October 12 through October 19, 2005

Wednesday October 12:

Today we revisit San Francisco!  We drove in early, leaving Rohnert Park before 6AM, and arrived at Candlestick RV Park promptly at 8AM.  The proper exit from US 101 is the 'Monster Park" exit (Yes, Candlestick park has been renamed!) a bit south of the RV park, take the road that winds around the water to the RV park, NOT the shortest route picked by Street Atlas (we found this by accident this time, as we overshot the planned exit; it is MUCH easier).  This is an expensive place at $55/night, plus $10 each for shuttle to downtown, but it is worth it for convenience....no complicated unfamiliar public transport into the city from a park on the outskirts.  We went to downtown San Francisco on the 9AM shuttle to California and Kearney streets.  First move is to ride the cable car....not the cheapest form of transport in the city, but fun.  We stopped at this steep short street, a tourist attraction....it was a challenge just to walk down it....but cars used it, and there were parking pullouts too!

The sidewalks are steps.  Needless to say, vehicle traffic was one way...DOWN!  :-)  We won't take the RV here!  We plan on taking a boat to Alcatraz this trip.  The island is dimly visible in the distance through the haze below...in the center of the picture.

The car parked on the crest of the hill is following standard procedure here....wheels are required to be turned to the curb when parked on hills to prevent runaways.   That's certainly understandable, given these hills...  We re-board the cable car for Fisherman's Wharf.  At the end of the line, the car must be turned around...by man power.  :-)

We walked to the Alcatraz Island tour boat terminal, and found they were all booked for today; we could wait for standby passage...but the list was long.  We decided waiting for standby was NOT the way we wanted to spend our day in San Francisco, so immediately changed plans.  We wandered on Fisherman's Wharf.....

The crowds were not yet heavy in the streets...but it is early!  This sailing ship was open as a tourist attraction.

We decided we'd rather roam around Chinatown a bit, then have lunch there.  We boarded another cable car for the trip back.   We wandered Chinatown then picked a modestly priced Chinese place for lunch, recommended by our AAA Guidebook. We felt we were in the right place when we saw only Chinese people were eating here.  :-) It was very good, especially my fish/vegetable dish. Claire's lamb in a clay pot dish tasted excellent, but used lamb shank, and had the bone and gristle in the pot to be picked out. My fish had been deboned.  NOTHING was left when we were done, though! :-)   We took another cable car, and walked a good distance to see the Japanese section of San Francisco.  This was MUCH smaller than the Chinese section.... but it was attractive. :-)  

This pagoda is the centerpiece of a Japanese trade center with an interesting  market building sheltering stands of many types.  We had coffee and rested a bit here before starting the walk back to the cable car.  The cable car passed the cable car museum, which we had passed up last time here...

This time we do go in.  I am surprised to find that this is an "active museum"...we get to view the operating power source for the three cable car lines....but not the car storage and repair shop located above the drive machinery.

These huge electric powered winches drive the steel cables moving for miles under the streets.  Electrical drive was first introduced in 1911, replacing the steam engine driven winches used from the start here in 1878.  The 1911 winches were replaced with the current design in the 1984 cable car upgrade.  If the cable frays or (very rarely) breaks, the affected line must be stopped and the cable spliced to repair it.  Many repairs are done in the shop here next to the winches.

 When a fray detector switch along the line gets tripped, the cable is slowly moved until the damaged part is at this place, then the line stops until repairs are complete.  Cables are totally replaced with new ones much more frequently than I'd thought economically feasible....every 75 to 250 days... but the cars are a MAJOR draw for San Francisco tourists (like us...)  Cable replacement is done at night when the cars are not operating.  This cable car system was the first in the world, and is the only one left operating.  We catch a cable car back to Chinatown and wander some more.  

