Looks like you were there on a different day to me judging by the single seaters on track? Hope you had a great trip and bought souvenirs in the shop?
I've been back for a week now but have been pretty ill since getting home. I caught a cold on my second day which I'd just about got over by the trackday and was then fine for the rest of the holiday (passed it to my wife!), sadly once I got home I lost all balance, my vision started swirling around and I was repeatedly sick, diagnosed as an inner ear viral infection. I've never had a problem with this before but it's stopped me working and driving for a week, I'm still not 100% yet.
Anyway, that didn't stop us having the holiday of a lifetime, we took over 2000 photos, the highlight being the trackday in the Z4M of course. Trip write up as follows (takes deep breath):
Day 1: Thursday 22nd Sept. My wife and I (Elizabeth) drove to Gatwick, using the 'park on my drive' website which was a decent saving of £50, including the house owner dropping us off at the terminal. Direct flight with Norweign on a very nice Being 787 Dreamliner with excellent in flight entertainment (not just my witty banter). Interesting to look down on Iceland, Greenland and Canada en route. By the time we'd watched 3 films the flight was almost over. Landed at Oakland on the same day, shuttle bus to hotel (thank god as Oakland looks rough!), quick swim in the pool then sleep.
Day 2 Friday 23rd Sept. Up at a sensible time to experience our first American hotel breakfast. Mmmmm, waffles. Surprised at the amount of wastage of materials with food, plastic cutlery, paper plates, cups and more all going in the one bin. This would be repeated at almost every hotel we stayed in.
Shuttle bus to the BART station (Bay area rapid transport) to go across the bay to San Francisco. The 49ers weren't playing at home sadly as I'd have loved to have taken in a game, closest was passing by the Raiders stadium. Spent the morning walking around and hopping on and off the various trolley and cable cars (including hanging off the side, great fun), the Muni Mobile App made things really easy.
We took in the cable car museum, twisty road at Lombard Street, Sealions at Pier 39 and Chocolate pud at Ghiradelli Square. I got to try three types of clam chowder, delicious.
We had booked the last trip to Alcatraz of the day which was a good move as crowds were small and towards the end of the tour it felt we had parts of the prison to ourselves. We saw a brightly coloured humming bird but it was too quick to get on camera. Having enjoyed a lovely warm day the temperature on the water and on the Island really dropped cold. I started to feel rough so we cancelled the planned trip to see the Golden Gate bridge up close, probably sensible as it gets dark by 7ish and we were back at the hotel by 8.
Day 3 Saturday 24th Sept. Arrgghhh, disaster, I'd caught a cold, having not had one for well over 6 months, typical. After breakfast it was back to the airport on the hotel shuttle bus to collect our SUV hire car to begin the road trip. Whilst we really wanted to book a V8 or a convertible parts of the trip had to be done on a budget, hence the cheaper SUV, but once at the check in desk I just had to find out how much (inspired by others on the Z4 forum)......So, a V8 Dodge Challenger or a V6 Mustang convertible. I REALLY wanted a V8 but knew that the convertible would be great in sunny weather and mountains, so out came the credit card, I chose a white Mustang and off we went! First time driving in the states, thankfully I'd had a quick read up about turning right at many red lights and etiquette at crossroads but a 7 lane interstate in a lhd auto car with a fresh case of man flu was daunting at first.
Two hours into the drive and we were on a single carriageway road heading to Mammoth Mountain, hundreds of miles away, roof down, hot and then a metal pipe came loose from the back of truck going the opposite direction, no time to swerve and it hit the rear tyre ripping a hole in the sidewall. Pulled over, called Avis who intially called a tow truck but that was almost 2 hours to wait so I said I would change to the space saver spare. Avis directed me to travel to Modesto airport (45 mins in the wrong direction) to swap the car over for something similar, no charge. Ok, off we went, only to find the regional airport quiet and the hire centre shut! On the phone to Avis, sorry about that, go the the next nearest hire centre the other side of Modesto, they are definately open. Well, yes, they were open but were served by a particularly unhelpful lady who didn't want to know and said she had no cars available to swap. Another call to Avis, they called the lady but she was as rude to them! This crisis required food, a nice sports bar called BJ's (!) served up black cherry soda and tasty Pizza, mmm. Rather than waste anymore time of our holiday we decided to press on with the space saver as we still had hours to travel.
