On The Road Again, Chapter 7

The Golden Gate Bridge (Photos (c) Bonnie J. Schupp)

Reaching the Pacific,

it was easy to see why

people love San Francisco

 

Horace Greeley said it well: “Go west, young man….” I’m not exactly young, but along with Bonnie we reached the Pacific Ocean this week to complete the outbound portion of our coast-to-coast road trip.

The last leg took us some 275 miles from Fallon, Nevada (about 60 miles east of Reno) to Petaluma, Calif., home to a friend we visited for two days. We first met Elaine Harvey Ellsworth through our mutual membership in the international peace organization Servas, through which traveling members stay free for two nights or longer in the homes of host members – long enough to get to know each other and build understanding at a grassroots one-to-one level.

Elaine was traveling with a friend from Germany, Lena, and they stayed in our home southeast of Baltimore. Later, we visited Lena in Germany – and now we were visiting Elaine. Servas travel doesn’t always work out like an exchange, as we do not maintain contact with many of the people who have visited us over nearly four decades from various countries in Europe, Asia, and the South Pacific, as well as the United States.

Elaine, David and Bonnie

So we got a tour of Petaluma, whose countryside and vineyard attractions make it a tourist draw, and to Elaine (who grew up in the Baltimore area!) a nice place to live for the past eight years or so. Then she directed my driving on a tour of San Francisco – through funky neighborhoods and to the highest viewpoint, known as Twin Peaks.

First stop, though, was the viewing area on the north side of the Golden Gate Bridge, before we crossed it into the city. Bonnie and I had been there a couple of decades ago, but the sight is ever-changing with the fog sometimes obscuring the bridge, skyline or both. (A high school classmate who lives in the area and is a noted professional photographer has aimed his camera there countless times… it seems to never get old.)

We crossed the bridge – mystified at how to pay the boothless toll. Did our Marylander EZPass transponder cover us? Have to check on that eventually.

Bonnie's favorite painting in Casanova show.

We took the first exit in the city, heading through the Presidio national park (and former military base), heading for the nearby Legion of Honor fine arts museum in Lincoln Park where Elaine is a member and can take one guest inside. She took Bonnie first, for a quick look including its soon-to-end exhibition, “Casanova: The Seduction of Europe.” It included an array of 18^th century art, much of it a tad risqué… at least by period standards. (Have to wonder what those folks would have thought about Cinemax After Dark.)

Then it was my turn, and I added a peek at the museum’s collection of impressionist art (not nearly as big or spectacular as the Baltimore Museum of Art’s Cone Collection).

In the museum’s outdoor courtyard sits Rodin’s “The Thinker” – and it seemed a lot more powerful and even larger than the BMA’s twin, which was moved indoors years ago because of damage attributed to acid rain.”

George Segal's Holocaust memorial sculpture

Also on the park property is a Holocaust memorial by artist George Segal in white-painted bronze, presenting a male figure standing at a barbed wire fence and, behind him, symbolic star-patterned bodies of victims spread in various poses.  (The powerful work has been vandalized several times since its installation there three decades ago.)

Another early stop in the city was the Cliff House area, where a restaurant and gift shop occupy the site of the mansions (two of them destroyed by fires) of the late millionaire Adolph Sutro, overlooking a stretch of ocean beach and the ruins of the elaborate Sutro Baths swimming facility.

The parking lots and curb areas have warning signs about frequent car break-ins, so everything we were not carrying got stuffed into the trunk. 

Policeman takes report from Cliff House car break-in victim.

Afterr walking around the paths overlooking the graffiti-decorated ruins, we headed for Cliff House and found several police officers talking to a family whose SUV was now missing a back window and whatever of seeming value had been left in the vehicle. Talk about blatant theft – in daylight, nearly in front of the building entrance and while a young woman was selling jewelry from the back of her vehicle several spaces away.

Bonnie had been researching the city’s entries in our travel bible, RoadsideAmerica.com, and directed us to a neighborhood called Hayes Valley to see a comic book store with a collection of illustrated toilet bowl seats. (I know, it’s crazy to drive thousands of miles across the country to seek out a collection of toilet seats – but that’s the kind of thing we do!)

