After a late start, we headed out of Oakhurst on SR-41 for about 30 miles before turning east onto the route SR-145 across to Madera, an agricultural town. Here, we headed straight on into farm land on smaller roads before heading north again towards Chowchilla. Back on the main roads, we joined the US-152 heading west. The road was pretty flat until we passed Los Banos after which it became more hilly. We passed two reservoirs, one small and one huge. The huge one, San Luis Reservoir, had a very low water-level. We tried to go down to look at it, but we would have to have paid $10 just to park for a few minutes. On the way down the road we spotted a Roadrunner.
Once over the hills, we continued west and joined the US-156 towards Monterey, once again through farmland. Eventually, we joined the US-101 heading south to Salinas. We found the Laurel Inn Motel easily and checked in for 4 nights.
After settling in we headed to down-town Salinas for a look around. By chance, there was a rally of old cars and 'hot-rods' right in the centre of the older part of town, so we wandered round and looked at all the cars, bikes and boats on display. By this time, it felt quite chilly with a cool breeze blowing so we stopped in at a brew-pub on the main street for a beer before wandering on again to look at cars. The streets in the town centre were all closed and hundreds of people had come out to look at, and admire, the cars and speed-boats. Some of the cars had just been restored, others modified with huge engines for drag-racing and others were just made up cars. There were also very small speed-boats, with huge 5 or 6 litre engines on the back, all gleaming chrome.
Later we returned to the motel and ate dinner at a restaurant called the Black Bear Diner next to the motel. Good food, but a seriously confused waitress, who told us they only sold Bud Light and all the wine had run out. Neither statement was true. Regretably, it clouded our judgement of the place, we wouldn't be returning.
Hotel - Laurel Inn Motel
Weather - Clear skies and sunny until closer to the coast, then cloudy. Warm to hot all day until the coast then cool in the 60s with a NW breeze
No comments:
Post a Comment