Winding Roads

SUMMARY: You think you know where you are going, and suddenly--

First posted in a Facebook Group Oct 23, 2021

In my area--southwest to west of San Jose, CA, if you start at the southern end of Highway 9 in Los Gatos, its name is Los Gatos-Saratoga Road. (Or "highway 9," depending on your inclination.)

As it continues northwesterly, when entering Saratoga at the intersection of Saratoga Ave. it becomes Saratoga-Sunnyvale Rd AKA "Old Highway 9" (because the new one veers away and is a different road entirely). At this point, you are going north.

When you enter Cupertino, it becomes DeAnza Blvd (This was Cupertino's bright idea so that we didn't have TWO local names for the same road (Saratoga-Sunnyvale and Sunnyvale-Saratoga). Now we have THREE names for that section), also aka Old Highway 9.

When you enter Sunnyvale, it becomes Sunnyvale-Saratoga Rd. Still going north.

At some point, it splits; if you turn right onto its old path, it becomes N. Sunnyvale Ave and then peters out. But if you follow its main flow, it becomes S. Mathilda Ave. for a few blocks, then N. Mathilda Ave. for about 2 miles.

It curves right smoothly about 90 degrees east at that point and becomes Caribbean Dr for a few more blocks going more or less east, then curves gently until it becomes Lawrence Expressway, going due south. (Aka state (? or county) highway 82, but no one calls it that).

And if you follow that for 8 miles, it turns into Quito Road where it crosses Saratoga Ave. (see above).

If you keep going south on Quito, eventually it ends at Los Gatos-Saratoga road, less than a mile northwest of where you started your trip.

(If you want to go around the circle again, sorry, you have to make an obvious right turn at a stoplight, and where's the fun in that?)

(This map shows you the west side of the loop with scale of miles at the bottom; Lawrence Expressway/Quito Rd is fairly obvious for the east side. Also here: Google maps: all that route mostly)

Snippet: On Visiting

SUMMARY: How much time do you have?

My brain automatically plays this recording through my mouth to anyone who's considering going somewhere to visit or coming here to visit. Particularly if the destination du jour is where one used to live, or where you know multiple households, or where One Has Always Wanted To Go Because Reasons.  

I know what it’s like, visiting someplace in which dozens of family and friends might be interested in getting together. The first decade or so of my marriage, we’d go to Los Angeles at least a couple times yearly to visit...

Visiting L.A. in-law relatives, 1985.
Required By Law™ when visiting: Photos.
Guess which one I am.

...His mom. His stepfather. His great aunt and uncle. His cousins. His best man and wife, his 2nd groomsman and his wife, and 3rd groomsman and his wife. A few other high school friends of his. If I were lucky, a couple friends of mine.

And although I enjoyed visiting these folks, honestly, what I really wanted to do was keep going and hit up allllll the things to see in the L.A. area (never did) or  Disneyland (did once, for one day). Ha!  We most certainly did not see everyone every trip, but it was crazy anyway. 

If Disneyland were our higher priority, we'd carefully sneak past the L.A. area, covering our faces so no one could recognize us.

What I’m saying is, would be fun to see you, but I totally get it if you’re swamped when you get here.

-------

Once again I failed at "snippet". I started with one large paragraph, so I figured: Snippet of text! Then added three sentences and a squillion paragraph breaks and, voila, result =  > snippet

Nothing tastes better than [location] served with [food]

SUMMARY: Going places, doing things, relaxing, eating.

I'm a big believer in the  nothing tastes better than [view of  something] served with [edible item] life-enhancing method..

And I'm a believer in photographing the experience, or what's a camera heaven for?* / **

Allow me to take you with me.

Nothing tastes better than [a view of the Lyell Fork of the Tuolumne River (High Sierras/Yosemite)]
 served with [homemade trail mix].
August 2013

Nothing tastes better than [hills beyond hills beyond rare California natives near San Jose] served with [homemade banana bread].
March 2013

Nothing tastes better than [Hermit's Rest at Grand Canyon] served with [Cinnamon roll].
June 2010

Nothing tastes better than [Elk at Grand Canyon] served with [protein bar].
June 2010

Nothing tastes better than [Grand Canyon on a cold winter day] served with [hot chocolate and cookie].
November 2016

Nothing tastes better than [Eastern Washington mountains farmland] served with [fresh from the nest scrambled eggs].

