The longer version of the trip
Computer is basically set up and I now have internet (however we don't have net at our place, but the computer is set up elsewhere, it will work for now).
Got up at 6pm as planned. The car was mostly packed up, I just had to fill in some space in the backseat and fill up the front seat and get rid of the last of what I could not fit. I estimated this to take about 2 hours, it actually took a bit over 3 hours to accomplish this, so I did not leave until about 9:25 my time and it was already dark, which was not a bad thing, I planned on doing the trip mostly at night anyhow.
The trip itself was mostly boring except for a few things. Right after getting out of San Diego county there is a nasty incline (6% actually, last 9 miles, not too curvy though). After that joy, I had to stop for the first stop at a rest area. Seemed like a good idea, but I have never seen a more foul rest area in my life. Upon going in, in a crack on the wall there was a mouse, I am not kidding, it skittered off upon seeing me. Looking in all the stalls there is not a bit of toilet paper except for that which people left on the floor. So I went outside, was about to consider making use of the men's room to at least find some toilet paper when another group arrives with a male in their group, I warned the girls about the lack and the guy grabbed us some toilet paper. Then when entering the stalls, I found that there were more spiders than the bathroom at my old place had (and I know wolfhound knows how many spiders my old place had, as he heard me turn two into black spots on the wall during a phone conversation). And then when washing my hands, one of the sinks was filled with crickets. Needless to say, I left as quickly as I could and went back on my way.
Got to Yuma and was ecstatic, as that was one state out of my way. I stopped and got gas, even though I had yet to use a half a tank. As I was told that gas would be hard to get at times, and Yuma was a good place to stop, I filled up and got some food, as my stomach was starting to growl a bit.
Around 1 am I started getting sleepy, so I stopped again and rested my eyes for a few. Felt much more refreshed after a few minutes. I ended up getting some cookies from a vending machine and walked around a bit and hit the road again.
After finishing up the first leg of the journey on the 8, stopped for gas, only used half a tank, but better safe than sorry as far as gas goes and I was told Arizona has a lack of civilization. However, Arizona did have a bonus of marking nicely at each exit that did have gas and food how far the next exit that had gas and food was so you can determine if there was a need to stop now or if you could press on.
Around 5:30 am (still going off pacific time, for ease of reference) I felt a need to stop and stretch my legs. Of course, since it was fully light out, and I had been going for a time at 75+ ran into a problem. When I got out, I noticed an orangish fluid coming from the bottom of my car. After having enough issues in the past with leaky cooling system, I knew right away that my car likely tried to overheat again. I lifted the hood, noticed steam coming up from around where I put coolant in. I let the car cool off for a bit with the hood up. After thinking about it and reading over the manual, I decided to just refil the coolant, watch the temperature guage and see what happened from there. As it turned out, it just did that because I went from a good time of high speeds which helped cool things off to nothing real quick, that caused the coolant to boil up and then drip out, there was no problem, I just had to be more careful about stopping, from there out, I turned the heat on when I was going to exit to prevent further issue, since I was low on spare coolant and buying the kind my car uses was going to be hard until I could find a store that actually sells auto parts.
Eventually hit New Mexico, that was a long and boring state amd pretty much had nothing of note other than a lack of civilzation and too many Mexican import stores and few places to stop for gas.
Around 8:30 am I finally hit Texas. I sure was happy at that point, even though I still had a good 300 miles left to go. El Paso was an interesting city, there was actually more cars to dodge and all the roads were a pinkish red color, plus some of the bridges were real neat looking. If I ever drive through there again and have a camera, I will so have to get a few pics of that area, it was neat.
Texas definitely has interesting roads. For one thing, they have posted seperare speed limits for night and day. The major roads have differnt type of names, like there are loops and something there is a FM (still haven't figured that out, will eventually ask about it). There is also oddly enough at some points a specific turn lane for U-Turns, am not kidding, I found one earlier today that I likely will use every day to get to work, it is for the specific purpose of getting over to the other side to get to where I will be working.
Anyway, I arrive a bit past 2pm pacific, 4pm cental, after accidentally passing one street I was supposed to turn on and finding it by the joys of zen navigation. Then I miss the next street as I was past from the location I entered the first street at. Found the street I was to live on okay, but then passed the house. Got there, and my luck was that no one was home. But the door was left open (seems this is such a quiet neighborhood that one can do that with no worries, just as long as its closed but not locked, as a wide open door is an invite to bugs. So I bring in a few things and find the bedroom that looks to be mine and decide to take a nap. Eventually my roommate arrives and shows me around the street and introduces me to a few folks.
I ended up going to bed early and then today I went exploring a bit and found the Wal-Mart again so I could pick up a few things, like some food and such. I also unpacked the car a bit more. Once some folks arrived I got my computer set up and now have net access again.
So far I think its pretty nice. Things definitely cost a lot less out here, there is pretty much no traffic to speak of and its nice and quiet and not as hot as I was expecting, there is actually a nice breeze. Also everyone here seems nice and friendly, of course I am a new female gamer to the area, and male gamers tend to be nice and friendly to females willing to game.
