1998/9 Baja, Mexico / California Trip

We left Williams at 8:00 as the sun had been up for 1/2 hour already. The weather was like yesterday, cold but sunny and blue sky. We saw many large flocks of birds or geese that were headed to the northwest direction. We drove through flat farmland including orchards and wheat farms again today. In what seemed to be the middle of nowhere is when the large city of Sacramento comes into view. I would compare this town to Spokane or Portland as it is city life with a laid back atmosphere. We stopped in the city at Chinatown and walked around for 30 minutes. A couple blocks closer to the river was Old Sacramento, which consisted of several blocks of old buildings with restaurants and gift shops and boardwalks for sidewalks. Most everything was closed down as it was still only 9:00 on a Sunday morning. There was also an old paddle wheel river boat along the water that had been turned into the Delta King Hotel/Restaurant and seemed to be doing a good business. We stopped to get gas and left town around 10:30

We drove south on I-5 through Stockton and ran into overcast skies southeast of the Bay Area. We had heard reports on the radio that it was snowing in San Francisco. I don't ever remember that happening before. We did pass a three car accident from a hale storm around Firebough and then had some rain for about 30 minutes. We stopped in Coalinga for gas and McDonald's as this place was packed because there is nothing else in the vicinity. We continued south on I-5 through flat country with mountains coming up in front of us. The weather alternated between rain, complete overcast, sun breaks and rainbows. We finally weaved our way through the mountains and up to Tejon Pass at 4,000 ft elevation. We stopped at Fort Tejon at 3:15 to rest for a couple minutes and saw some snow flakes. The forest ranger said that this place is packed during the summer. They had trails and buildings here to tell about the history of the area. We only stayed for about 15 minutes as we were now ready to descend into LA.

We arrived in Los Angeles around 4:00 and traffic was not that bad since it was Sunday. It only took us 45 minutes to get through town and continue on to San Diego. We arrived there at 5:45 and would go into Chula Vista for dinner at KFC. I also bought an extra barrel of chicken to take across the border as I knew that Shawna would at least eat it if she didn't want Mexican food. After two days of just driving we decided to go see a movie tonight. "You've Got Mail " had just come out, about an E-mail relationship. It wasn't real good but it was entertaining for the night. It gave us a chance to get out of the truck and do something else. The town had Christmas decorations in the city park where we took the kids for a little while after the movie. All the trees were lit up and they also had a fountain going that had orange lights glowing on the water. It looked like there was also a little house where Santa had been greeting the kids. This was a nice clean park and also felt safe walking around this area. We left the park and started looking for a hotel. We finally found a Value Inn for $42 in National City and we went to bed around 11:00 prepared to go into Mexico tomorrow.

600 miles today, 1300 Total.