June 2018

Nothing tastes better than [dog agility] served with [nothing because I'm in the ring].

April 2014

Nothing tastes better than [London from St. Pauls Dome] served with [um...a device that gives a recorded self-guided tour?].  

July 2014
(I feel like this is cheating on my theme, but it's the only one of the 3 photos of me while I was there, and the others don't have a view. Took no photos of feet. No hands. No food. But whatcha gonna do?)

Nothing tastes better than [an eager dog about to get a treat] served with [Wild'n'Reckless Sherbet]. 
June 2020

Nothing tastes better than [the county fair] served with [a huge chocolate-dipped soft-serve ice cream cone]. 
August 2018

Nothing tastes better than [the Death Valley General Store] served with [ice cream on a hot afternoon]. 
November 2016

Nothing tastes better than [the Scottish Games in Pleasanton] served with [chocolate/vanilla swirl soft serve ice cream]. 
(Do you detect a theme here?)
September 2016

Nothing tastes better than [a sister and Haunted Mansion at Disney World] served with [an OttoPop (think "Frozen") Lemonade Juice Bar]. 
January 2015

Nothing tastes better than [Tuolumne Meadows Grill, Yosemite] served with [ice cream]. 
August 2013

Nothing tastes better than [Rue St. Paul, Vieux-Montréal (Old Montreal) ] served with [a triple tornade ice cream cone]. 
September 2008

Nothing tastes better than [Frontierland, Disneyland] served with [cotton candy]. 
January 2015

Nothing tastes better than [Disney California Adventure] served with [a Ghirardelli Mint Hot Fudge Sundae]. 
November 2015

Nothing tastes better than [the Ghirardelli Store at Cannery Row, Monterey] served with [a Ghirardelli Mint Hot Fudge Sundae]. 
January 2016

Nothing tastes better than [Joshua Tree National Park] served with [a ...map!? and bottle of water on my belt]. 
May 2010

Author's Note: After about 3 hours [so far] of looking through photos for ALL THE TIMES I held up food in front of a view and not finding them (probably lost in "I'll label these someday"Land), I realize that even when I think to take selfies in interesting places, I do it with not-so-interesting backgrounds. Like here: Joshua Tree National Park. And not a Joshua Tree to be seen in this shot. (But the rocks are well-known there, too, so, OK.)

Nothing tastes better than [Red Rock State Park, Sedona AZ] served with [a freshly made turkey sandwich]. 
June 2010

Nothing tastes better than [Port Townsend, WA] served with [a hot dog and fries from a popular hot dog hut. And a sister]. 
May 2021

Nothing tastes better than [Cannery Row] served with [whatever's in that restaurant straight ahead]. 
July 2017

Nothing tastes better than [the Denver Airport] served with [popcorn and mint swirl fudge]. 
September 2008
-
The Denver Airport is a horrible horrible place to have a layover or transfer--popcorn! candy of all kinds! those wafflecones stuffed with ice cream! So much more! I can't begin to tell you how many calories this airport has forced me to eat! (At least... prepandemic anyway...)

Nothing tastes better than [a dine-in theater] served with [whatever you want to order and they will bring it to you]. 
August 2019

Nothing tastes better than [the South Rim Trail, Grand Canyon] served with [oops Ate first, asked for photos later]. 
June 2010

Nothing tastes better than [sailing on the San Francisco Bay] served with [Peanut M&Ms]. 
May 2016

I abandon ship for now. My messy digital archive pile of tens of thousands of photos holds more--but where? Why have I not labeled most of them? (Why why WHY?!)? Are those missing photos more like photos of the corndog that I knew that I took at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk--but turns out it was only of the corndog? Or of my legs up, popcorn in lap, watching a movie on TV, surrounded by dogs, which were horribly underexposed?

Mysteries abound. 

Enjoy yourself wherever you go, whatever you taste, and whatever you serve it with.

----

* Obscure Robert Browning reference

** Haven't I posted about this before? Hmmmm...

----

Some Things We Looked Up While On Our Trip

SUMMARY: We both have curious minds.

So, this happened:  Seester and I headed north to western Washington to investigate possible future retirement locations. Driving is the best! Lots of time for conversation and asking questions about--anything! [yeah, will probably get around to talking about the trip at some point.]