Anyway, in about an hour I got game to go to. So I am going off to take a shower and get ready. Game is at our place, so no worries about getting there at least :)
Got up at 6pm as planned. The car was mostly packed up, I just had to fill in some space in the backseat and fill up the front seat and get rid of the last of what I could not fit. I estimated this to take about 2 hours, it actually took a bit over 3 hours to accomplish this, so I did not leave until about 9:25 my time and it was already dark, which was not a bad thing, I planned on doing the trip mostly at night anyhow.
The trip itself was mostly boring except for a few things. Right after getting out of San Diego county there is a nasty incline (6% actually, last 9 miles, not too curvy though). After that joy, I had to stop for the first stop at a rest area. Seemed like a good idea, but I have never seen a more foul rest area in my life. Upon going in, in a crack on the wall there was a mouse, I am not kidding, it skittered off upon seeing me. Looking in all the stalls there is not a bit of toilet paper except for that which people left on the floor. So I went outside, was about to consider making use of the men's room to at least find some toilet paper when another group arrives with a male in their group, I warned the girls about the lack and the guy grabbed us some toilet paper. Then when entering the stalls, I found that there were more spiders than the bathroom at my old place had (and I know wolfhound knows how many spiders my old place had, as he heard me turn two into black spots on the wall during a phone conversation). And then when washing my hands, one of the sinks was filled with crickets. Needless to say, I left as quickly as I could and went back on my way.
Got to Yuma and was ecstatic, as that was one state out of my way. I stopped and got gas, even though I had yet to use a half a tank. As I was told that gas would be hard to get at times, and Yuma was a good place to stop, I filled up and got some food, as my stomach was starting to growl a bit.
Around 1 am I started getting sleepy, so I stopped again and rested my eyes for a few. Felt much more refreshed after a few minutes. I ended up getting some cookies from a vending machine and walked around a bit and hit the road again.
After finishing up the first leg of the journey on the 8, stopped for gas, only used half a tank, but better safe than sorry as far as gas goes and I was told Arizona has a lack of civilization. However, Arizona did have a bonus of marking nicely at each exit that did have gas and food how far the next exit that had gas and food was so you can determine if there was a need to stop now or if you could press on.
Around 5:30 am (still going off pacific time, for ease of reference) I felt a need to stop and stretch my legs. Of course, since it was fully light out, and I had been going for a time at 75+ ran into a problem. When I got out, I noticed an orangish fluid coming from the bottom of my car. After having enough issues in the past with leaky cooling system, I knew right away that my car likely tried to overheat again. I lifted the hood, noticed steam coming up from around where I put coolant in. I let the car cool off for a bit with the hood up. After thinking about it and reading over the manual, I decided to just refil the coolant, watch the temperature guage and see what happened from there. As it turned out, it just did that because I went from a good time of high speeds which helped cool things off to nothing real quick, that caused the coolant to boil up and then drip out, there was no problem, I just had to be more careful about stopping, from there out, I turned the heat on when I was going to exit to prevent further issue, since I was low on spare coolant and buying the kind my car uses was going to be hard until I could find a store that actually sells auto parts.
Eventually hit New Mexico, that was a long and boring state amd pretty much had nothing of note other than a lack of civilzation and too many Mexican import stores and few places to stop for gas.
Around 8:30 am I finally hit Texas. I sure was happy at that point, even though I still had a good 300 miles left to go. El Paso was an interesting city, there was actually more cars to dodge and all the roads were a pinkish red color, plus some of the bridges were real neat looking. If I ever drive through there again and have a camera, I will so have to get a few pics of that area, it was neat.
Texas definitely has interesting roads. For one thing, they have posted seperare speed limits for night and day. The major roads have differnt type of names, like there are loops and something there is a FM (still haven't figured that out, will eventually ask about it). There is also oddly enough at some points a specific turn lane for U-Turns, am not kidding, I found one earlier today that I likely will use every day to get to work, it is for the specific purpose of getting over to the other side to get to where I will be working.
Anyway, I arrive a bit past 2pm pacific, 4pm cental, after accidentally passing one street I was supposed to turn on and finding it by the joys of zen navigation. Then I miss the next street as I was past from the location I entered the first street at. Found the street I was to live on okay, but then passed the house. Got there, and my luck was that no one was home. But the door was left open (seems this is such a quiet neighborhood that one can do that with no worries, just as long as its closed but not locked, as a wide open door is an invite to bugs. So I bring in a few things and find the bedroom that looks to be mine and decide to take a nap. Eventually my roommate arrives and shows me around the street and introduces me to a few folks.
I ended up going to bed early and then today I went exploring a bit and found the Wal-Mart again so I could pick up a few things, like some food and such. I also unpacked the car a bit more. Once some folks arrived I got my computer set up and now have net access again.
So far I think its pretty nice. Things definitely cost a lot less out here, there is pretty much no traffic to speak of and its nice and quiet and not as hot as I was expecting, there is actually a nice breeze. Also everyone here seems nice and friendly, of course I am a new female gamer to the area, and male gamers tend to be nice and friendly to females willing to game.
Anyway, in about an hour I got game to go to. So I am going off to take a shower and get ready. Game is at our place, so no worries about getting there at least :)