When you drive south down the mountains from Dunsmuir the next "sight to see" is Shasta Lake, which is a reservoir that helps supply water to the great central valley. After Red Bluff the land becomes flatter and drier and I-5 seems to stretch endlessly. It was a little over nine hours and 420 miles from Yreka to San Juan Bautista - but I had a break of about an hour at Dunsmuir, plus a gas stop and a stop at a rest area along the way.
Shasta Lake is very low from the drought conditions This is the I-5 bridge.
Once down in the valley the highway divider strip is planted with oleanders of every color. Some have grown huge over the years, like this white one.
Other places the pinks and reds are predominant. They at least provide something green to look at in the brown landscape.
South of Williams the rice fields begin. When I drove north several weeks ago the fields had not yet been flooded and I wondered if there was a lack of water to start the crop.
But they seemed to all be filled on my way home.
These are just north of Sacramento.....
....where the road goes up a long man made grade...
...and passes over the Sacramento River - quite a bit larger than it was in Dunsmuir.
Sacramento is the capitol city of California, but the capitol building is drowned by the tall "sky scrapers" of the downtown.
It is always amazing to see a city after all the miles of mountains and flat farm country.
Between Sacramento and Stockton I saw this huge field of wild mustard, more than I had seen, or would see, on the entire trip.
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Southwest of Stockton there are just rolling hills and lonely farms and flat fields and cattle ranches. I'm sure this place was built before the Interstate, surely nobody would build this close to all the traffic going continuously by. This stretch of I-5 was built in the late 1960s.
Turning onto Hwy 156 the road goes through rolling hills and over the top into the valley that is the center of "row crops". Lettuce, spinach, mixed greens, cauliflower, broccoli, and on and on.
The fire breaks are kept cleared all year round. Good thing as this is the area where I saw the grass fire on my way home to Placentia.
Heading west on Hwy 156 there is a fog bank hanging over the coastal mountains - means that Monterey, Pacific Grove and Carmel are experiencing fog and cool weather. When it is hottest in the inland valley it is foggiest along the coast.
It was a great trip - almost 3000 miles and only one night of rain in Washington. I do need to take three nights on the road, driving it all in three days is too hard on this old gal.
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