But first we sought a late lunch at a nearby French-style café.  Bonnie and Elaine got seated while I looked for a legal parking space… one that would cost less than $3.50 an hour at the meter, and was not in a 4 p.m. tow-away zone. It took nearly half an hour. During my search, I spotted a shabbily-dressed man looking into parked vehicles and pulling a red window-smashing tool from his pocket. I stared at him, and he stepped away from one vehicle, and I watched in my rear-view mirror as he cased a vehicle further down the street.

The space I found was about five blocks away, with its designated space number on the curb and a machine to pay the 75 cents-an-hour fee. It does not dispense an actual parking slip, so how it is enforced is as much a mystery as the bridge toll. I followed somewhat confusing instructions, then identified my spot as Space 5, and was informed that the space “expires at 5:15 p.m.” So I figured it was free. Walking to the restaurant, I began considering the possibility that it was 3:15 p.m., and maybe the machine was simply indicating my space was in a two-hour limit area. Hmmm. But I wasn’t walking back to cough up a buck fifty. I was hungry. And the café was terrific.

James Sime points out his own depiction in a comic illustration.

Artist-illustrated toilet seats

Isotope Comics was little more than a block away on Fell Street, and Bonnie took pictures as we talked with owner James Sime about the odd collection – having more decorated toilet seats than he had room to display. It started when a visiting comic book artist decorated the bathroom… pretty much trashed it, as Sime described it. And that was the first of the artistic comic-style seats and lids to go up on the wall. Other visiting artists got into the act over time. The rule is that the artist must physically visit the store to merit a toilet seat. Sime buys them from a plumbing supply source, but you’d think he could write to the manufacturer, with pictures, and get a bunch of freebies.

The proprietor, and especially his high-spiking hair, had a slight resemblance to my comic artist friend Steve Stiles back in the Baltimore area, and I mentioned it. (Hey, Steve – he knows who you are! All you have to do is visit the shop and you can get a toilet seat on the wall!)

Other delights were found along and near narrow, mural-bedecked Linden Street behind the comics store, including the Dark Garden shop specializing in women’s corsets and other undergarments (Elaine was hoping to see a corset it produced for Lada Gaga, but it was not in house), and Smitten Ice Cream – famous for making its product on demand, using liquid nitrogen. A counter worker demonstrated the technique and offered free tastes.

The view from Twin Peaks

Then it was a walk back to the car, where we found no parking ticket – and then drove to Twin Peaks for the highest and widest view of the city. Elaine and her former husband had previously lived in a house just behind the Peaks, so she readily pointed the way from the back seat of our Camry. And the view was spectacular, the damp fog and low clouds having given way to sunshine.

Rush hour was well under way as we tried to check out a new attraction outside the Moscone Center half an hour away (it was covered with a tarp behind construction barriers, alas), and rode through a few other neighbors including the bustling Haight-Ashberry of the turn-on, tune-in, drop-out era of the 1960s and 70s. It was the most colorful neighborhood of our visit, largely because of commercialization of the good old hippie days.

We left the city about 6:30 p.m., and were back at Elaine’s home an hour later at exactly the time we’d planned, when her new male friend – a Turkish-American who goes by the name Joe – was to arrive, having offered to cook us a gourmet dinner. (He tells of having owned several restaurants over the years, including one in Petaluma now operated by a family member.) And he delivered! The food and conversation were terrific.

The next morning we had to depart. It was time to head south and east across California, into Arizona and, a few days later, New Mexico for other planned stops on the long drive back home. In case anyone was wondering, we had already covered about 4,500 miles. My best guess when we left home was 8,000 miles total, so we were right on target so far.

Next chapter: Crossing Arizona

On The Road Again, Chapter 6

 

Storm clouds over Highway 50 (Photos (c) Bonnie J. Schupp)

Crossing Nevada on

the “loneliest road”

amid some stormy weather

Downpour presents a free car wash.

Some folks would likely prefer taking the high road west from Utah, but Interstate 80 would have meant back-tracking – and besides, the low road seemed to offer the unpredictability we enjoy. So we left Spanish Fork heading for U.S. Highways 6 and 50, starting out with sunshine and fluffs of beautiful white clouds.

Not the other Sinclair, alas. Maybe someday.

