September 2nd, 2014
After a lovely breakfast at the Airbnb “House in Downtown Arcata“, we headed on to Oregon. The trip started with a light fog and before long, we were in full sun, shaded only by the canopy of awe inspiring redwoods. Such grandeur and beauty makes one feel very insignificant indeed. And very grateful to have this opportunity!
We arrived in sunny Oregon in the late morning and continued our drive northward along the seashore. Again, the scenery was fabulous. Special care to keep to the speed limit, of course!
The shoreline and outcroppings are possibly even more spectacular than Highway 1 in California (if that is possible).
After lunch and cheese sampling at Face Rock Creamery in Bandon OR, we headed north again. Our via point was to be Sunset Bay State park, off of Highway 101. BEWARE! Setting your GSP to shortest route can have unforeseen consequences! After two miles of lovely paved roadway, we found ourselves on a crushed rock single lane, twisty, inclining, “highway”. This continued for another 6 miles (at a snail’s pace). Boxsters are not designed for four-wheeling! The GPS had decided that this backroads track was, in fact, the shortest route. Got the adrenaline pumping. We suddenly got dumped back onto a smooth “standard” road, that we could have taken the entire way, but would have cost us four extra miles at 7x the speed we traveled on the gravel road. This is the road we ended up on . . .
We did eventually end up at Sunset Bay State Park; indeed a beautiful bay and worth the journey.
And just to prove this is all being done in a Porsche Boxster (and not an RV), we took a picture of the topless beauty (the car, that is)!!!
Turned out that to get from this beautiful bay to our final destination of the day, we had to cross a large bridge. In fact, the first of six large bridges. Jo does not do well driving across large bridges and, of course, she was driving! Steve says she did a great job (but he didn’t know her eyes were closed the whole time).
We ended the day in Newport OR, where we had dinner at the South Beach Fish Market – fish (halibut & salmon) & chips. It was as good as it’s reputation.
We are spending this evening at a Bed & Breakfast called “The Grand Victorian” in Newport, Oregon, where we were served a shrimp cocktail and candied salmon upon arrival.
The journey continues . . .
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September 1st, 2014
No better way to start the day than a trip across the new Bay Bridge . . .
Into San Francisco 
and on to the Golden Gate! It doesn’t get much better than that!
We stopped for lunch at David’s in Fort Bragg (excellent food and very nice staff) after winding our way along Highway 1. Wow, what beautiful scenery and, oh so many twists and turns!
We ended the evening with a light supper at the Plaza Grill. We are spending our first night at an eclectic Airbnb called “House in Downtown Arcata“. We have our own private upstairs room & bath and the pillow is calling to me! It has been a long day.
The journey continues. . .
Posted in The Actual Trip | 2 Comments »
September 1st, 2014
Posted in The Actual Trip | 1 Comment »
August 27th, 2014
With only five days to go, we are down to the last minute thoughts and things to do. We decided it would be a good idea to put a coat of wax on the car before we leave (knowing we will encounter a few bugs along the way)! Stopped by America’s Tire and had them check the tires (including the spare). Tires are good to go!
We have been watching the weather and that seems to be hubby’s biggest concern. He has only lived in the Bay Area and in Maryland, so the rest of the country’s weather is a mystery to him. He is convinced we will be chased across the Midwest by tornados and that we will have to park the Boxster in high-rise parking lots to avoid the floods. I just chuckle. He is in for the trip of his life!
Posted in Sidetracked | 1 Comment »
August 16th, 2014
We decided it would be prudent to actually pack our bags and see if they actually fit into the Boxster. If we were traveling in an RV or even an SUV, space would not be a problem. But we are traveling in a Porsche Boxster, with limited trunk space (and even more limited cabin space), so testing to make sure it all fits was worth the effort.
This is what it looked like before we started loading.
Front Trunk aka The Bonnet. . .
Rear Trunk aka The Boot. . .
