Countdown to Departure

You can find your way across this country using burger joints the way a navigator uses stars.

This is winter.  Traveling in the winter can be less than exciting.  Well, it could bring some excitement to your travels.  That kind of excitement nobody wants.  I don’t care if you’re traveling by car or by plane, weather delays can play a major part in your departure or arrival time.  We also know the accuracy of weather forecasts.  In other words …. an unexpected storm could certainly ground you along the way.

I don’t like traveling in bad weather.  I especially don’t like traveling in the winter time.  However, about the only way to get from one point to another is to travel.  We have spent more than our fair share of time on the tarmac at airports waiting for runways to be opened up after a storm or waiting our turn to be de-iced.  We’ve also spent our fair share of time inside the airport after our flight has been cancelled.  What we did learn is if you have a choice and can figure it out, pick the flight on the schedule where that plane will be heading to a very popular destination after it drops you off.  That’s the plane that the airlines will put ahead of other flights before cancelling.  As an example, if you’re heading to Miami or Chicago, get on a plane that they need in Miami or New York for an international flight after you land.  More bucks are made on those flights than the one that will just head to another in-state airport.  Been there, done that, lots.

However, it’s not so easy if you’re driving.  If you’re driving, you’re in charge. You need to check the weather reports and road conditions.  That’s just what we’ve been doing.  Driving a vehicle with a dog is a lot different than driving with an RV.  With an RV you have your motel accommodations with you.  In a vehicle, you don’t.  In your RV you can have a dog.  Finding a motel that will accept your dog in the exact place you want to stop for the night could be a different story and takes a little more research.  Then, you’re also not sleeping in your own bed with your own bedding. We’re not fond of the idea of boondocking in our Jeep at a Wal-mart on our up coming trip.  No, we’re not fond of that idea at all.

Our original departure date was going to be on Thursday.  We have a couple stops we want to make in California along the way.  One is in Cabazon (do you know what’s there?) and the other might be in Stockton.  If we left on Thursday, we figure we’d arrive in Portland on Saturday.  However, Terry is getting more and more antsy to get on the road.  The problem is if we pull out on Tuesday, there’s a good chance we’ll run into some snow over the Siskiyous and possibly on into southern Oregon.  When we’re ready to go, we’ll go but we don’t even have chains.  We didn’t want chains.  We had no plans of traveling through snow in the winter.  Absolutely no plans of doing that at all.

I had been so busy focusing on the weather through the mountains in northern California and Southern Oregon that I never bothered to check southern California until now.  Guess where and when the storm is due.  Southern California is the target with snow expected through the Grapevine just about the time we were thinking might be a good earlier departure.  Geez … you just can’t win, can you?  Tehachapi is looking at 2 – 4 inches of snow on Tuesday.

There is a window.  There always seems to be a window even if it's not the one we want.  With snow expected on the southern part of our route on Tuesday and snow expected on the northern part of our route beginning Wednesday evening, we found a window.  We don’t necessarily like that window and aren’t even sure if we’re going to use it.  Knowing the accuracy of the weather forecasts, trying to use that window could be worse than just winging it.  Storms seem to rarely travel at the speed they are forecast.  Many arrive earlier and many arrive later.  Thus, we have a dilemma. 

‘Tis life on the road …. we just hope it’s a dry road.  My guess is that we'll be on that road before this is posted.