SFO - PHX - PRC

Christian took us out for a great breakfast at Squat & Gobble before loaning us a car for the day. Armed with a few pointers on the best options for our San-Francisco-in-an-hour tour, we managed to squeeze in a drive around downtown, a walk from the Embarcadero down to Fisherman’s Wharf, and a bike-taxi ride back to the car before our flight to Arizona.

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Crossing the Sierras

A late morning in the canyon, the sun finally hit us around 09:30. With clear skies and plenty of time we wandered our way north along the Walker river towards Monitor Pass in search of some fresh coffee.

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Racing Snow

The maps of this route show a deceptively straight line. We left our camp overlooking Black Lake this morning expecting to drop quickly into the open plains around Mono Lake. Instead, we’ve been winding through beautifully thick pine forest and jagged mountain vistas for the last twenty miles.

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Death Valley to Black Lake

Morning blasted through the open window, brighter and earlier than any civilized day ever should. At least, that was Danielle’s feeling on the matter.

Moments later she had figured out how to work the blinds and gone back to sleep. Meanwhile, I took a pre-breakfast hike to explore the abandoned RV park we pulled into not 5 hours earlier. I’m not sure what it is that makes me this way, but now I do know it isn’t the tent. Despite a very comfortable bed, we are “camping” so I am awake and ready to start the day before the sun.

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Prescott to Death Valley

My first “assignment” in my new position with the Journal is to move a Bigfoot up to San Francisco. A Bigfoot is a well-insulated, 3,000-pound “cabin” that sits in the back of a pickup truck, in this case a GMC 2500 Diesel. It needs to be there by the morning of June 3rd.

Dani has joined me on this 1,200-mile test drive so we can evaluate the pros and cons of an “overlander” this large, though we will be sticking to tarmac for the most part. The plan is to retrace part of a trip we did back in June of 2000, and hit a few of the little places we missed last time – like Bodie and Yosemite. For sentimental reasons (and a luggage-free return flight) we’ve left most of our gear behind, and will figure the route out as we go using a paper map and our open eyes.

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