Claire is interested in some things in the Chinese food markets, but the evening rush has started and the shops are bustling with local customers. We decide to pass on the food, and returned EXHAUSTED to the shuttle stop 20 minutes early for our scheduled 6PM return to the RV.  This has been a heavy walking day; by the time we returned we were HAPPY we did not have to use complicated public transport to get back to our "home".  We have snacked enough all day that dinner is not needed, but sleep sure is after our early start.

Thursday October 13:

We slept late, showered, dumped, and filled water before leaving San Francisco at 11:15 AM via the Oakland Bay Bridge.  We stopped at Costco in Livermore for fuel, found nothing else to buy and moved on to I-5 south along the central valley. Our destination today is Walmart in the town of Los Banos CA.  We had not checked email for a while;  we found McDonalds had pay WiFi, but there was free WiFi in back of their shopping center lot.  After dinner, we moved on to Walmart for the night.

Friday October 14:

We got an early start today; there is not much along the central valley but farms, and we plan to stop at Flying J in Frazer Park CA for the night.  We need regular engine maintenance too, and  want to stop a couple hours for that on the way too. The run was easy, as we passed many fields of different crops along the road.  Here a crop sprayer is busy over fields of cotton.

Things get harder when we came to the climb up Tejon pass at the south end of the central valley.  Trucks were VERY slow here, and we got stuck behind one in the right lane, and could not pass...it was a long climb in second gear at 25 mph to the Flying J near the top.  Flying J usually has pay WiFi, but this one had free WiFi available in their parking lot.  It was windy and COOOL up here at 3870 feet!  There is a storm coming, and tonight we need HEAT.

Saturday October 15:

Before leaving Flying J we bought propane, and as I paid the bill the clerk was fending off phone calls for tire chains; it's time to be OUTTA here and down in the warm lowlands on the other side of this pass!  The way down is steep too, but it is faster and easier on the machinery.  We sure notice the difference in traffic as we join I-10 west of Los Angeles...this is a mid day all lanes occupied traffic jam... but it moves.  

We were surprised to see the fenderless car (yellow sportster convertible in next lane right) operating on the highway....we're rather sensitive to rocks flying into our windshield by now.  :-)    He soon went ahead out of sight.  We intend to stop for fuel at Costco in Montclair...we've been told that fuel costs go up away from the major cities as the refineries are located there and transport adds to the cost elsewhere.  We find this Costco is quite reasonable for the time and place, at $2.739/g.  the place is full, with lines.  We have to help several people who pull in behind us to fill back out as we take a LONG time to fill and are blocking their exit.  We continue on towards Palm Springs.  We have never approached it this way, and are AMAZED at the quantity of wind driven electric generators along I-10 just west of the City. 

I like these things, and so does Claire...but she remarked that maybe this was a few too many in one place...  :-)   We asked at the Walmart in Cathedral City, where we had stayed last year; they said we could not stay now due to enforcement of a local no overnight parking ordnance.  We moved on down the street to Sam's Club; Sam's said we could stay, but at our own risk.  Sure, it always is at our risk....as long as the risk is not getting a ticket, which they said was not a problem.

Sunday October 16:

We decided to spend today and tomorrow morning at Desert Pools RV resort in Desert Hot Springs CA near Palm Springs.  We drove here in rain; the mileage in the Passport America book is off by 50%; 2 miles is really 3, and 4 miles is really 6.  This is a NICE place for $15 a night!  :-)  The hot pool is 104 degrees max, with a Jacuzzi.  We enjoy as much as we can take!  It is lightning when I come home at near 9PM, and they insist nobody use the pools in lightning.  There was quite a storm during the night, we unplugged electricity and cable TV.    

Monday October 17

 There were sirens in the night, and I smell forest fire smoke in the morning.  Lightning lit something off!  :-(  We soak in the morning and stay until 11AM checkout time, then drove to downtown Palm Springs in very heavy rain to see the area.

