Oregon Trail - San Francisco to Fresno



We Stop to Smell the Roses
Golden Gate Park, San Francisco

We begin another sparkling day with breakfast at the Little River Inn, finish packing the half-empty Pinot Gris and half-eaten cheese from the evening before and check out at the front desk.


As "My Pet Boy Sherman" would always ask at the beginning of the every episode of the excellent, pun-infested cartoon from my childhood, Peabody's Improbable History; "Where to today Mr. Peabody?" as the dog historian character would then set the dial on his 'Wayback Machine' and return to some earlier historical time in order to set history right.  Where to today Mr. Peabody?  We might ask.  Today Sherman we will be traveling through Novato, San Rafael, San Francisco, Los Banos and Fresno - all sites rich in memories and personal history.  Places where either I once lived or through which I have often travelled.

Mr. Peabody and his boy Sherman
setting the dial on Mr. Peabody's Wayback Machine

As the highway headed inland from the coast, we passed by Hendy Woods State Park, a favorite family campsite from the middle 1960's.  At Hendy Woods, there was a swimming hole at a wide spot in a small river.  The slow water in the summer made for a pleasantly cool dip in the rather murky water.  Upon our return from a weekend camping trip, one of my sisters was invited for a chicken dinner at Cindy Pate's house, our neighbors across the street.

   Mrs. Pate asked her after dinner, "How was the leg [of chicken]?"  She heard the question as "How was the lake?" [i.e the swimming hole at Hendy Woods]  Her reply was "Well, it was kind of mossy."  She returned home acutely aware that she had said something that did not go well with Mrs. Pate, her hostess and dinner cook.

In Novato, home from 1962 to 1968 - my formative years, I turned off the now re-routed Highway 101 and drove through town.  Many things have changed, but still a few landmarks remained to orient my nostalgia.  I briefly cruised through the old neighborhood on Cambridge Street, Rancho Elementary School and the secret Miwok Indian campsite where I spend many a joyful afternoon excavating for obsidian chips (which I still have).  Back to Highway 101, south to San Rafael and over the Golden Gate Bridge into 'The City'. 

We planned to have several hours in San Francisco, and opted to spend most of the time in Golden Gate Park.  Finding the park was a little more difficult than I anticipated.  Is this Mason Street?  Do I need to take a right on Geary Street.  That was Lombard Street - are we going the right way?  But with the use of a navigator and an old-fashioned paper road atlas, we happened upon the Park.  Though I had celebrated several of my boyhood birthdays at Steinhardt Aquarium (a favorite and familiar landmark) and even though I have not seen it since it was renovated some years back, we chose to walk through the Park and visit the Japanese Tea Garden.  A tranquil setting for a Japanese lunch of red bean sauce on rice cakes, a few skewers of meat and hot tea. 

Pagoda from Pan American Exhibition 1915
Japanese Tea Garden, Golden Gate Park

Mark chants the mantra - Remember the Alamo
Buda in Japanese Tea Garden

Chinese Pavilion in Golden Gate Park

Wanting to leave The City before traffic became really packed, we tried to disentangle ourselves from Golden Gate Park and get across the Oakland Bay Bridge by 4:00 PM.  With some luck we managed to find our way onto the proper highway and crossed into Oakland.  I believe I was honked at twice by other drivers for what I assume was my sin of leaving too much space between my front bumper and the vehicle in front of me.  If that was truly the case, I think those hip Californians need to chill-out, hang loose and drive like a Zen master - or maybe they are transplants from New York.  In Texas we post the sign "Drive Friendly" - which does not seem to sink in here either.

We had called my sister Wendy in Fresno to let her know how our fluid travel plans were shaping up and to let her know approximately when we might arrive at her new home in Fresno for a day's visit once we left San Francisco.  It was then that we learned that Barth's (my brother-in-law) father had suddenly died two days earlier.  We of course expressed our sorrow and shock and offered to rearrange any plans we had for our stop-over at there home.  We of course were warmly welcomed and we hope we provided some comfort while we were there as family.

Once out of the Bay Area and rolling south down I-5, I planned to stop for dinner at the Wool Growers Hotel on the North end of Los Banos for the most unique and fabulous dinner on our "2010 Oregon Trail".  The Wool Growers is an old, unremarkable (if not dilapidated) looking establishment on the edge of downtown.  But does this old Basque heritage cavern of a dining hall ever know how to put on a meal!  The door on the street is not one you would naturally notice unless you were looking for it and not a door you would naturally open, except for the weathered sign "Dining Entrance" screwed to the exterior.  Once you have opened the door, you are still not confident that you have found the correct entrance as you peer down a long, dim and narrow hallway toward another set of doors.  At the end of the narrow hall, there is another sign that instructs diners to go through the door on the left.  Passing through a set of double doors, you enter a large room with paneled walls, linoleum floors and four long rows of tables with benches.  

Our waitress quickly motions us down to the far end of the table in Row 1 where we are seated next to several other diners on our bench.  This is 'Family Style', cash only (no credit cards), one price - $18 bucks a head for dinner.  And the action begins; what would you like to drink?  She is always moving fast in-and-out of the kitchen, she tells us the owner never likes to have his food waiting and getting cold.  There is a carafe of Beaujolais on the table for anyone to help themselves, but they had run out of butter that night.  Otherwise the meal includes

• Lettuce Salad with terrific vinegar dressing
• Bread Basket
• Lamb Stew
• Bowl of Baked Beans
• French Fries 
• Entree Choices (choose only one): Baked Chicken, Fried Chicken, Lamb, Pork Chops, Prime Rib or Steak
• Dessert is a bowl of Vanilla Ice Cream

Old men regular customers and large families continue to come in and pull out a bench at one of the tables while we rub our bellies and wipe our chins and waddle back out to The Q.  It is late enough now that, I just give a nod to old times as we drive down Highway 99 without stopping in Madera, home town 1971 - 1981.

Barth recently went to work as an engineer for an agricultural plant in Firebaugh, but he and Wendy settled in a home along the San Joaquin River off Herdon Avenue on the north edge of Fresno.  When I would drive along Herndon Avenue going from Madera to Fresno State's campus, Herndon Avenue was lined by miles of fig orchards.  Now all the orchards are gone and in there place are subdivisions and shopping centers.  Does anybody grow figs anymore? Or do we import all of our figs from the middle east these days?

Don't be Koi
Carpe Diem - Which loosely translated means, "Seize the Carp"