Monday morning, we checked out of our motel and bid adieu to Lucille and Doug. We wished them well in their effort to sell their home in preparation of their moving back to Missouri.
Terry and I headed south on US Route 1 again, stopping at a few of the beaches (not surprisingly empty as it was 1- early 2- wind, cold and damp) and then Pigeon Point. There was nothing new except the tide changes and the weather so we made the turn east at Pescadero and headed back up the mountains toward Skyline Ridge Road.
We stopped along the way to walk in several redwood groves and enjoy the peace and quiet the forest envelopes. We stopped for lunch at
Alice’s Restaurant (more
here). I felt uncomfortable at first since I didn’t have any shovels, or rakes, or implements of destruction, nor did I have any glossy 4 by 6 color photos with circles and arrows and paragraphs on the back of each one. But that was okay. Alice’s (at the intersection of Cal routes 35 and 84) is a motorcycle hang out. Everything is themed for the motorcycle crowd. And their burgers are from heaven!
(Actually, I seem to have lost all the pictures I took this day. Downloading them to the computer in the airport, I must have skipped a step somewhere and they were not saved. Of course, I erased the memory card in the camera—idiot!)
After lunch we took a ride down to the Pulgas Water Temple off Canada Road where the waters from Hetch Hetchy end their journey and pour into the Crystal Reservoir.
Then it was East on Route 84 to Redwood City and Bayfront Park which is surrounded by the San Francisco Wildlife Refuge (and adjacent to the sewerage treatment plant). It’s smack dab abutting some of those colorful salt flats I had pictures of earlier. But you can’t see the colors from down on the ground. What you can see are hordes of California ground squirrels. They are all over the freakin’ place. And they are known to carry the plague. Sweet! And jack rabbits! Now I know why they were named after a male mule. They ware HUGE! I thought it was a small deer coming down the trail. Terry swore it was a Great Dane with mutated ears the size of baseball bats.
We got some good birds at the Park (Willets, Forster’s Tern) and even better ones at the sewerage treatment plant (nesting Killdeer and Black-necked Stilts). When a stilt stands up from the nest you just wonder when its legs are going to stop uncoiling.
Someone was flying a remote control plane from the top of the hill and a Turkey Vulture and Red-tailed Hawk were trying to prove they could soar as well as the red plane.
When 4:30 rolled around we decided to pack it in and head for the airport. Our flight wasn’t until 11:50 PM but we had had enough. We returned our rental car, checked our bags and moved through security without a hitch. We ate at one of the airport eateries and took a seat to wait for our flight. It was only 7:30 PM.
Eventually our flight was called and we took off for Newark at midnight, San Francisco time. Nearly five hours later we were in Newark and I collected my bag from the carousel. Terry’s bag was nowhere to be seen. We waited and waited. Finally the carousel stopped spinning and no more bags came out. While she went to report the missing bag (one that contained four bottles of wine when we checked it in), I looked for a floor manager to see if there were any bags still left down below.
I found one, who came by to collect the one bag still on the carousel. He radioed down stairs. They were going to send up two empty trays, if no more bags came up before them, I should go see how Terry was making out. The empty trays came out but no bag. Off to baggage service.
Terry was finishing her report and being told that when the bag was found it would be sent to Syracuse (the nearest airport serviced by Continental) and we would be called to go pick it up. If it was still in SF, that might take two days. Since I didn’t relish the idea of having to go to Syracuse (2 hour drive) to pick up the bag, I was not a happy camper.
As we were leaving (and I was swearing off air travel) the floor manager came up to us and said they had found Terry’s bag. It was on the tarmac. At Newark. Apparently it had fallen off the baggage cart between the plane and the terminal. They would be sending it up ASAP. As we waited and a little Alphonse and Gaston routine (think “who’s on first”) was played out via radio with a baggage handler downstairs saying it was going to be sent up chute 6 while we were waiting at chute 7. Finally the right bag came up the right chute and the wine bottles were 1- present and 2- intact. We were on our way.
By now it was late enough for us to stop at The Mall At Short Hills to give Jessica her two bottles of wine (flying standby she could not take them aboard in her carryon luggage). We also stopped to get some real bagels in a shop in Parsippany before turn west. Aside from nearly falling asleep at the wheel on I-80, the ride home was pretty uneventful.
The cats were mostly happy to see us when we bailed them out of the vets care (aka Kitty Day Care). At least Chester and Shadow were happy. Julie was still pissed about being dropped off and cursed us all the way home.
Thus ended our California adventure. We’ve still got friends living down San Diego way whom we haven’t seen in a long time, but I’m not sure I want to fly back there anytime soon and driving with the trailer in tow…maybe. But my sights are set upon the northwest up to Alaska as our next major trip. San Diego is a little bit outside that path.
ps: As Terry was unpacking, she brought out the souvenir spoons Rick brought from Alaska and elsewhere that she had in her carry on bag. One of the "spoons" was in fact a four inch letter opener. She could have been given the royal treatment by TSA out in San Francisco.
Labels: Family, Travel
