Category Archives: engineering

engineering, roadtrip, travel, USA

Lick Observatory

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Since we’re well over the idea of big driving days, we let Kristy & Joel head off north towards Napa Valley. Our route towards Yosemite was much more direct. I’d spied a solitary road in the atlas that headed east from San Jose. It looked much better than sitting on the freeway so we headed up into the hills. Another great twisty road that just climbed & climbed, we eventually made it to Mt Hamilton & California University’s Lick Observatory. This was another one of those great discoveries on the side of the road we were traveling.

At the bequest of the man whose name the observatory bears (too rich, wanted something by which the world would remember him by), the best telescope in the world was built. He died before it was completed in 1888 – with a 36 inch lens, it was the largest refracting telescope in the world at the time & is still number three. It was handed over to California University upon completion & they have many more telescopes built up there.

There is also a 120 inch reflecting telescope built in the sixties – the lens took four years to bring up to standard by grinding & polishing. Leaving the boffins behind (actually I don’t think there were many there – most of the viewing is done remotely now) it was another fifty miles of driving down the twisty roads through trees that slowly gave way to ranches & then to grass covered hills – all very scenic.

As soon as we crossed under I-5 we were on the valley floor (a very wide one) & into intensive agriculture & horticulture land. It also got stinking hot – probably the first time this trip that the temperature for us has gone through 40ºC & 100ºF (we’ve been very fortunate). We had a couple of nights booked in Merced, as it far enough away from Yosemite to be well-priced & not booked out, but not too far away to prohibit a day trip there.

For the second half of the day’s driving I’d begun to feel the effects of a tank of nasty gas on the engine. Under-powered & stuttering, it was a little weird driving – but it turned even stranger the following day. Short of gas the previous day I’d somehow ended up at a gas station that only had 87-octane (yes, they sell such rubbish on this continent) – this must have been particularly bad, as I haven’t had a problem before. Back on my preferred 91 (the highest grade you can usually find), the car is back to normal. While I’m writing about boring car things: I’m not sure when it happened, but sometime before we reached San Diego I noticed that there are hardly any pick-ups or minivans on the roads here. Maybe it’s been a gradual decline since leaving Alberta, or maybe there was a step-change around Colorado or Arizona – but there’s many more cars & small SUVs around here. Gas is a little more expensive in California (particularly in the cities), but not exceptionally so.

bikes, engineering, GPS, MTB, roadtrip, travel, USA

Golden Gate, China Camp & Pt Reyes

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As Marin County is considered by some to be the birthplace of modern mountain-biking I was keen to hit a ride in the area. But I couldn’t find any that really grabbed me as must-do, so I opted for a loop in China Camp State Park – near San Rafael. First that meant crossing the Golden Gate Bridge & stopping for Valerie to get a closer look & walk to the middle. I didn’t mind – it really is one of the most beautiful bridges in the world & possibly my favourite after Tower Bridge in London. I love its size, simplicity & elegance. This time we didn’t get to see it with the towers peaking up through a layer of Bay Area fog as it was a gloriously sunny day, with a nice breeze as you got out onto the bridge.

The China Camp area is so called as it was home to a large settlement of Chinese shrimpers at the end of the nineteenth century. There are still some remains of the buildings they used & some brief exhibits detailing the history of the fishing in the area. With just a light occasional breeze, as I set out on my ride it was the warmest I’d been for a while. But that wasn’t too much of a problem as the first half of the loop remained generally level as it traversed the bay just above the road. A big wide smooth trail, it was the least technical I had rode in a while & it was good fun with great views out towards the sun covered bay. At the far end of the loop, the trail hooked inland & climbed gently up to the ridge. Doing so, it became more thickly wooded (the odd stand of redwoods) & nice & cool in the trees. Wildlife sightings of note for the ride were a big family of turkeys, a large coyote & a grey squirrel (who got the fright of his life as I came around the corner). Along the ridge & back down to China Camp was pleasant, although the views were never as good as they should have been with all the trees in the way.

As Joel & Kristy were supposed to be driving down the coast we drove across to Olema to meet them. While we were waiting, we popped into the Pt Reyes National Seashore area to have a look. As I remember, the peninsula has been slowly moving up the coast of California on the back of the San Andreas fault. We walked around short loop learning about the fault & the 1906 San Fran earthquake & fire – at one place we saw where a fence had been split in two & the two halves were now running along parallel lines, but sixteen feet apart. It was a long & windy drive out to the Pt Reyes lighthouse (set low on the rocks to stay under the fog) past numerous old cattle ranches. At the point we had to walk a fair way in a howling gale to see the lighthouse from well above – a pretty desolate area, but we had the time to burn.