A year or so ago I bought luggage (as a birthday present for hubby) specifically designed to fit in the Boxster from RoadTrip Luggage. The luggage is well designed and well made; however, in our case, it does not fit the Boxster as shown on their website because we have a spare tire. I believe that Porsche removed the spare tire in later years, but since our car is one of the very early Boxsters (I bought it in 1997), it does have a spare. We considered removing the spare to allow for more luggage space (and just carry a can of fix-a-flat), but decided the safety factor of having a spare outweighs the space we would gain. And we want to keep the car in its original condition!
So we packed our bags and they fit! However, we could only fit three of the four bags we bought from RoadTrip Luggage and we had to be creative on how to make them fit. We even have room for our pillows! But I’ve been told there is no room for any purchases, so no shopping allowed. Ha! There is always the option to ship things home!
This is what the front trunk (bonnet) looks like packed, with and without the pillows!
And the rear trunk (boot) . . .
Looks like we are gonna make it after all!
And the count down begins . . .
Posted in Sidetracked | 1 Comment »
August 5th, 2014
I wanted to put together a summary of prior posts because I’ve finally figured out how to link this post to Facebook (I know, I am sometimes technically challenged!).
The Dream
Going on a 48 state (and 2 province) road trip in our 1998 Porsche Boxster and taking our own sweet time seeing our beautiful county. The plan is to take the northern route from the Bay Area to Boston, timing it so we arrive in Boston in mid-October, to experience the autumn colors. Then we take the southern route home.
Haunted on Halloween!
We traded our Marriott Kauai Beach Club timeshare week for a week at Marriott’s Custom House in Boston and, lucky for us, we got the week of October 10 through 17. During our planning, we discovered airbnb and we have now booked almost our entire trip staying at airbnb places. Our belief is that we can get a much better experience of a local area by staying with the locals. In the case of October 31st, it turns out I booked a room in a haunted house (the house is actually on the hanted house tour that evening). How fun is that? Needless to say, I will be sharing our experiences in the daily blog (once we hit the road).
Getting the 1998 Porsche Boxster Ready for a 15K Mile Trip
There are things you must do (like getting the car serviced, getting new tires, replacing front struts) and things you just want to do (like replacing the sound system). We did do all of the mandatory stuff and then moved on to the fun stuff. We drove up to Car Audio Innovations in Roseville where Rod and his team did a significant upgrade to our sound system. We now have a Hertz Amplifier and Focal Speakers, and this breathes life into our awesome Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997 Receiver.
I also bought some great after market cup holders from Mike at Ultimate Cupholders (this was a shortcoming in the early Boxsters).
Software, Hardware and other “Techie” Stuff
We chose My Scenic Drives to do the trip planning and we bought a National Geographic Road Atlas (Adventure Edition) for a hardcopy. I still like something I can write on. We bought a Garmin nüvi® 50LM and then replaced it with a nüvi® 3590LMT (because the 50LM only allowed for one waypoint).
Put Another Nickel In . . .
Music, music, music! We have all of our music in MediaMonkey and we have spent the last three months rating it, so we could put the best of our library on a “stick” (or thumb drive, for you techies). We finished that project today.
So that is about where we are with less than a month to go.
I’ll be blogging about the packing (and seeing if it all fits) next.
Stay tuned . . .
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July 17th, 2014
The software we ultimately settled on for managing our trip is MyScenicDrives. We’ve built our trip in two sections: the trip from the Bay Area to Boston and the trip from Boston back to the Bay Area. It could have all been done as one trip but, since we are taking a one week break in Boston, we really see this as two trips. MyScenicDrives can give us advice on scenic drives along the way, which is a nice perk. It allows me to put in my estimated MPG and average gas price and then it calculates the cost of the trip. To date, the trip from the Bay Area to Boston is 7,179 miles, about 160 hours 7 minutes of driving, about 46 days, and $1,225.60 of fuel. The trip from Boston to the Bay Area is 5,678 miles, about 116 hours 48 minutes of driving, about 37 days and about $968.87 of fuel. In addition to this great information, MyScenicDrives allows me to download the trip into my Garmin and my trip is now available on our GPS (and we hopefully won’t get lost)!
