Day # 34 - Bakersfield, CA

Travel day! I left my heart in San Francisco (and the beautiful weather too). The trip from Petaluma to Bakersfield was extremely hot and uninspiring. We had wanted to get an early start to beat the crazy drivers out of town, but unfortunately I reversed the am/pm on the alarm clock when I reset it after the power issues so we didn’t get quite the start we wanted.

It didn’t take long on the highway in San Francisco's morning rush-hour for Tony to decide to stop for breakfast to let the traffic thin. We found an old fashioned IHOP and grabbed a bite then just to be sure the rush hour traffic had past, we stopped at a Safeway for Ice and Milk.

The scenery on the drive wasn’t much to look at. Everything was extremely dry and barren looking. With the heat, winds and dry plants, I could clearly see why California has such a wildfire problem. Then there are stretches with huge agricultural farms (using A LOT of irrigation) and it was a little interesting to see such a wide variety of things being grown.

Driving through the Midwest you see mostly corn or soy beans. We saw orange groves, grapes, figs, olives, carrots and pistachio farms. Our favorite was the sunflower fields. Miles and miles of happy little sunflower faces smiling at us. We passed many trucks full of local crops. When we stopped for gas, we noticed a fruit stand and went over to see if they had anything that looked good. We picked up some fresh fruit and nuts and had a yummy snack.

We made pretty good time and we got to Bakersfield early enough for a trip to the local Camping World for some RV supplies and a couple of new reclining camp chairs. Neither Tony nor I wanted to cook, so we found a Little Caesar’s Pizza and grabbed some Pizza, Pizza and crazy bread then headed back to the campground for dinner and a quick dip in the pool before bed.

We’re headed to Vegas tomorrow and we’ll meet up with Tony’s mom who is flying in to join us for a few days in Sin City before before we all head to the Grand Canyon.