Placerville

We carefully came down from our way high up campsite at Laguna Seca, and roared off down the road. Well, not really roared except on the steep grades, we drive even slower now that diesel is running us $4.45 a gallon. It’s putting a dent in the bank accounts, but we aren’t going to just stop. Time enough for that when we have no choice.

We ran up the Salinas Valley of veggies and fruit, bought artichokes and strawberries. California strawberries were always looked down on back in MA, as pithy and lacking in flavor. We had been looking for strawberries to buy, as they are madly in season, but they were all expensive. And besides, buying strawberries inevitably leads to strawberry shortcake, a dangerous tendency. The strawberries we finally did get were amazing. Perfect red cones, perfectly red all round, and sweet and red all the way through. Yum. They were so good we managed to avoid the shortcake trap. The artichokes were terrific too and we cooked chicken over the fire. Camping is great!

We climbed up into the Livermore Hills, golden with dried grasses, with the same noble oak trees, and down the other side into the San Joaquin Valley, miles of grapes headed for life as raisins, not wine. Through Stockton and Sacramento, highway highway, zoom zoom.

Then we climbed up again into the foot hills of the Sierra Nevada, to the banks of the America River. Our campsite is right on the river, which rushes by with lots of standing waves and occasional rafters. Above is a ripply golden hill, made even more golden by the late sun. Yet another scene in the commercial for perfect RVing.

There are a number of Canada Geese on the river, one pair with 7 babies, and various others all engaged in the usual arguing and complaining. The sun sets on a grassy hill, turning even more golden, and 4 horses doze in the last light. Must be a hydro-electric up stream as the river level rises and falls. I saw one goose family shoot the rapids with the babies. I’ll bet they are clamoring to do it again.

Down the hill to Sacramento and the CA State RR Museum.

First surprise, ships tied up on the river bank! I confess I never looked very hard at the map to see that Sacramento is connected by water to the Pacific, not even any locks. Today, there are three stern wheelers tied up, and the railway is right there next to the dock. Tomorrow we go see the place where gold was found, that started Sacramento on its way to being a city, and eventually the state capital. And from here, 4 barons of commerce, Stanford, Huntington, Hopkins and Crocker got fired up by a mad engineer named T.D. Judah to take the Central Pacific over the Sierra Nevada and meet the Union Pacific at Promontory point in Utah. This really made California a power, and so it is fitting that the state has a magnificent RR museum here.

Interstate 80 runs close to the river, and in between is old town, the old buildings were a nest of bars and flop houses in the 1950’s, many of the first floors abandoned after endless floods. In the 1960’s, this area was the first federally funded urban renewal project, and it is now a splendid restored train and waterfront village, lots of nifty 1870+ architecture, board sidewalks, and thriving tourist attractions. The RR museum is the northern end of this, and pretty humbling compared to our museum in Campo.

They have a working round table, and a huge indoor, air-conditioned area full of immaculate restorations. Steam engines galore, although none working right this minute, really old restored passenger and baggage cars, a great dining car and sleeper to go through. There are masses of interpretive exhibits about the people and the building of the Transcontinental RR, all spendidly top drawer, labeled, lit, with mannequins in place. And a real movie theater with a great film about the Transcontinental Railroad.

Sigh. They get huge funding from the state, and are located where any tourist can hardly miss them. However, the docents (maybe 10 or 15!) were a little bored, and it was all very slick and uptown. If they have a collection beyond what’s all polished and here, don’t know where it is. The museum lacked foam, and bubbles. At Campo, we are all a little mad for trains, and love playing with them and sharing them. We don’t have trains under glass, we have real trains, and real dirt. Any one of our cars or engines might someday be fixed up and run again, a big might, but the State Museum collection is not going anywhere, and seems stuffed, as in stuffed animals, not real ones. They do run an excursion train down along the river and back, but I suspect it has a theme park quality to it. They also have a whole play area devoted to Tommy the Tank Engine. This “star” of merchandising is a fake train that has to be pushed by an engine, no power of its own. We are averting our eyes.

I guess Old Sacramento is a fun thing to visit, but I prefer real life in Campo.