• Can we reasonably make it to our first area of exploration (Silverdale, WA) in one day? Answer: Yes, if we're willing to drive for 14 hours. Not including rest stops, food stops, gas stops....  Final answer: No.

• Where should we stop our first night? (Checking distances from our starting location to Portland, Crescent City, Eureka, Ukiah, and some other places.) Decided on Crescent City but I insisted on not making reservations until we were well on our way, and glad about that because we made it only to Eureka for dinner with a friend.

• How to pronounce Puyallup?

• How does tolling work for non-Washington residents crossing the Tacoma Narrows Bridge? (Apparently they'll get our address from CA DMV via our license plate and send a bill.)

  

  When we headed home, that was really the only day with dark foreboding clouds.
  Which pretty much cleared up by noon.

  
  

• Did L. Ron Hubbard *really* have more published works of fiction than Stephen King? (Guiness World Records says yes.)
  
  
• If I wanted to pick up Zorro the day after I got home instead of Friday night, and he was in Sonora, how long would it take? (Gulp--4 hours round trip. Answer: No. Fortunately arranged a pickup in Tracy, only 2 hours round trip.)
  
  
• Which rest areas (er, "safety roadside rest areas") are currently open on I-5? On US 101?  (Didn't have much luck finding those answers.)
  
  
• Where exactly is Trees of Mystery and what are their hours?
  
  
• What's interesting about Port Angeles?
  
  
• Rainfall averages for various places in Washington?
  
  
• Lots and lots and lots and lots of queries in Google Maps for how to get somewhere or how long it would take or where it was.
  
  
• Where's the nearest AAA office?
  
  
• Tsunami Hazard Zone Maps for WA.
  
  
• Exclusion zones for Mount Rainier eruption dangers
  
  
• Iceland isn't on the Ring Of Fire, so why does it have volcanoes?
  
  
• How did prehistoric irrigation work in the Americas without the wheel? Was it all gravity-based? (Apparently, yes.)
  
  
• Calories in a Wendy's small chocolate Smoothie?
  
  
• Common name for Humuhumunukunukuapua'a? [Yes, I could remember the Hawaiian name, but not the common  English name.]
  
  
• What is all the white stuff growing next to  101 around Eugene? [Answer: Meadowfoam. OK, what is Meadowfoam?]  

  

  Meadowfoam, by phone from a moving car.

  
  
  
• Is there an airport near Labanon OR? (Yes, the Labanon airport.)
  
  
• Are wild pigs just domestic pigs gone feral?  (Maybe in some cases, but actual different species. They are a likely ancestor of domestic pigs.)
  
  
• Are wild turkeys just etc etc. (Domestic turkeys are descended from them.)

• ARE there so many songs about rainbows and what's on the other side? (Interesting and funny blog post about this.)
  
  
• List of fictional characters with stars on the Hollywood walk of fame?
  
  
• Does EVERYWHERE WE GO have a Safeway?  [It sure seemed like it. I think we saw more safeways than anything other than trees.]
  
  
• Can that photo of our hotel on [something] Bay [which appears to be mostly mudflats] in the far background of an orca leaping into the air be real? For that matter, do orcas really breach often? [I said, yes, they're basically just big dolphins.] 
  
  
• What's the best Incorrect Quote we can generate for our favorite fictional characters?
  
  
• If someone says their dog is a Service Dog (and the person is disabled after overseas service), but the dog is badly behaved, can it really be a Service Dog? And how is that defined?
  
  
• Where is the wooden ship Tally-Ho being rebuilt in Sequim? (All that info has apparently now been hidden and we couldn't find it.)
  
  
• Rules about capital gains on primary residences.
  
  
• Dimensions of a king-sized mattress?
  
  
• Actual name of the Klamath River bridge that washed away, and is it the same name as its replacement?

  

  Site of the old bridge. Seester taking a photo.

  
  
  
• Earthquake and liquefaction hazard maps in and around seattle?
  
  
• Did our favorite hotel Candy Cane Inn in Anaheim survive the pandemic? [says it's currently "under renovation"... whatever that really means]
  
  
• Kaiser locations in Washington and Oregon?
  
  
• Nearest Wendy's?
  
  
• We're alongside the Salmon River -- want more info.
  
  
• What causes nighttime leg and foot cramps?
  
