Travel

Leaving on a Road Trip

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The Winchester House in San Jose, California, was one of our first stops. This 161 room mansion was the home of Sarah Winchester, heiress to the Winchester gun fortune. With all those rooms, she could have expanded to a hotel chain.

It’s 4:00 am, and we’re up and moving, looking forward to our next road trip and a cure for cabin fever. I pull the car up close to the front door and start loading luggage.

If a man knows what’s best for him, he will put the woman’s luggage in the car first, before he tries to find room for his own.

The Golden Gate Bridge, and San Francisco behind it.

My wife belts out an order: “Take the black bag!”

She means the multi-colored bag with the black handle. I don’t know this, so I stand in front of it looking stupid, trying to find the black bag. “Oh, I’ll get it myself!” she huffs impatiently, and snatches the bag and puts it by the front door for me to carry the rest of the way.

Five of the 21 California missions are in the San Francisco bay area. We pilgrimed to all five. Poppies bloom beside the northernmost mission, in Sonoma.

Our pack of dogs follows her every movement, as she frantically darts about the house looking for this and that to take on the trip. She screeches, “Move you fucking dummies or I will kill you!” She doesn’t mean a word of it, and the dogs know that. They continue to mosey and mill about her feet.

Sea lions at Fisherman’s Wharf, Pier 39, in San Francisco. Their playful ways reminded us of our dogs at home.

The dogs are aware that something is up. They’ve watched our madcap routine before. They know we’re abandoning them. They’re casting forlorn looks at us. We avoid their eye contact.

A meat market in Chinatown, San Francisco. For some reason, this too reminded us of our dogs at home.

I was hoping we could leave by 4:45. But no, she hasn’t poured her coffee yet. Coffee. That poisonous impedimenta that slows us down like leg irons, everywhere we go.

Time to leave the motel? No, wait, not until she walks to the lobby, pours one last cup of joe, and admixes the precise blend of cream and sugar to make it just right. Time to leave the restaurant? Nope. Not until she gets a cup of coffee to go, again carefully mixing in the perfect blend of condiments. Time to get out of the car and walk to the tourist attraction? Uh-uh. Not until she grabs her styrofoam tumbler of java, locates the ice chest, and creates a cup of iced coffee.

Lombard Street, in San Francisco. This is putatively the crookedest street in the world. So I guess a lot of politicians live here.

Ice. Coffee. And tea, also. Banes of my existence. I don’t use ice in my drinks, and I don’t drink coffee or tea. But she does. And it throws quicksand in our path to vacationland.

The north fork of the American River, near Auburn, California. Gold was first discovered on the south fork, sparking the 49er gold rush. It would have been discovered on the north fork first, but the prospector there had to brew a cup of coffee, and missed his chance.

At 4:55 am we finally drive off, feeling electric with excitement. Her electricity supercharges her mouth, and she starts yacking and yacking and yacking, while my ears sink lower and lower and lower, until they drop off my skull. But that’s okay, after just 300 miles of this she finally tires and nods off.

We ventured over the Sierras between snowstorms, and caught this wintry view of Lake Tahoe.

We see many sights on this trip, some of which I’ll be blogging about. And we make just as many memories. We laugh, we grouse, and we’re awestruck by all the new, unique things we encounter.

Mono Lake, and the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada. Los Angeles has a 350 mile-long straw, which it uses to suck up the snowmelt that would normally flow into this lake. It’s caused ecological catastrophe, and has been a source of controversy since 1941.

Finally, after a long, circuitous route through northern and southern California, and a few bits and pieces of Nevada, we drive home. We’re looking forward to familiar territory, our cabin fever cured. The dogs yap at the door, and paw us with happy feet as we step over the threshold.

13,754 foot Mt. Morgan, in the Sierra Nevada, overlooking Bishop, California.

This was how my last vacation went, and basically how they all go. It isn’t easy traveling with someone whose habits are different from mine. But I adjust to her, and she adjusts to me. And this makes it a whole lot better than traveling alone.

Because it wouldn’t be a vacation without her.

We spiced things up a bit, by going from 40 degree temperatures one day, to the 80’s the next, with this side trip through Death Valley.

Categories: Travel

55 replies »

  1. The last trip I took with my late husband (6 weeks before his death from lung cancer) was through this part of the country including San Francisco. We landed in Phoenix, went to Sedona, then the Grand Canyon, then Las Vegas, then Bakersfield (work meeting, for me). After that we drove up the coast to Seattle and flew home from there. On a previous trip we had made it to Lake Tahoe and Reno, and back again. Such a gorgeous part of the US, and one we meant to make many more visits to. We had our share of squabbles and adjusting to each other’s differences as travel partners too. Great memories. Thanks, TG.

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    • How sad that you lost him so soon after that trip. But at least you got to have some good times to remember him by. I agree, it is a gorgeous part of the U.S. We really enjoyed it.

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  2. No wonder coffee is anathema to you:

    I was hoping we could leave by 4:45. But no, she hasn’t poured her coffee yet. Coffee. That poisonous impedimenta that slows us down like leg irons, everywhere we go.

    Time to leave the motel? No, wait, not until she walks to the lobby, pours one last cup of joe, and admixes the precise blend of cream and sugar to make it just right. Time to leave the restaurant? Nope. Not until she gets a cup of coffee to go, again carefully mixing in the perfect blend of condiments. Time to get out of the car and walk to the tourist attraction? Uh-uh. Not until she grabs her styrofoam tumbler of java, locates the ice chest, and creates a cup of iced coffee.

    Loved your last sentence!

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  3. Beautiful country out West! Glad you guys had a great time. I traveled a lot as a child and so glad that we could see so much, but there is still so much to see! My husband caught the traveling bug from me, as he rarely traveled growing up.
    I am impressed with your wife’s skill at teaching you all about patience, as you wait for her to get her all-important coffee. You should thank her for helping you to work at strengthening your patience. 🙂

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  5. I wondered where you were. I noticed it was unusually quiet in your corner of the world. Now I know what you were doing 🙂

    You’ve just ended your road trip together and ours starts next weekend. So true about having to adjust to each other’s difference. Outside the bubble of our homes, those differences somehow seem to magnify. I smiled at the line about your wife yacking, and yacking, and yacking. I get the opposite complaint. I’m a pretty quiet person and don’t talk much which Husband finds challenging in the car. He will periodically prod me to talk to him while he’s driving.

    Love your pictures, especially of the mountains! It’s hard to know how to pack for a trip that takes you through yo-yo’ing temperatures.

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  7. How funny, Tippy. Maybe vacations involving personality and/or java clashes are more universal than I thought. My hubby is the java guy. I love coffee, but it makes me have to pee even more than usual (read: hourly), so I avoid drinking it on roadtrips. I bet you needed a nap after rolling out of bed at 4 am. Great pics of the San Fran sights. 🙂

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  8. I have a way to save the day in regards to coffee. Don’t get up at ungodly hours like 4 am. No wonder so much coffee was needed. I’m surprised you didn’t need to drink a pot of it!

    Sounds like an interesting trip. Glad you had a good time.

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