A long land voyage.
In these uncertain times (ugh) we opted not to fly and rent a car to visit our fresh niece Winifred. We figured it was only fair to visit Tay’s family as well, in case we love Mexico enough to move there, we can say a proper goodbye to both families. But we needed a stopover halfway to Denver. I have friends in Phoenix so it was all coming together. Plus our truck is stored in Hannah & Joe’s driveway in Vancouver WA, so we could get that. It’ll be nice to have our own car when we wind down the voyage. We also scored a stopover in San Fran for the home stretch. The plan was set for our loop, and as is our custom, got delayed for weather. Rental cars aren’t guaranteed to be 4wd, and would definitely have San Diego style tires which would be lacking in the great white North.
· Leg 1. San Diego to Phoenix. 6 hrs & 360 miles. An easy first day along the Mexico border, brief pit stop rolling in the sand dunes, and warmly greeted by some golf, a sunset, and wonderful dinner & conversation with the Sweitzers.
· Leg 2. Phoenix to Loveland. 14 hrs & 870 miles. America is stunning part 1. Sedona, Flagstaff, Moab, Colorado canyons & our first taste of snowy roads in a year. Greeted by -15 degree weather, cold Busch lights, and a warm Buschy welcome. We spent 3 days with the Buschys. Threw axes for Valentine’s day and had a blast.
· Leg 3. Loveland to Bozeman. 10 hrs & 600 miles. A cold Wyoming day and a heated game of horse-horse (Tay the victor). Greeted by the Holidays with a fire, feast, and A NIECE!!! We spent 4 days in Bozeman seeing old friends, fawning over Lil’ Win’ and a surprise visit from Troy, who quit his job in DC to fly in and see us for a day! Talk about dedication & poetic license. (He actually came to ski and had already planned on quitting but it all worked out so we overlapped a day).
· Leg 4. Bozeman to Vancouver. 13 hrs & 760 miles. The drive from Bozeman to Spokane is becoming like a commute to us, but the new territory on the South route to Portland is stunning in the winter. The Columbia River gorge is deep, green, and overwhelming. We were welcomed in by Joe and caught up about old boat adventures and new. We saw our ole pal Max and got introduced to Joe’s ½ jeep. He cut the back half off…you can ask him why but we didn’t get a clear answer.
o Now that we have Tay’s truck but need to deliver the renal back to SD, we’re in 2 cars, but luckily have a good pair of walkee-talkees.
· Leg 5. Vancouver WA, to San Francisco. 14 hrs & 810 miles. There’s a fine line between trusting google maps, and being too independent. We wanted to see the Redwoods and drive the coast road. A mudslide ruined the coast road but google maps suggested a quick hour detour around the slide. Once in Redwood National Park, the rangers informed us the ‘detour’ was more of a game trail and had to be closed due to the number of google-trusting-tourists’ getting stuck. We backtracked a hundred miles north to I-5 and resumed. Coming into SF over the bay bridge at night has to be one of the most stunning “Welcome” to a city out there. The pizza at Max & Matt’s was a close second.
· Leg 6. San Francisco to San Diego. 9 hrs & 600 miles. This leg also could’ve been shorter but we wanted to see sections of the coast we missed, and having already listened to 2 Steinbeck audiobooks on this trip, we wanted to detour through Salinas & King City, and take a few back roads. Southern California is another amazing part of the country. This time of year its green rolling hills, and striking ocean views which we missed on the foggy sail down. We pulled into San Diego, tuckered out, but pumped to pick up Eunice from her second home.
Total Trip Sats:
4139 Miles.
67 hours
9 States
3 Audio Books:
- The Log, from the Sea of Cortez (We’re so excited for Baja)
- Travels With Charley (We’re already planning a land-based version of our trip)
- Two Years Before The Mast. (Oh man, we have it easy onboard)
3 cases of LaCroix
3 stops for food/coffee (shocking I know, but we prepared an obscene amount of veggies, dips, bags of popcorn, and sliced cheeses before we left San Diego, plus we didn’t want to catch the ol’ ‘rona)
