked far more beautiful than I remembered. I was only in Arizona briefly before I got into Nevada.
Nevada Desert
Once in Nevada, I was in the Pacific Time Zone. I gained an hour on my trip for the final time. When I switch time zones in the future, I will be losing an hour each time. As there was still some light, I noticed that despite this being the desert, the grass and other plants were lush green. All previous trips to the American desert were in the summer, and everything was brown and spent by then.
Lights of Vegas
As I got further into Nevada, darkness came. When I got closer to Las Vegas, I got to see the lights. I had never seen the Vegas lights from so far away before. While I had briefly been to Las Vegas at night in 2007, I only saw a few casinos lighted up. I didn't see the entire area from a distance. It was amazing. No wonder they say it can be seen from space.
Cheaper Gas
Gas was much more reasonable in the Las Vegas area. They had 87 octane for regular as we do in the Northeast. The price was $2.83/gallon.
While it had been cold at night in many of the other areas I had visited, it was very pleasant in Henderson. The hotel (Comfort Inn) was relatively inexpensive, but it was one of the nicest hotels I have been in on this trip. It's only a year old. If I'm ever in the area again, I would definitely go to this one.
View Larger Map
Oil Change
I also decided to have the oil changed today. When I rented the car, the Avis agent told me to get the oil changed when I got up to 4,000 miles. (I normally change my own car's oil at 3,000 miles.) I was getting close. Finding a place to change oil in southeast Utah is an adventure. In looking at the phonebook, I only found places ninety minutes east of the hotel. That was worse than trying to visit Canyonlands. In speaking to one of the garages, the guy nonchalantly suggested I go up to Salt Lake City when I said I was heading west. Out here, people truly think nothing of a four or five hour drive. However, Salt Lake City is four hours NORTH (and slightly west) and into the I-80 corridor. I needed to get to Las Vegas, which is west via I-70 and then southwest via I-15. I saw Salt Lake City on my 2008 cross country trip and don't plan to include it on this trip.
In searching around online, I found that after going two hours west on I-70 (which was the interstate I needed to take), there were several cities with Walmarts that could change oil. No appointment was necessary. Problem solved in terms of finding a place (though getting the oil changed still wasn't smooth).
View Larger Map
As soon as I got on I-70 from Green River, there was a warning sign indicating that there were no services for the next 100 miles. It's good that my gas tank was full. There were few exits and each one had a "No services" sign on it.
Scenery Along I-70
I-70 in southeast Utah is basically like its own national park. The rock formations are beautiful. There is a section called the "reef" and the road passes through a narrow area between giant rock formations. I-70 was extended into southern Utah in the late 50s/early 60s and they of course had to blast through the rocks. It was quite an expensive project. There are numerous viewing points along the interstate and even trails to look at canyons nearby. Obviously, unlike a national park there are no park rangers or anyone else to help, so it's best to be very careful. Cell phone service is very limited. In one of the viewing areas, there was a sign indicating no soliciting or vending. The funny part is that literally below that sign were table cloths featuring turquoise jewelry, pottery, and other items for sale.
The viewing points had the usual signs explaining the area. In one case, they talked about some of the more infamous old west outlaws using the canyons to hide out. They unfortunately even took Native Americans into slavery and sold them for $200 apiece.
Getting the Oil Changed
Getting the oil changed was an adventure. First, the GPS sent me down some service road along I-70 to a business that was clearly not Walmart. Finally, I drove around a bit and found Walmart on my own. The vehicle was so new that the make and model (despite this being a model that has been around for a while) was not in their system for the 2010 year. A manager decided to just list it as a 2009 even though it was a 2010 vehicle. At first they were suggesting I might have to purchase oil filters at a garage somewhere else for them to do the work. All of this for a simple oil change. (During my 2008 trip, I do recall being turned away by a garage in Wichita, Kansas --- a city of 350,000 and the largest city in the state --- because the vehicle was too new.) Then I had to sign a waiver that they were not responsible for loss of any items in the car. So, I hauled the various electronic items out of the car and watched the vehicle like a hawk as they did the oil change. After the experience with my friend Dan having his laptop stolen at the hotel in Birmingham, I was not taking any chances. They may have felt I was rude, but too bad.
After finally having the oil changed, I decided to see Zion Canyon so I could at least see something else before the hotel. This would be my first return visit to a big national park in the West. (I've visited the Adams and Van Buren Presidential homes --- which are national parks in the Northeast --- multiple times.) My previous visit to Zion was in August, 2007.
Kolob Canyons/Zion National Park
When I arrived, I noticed the more prominent name was Kolob Canyons. I didn't remember the park being called anything other than Zion National Park last time I visited. Things looked very different from what I remember. Still, the scenery was nice and some of the rock formations had snow on them. I remember Zion had two entrances last time I visited. I expected to drive through one and come out the other side. However, what I found instead was a road that ended in a cul-de-sac and visitors left from the same entrance they entered. Evidently, this is a subunit of Zion NP not connected with the main part of the park. I set the GPS to get me to the main section of the park. However, it was getting later in the day. It would be a half hour of driving after the exit from I-15 just to get to the park entrance. Then there would be time in the park plus another half hour drive to get back to I-15. I decided to skip it. I just wanted to get to my hotel.
Getting to Nevada
As I saw that I crossed the Utah state line on I-15, I kept wondering why I was not seeing a sign welcoming me to Nevada. As I turned a corner, I noticed a sign welcoming me to Arizona! I hadn't planned on visiting Arizona at all in this trip. I had forgotten that I-15 runs through AZ. In my 2007 trip, I drove this route heading towards Utah. This was another case where they had to blast through mountains to build the interstate. But the scenery looked far more beautiful than I remembered. I was only in Arizona briefly before I got into Nevada.
Nevada Desert
Once in Nevada, I was in the Pacific Time Zone. I gained an hour on my trip for the final time. When I switch time zones in the future, I will be losing an hour each time. As there was still some light, I noticed that despite this being the desert, the grass and other plants were lush green. All previous trips to the American desert were in the summer, and everything was brown and spent by then.
Lights of Vegas
As I got further into Nevada, darkness came. When I got closer to Las Vegas, I got to see the lights. I had never seen the Vegas lights from so far away before. While I had briefly been to Las Vegas at night in 2007, I only saw a few casinos lighted up. I didn't see the entire area from a distance. It was amazing. No wonder they say it can be seen from space.
Cheaper Gas
Gas was much more reasonable in the Las Vegas area. They had 87 octane for regular as we do in the Northeast. The price was $2.83/gallon.
While it had been cold at night in many of the other areas I had visited, it was very pleasant in Henderson. The hotel (Comfort Inn) was relatively inexpensive, but it was one of the nicest hotels I have been in on this trip. It's only a year old. If I'm ever in the area again, I would definitely go to this one.
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