9/25/2008

Day 6 Ends at Sacramento, CA... finally



We left Las Vegas at 8 in the morning bound for Sacramento where our friend Tim awaited us. We knew it would be a long day on the road because we planned to hit both Death Valley and Yosemite. As we started into Yosemite we had felt as if we had been making pretty good time. We guessed that we could make it to Sacramento by 8 or 9.

Unfortunately we hit some kind of time vortex. The winding roads of Yosemite took us through some beautiful vistas so we decided to go through the middle of the park to see the big landmarks like El Capitan, Half Dome, and Wedding Bell (the waterfall). We left around sunset hoping to make it to Tim by 10.

We drove the winding highway leading from Yosemite to I-5 north for hours. And hours. And it never stopped. We couldn't get of the damn highway. We finally reach a little hell hole of a place: Manteca, California (my apologies to anyone from Manteca). We needed food. Since the "Chinese food" joint had already closed we settled on the diarrhea-inducing wonders of Appleby's and took a half-hour break.

After getting back to the road we drove straight west and bit later got to I-5. We turned right to merge onto I-5. But instead of the signs reading Sacramento, they read Los Angeles. We were driving south. How this happened I have no idea. It seemed simple enough: drive west, meet freeway, turn right and go north. But no, we headed south.

Long story short, we eventually made it to Sacramento after midnight, and Tim was fast asleep (snoring... snoring really, really loud. Tim, you gotta go see a doctor about that). A truly hellish day of driving. Never again.

この日のドライブは死ぬほど長かった!朝8時にラスベガスを出て、Death Valley を通り過ぎて、ヨセミテに2時についたところまでは良かった。その後の、ヨセミテ内の細い道と、ヨセミテをサクラメントに抜ける日光いろは坂も真っ青のぐねぐね道に泣かされました。レストランも閉まってしまって、夕飯はものすごっく不味いファミレスだし・・・(たぶんこの旅行の中で一番不味い食事でした)。泣きっ面にハチとはまさにこのこと。サクラメントに着いたのは夜中の1時ごろ。


But the next morning we met Tim at his bungalow and all headed to Napa for a good time.

本日の走行距離:905 km
Today's Driving:560 miles

テキサス暮らしが長くなってきて、地図上で近そうに見えると、基本的にすぐって思ってしまいます。西海岸には山があって、時速80マイルでぶっ飛ばせるわけではないのですよね。中西部に御住まいの皆様、ロードトリップの際は要注意ですよ!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

初コメントです~
とにかく、圧巻です!
ロードトリップって、単なる観光とは全く違う醍醐味があるね。ホワイトサンズとか、デスバレーとか、砂漠に強く惹かれます。
一度は、地獄のドライブもやってみたいかも(?)。。。

かしまし三人娘には脱帽です~

Anonymous said...

すごいたのしそーーー!
私も絶対ロードトリップしてみたいです。でもヨセミテまでかなー笑
ずっと読んでたのに、コメントの残しかたをこないだ発見しました!これからはがっつしコメントします!

Anonymous said...

wow, i'm impressed by the spatial intelligence required to get that luggage to fit in the back of the van like a jig-saw puzzle!