Bakersfield
Posted by jonno | Posted in US | Posted on 14-11-2009
Haven’t caught up with the blog yet as we’ve been pretty busy. Day two in the Napa was great. We went to Stirling Winery which was recommended by the hotel. It was great. I think next time we’ll do the wine train so we don’t have to worry about driving. There are so many wineries it’s not funny. Way more than the Yarra Valley and Tamar Valley which is all I can really compare it too.
Kate has a mild cold so it after her 5 tastings she was done. I was too since I was driving and if there is one thing you don’t want to be doing in a country that does everything arse about, it’s drink driving!
I’ve pretty much got the driving sorted now. Didn’t take too long. It’s very easy to remember that you’re in a different country so while it may still not be an automatic reflex to get on the ‘right’ side of the road, it IS a reflex to slow down and think about which side I’m supposed to be. This is ‘close-enough’.
So we headed off at 8 this morning for the drive down to Bakersfield. It was pretty good. A little slow leaving the Napa but it would have been peak hour so all in all, not too bad. The country-side is not really country-side. There are plenty of farms but there is an amazing amount of industry and towns that line the highway. We took C99 not I5 which was the original intention. We have a GPS that doesn’t seem to agree with Google Maps. We’re following the GPS although she does seem to have problems with highway exists every so often.
The drive tomorrow will be big, 8hrs but we know at the end of it we’ll be at the Grand Canyon which we’re both really looking forward to. We’re staying at a hotel about .5miles from the southern rim. With close access to, we’ll aim to spend all day there on Day two and hopefully sneak in a sunset tomorrow night.
Kate got plenty of photos from the car today so we’ll post some soon.
We ducked into a supermarket today to pick up dinner since we had a microwave in the room. The place we went to was like a movie. Everything was MASSIVE and our initial thought was it was just a bulk-buy place. It wasn’t, but if you wanted the MEGA version of any grocery item, this was the place for you.
We couldn’t find anywhere to buy bloody CDs so tomorrow it’s the radio again. They play mostly R&B and Rap which is really annoying us but life goes on.
Grand Canyon – Here we come!