We soon found an old, deserted pumpless Sinclair gas station, that was more like a big locked garage with the brand name above the door in large-letter faded paint. It was a perfect setting for a photo, and a young Mormon couple were already there with camera and tripod trying our angles and poses (and a couple of kisses). They were from Salt Lake City, enjoying a Sunday drive.

Then another couple stopped to admire and photograph the structure… and they were from Munich, Germany.

Finally, Bonnie and I had our turn, and I posed wearing my new white cowboy hat – the gift from Brian Rutledge that served me so well during the rodeo.  I lowered my head for artistic purposes, and Bonnie took several pictures.

Then we continued west as the clouds slowly darkened. Nearing the Utah-Nevada border, we noticed what appeared to be a huge lake south of the highway. But the closer the road and “water” converged, it became clear this was an illusion. It was a former body of water gone dry, labeled on our map as “Sevier Lake Dry.”

Sevier "lake" before the storm

 We walked across the “beach” on the edge of the “lake,” which had a few tire tracks indicating some folks have a strange sense of invulnerability. I can just imagine getting stuck in the middle! As we walked back to our trusty Toyota Camry, there were distant booms and flashes of lightning… time to get across the border.

Continuing westward through sporadic downpours, and having not seen much in the way of accommodations, we decided to stop in the old mining town of Ely (pronounced EEE-Lee). It had a grocery store, gas stations, interesting artsy shops, several casinos and bars, and the historic Hotel Nevada, which had a bar, casino and Denny’s restaurant downstairs.

Hotel Nevada

The floors had small, but relatively nice rooms (king bed in ours) and tiny bathrooms with a warning that given the age of the building (it opened in 1929), hot water might be erratic. Mints on the dresser, even. The cost of just under $80 included coupons for free breakfasts and two margaritas. There was a parking lot out back, but I found a space by the curb nearly at the hotel entrance.

We really lucked into getting the king room, because all of them had been booked and the nice desk clerk gambled there would be a few no-show cancellations. It was “race day” in the area, a twice-a-year event in which amateur drivers test their high-speed mettle on a 60-mile stretch of highway that police close for a day. They compete in various speed categories, in cars ranging from antique sportscars to one parked by the side of the hotel – a stunningly restored Corvette. Top speeds in the 120-mile down-and-back race reportedly reached 165 mph.

The Nevada has a walk of fame along the sidewalk, with Hollywood-style stars bearing the names of such guests as Gary Cooper, Ingrid Bergman, Jimmy Stewart and even Lyndon Johnson. (I’m guessing they stayed in the pricier suites.)

I spent an hour in the casino, trying various machines, and ended up – after hitting a straight in poker – losing only two bucks.

At an antique store a few blocks from the hotel, I learned about the promotion of  Nevada's stretch of Highway 50  as "the loneliest road in America.” According to a Wikipedia entry, the name was bestowed by Life magazine in 1986 as a pejorative for its long desolate stretches, but was seized upon as a marketing tool instead. There’s even a U.S. 50 “survival kit” distributed by merchants, but the places we looked for them had all run out. Evidently, it features places to stop, and shop or see, and provides for getting the booklet stamped at each. 

Eureka's welcome sign

And it was pretty desolate as we drove across several mountain passes. One town where we stopped, Eureka, Nevada, had seen better days in its mining era, but local folks were fixing up some storefronts and hoping for a business boom in tourism.  There’s a museum, an old opera house and  old  hotel building, and a welcoming sign billing Eureka as “the friendliest town on the loneliest road in America.”

Near Hickison Summit (elev. 6,591 feet), we stopped to check out a petroglyph site, but the ancient markings on walls of the slope were very faint. Easier to find on our six-tenths of a mile walk was a modernist petroglyph with a peace symbol and the words “Give Peace a Chance.”

Me, at petrogyyph site summit

We stopped for lunch further along the way at the even-smaller town of Austin, enjoying an excellent grilled ham and cheese at a café on the main street, and that’s when the storm caught up with us. Torrential rain, pea-size hail, an epic downpour soaked the town and sent water rushing on the edge of road. As the storm slowed to a drizzle, we climbed over the little rain river and into our newly-washed car. 

Two hours later, we checked into a Holiday Inn Express in the larger town of Fallon, some 60 miles east of Reno, setting us up for a quick drive north back to Interstate 80 and the push into California.

Next Chapter: Left Coast downy ocean