I'm glad we are below the snow level with this storm.....  :-)  We plan to eat at Thai Smiles in downtown Palm Springs.  Our friend Kathleen in Austin recommended it...and she lived here for quite a time. We must find parking ...and while driving around looking, find a post office we need to use.  It's raining, but that's OK.  Parking was found a couple streets over on the street near a casino; we waited a bit for the rain to subside.  There was WiFi available, so time passed quickly.  We finally decided to walk with rain jackets, and found it easily.

Well, perhaps we did have to dodge a few puddles and splashes from passing cars.  :-)   We found Thai Smiles to be DELICIOUS.     We stayed downtown until after dark, the rain stopped and we walked the streets, enjoying some ice cream.... the sidewalk celebrity tiles were interesting, but I found I knew very few of them.  This one brought back some memories though....

I remember watching Cheeta on TV when I was just a kid....  :-))  We drove to Sam's Club for the night in the dark....  The rain during the night was H E A V Y.  Roads were closed, emergency vehicles parked nearby in Sam's lot for a time.

Tuesday October 18:

It has cleared by morning, but we were not in too great a hurry to leave, as roads are reported blocked by flooding and washouts. We went shopping for food at Staters, then to the El Paseo shopping area ("The pass" in Street Atlas) east of Palm Springs.  

This is a REALLY upscale shopping plaza, manicured and artsy; I bought an ice pick…probably overpaid by several times, but few places carry them and we needed one.  We went on to the Walmart in La Quinta CA that we could not find last year, with a wrong address from Walmart's own map book.  This year we found it, but it's hidden in back away from the road, hard to find if you do not know it's there..  Claire had her hair cut, and they left us stay overnight.  :-))

Wednesday October 19:

Today we decided to take the tram to the top of the mountains west of Palm Springs.   The transmission temperature went up to 247 degrees on the outlet line to the cooler on the climb to the tram parking area at 2800 feet.  The 4 mile grade averaged 12.5%... There was  a hot smell near the top, and we left the engine idle a long time until the temp came down under 180. We got off the tram and found ourselves in...... SNOW, between 8500' and over 9000' elevation.  I guess we shoulda known....  :-))   At least we were dressed for cold, which it really was not.  A few playful snowballs had to be exchanged.....

 The hike was GREAT up top, but TIRING in the snow and high altitude.  It was just gorgeous.....even though it cooled as we approached 9000 ft elevation, and needed all our jackets.

We returned to the tram terminal and ate our snacks with coffee.  The view of the valley below was outstanding!

We caught the tram down as the sun sank.  The ride is an experience in itself.  The rocks pass close, the car rotates so everybody gets to look in all directions...but it makes pictures hard to plan :-)

When we got back to the RV, I checked the transmission fluid for any burned smell or brown appearance before starting down...all is OK, so we dodged that bullet!   There was considerable braking required in low gear to stay under the 30 mph speed limit on the way down.  This is a tuff place for heavy RVs.   We decided on dinner again tonight at Thai Smiles, as we are quite close and too tired to cook.  I  had Pad Thai, as I needed more carbs after the hike!   We then drove to Flying J at Ramon Road in Cathedral City.  There was no good place to park in their crowded truck parking lot where the Flying J clerk said "Truckers don't mind", and this Flying J has no RV parking lot….truckers sure would have minded if they could not find a place to sleep and we were in their spot!  After waiting a long time to dump behind a trailer who took forever rinsing his tanks, we decided to dump and fill in the morning.  We squeezed into an open place on the street, and hit the sack.  It was NOISY as trucks passing very close on the road used their jake brakes to slow to go into Flying J…  Tonight ends our stay in the Palm Springs area.  Tomorrow we move on to the Slabs in Niland CA.

 PLANS: This page was completed on New Years Eve, 12/31/2005....no more will get done this year!  :-)  We may be able to finish the fall trip in one more page, as the last week was pretty much all work and no play.  Hopefully we get it done SOON, before packing begins for the NEXT trip  :-).

Enjoy,
Barrie and Claire