Back in April we decided to take a fall trip to see family on the West Coast. We knew that many of our retirement travel plans would be cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic but we hoped that the situation would be better under control by October. Travel rates were very affordable and flexible because practically no one was traveling. Government imposed quarantining and travel restrictions made most travel impossible. We were able to fly at no charge using our Delta Skymiles, and secured good rates on motels and the rental car.
Although the pandemic related restrictions were not lifted by fall, they have been eased permitting cautious travel using face masks and social distancing. Most restaurants were still carry out only and airlines have passengers well-spaced. Hotels are doing extra sanitizing in rooms, and everyone has sanitizer available.
We made an unplanned trip on Monday. My former boss and now friend, Dr. Stan Maynard, had sold his cabin at Timberline, near Canaan Valley. To help him get his personal things from the cabin, I rented the smallest box truck offered by Enterprise and had arranged to pick it up when Enterprise opened at 7 am. Mary & I left home at 4:30 am and arrived at Enterprise to learn that they had only their largest box truck available. Making the 4 ½ hour drive from Huntington to Canaan in the huge truck was stressful on the winding mountain roads. With the help of a couple of Timberline maintenance staff, we were able to get the truck loaded in a little over an hour. Because everything was well loaded and strapped down, it arrived back in Huntington without damage. With the help of a couple of medical students who rent from Stan, we were able to unload the truck in less than an hour. We returned the truck to Enterprise and drove our own car back home arriving a little after 9 pm and went straight to bed to rest before we leave tor Sacramento early on Tuesday morning.
We awoke at 4 am on Tuesday morning to drive to Cincinnati airport for our morning flight to Sacramento. As usual, we parked at the Hilton using the OneStopParking plan. The shuttle took us quickly to the Delta terminal of the airport. We had checked in at home and had the boarding passes on our phones, so check-in went easily. Our bag was two pounds over the 50-pound limit, but the agent let it go without an additional charge.
Thanks to our Global Entry status, we were able to go through security quickly and easily. We did not have to remove shoes or jackets, and nothing had to be taken out of our carry-on bags to pass through the scanner. Once through security, the airport had seats marked to assure social distancing and only a few restaurants were open. We were surprised that more people were flying than we anticipated. We walked through the terminal to our gate and ate the breakfast that we packed with us as we waited for our flight to board.
Soon after getting into our seats on the flight from Cincinnati to Salt Lake City, a flight attendant asked us if we were the Beckelhimers and welcomed us to the flight then asked if there was anything that we needed to make the flight a more pleasant experience. We assume that this was because we paid for the flight with Delta Skymiles, and she may have assumed that we fly with Delta much more than we do. We teased that she must have assumed that we were celebrities.
The layover at Salt Lake was not long, and we didn’t have far to go between gates. We noticed that the flight crew for the flight from Salt Lake to Sacramento was the same as the flight from Cincinnati including the flight attendant who greeted us on our first flight leg.
Once we were on at the gate in Sacramento, the crew deplaned passengers slowly to assure social distancing, but our bags were on the carousel and ready for us to pick up, We contacted Uber for the ride from the airport to an Enterprise car rental. The rental rates were a lot lower by not getting the car at the airport. This was our first experience with Uber, and it was good. I don’t know how much a taxi would have cost, but I am sure that it would be more than the $24 for the Uber.
Although I had reserved the rental car back in April, Enterprise managed to get things confused. We showed up at the branch that was near the airport where we had arranged to pick up the car, but they said the rental was scheduled for the downtown branch. However, they said that they could honor the rental but would upgrade the car from the compact we requested at no additional cost. After a bit of a wait we got a black 2020 Ford Fusion. The car was nice and had a lot of options like heated and cooled leather seats and other features that we would be unlikely to use. The temperature in Sacramento was 97 degrees, and we knew that a black car would be hot. It wasn’t until we were well north of the city on Interstate 5 that we discovered that the car’s air conditioning didn’t work. We thought about returning it to Enterprise but knew that our trip would be further delayed while they dealt with the problem. Since we were heading north along the Pacific Coast, we hoped that the temperatures would be cooler for much of our trip. We rolled the windows down, turned on the air conditioned seats, opened the sunroof and were fine.
Our travel plans have us on smaller, more scenic roads for most of our trip only taking Interstate highways to get between our planned routes. The main road that we planned to travel is US 101 sometimes called the Pacific Coast Highway. We took I-5 north for a short distance from Sacramento to Williams where we picked up California Rt. 20, which we took west until we hit Highway 101 near Ukiah, California and found our Days Inn hotel there. We checked in and made plans for dinner.
We made a quick stop at the Walmart in Ukiah for breakfast and lunch on Wednesday as well as bottled water that we like to keep in the car on all of our trips. We picked up Raisin Bran and yogurt for breakfast as well as our usual Ritz Crackers and peanut butter for lunch. We got grapes and bananas for snacks to supplement the bags of nuts and raisins that we packed.
We picked up dinner at a well rated local Mexican restaurant, Villa Del Mar. Mary got beef flautas, and I had chicken enchiladas. Both of us had beans and rice on the side and enjoyed our meals.
There was a general smoky quality to the air in Ukiah, and it was the northern staging ground for fire fighters involved with the Napa Valley fires. We didn't see any fires burning on the drive there, but we did see evidence of where they had been.
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