Back in Sacramento - Day Trips Planned

We left Yosemite Pines around 10 am, and headed down California 120 towards US 99, to take us to Sacramento.  Remember that when we arrived to Yosemite Pines, I talked about the last few miles where we climbed a few thousand feet in a 5 mile stretch of the highway.  Well, what goes up, does have to come down.  

I first checked to be certain that there was no other "easier" route worth looking at, and there is not.  I could have taken the old route, which covers the same amount of elevation in just under 2 miles...well, that is not what I was looking at.  What we did decide to do, however, is to have Marcia follow me driving the HHR.  Well, we made it down without any problem.  I pulled into a turn out about a mile into it to let 4-5 vehicles pass, and later near the end pulled over to allow a single car to pass, so we did not hold up traffic at all.  I had the motor home in second gear with the PAC break engaged, and I rarely had to hit the normal breaks all the way down.  When I hooked up the HHR at the bottom, there was no smell of breaks or anything.  We did it!

From there, it was an easy drive back to Sacramento.  We did stop for some strawberries from a fruit stand, and they are sweet and delicious.  Last time we brought some back from the Sequoia trip, and everyone loved them.  So with so many strawberries in hand (in the motor home fridge), Marcia says, "When we get to Sacramento, lets go to Marie Callender's and get one of their Strawberry Pies."  Well, I could not pass that up...hard to beat a Marie Callender's restaurant made pie.  So back in Sacramento we had dinner with Mom, Dad, Sandy, Arny and Patti.  Mom brought a large lasagna, salad and bread over, which made the Strawberry Pie just that much better.

For the next week or so we are going to do some day trips out of Sacramento, starting with a Sunday excursion after church where we will drive around Folsom Lake (yep, and a view from the outside of Folsom Prison), visit Coloma, where James Marshall discovered gold in California at Sutter's Mill in January 1848, then over to Placerville, which was called "Hangtown" back in the day, where we plan to eat dinner, and then back home.  It should be around a 100 mile trip.  We are hoping that mom and dad will join us on this, and perhaps other, excursions which are close to our Citrus Heights/Roseville location.