We upgraded our Garmin to a nuvi 3590LMT after having purchased a nuvi 50LM and learning that the nuvi 50LM only allows for one waypoint. Clearly, one waypoint on a 7,179 mile trip is definitely insufficient! So, my advice to anyone buying a GPS device, whether it is Garmin or another brand, is to make sure the GPS will allow for multiple waypoints. A costly error on our part!
Then there is the blog. I stumbled a few times on this endeavor because, as I mentioned in an earlier blog, I was learning as I went along! And, WOW, is there a lot to learn and a plethora of choices to be made. I settled on WordPress as the blog foundation and have added a few Plugins to help me manage the blog. The plugins I am using are Akismet (to manage spam), My Calendar (for an easily maintainable calendar), Visitor Maps and Who’s Online (so I can see and share who has visited the blog), and WP Backup Plugin (so I have backups).
I wanted to be able to show the trip on the blog and that is the one “upgrade” I would request from MyScenicDrives: the ability to import the map into a blog would be an awesome upgrade! But, since it is not a current feature, I found Blogabond, which allows me to build a map and use their blog template (which is what you see when you are on this blog site). It is a fairly easy way to build a travel blog and, if you plan on blogging a trip, you should take a look at it.
We have 6 weeks until we leave and I’ll be blogging a few more times before then. However, once on the road, I’ll be keeping you up-to-date daily (when we have a connection).
Stay tuned!
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July 7th, 2014
With the route fairly well defined, we decided to start looking into places to stay along the way. As luck would have it, we had our annual Preakness Party in May and one of our good friends, Rusty, mentioned airbnb. We had never heard of airbnb, so thought we should check it out. Per the airbnb site, “Founded in August of 2008 and based in San Francisco, California, Airbnb is a trusted community marketplace for people to list, discover, and book unique accommodations around the world — online or from a mobile phone.” In other words, people rent out a room or an entire home (or castle!) to travelers like us. This seemed so perfect and in line with what we want – a view of America – all 48 contiguous states. And it seems to us that we can get a better peak at the real America by staying in people’s homes. So I started booking and, to date, I have booked 18 rooms via airbnb, 11 B&B’s, 2 timeshare weeks (both Marriott’s), 9 hotels, and 7 friend’s guest rooms. So it looks like we won’t be sleeping in the Boxster, after all!
Haunted on Halloween!
After we booked a room for October 31st, we found out that it is in a haunted house and is actually on the haunted house tour for that evening. If my blogs end on October 31st, you will know why! How fun is this? Also, as I began booking the stays, the route changed a little bit and I’ve updated the map accordingly. As we travel, we will be blogging about our experiences both on the road and about the places we stay (and, of course, taking loads of pictures). We look forward to you following us on our USA adventure!
Tags: airbnb, B&B, Boxster, boxster road trip, Marriott, Marriott's, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip, Timeshare
Posted in Planning the Trip | 2 Comments »
June 22nd, 2014
Okay, the truth is that I’ve never been a “light” packer. So packing for a 3 month trip, covering weather from the 80’s to the 40’s (hopefully, not lower than 40’s) and getting this all into a Porsche Boxster is going to be a challenge! And there are two of us, so I’ve been told in no uncertain terms that I have to share the trunk space. Given these confining parameters, we have put together a list.