  
• Where did the city name Cotati come from? (Coast Miwok)
  
  
• So much more--but I didn't save everything... and sorry I didn't include all the links (sometimes searched a lot for an answer). 

Tuesday T-Shirt Tales: Briar's Patch Iditarod Team

T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??

All T-Shirt Tales

SUMMARY: Revisiting a friend's story

SORRY--I posted this and then took it down again because I had a lot more to add.  Now it's back. 

A woman I met through agility decided to run the Iditarod one year (years after ceasing dog agility). She did. She completed the whole thing, and did not come in last. An impressive effort.  I already wrote about it in this prior post, "Goals and the Iditarod", back in 2008.

The picture is her and her team, practicing around the rim of Crater Lake.

Good t-shirts are always worth getting out and doing things in, sooooo--

The shirt apparently enjoyed hiking with the Merle Girls.
Gathering for a hike with the local Sierra Singles group of the Sierra Club. Oct 2008.

The inspirational shirt makes it to the top of our local Coyote Peak
with the Merle Girls. August, 2009. 

The shirt helps with my note-taking at our photo club's macro workshop.
August 2012.

The lovely shirt appears again, at the old Douglas Memorial Bridge 

across the Klamath River near Oregon. 
This old bridge washed away in a massive flood in 1964
after the heaviest rain ever recorded in the area.
They kept the approach to the bridge and the original bears to remember it by.
May 2018.

The new Douglas Memorial Bridge is about half a mile upriver, with newer, fancier, goldier 
California Golden Bears. 

 

That same morning, in my hotel in Eureka (CA), I found myself in a selfie mood.

Who says Zoom work meetings can't be fun?
The Iditarod shirt makes another appearance. June 2020.

BONUS FUN FACT: The shirt looks like a slightly different color in every photo. It's really a lovely rich forest green. I gave up trying to get a photo of what it "really" looks like, because it varies by camera and ambient light. The joys of photography. 


>>  Visit the Wordless Wednesday site; lots of blogs. << >>  Visit Cee's Photo Challenge blog; lots of blogs. <<

Photos, cameras, memories, gratitude

SUMMARY: Reminding myself.

Backfill: posted on FB Oct 12-15, 2020

Sharing some of my photos to remind myself that the world still holds so much more than my cluttered house and mind, those irritating 12 (!) propositions on the ballot, that defining Tuesday coming soon, and the five rude pounds I've finally given up and allowed to join me over the last month. 

I am grateful to my cameras for having preserved for me--over the last decades--places and people (including furred and feathered ones) and moments and random eye-catching objects worth revisiting.

The world changes, and ages, and moves on--as do I--and apparently this thought manifested from my subconscious as I titled the first two images last weekend.

"Aging: Lines and Circles"
At the Hayes Mansion in San José, adjacent to the lost lamented Frontier Village.  

"Ancient Erosion"
Zabriskie Point, Death Valley

"Amazing World:Hummingbird Feather"
Out in my yard pulling low, small weeds--gray weeds on gray gravel--
a tiny piece of brilliant green caught my eye. 
I reached, expecting to pick up a piece of plastic, and realized just in time that it wasn’t.
5/8” long tip to tip; the green part is half that size. 

Tuesday T-Shirt Tales: Alaska State Parks

T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??

All T-Shirt Tales

SUMMARY: A shirt for a place I haven't been.

Side Note: I missed last Tuesday. Not deliberately. I wrote a quite long and personal account of a recently acquired shirt. Worked on it for a couple of days, rereading and re-editing. Added photos. Just needed to add one more sentence. Hit Return when I didn't mean to, so, unthinkingly and automatically, I used my browser's UNDO. And the whole thing vanished. Couldn't get it back. Thanks so much, Chrome or Blogger or whomever--I don't care who. Devastating. 
I'll get back to that one eventually. But couldn't face it or anything else again last week. Nor this week for that one. With single keystrokes such are entire histories changed or lost. Fortunately I have lots and lots of t-shirts to write about.

My parents started us out right: Traveling. Not overseas--just wherever we could get to by car and then camp. For weekends, or for vacations, which were usually not more than a couple of weeks.   But, by the time I moved out, I had driven with them across the entire width of the country five times. And my dad in particular liked to go places he hadn't been before, so we took different routes each time, mostly, near as I can remember. Including one 6-week across-and-back summer trip.  We hit so many state and national parks as we went! A habit that's hard to kick once it's started.

