Hello! It has been quite a while since I posted, but I do still exist.
We recently took a trip down to California to visit family. Overall it was a nice time, but the trip down was way too exciting.
Since it's about a 14 hour drive, we decided to do the trip in two days. The first day was a bit stressful as there were just a lot of trucks on I-5 and then the A/C in the car was on-and-off, but overall we weren't concerned as you don't use the A/C for months up here, so turning it on in the springtime to discover it has stopped working is not that unusual.
The second day is where things really went wrong -- we all slept really terribly at the hotel, so we got up early-early, ate breakfast, then left. We were looking forward to be in Gilroy by about 4pm, earlier than we had originally planned. I drove us through the mountainous area around Mount Shasta, and just as we were coming out onto the flats by Yreka, the radiator blew. I coasted the car down into a vista lookout spot and managed to get the car off and cooling before the temp hit the red line. After about an hour and a half of figuring out what to do and waiting, we had the car towed to a shop in Yreka, with the boys and I getting a ride from highway patrol (big thank you to CHP officer Josh W. out there in Siskiyou county).
At the shop, they bumped us to the front of the line and were able to source all the required parts from in town. About 6 hours later, we were back on the road again! While waiting, we walked around town and chatted with people; the general consensus is that A1 Auto is a high quality shop, and I cannot agree more. Because of their work, we were able to get into Gilroy at around 11pm that same day and able to enjoy the rest of our vacation without disruption.
Despite the age and milage of our car, this is the first time it has ever left the whole family stranded in the 10 years we've owned it.
In terms of "I have been stranded and this sucks", I would rate the suckiness level of this event as lower than being stuck in the middle of the dessert in the early 1990s (no cell phones, I was six years old and I did cry), but higher than being stuck at the post office during a heat wave.
After finally making it to the bay area, we did some fun activities:
- Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum
- Family day
- Visiting at the Davenriche Martial Artes School
- Historic carousel and museum in Albany, OR
Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum
I... didn't take any pictures when we went here. Just didn't. I would recommend taking a poke around the Rosicrucian's website as they do have a lot on there.
I really enjoyed looking through their daily life exhibit -- they have a 360 tour available online!
Down in the tomb, from the after life exhibit (also with an online tour):
Family Day
We decided to celebrate Osric's birthday while we were down, so the whole family gathered at my mom's house.
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| The boy with his pile of presents ^_^ |
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| MASSIVE red velvet cake. This thing was HEAVY! Like, actual poundage of cake. |
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| NOM NOM lots of cream cheese in there! |
Visiting at the Davenriche Martial Artes School
My brother in law works at this martial arts studio, and both he and my husband were some of the first students years ago. They recently moved the school to a new location with massively more space. It was really fun to see how the school had grown and to see all the people there.
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| I love Corey's "WHOA" face in this one xD |
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| We played with this "axe" throwing set a lot; probably will be buying one for at home too! |
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| Many weapons in the armory! |
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| S-W-O-R-D-S (and friends) |
Historic carousel and museum in Albany, OR
This place is pretty cool, with a bunch of historic carousel animals, as well as a workshop where they highlight the craft of making the actual carousel critters. I really enjoy going, this is the second time we've visited the place and we will be making a third trip eventually!
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| Flying pig! |
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| Down in the painting studio |
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| This one is still being painted -- despite looking mostly done, he won't be ready until late this year. It takes a lot of work to make one of these! |
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| And of course, we had to ride the carousel too! |
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| Antique band organ |
Trip Retrospective
What worked:
- Not packing a big ice chest; we packed more shelf-stable foods for this trip vs previous ones, and this let us have more space in the back for stuff.
- Not packing too heavy; I am usually the lightest packer in the house, but this time we all decided not to pack too much. Again, this paid off in extra space to bring back goodies.
- Being flexible on the trip home; we took an extra day traveling home, making the last two days shorter drive times and getting home early enough to be able to do some grocery shopping, unpack, etc.
What did not work:
- Driving our current family car. It's getting up there in age and miles, so this is probably the last drive to CA it's doing.
- The room we had at the hotel in Medford, OR was horrible. Sadly, we stayed there twice on the trip (once on there, then again on the way back).
- Forgetting to pack enough water. It was warm, especially with the broken A/C, and we wound up buying extra water twice on the trip.
BONUS pictures
Random pics from the trip that don't really belong anywhere else:
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| Picnicking at a rest stop |
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| Somewhere in Oregon |
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| Corey playing Battletech with my brother |
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| This is near where the house we stayed at on our trip back home. |