In the car where we can get to it we believe we will need the following:
- Music Thumb Drives (in the ash tray)
- Garmin w/Updated Maps (mounted on windshield)
- National Geography Map Book, Notebook, Pens & Highlighters (in zippered area behind seats)
- Kleenex & Wet Wipes (in zippered area behind seats)
- Phone Charger (in cubby below radio)
- Camera (in passenger’s door cubby)
- SPF 50, Hand Sanitizer, Hand Lotion & Chapstick (in passenger’s door cubby)
- Flashlight (in driver’s door cubby)
- Swiss Army Knives – 2 (in driver’s door cubby)
- Loose Change for Tolls (in center section glove box)
- Binoculars (in center section glove box)
- Power Bars (in center section glove box)
- Hats (behind driver’s seat)
In the front trunk, in addition to luggage, we will pack the following:
- First aid kit
- Roadside Emergency Kit
- Duct Tape
- Snow & Ice Scraper
- Rainex
His Packing List Includes:
- 7 Pair of Undies
- 4 Pair “Driving” Socks
- 4 Pair Beige Socks
- 3 Pair Beige Slacks
- 1 Pair Shorts
- 3 T-Shirts
- 2 Polo Shirts
- 2 Long Sleeved Shirts
- 1 Sweatshirt
- 1 Sweater
- 1 Reversible Belt
- 1 Pair PJ’s
- 4 Hankies
- 1 Swim Suit
- 1 Set Workout Clothes
- 1 Pair Brown Slip-on Shoes
- 1 Pair Athletic Shoes
- 1 Pair Sandals
- 1 Pair Driving Shoes
- 1 Pair Gloves
- 1 Anorak
- 1 Small Umbrella
Her Packing List Includes:
- 7 Pair of Undies
- 3 Bras
- 1 Pair Silk Long Johns
- 1 Pair Silk Socks
- 1 Pair White Socks
- 2 Pair Black Socks
- 2 Pair Khaki Socks
- 2 Pair White Slacks
- 1 Pair Black Slacks
- 1 Pair Khaki Slacks
- 2 T-Shirts
- 2 3/4 Sleeve Shirts
- 1 Black Turtleneck
- 2 Ivory Turtlenecks
- 1 Khaki Turtleneck
- 1 Black Silk Over Sweater
- 1 Heavy Over Sweater
- 1 Pair PJ’s
- 1 Bathing Suit & Coverup
- 1 Set Workout Clothes
- 1 Pair White Sandals
- 1 Pair Athletic Shoes
- 1 Pair Slippers
- 1 Pair Driving Shoes
- 1 Pair Gloves
- 1 Warm Scarf / Wrap
- 1 Rain Poncho
- 1 Small Umbrella
- 10 Pair Earrings
And the Rest of the List:
- Kindles (2) & Micro USB Cords
- Tablets (2) & Power Cords
- Cat5 Cable
- Phone
- Games (Uno & Phase Four)
- Gifts
So, now that we’ve defined the packing list, our next job is to see if we can put it all together and if it actually fits in the Boxster. Stay tuned . . .
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May 31st, 2014
We took a little 1100 mile “mini-trip” to Palm Desert and we are so glad we did. We had several “aha” moments on this trip.
AHA Moment Number 1: Our Garmin only allows for one via point. One. Uno. Holy socks, Batman, we can’t travel across the country and only have one via point. We need hundreds. We just bought the nuvi 50LM and I am really bummed. Not sure yet what we are going to do to solve this problem.
AHA Moment Number 2: We LOVE our Kenwood eXcelon KDC-X997. I can’t say enough good things about it. However, I recently learned that we could have retrofitted a Kenwood DNX691 or Kenwood DNX891 into the console of our Boxster and had BOTH great sound and an integrated Garmin GPS. At this point, we can’t afford to upgrade again or we won’t have enough money for the trip. So I am letting you all know that there is a better solution than we have implemented and I only wish I’d known this before buying and installing the eXcelon KDC-X997 and before buying the Garmin nuvi 50LM. We could have paid a little more and had it all in one place. Poop! Rod from Car Audio Innovations has a kit and a special Porsche Start Up Screen for the Kenwood DNX691 and Kenwood DNX891. We could have had it all.
Other than those two “oops”, the car seems ready and we are beginning to get very excited. We almost have our packing list put together, so that will be the next blog.
Stay tuned . . .
Tags: 50LM, Boxster, boxster road trip, Car Audio Innovations, DNX691, DNX891, garmin, Kenwood, Kenwood DNX691, Kenwood DNX891, Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip
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May 10th, 2014
We did it! We drove up to Car Audio Innovations in Roseville where Rod and his team did a significant upgrade to our sound system. They replaced the factory amplifier with a Hertz Compact 4 x 150 Watt Class D Full Range Amplifier (which fits nicely where the old amp was located, so no lost trunk space). They replaced the factory dashboard speakers with Focal Polykevlar 4″ 2-way speakers. And lastly, they replaced the door speakers (also original factory speakers) with Focal UtopiaBe 5″ Subwoofers. The car was at CAI for the entire day and we were given a loaner so we could go explore Roseville. We had a late breakfast at Four Sisters Café and we took the opportunity to see a movie (something we seldom seem to have the time to do).
