As is typical - I am several days behind in updating this blog after arriving at our destination here in San Leandro, California. Let me see if I can bring you all up to date on our last few days ...
On Tuesday we drove about 200 miles from Winnemucca, NV to Minden, NV to my Sister Marcie's place. The first 140 miles or so were pretty uneventful - we traveled along I-80 to Fernley, NV into a pretty brisk wind of about 30 MPH - but it was a pretty steady wind coming right at us and not a big driving problem. Then we turned south and that started about the worse 60 miles of driving I had experienced in a long time. First of all the winds picked up to about 40 MPH and were broadside to the rig making driving a true white knuckle experience. Then we turned west again and not only were we faced with a now quartering 40 MPH wind - I also got to experience my first real wind driven dust/sand storm. Let's just say it wasn't fun - but we managed to survive and made it to Minden unscathed. Marcie and Don treated us and their daughter Carin and her son Zach to a nice dinner at Bodines - a local casino with a pretty nice restaraunt. Fortunately the wind died down in the late afternoon.
After a great evening visit with the Redekers and an even better breakfast in the AM at the Redeker Ranch - Peggy and I hit the road again on Wednesday morning to finish our trip west. But once again - the final leg of the trip would not be without it's special moments. We left Minden and drove north on Highway 395 to Reno where we merged with I-80 again and headed west over the Sierra Nevada Mountains. That's where the fun began. It seems both the Nevada DOT and Caltrans (the California DOT) are doing a lot of roadwork on I-80 over the Sierras. Before we left Nevada I noticed a sign stating that loads over 9' wide were not permitted any further on I-80. As I recalled - our motorhome was about 8'6" wide in general and about 9'6" wide if you count the mirrors ... so I decided to pull off at the next exit and take a few confirming measurements. Yup - 8'6" alright. We noted that some big-rig trucks were still heading west on I-80 so I figured I could too ... and off we went.
About 3 miles down the road we found out why loads over 9 ' were prohibited. The DOT was doing some road reconstruction and had I-80 - both east and west bound down to one lane in either direction with the lanes defined on both sides by concrete barriers - right about 9' apart. Yikes !! Believe me - you haven't lived until you have driven an 8'6" rig through a 9' wide winding mountain road with concrete on both sides at about 50 MPH. With Peggy watching one side, me watching the other - aiming for the middle and devine intervention - we made it through this 3-4 mile gauntlet without any new scrapes. Whew!! After surving that few miles the other stretches of construction zones with barriers on one side and barrells/cones on the other were pieces of cake in comparison.
So we completed our drive through the Sierras - drove through the central valley region of California near Sacramento - and then found ourselves in the Oakland area of the San Franciso Bay region around 3:00 PM. Needless to say the traffic became pretty intense and the highways became pretty numerous and confusing. Since we had little experience driving in this area I had to rely on our GPS ("Lola"). In spite of all the challenges - we found our destination here in San Leandro and pulled into the Sandev Mobile Home and RV Park around 3:30 PM. Considering how close we are to San Fransisco (known locally as "The City" but never as "Frisco") the park here is a pretty nice place with only the very close railroad tracks and the associated trains with loud horns as a detractor.
Over the next several days we plan on getting into some sort of routine here in Cali. I'll try to get back into some sort of routine in updating this blog ... including the highly anticipated mid-trip statistics that I will try to include with the next entry. Until then - we hope everybody is doing well and staying safe!
After settling in here in San Leandro - we drove up to Oakland to visit Derek, Sister Jamie, and Neice Decky for a few hours.
Today we visited the hospital gang again and learned a lot about what Derek has to put up with everyday. Alot of therapy and incremental improvements - but his spirits appear pretty good and we we'll hope and pray for daily improvements.
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