Milly the Mustang drove just fine on its space saver, in fact I had some fun as the roads became more twisty towards the Sierra Nevada.
It's not a muscle car but a 3.7 litre V6 with 300+bhp still makes a nice noise.
The last hour of driving was in darkness, but we'd seen enough to know that the scenery was going to be stunning in daylight next day.
Day 4 Sunday 25th Sept. A day planned hiking. The Alpenhof hotel at Mammoth Lakes was charming, used as a ski lodge in the winter with a fab breakfast that set us up for the day.
A short drive to the Devils Postpile, an unusual basaltic rock formation, similar to the Giants Causeway with hexagonal pieces. We passed on the shuttle bus that ferries tourists around the park, enjoying the long walk in very warm weather to Rainbow Falls. There were chipmunks everywhere, a number of different species, very cute.
Driving back past Mammoth Mountain we stopped at the gondola, paid for a return journey and joined the queue behind the downhill mountain bikers.
At over 11,000ft the views were spectacular, the photos just don't do it justice. The restaurant had just closed when we arrives so we had a walk around and took loads of piccies.
Although my mountain biking days are behind me I did reminisce whilst watching the nutters hurl themselves down the mountain in body armour. Elizabeth didn't enjoy every bit of the Gondola ride on the way down, lol.
Food was needed after a day of exercise, found a friendly place with a great view over the mountains as the sun went down. Another USA boxed ticked with homemade apple pie. Another day where just breakfast and one meal a day is enough. Weather reports were showing that much of California was having a heat wave with temps inland into the 90s and even over 100, unusual for late September. Glad we were in the mountains with just high 70s.
Had a short walk into the village with its friendly ski resort atmosphere even in darkness.
Day 5 Monday 26th Sept. Back to the west coast via Yosemite. Day started with another phone call to Avis to try to sort out the tyre issue. Whilst the car was driving ok on the skinny space-saver spare it was a pain having the larger rear wheel in the boot (trunk) as it meant one of our suitcases had to live on the back seats. A very helpful lady agreed that providing I replaced the tyre for the exact model (Eagle F1 235/50/18) they would refund me at the end of the term. If we were in a major city I'm confident a decent tyre fitters would have one, but in the mountains there wasn't a chance, so after a couple of calls we moved on.
Today was always going to be a bit of a rush with so many beautiful places to stop and take in views. The road from Mammoth to Yosemite is just stunning and goes on for hours. In the UK we are blessed with some great driving roads but many of them are over in 15 minutes, over here you could drive for hours and have a constantly changing, stunning view with smooth tarmac and very little traffic.
After a couple of hours we reached the first planned stop, to see the giant redwoods (Sequoia). Sadly a rare species that is very fussy about its habitat, one of the worlds oldest living things, in excess of 3000 years old! To see the 25 trees at Tuolumne Grove involves a good walk with 700 foot of descending, it was well worth the sweat, they are HUGE. Hard to comprehend what they have been through in the past 300 years.
Back in the car and another stunning drive into Yosemite Park to see the highest waterfalls in North America (Yosemite Falls, 2450ft). A bit of an anti-climax to see just the tiniest amount of water running down the rock, California has had 3 years of quite serious drought. A look around Yosemite village and then back in the car with a couple of hundred miles ahead.
For miles Elizabeth Smitheram and I travelled downhill, losing the thousands of feet gained in the mountains. Whilst the sun went down the temperature went up into the 80s, even into darkness. Stopped at Charles Street Dinner House in Mariposa for Dinner, a delicious Lobster and Filet Steak feast, superb and such friendly people.
The long drive continued for a few more hours before reaching Monterey for the night.
Z4 content coming up, promise.....!
We had hours of the stuff which was a shame, so a stop for some sickly sweet sodas and on we went again.