I can’t begin to describe the difference in sound. It is absolutely astounding. We used The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again” as our benchmark, listening to it on the way up to Roseville and on the way home. The clarity of the instruments and the voices on the return trip was amazing. And being able to actually have a nice bass bottom was icing on the cake.
We had already installed the Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, but we hadn’t really found a good place for the microphone. Rod relocated the mic to the steering wheel column, which is perfect. He also moved the Kenwood’s rear USB wire to the top center column compartment (located just under the radio). This will be a great place to charge the cell phone!
We now have a great sound system and haven’t had to give up an inch of space. The speakers fit nicely in the original locations, with no new cuts in the dash or door panels, keeping the original look of the car, while significantly improving the sound.
We have been busy rating our music collection (using Media Monkey), doing about an hour each day. This will most likely take us a couple of months.
Now that the car is ready for the trip, I’ll move on to getting us ready (gulp). The next big item on our agenda is deciding what we will pack for this trip (and what we have to leave behind). . .
Old Amplifier
New Amplifier
New Dash Speakers
New Subwoofers
Tags: Boxster, boxster road trip, Car Audio Innovations, Focal Speakers, Hertz Amplifier, Kenwood, Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, Media Monkey, mediamonkey, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip, UtopiaBe
Posted in Planning the Trip | 2 Comments »
April 22nd, 2014
I said in my last post that I would next write about Music, Bluetooth and Hands-free Microphones – which I will. But first, I wanted to update the coffee cup. While I do love the Chantel, I recently tried the Thermos 16-Ounce Stainless Steel Travel Tumbler and I am thinking I like it a little bit better than the Chantel, primarily because it fits more snuggly in the cup holder and, more importantly, holds one more ounce than the Chantel. If you are a coffee-holic like I am, that one ounce can be very important!
Okay, on to Music! We have two choices, as I see it. Either have some really good tunes or spend three months talking to each other. Hmmmm. Tough choice, eh? So, we upgraded the radio in the Boxster to a new Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, which also provides us with the Hands-free capability we need in order to stay legal in most states. I have to say, this radio is leaps and bounds above what we had before. It has more bells and whistles than I can figure out (I will need to spend more time with it) but the best feature is the ability to plug a USB memory stick into the front USB port and listen to your own music. No more CD’s or DVD’s necessary! And when you are into conserving space, which we clearly will need to do, five or six 16GB memory sticks is the way to go! We thought we’d load up each stick with a type of music – rock, country, classical, bluegrass, latin, swing, and so on.
We loaded Media Monkey on our notebooks and we are in the process of categorizing and rating our music (we have a rather extensive library). Once we have that task completed, we can load up the memory sticks.
Now we have a great radio, Bluetooth, and music, but it is not quite there. After much “discussion” (which means he argues the benefits and she argues the cost), we have agreed that the factory speakers just don’t provide the sound we want. We did our research and we have planned a mini-roadtrip to Roseville, CA to visit Rod at Car Audio Innovations and listen to speakers and figure out just what we will be upgrading to. So, while I didn’t plan on writing a “Getting the 1998 Porsche Boxster Ready for a 15K Mile Trip – Part 3”, that will be the next installment – where I will describe what we chose and why (with pictures). Stay tuned . . .
Tags: Boxster, boxster road trip, Car Audio Innovations, Excelon, Kenwood, Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, Media Monkey, mediamonkey, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip, Thermos
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March 28th, 2014
I bought the car in December, 1997. I had been on the wait list for four months when the dealer called me and said they had received a shipment and did I want to come in and take a look. I hadn’t even specified a color and I think I would have taken just about any color at that point. As luck would have it, the car was white (just like my first 1970 914) with dark blue interior. Perfect! Thank you, Santa Claus for bringing me just about the best Christmas present ever!
