Today started out pretty bad, but ended up pretty good! I was in San Clemente SP dropping some things I brought from the lawyers in Florida off to my co-POA. Did that yesterday and had a nice lunch together and went through jewelry and coins. She is putting them in Safety deposit box.
So today, I decided to take I-5 straight north to Napa, staying overnight tonight about halfway there. First bad thing was driving through LA. Do I need to say more?? Have to add that CA drivers in the big cities don't merge, they just refuse to slow down or speed up and just honk at you if you are in their way.
Got north of LA on the freeway at about the city of San Clarita. Freeway was 4-5 lanes wide and started to slow down and then stopped. Saw smoke ahead of us, and after almost an hour of being mostly stopped, I decided to bail out, so was able to move to far right lane and exit, following my GPS's alternate route. Ha, about a thousand of my fellow escapees also followed that route, which took us to the entrance of a county detention center, so we had to turn around!! This was about noon, and temps were 110 degrees, which was rough because my AC is blowing out of the place where the defrosting air usually blows. I think something is stuck in there, but I have not taken it in to get it repaired yet, so my rig was getting hotter and hotter in the long line of people trying to find a better route that did not take us to jail!
So, I pulled over and tried my generator so I could run AC, but it kept quitting, I think because of heat. Even my tire monitor showed my tires getting really hot. And personally, I was about melting. I could have headed east through Tehachapi, but that was a lot longer, so I ended up heading west and getting onto Highway 101 at Venture, and then drove along the much cooler coast. Ended up being a lot longer drive, but at least the coast road was scenic and very cool. And I am finally in a campground near San Luis Obispo. Got here about 7 pm and temp was 65 degrees, which really, really felt good!!! It is 9 pm and I don't even need AC right now.
And yes, it is really expensive to do all the driving from Ohio to California, but this is my annual migration from one set of grandkids to the other, so worth it. Also, I was paying around $4 per gallon in Kansas, Nebraska, etc, and even paid $3.59 in Colorado at one point. Is over $5 here now, but I did get a couple of fill-ups at $4.89 in CA so it is going down a bit. PLUS, I have the advantage of not having to pay property taxes or for utilities, which I know adds up for most of you who have permanent homes.
And Anne, is about two weeks, I will be at Tillicum Campground near Yachats, OR so how about joining me with your RV? It is right on the ocean and high there for most of this week will be in 60s.
I just checked and Route Fire is getting bigger and I-5 is still closed in both directions:
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-08-31/fire-5-freeway-castaic-route-fire