Left n back Again - A Continental Road Trip - Main Narrative - September 2004

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Driving amidst the Giants

We drove a little ways down the coast, crossing into California and taking a quick drive through the very scenic avenue of the giants (Huge Redwood trees in Redwood National Park). I had Jenn drive the S2000, and I was not paying super-close attention to the diminishing gas supply in the S. Well, just outside of Eureka, California, we ran out of gas, about 1 km from a gas station. Luke and Sophie went off to get some gas, while we waited, me feeling a little dumb for pushing it quite this far.

Jenn on the avenue of the Giants

Luke and Sophie came back with some gas, and I made a bit of a mess getting it in the car. I then could not get the car to start again, and I was starting to get a bit worried. The most it would do was barely start and idle barely. Fuel pressure seemed low, too, according to my fuel pressure gauge. Had I done some sort of damage to the car? After much cranking, a CHP officer pulled up and offered to get us a tow, which I accepted. There was a Honda dealership just a few kms back and that seemed the best place to go.

courtesy Luke

a 'fuelish' mistake

The flatbed tow-truck eventually arrived (and it seemed that my attempts to start the car were getting a little more successful), and I watched as the S2000 was carefully and slowly loaded onto the flatbed. The day wasn't going too well. As we drove to the dealership, I racked my brain trying to think of what was going on with the car. With the car finally at the dealership and unloaded, I decided to cycle the ignition a few times before starting (to get the fuel pump to prime for longer). Sure enough, the car started right up and ran perfectly. It looks like I had not built up enough fuel pressure in the fuel system after having drained it completely by running out of gas. I jumped in the car and drove around to where everyone else was happily suprised to see the car running. Well, a few lessons learned from my 1.5 hour, $60 [tow-truck] adventure: 1) if you run out of gas, make sure the entire fuel system is fully primed before trying to restart the car and 2) don't run out of gas in the first place!

I apologized profusely to everyone about wasting a few hours of time, and treated the gang to a relaxing lunch at a local Appleby's restaurant.

Well, again we wanted out of the wet (it was still cloudy and gloomy out here on the coast). Our solution was to head back east again, back into the drier regions of the interior. We decided to head more-or-less straight towards our next major stop, Yosemite National Park.

California Weaving

We took very twisty California route 36, and, as soon as we were a couple of kilometres inland, it stopped raining, then became partly cloudy, then clear, sunny, dry and hot.

After a couple of hours of most excellent twisty road driving, we reached the broad flat semi-arid central valley of California, where we headed down Interstate 5 towards Sacramento. It was after dark and we wanted to camp again, which is generally tricky in relatively populated areas. Still, we managed to find the Colusa-Sacramento River State Recreation area, which had a very quaint little campground. (this was the night of September 14/15).

We drove through the busy urban freeways of Sacramento on our way to Yosemite. It was another beautiful and hot sunny day, and we thought maybe we'd broken the curse of the rainy fall weather. Yosemite was spectacular, as usual. We briefly hiked around in the grant grove of Giant Sequoias, viewed the main sights from the Yosemite valley floor (Yosemite falls was totally dry), and caught the sunset on Half Dome at Glacier point.

Thursday, September 16

courtesy Luke

Classic viewpoint

Half Dome

Beauty and the Beast

Silent and unwavering

A giant dwarfs Sophie and Luke

Measuring a Sequoia's tree rings

courtesy Luke

Sophie and Sequoia root

Luke and Soph at Yosemite

Half Dome from Glacier Point

Jenn at Glacier point

We had one unfortunate little incident where Luke got a ticket while passing (on a solid line) some very slow traffic on one of the roads in Yosemite. Seems like the passee did not like getting passed and floored it while Luke was passing, causing him to nearly hit an oncoming vehicle. The oncoming vehicle put a wheel in the ditch and, in the ensuing tow-out, it was Luke who got the blame (the passed vehicle had not stopped at the scene).

We camped for the night in the high country of Yosemite, up at Tuolomne Meadows. Being so high up meant a chilly night, but we were prepared and it was actually kind of nice to have to bundle up under the crisp starry sky.

It was, at this point, September 16. We wanted to be back in Ottawa by the 25th (a Saturday), and we knew we'd need 2 or 3 days of travel time to get back. That meant we had to be ready and positioned to head back by the 22nd. So, we had 6 days left to work with. One of our main objectives was Southern Utah, and there was much to see there, so we figured it would be prudent to head straight there from Yosemite. The route from Yosemite to the first of our destinations in Utah meant we'd be traversing straight across the deserts of Nevada.

Driving east out of Yosemite, one crosses the crest of the Sierra Nevada and then down the steep eastern face of the mountains into the desert-y Basin and Range province to the east. This region is characterized by desert or near-desert, and endless parallel ranges of north-south mountains separated by broad arid basins. Right at the foot of the Sierra near Yosemite is the very neat Mono Lake, where we stopped for an open-air breakfast and short hike.

Mono lake terrain

Breakfast at Mono Lake

Mono Lake Shoreline

Mono Lake is a closed-drainage basin (meaning that water does not exit the lake, but rather just evaporates from it), fed by the nearby Sierra. Much of Mono Lake's water input has been diverted to satisfy Los Angeles' water supply needs for many decades, and, in doing so, the water level of Mono Lake had been steadily decreasing. In order to preserve the lake, local residents lobbied for and got some of that water diversion to stop, and the Lake has been slowly increased back in size.

A tufa Tower

Funny creatures hiding in tufa

Andrew and Jenn at Mono Lake

The water in the lake is very saline and bouyant, and has a wierd, soapy feel to it. It also is where strange scenic tufa formations are found, caused by the interaction of fresh groundwater and the concentrated saline water. A nice spot to spot an explore for an hour or two.

After our Mono Lake Breakfast, we headed east across Nevada. The landscape of vast open deserts is always interesting, as were the historical old-west-ish towns that we would periodically pass through. We had another open-air picnic lunch at a roadside picnic table near the end of the infamous "Extraterrestrial highway". I was quite getting to like this mode of road travel: instead of always stopping at an air-conditioned restaurant, isolated from the land, it was much more enjoyable to find a quaint scenic out-of-the-way picnic area to have lunch. And more economical, too.