So, you can figure out that the car is over 16 years old and, at this writing, has just over 94K miles on it. The Boxster has always been serviced by the Porsche dealer (thank you, Gunter) and I am confident we will have no mechanical problems on the trip. We recently had the 90K service done and, at that time, we replaced the front struts. We also recently put on four new Kumho Ecsta tires, which are not quite as “sticky” as the Pirelli’s we ran previously, but so far we like the ride and they should last a little longer.
One of the shortcomings of the early model Boxster is the lack of a good place to put a coffee cup. We’ve tried several after market cup holders, without much success. Recently, I bought two cup holders from Mike at www.ultimatecupholders.com and we have found them to be the perfect solution! Because the cup holders are at floor level, there is less risk of spilling coffee when you are cornering. Couple these great cup holders with our recent new Chantal SL92-T Travel Mugs and we are ALMOST ready to go. The last item is the coffee! We suspect there will be a few Starbuck’s along the way, but I’m fairly confident there will be areas where we won’t be so lucky, so we bought a small Presto 6 Cup Stainless Steel Percolator to use when there are no other options.
Next blog I’ll talk about Music, Bluetooth and Hands-free Microphones . . .
Tags: Boxster, boxster road trip, chantal, coffee, ecsta, kumho, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip, SL92-T, Starbuck's, travel mug, ultimatecupholders, www.ultimatecupholders.com
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March 17th, 2014
We knew the minute we started mapping our route, that we were going to need three tools:
- Good planning software for the tablet (in our case, a Lenovo Helix running Windows 8)
- A real paper map (we are old school and still like the visual that a map gives you)
- A new GPS for the Boxster
First, the Software
We started with the planning software. We looked at (and tried) several products:
- Google Maps (maps.google.com)
- Roadtrippers (www.roadtrippers.com)
- AAA’s TripTik (www.aaa.com/travelinfo)
- TripIt (www.tripit.com)
- My Scenic Drives (www.myscenicdrives.com)
We chose My Scenic Drives because it was easy to learn and use, and it had some features that we really liked, for example:
- You can set your start date, so you know when you might actually arrive at your ultimate destination (assuming not too many side trips!)
- It lets you set your estimated MPG and what you think fuel will cost, giving you an estimate of the cost of the entire trip.
- You can set your default speed to the speed limit, or 5%, 10%, 15% or 20% slower. Since we know we are going to be stopping to take photos, (and, of course, we would never exceed the speed limit in our Boxster), we are opting for 20% slower.
- You can set your default daily start time and the number of hours per day you plan to drive. These defaults can be overridden easily for each leg of your road trip.
- You can opt to avoid highways by default (my favorite) and also opt to avoid tolls. Again, easily overridden.
- You can add notes to each destination (I’ve added average temperature, so I know how to pack for this trip) and you can add activities (like stop for ice cream).
During the coarse of our planning, I have sent emails to the developer asking for help and he has always been responsive (a very important “feature”).
Second, the Map
We chose the National Geographic Road Atlas – Adventure Edition. It had everything we needed and it was spiral bound, which we think will hold up better. It is rather large, which could be a problem given our limited space. We’ll let you know!
Third, the GPS
In our case, since we had an old Garmin and we had good luck with it, we decided to stick with what we knew and just buy an updated version of the Garmin. So we chose a nüvi® 50LM.
So, with these three tools, hopefully we won’t get unintentionally lost; although we will, no doubt, get intentionally lost a number of times!
Tags: 50LM, adventure edition, Boxster, boxster road trip, garmin, google maps, GPS, myscenicdrives, nuvi, planning software, Porsche, road atlas, Road Trip, Roadtrip, roadtrippers, tripit, triptik
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March 10th, 2014
Ah, nothing like autumn in New England. So we have set our goal to try to hit the fall colors at their peak (which is always a gamble). Steve has never seen New England in the fall – as a matter of fact, he’s never even been to New England. He thinks he knows what autumn colors look like. Ha! He is in for a big surprise!!!