When I was in junior high or early high school, I made Dad a color-me-traveled map of the US on a large sheet of posterboard--an idea that I had seen in a magazine somewhere.  He immediately sat down and marked all states where each of the 7 of us had been (I'm arbitrarily in red). Later, they went cross-country twice more with my three youngest sisters, and he filled those in.

I've since traveled by car to places I hadn't been with them, and then to top it off spent several years in the '80s flying around the country on business. Seldom managed to see much of anywhere, but by golly I'd landed in airports and stayed in hotels and attended meetings in a whoooooole lotta states.  Also spent two weeks in Hawaii, twice. I didn't keep careful track (doh!) but I am quite confident that I have now set foot in 49 of our 50 states, plus Washington, D.C. 

I didn't update the map; it was his to do or not.
I have that map now, though. Frozen in time.

Happened to be wearing it
in 2015 to check out the
ballyhooed presence of the
Hello Kitty bus selling
Hello Kitty snacks. You can see
the extreme long line out behind 
my head. I took photos
and went home. 

But: I have not yet made it to Alaska. Someday. It's on my Bucket List. My parents made it, finally, in their retirement years.

And one of my sisters went twice, I believe.  She is generous with gifts and astonishingly aware of what people like.  When she returned from a summer visit there in 1998, she handed me this beautiful blue --of course--t-shirt. To wear for inspiration to get me up there.  And it does remind me, every time I wear it.

It’s one of only three t-shirts that I believe I’ve ever had for places I haven’t been, out of the 250-plus that I remember having over the years. That means I have to get there eventually, right?  

Aching to be On The Road Again - Point Bonita

SUMMARY: Point Bonita Lighthouse.

These photos from visit in October 2015.

During the COVID-19 Pandemic Shelter In Place/Lockdown/Quarantine -- I've not been able to go anywhere since early January, first because of knee surgery, and then the virus moved in.  Antsy to just go everywhere.  So, thinking back to places I've been that I'd like to visit again.

I've been to Point Bonita Lighthouse twice, and I'm ready to go back and get more, more, more pix!

Just north of San Francisco. After crossing my beauty Golden Gate on the Golden Gate Bridge, take the first exit after the viewpoint and find your way west. Oh--sure--Modern Times--fine, just use your cell phone or other technological wonder of your choice.

If you'd never heard of it and had never been there and suddenly you saw a photo like this in a magazine, wouldn't you want to go and check it out?! I did! So I did!

This is the 2nd or 3rd bridge generation of the bridge.
Originally you could just walk to it. See that space in the middle underneath? One day a lot of that rock just fell away.
These cliffs are, after all, battered by mighty waves 24/7/365. No waiting, immediate service.
Current bridge  is up to par with current engineering practices.
The base of that arch wayyyy down there is 124 feet below the base of the lighthouse.
I would not try to kayak through there if I were you.

After you're out at the lighthouse, you can look back at the bridge and the cliffs and the amazing green water and pounding waves.

Really zoomed in. And enhanced a bit. I love this photo but not everyone does.

Its Fresnel ("fray-NELL") lens is still active. Fresnels are gorgeous bits of art and engineering.

From there, you can see parts of San Francisco (including the TransAmerica Tower pyramid)
and the entire Golden Gate Bridge.  This photo just shows part of it.
I struggle to get the colors of water and sky and everything correct.

So many smaller and bigger things to see on or from the trail down to the lighthouse. And the lighthouse has a small museum about its history and operation. I have so many photos! But never enough time to sit and work on them. You'll just have to go yourself.

You know what I hate about the lighthouse? Two things:

1. Your viewing options of it are limited unless you're on the water outside the Gate (pretty rough, and lots of mongo commercial traffic) or over on the San Francisco side with a reasonable zoom lens.
2. Access to it is very limited. Only a few hours on only a few days of the week and not at all if it's very windy or wet or foggy and never during the hours when you might be able to see the sunset behind it! No way to see the sunset behind it, really. If you google "point bonita lighthouse sunset", there are a few, but not many--must be cliff climbers or park staff or photogs by special arrangement...  Sigh.
P.S. No dogs allowed. Really, it would not be a safe trip for them.

But it is still worth multiple visits.