We ate in Olema waiting & then gave up waiting & headed back to San Fran – on the tortuous & slow Highway 1. As it is not far off Route 101 & there was little traffic at the late hour, it was a perfect opportunity to drive up Lombard St & then down the famous crooked part. I think just getting up to top was the biggest challenge – those are some steep streets. That in itself is not so bad as the car could (just) make it up in second gear, but at every intersection is a four-way stop. That meant a lot of very steep hill starts, & the handbrake on my car has a long grab before engaging just to make it interesting (“we’ll have a shilling on the side”). Back to the motel eventually exhausted from the driving, the ride & the worst hayfever I’ve had in who-knows-how-long.

engineering, family, roadtrip, travel, USA, vehicles

Hoover Dam (again) & Route 66

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A slow start to the day had us out at Hoover Dam in the late morning. Since I was there last, the bypass highway has been completed (all the through traffic no longer has to drive down the winding road to & over the dam – quite a bottleneck). I enjoyed walking out on the large arch bridge that was still being constructed two years ago – I saw it just before they completed the arch. We did the same tour as I did last time – so nothing new to report there. Lake Mead didn’t seem much higher to me, but hopefully all the snowmelt boosts it a bit. Another warm, beautiful day – I still enjoyed seeing one of the engineering marvels of the world.

Crossing the new bridge into Arizona, we drove through the desert for quite a while before finding a late lunch. It was dry, barren, hot & windy country – not a lot to look at, but still with its own beauty. I just wouldn’t want to have to live there. At Kingman we both got on I-40 & then promptly off it to drive part of Route 66 (eighty-odd miles). We got back in the land of the massive train, with our favourite train company, BNSF, hurtling alongside us many times. Strangest sights of the day were the huge trains carrying only semi-trailers; a good way of keeping trucks off the roads I suppose. This was somewhat explained by soon passing many DHL jets on the tarmac at the local airport – although a small town in the middle of nowhere, Kingman is obviously some sort of freight hub.

This particular section of Route 66, I thought, was a bit of a disappointment. Sure, there were many derelict gas stations, stores & hotels – but it all looked a little sad. The environment did not get much more welcoming. Just before we got back on I-40, we did stop at a little town that was trying just a little bit to get into the Americana of America’s Main St. Incongruously, there was an old right-hand drive Beardmore London black cab sitting slowly going to seed amongst all the American west stuff. Back on the freeway, we climbed up to 2100m in to some beautiful forest before arriving at our motel on Route 66 in Flagstaff – I do hope the historic Route 66 is done much better here.

These two pictures are especially for Grandad

engineering, history, national park, roadtrip, travel, USA, vehicles

Wall Drug & Badlands

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With the weather still uninspiring, actually downright dreary, we reversed our intended loop & headed for the South Dakota Air & Space Museum. That would have been worth of pinning a tail on if most of the planes hadn’t been outside. Next door to Ellsworth Air Force Base, there was a very interesting exhibit on the Berlin Airlift there – SD seems proud of the role they played in it as half of the B29s came from Ellsworth. The museum was OK, in fact it was pretty good considering it was free. Outside in the rain there were plenty of planes. The best examples were the B-29 Superfortress & the B1-B. Despite getting damp & cold, it was neat that none of the planes were roped off, so you could wander right under them & have a good look – well, as good a look you could get before getting sick of the rain. Like all good air force museums there was a Huey – this always amuses me as the RNZAF is still flying these.

The signs to Wall Drug Store had started some hundreds of miles away in Billings, MT, & now they were increasing in regularity alongside I-90. Apparently the signs to this tourist attraction start even further east of Wall than they do west. The signs are now a bit of an institution & they sure do liven up the side of the interstate, after fifty miles I couldn’t wait to see what was there. I may have heard of this phenomenon somewhere, possible from one of Bill Bryson’s wonderful books, as the anticipation that was building seemed to be what should have been happening. From one drug store in the ‘30s, Wall Drug is now its own little mall of more than twenty stores (western wear, outdoor gear, jewelry, books, a huge café, shooting galleries & so on). There was quite a bit of local history displayed around the place – especially in delightfully pointless dead-end corridors. Although much of the wares were tat, we spent a good while there out of the rain – I was especially amused by the large T-Rex head that would come to life every twelve minutes at very high volume & send toddlers into hysterics.

On a side note of strange things you see on the back of semis on the interstate – how’s this for the dinkiest & most mobile bucket wheel you’ve ever seen?

We took a slight detour to go & check out a Minuteman site. This one was decommissioned, which is hardly a shock – there’s not much chance of tourist wandering in & checking out a live ICBM (inter-continental ballistic missile) underground site. There wasn’t a lot to see (a deep hole in the ground with a missile body in it), but at least we didn’t get shot for entering through the gate.

Finally, we made it to the national park of the day – Badlands. Driving across the prairie grassland, I had some idea what to expect having been to the Canadian Badlands a few months ago. But not covered in snow, these were so much more beautiful with the ground just disappearing from the edge of the grassland all of a sudden where it has eroded over many years. In many places it was easy to identify numerous different strata.

First the drive through was above the spectacle, then we dropped down & drove through the bottom for a while before rising again to follow the north rim. There were some quite pointy spires just sticking up from the top of various buttes. The sights would be even more spectacular in decent light or a clear twilight; alas, these are the only photos I have to show you.

In other exciting news, as we got back close to Rapid City it stopped raining! The sun even made an appearance this evening, so hopefully there is less dodging precipitation tomorrow. That ends the first week of the trip, it’s rained, it’s snowed, we’ve done a shade over three-thousand kilometers & three states & one province (plus four National Parks). I’m still undecided whether having company, not having to eat at restaurants alone, having someone to talk to or share companionable silence with (something I’m good at) is better or not than independence, doing what you want when you want, not waiting or have someone waiting for you & being forced to talk to strangers more. Time will tell I suppose.