The first thing we did was trade our Marriott’s Kauai Beach Club timeshare week for a week at Marriott’s Custom House in Boston. We were lucky and got the week of October 10 through October 17. We know by the time we reach Boston, we will be ready for a week of “down time”, getting out of the bucket seats and into our walking shoes!
So, now that we have the Boston pivot point, we can really get down to the serious planning! The next undertaking is to find the best roadtrip planning tool. That will be the next blog, so stay tuned.
Tags: Autumn, Boston, Boxster, boxster road trip, Custom House, Fall, Kauai Beach Club, Marriott, Marriott's, New England, October, Peak Color, Porsche, Roadtrip
Posted in Sidetracked | No Comments »
March 5th, 2014
The last month has been all about learning how to blog (and I’m fairly confident I still don’t have a clue). I wanted to find a cool theme that would include a map of the planned trip and, after some serious searching, I found Blogabond. Then I had to learn how to navigate the Blogabond site and build the map. I think the map you see above pretty much represents the plan – so far.
I’m still not clear in my mind the difference between a Plugin and a Widget and my mind melts when you start adding Tags and Categories and the rest. So I’ve decided to dive in and start writing and hopefully the rest will sort itself out over time.
I’m hoping that people will share with me the places we should go, things we should see, great places to stay and, of course, the best places to eat. I’ve already found the Kelley Country Creamery in Wisconsin, where we plan to stop for Ice Cream! Do you think they would believe it if I told them we dropped in from California just for a double scoop?
Off to do more planning . . .
TooCoolJo
Tags: Blogabond, boxster road trip, California, ice cream, Kelley Country Creamery, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip, Wisconsin
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February 2nd, 2014
I’ve been a Porsche driver since I was 18, having owned a 914/6, a 912 and a Boxster. The Boxster was purchased new in December, 1997 (yep, it’s an oldie, just like me). I’ve always wanted to drive across the country, taking my own sweet time to enjoy the scenery and meet the people and learn about this great country of ours. That dream will soon become a reality for my husband and me.
People say we are crazy, doing this in a Porsche. “Why not do it in an RV?”, is the comment we keep hearing. Well, if you drive a Porsche (or any type of fun car), the answer to that is obvious. This site will allow us to share this adventure – the planning, the preparation, the travels, the trials, the fun, the photos, the works.
Just so you know, this originally started out as a “Let’s take the northern route from the Bay Area to Boston, timing it so we arrive in October, to experience autumn. Then we can take the southern route home.” Well, that has grown into ” . . . and let’s make sure we stop in all 48 states!”
And so the adventure begins . . .
Tags: 48 states, Boxster, boxster road trip, Porsche, Road Trip, Roadtrip
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After a lovely breakfast at the Airbnb “House in Downtown Arcata“, we headed on to Oregon. The trip started with a light fog and before long, we were in full sun, shaded only by the canopy of awe inspiring redwoods. Such grandeur and beauty makes one feel very insignificant indeed. And very grateful to have this opportunity!
The shoreline and outcroppings are possibly even more spectacular than Highway 1 in California (if that is possible).
After lunch and cheese sampling at Face Rock Creamery in Bandon OR, we headed north again. Our via point was to be Sunset Bay State park, off of Highway 101. BEWARE! Setting your GSP to shortest route can have unforeseen consequences! After two miles of lovely paved roadway, we found ourselves on a crushed rock single lane, twisty, inclining, “highway”. This continued for another 6 miles (at a snail’s pace). Boxsters are not designed for four-wheeling! The GPS had decided that this backroads track was, in fact, the shortest route. Got the adrenaline pumping. We suddenly got dumped back onto a smooth “standard” road, that we could have taken the entire way, but would have cost us four extra miles at 7x the speed we traveled on the gravel road. This is the road we ended up on . . .
We did eventually end up at Sunset Bay State Park; indeed a beautiful bay and worth the journey.
Turned out that to get from this beautiful bay to our final destination of the day, we had to cross a large bridge. In fact, the first of six large bridges. Jo does not do well driving across large bridges and, of course, she was driving! Steve says she did a great job (but he didn’t know her eyes were closed the whole time).
