California Revisited

I’ve been to Los Angeles, Sacramento and San Francisco for short visits over the past 5 years. Disneyland and Universal Studios in L.A. feels like a cramped version of the ones in Florida. And to us it looked like all that Sacramento had to offer was a visit to the Governors mansion. No, we did not get to meet Gov. Arnold, he was in a meeting that day (Or so they said). We had placed a reservation with Avis for a minivan earlier but as in an episode of Seinfeld, they are good a taking a reservation, not holding the reservation. It took us nearly an hour to get a replacement SUV. It was equipped with one of those earlier forms of GPS that looked more like a phone. I do believe that they actually used Nextel back then. Still, it was a big improvement over the use of Mapquest and gave me my first taste of the GPS. With this model you called an operator, gave her the address you were going to and she sent in instruction to the GPS. It provided purely turn-by-turn voice instruction, and could guide you only to about 200 miles from your current location. We had to call twice to complete the whole trip. But after that I was hooked. When we got back home on the east coast my first project was research and get me my own.

Between Sacramento and L.A. lay the City by the Bay, San Francisco. We, as a family, liked visiting San Francisco the best. It isn’t only because we liked the cool, comfortable day-time weather, or the nice morning walks down in Rockaway beach, the expensive trips to the Fisherman’s Wharf, the field trips to the Golden Gate Bridge or the picnic at the Presidium. We actually had more friends to go to in San Francisco and therefore spent more time here than we did in Sacramento or L.A. The only drawback was that every thing seemed so expensive. After entertaining the thought for but a few hours we decided that while we like San Francisco, we would continue to live on the east coast.

Other than the weather there was another reason to visit San Francisco. Every first weekend of August, the city of Pacifica plays host to a reunion of those who lived or grew up in Baclaran, Philippines. We attended one 4 years ago. The reunion starts early, around 8:00 am and is supposed to end 11:00 pm with a big raffle draw. It started with introductions, then lots of contest and prizes, and a seemingly endless supply of food to eat. The attendees are organized based on what street they grew up or lived so there was a very good chance you would meet someone you already knew. My wife grew up in Mactan Street in Baclaran and she has not seen most of her friends from the area in over twenty years. The first time we attended the reunion back in 2004 it seemed like everybody she ever knew was there. Need less to say, if you spend 15 hours in a community center you will eventually bore yourself out of existence. We (along with most everybody else) decided not to stay till 11:00 pm.

This year the reunion falls on August 2, 2008. My wife will try to attend. This will depend on the availability of reasonably priced airline tickets. I (along with my kids) on the other hand have decided to skip this year’s festivity. With today's gas prices it is better for us to get to know the various vacation areas closer to home.

Ontario Revisited

Visiting another country always seemed to involve flying and going through customs at the airport. So I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I first crossed into our northern neighbor, Canada, with my family of course, to visit my wife’s cousin in Ontario back in August of 2007. Would my GPS work? How about my mobile phone? Would there be a long line at the border? What kind of questions would they ask? Would they even let us back into the United States?

Some of those questions can be easily answered with a little preparation before your trip, while others you will just have to find out. I would suggest that at the very least, do the following.

• Call your mobile phone provider. They can answer questions about using your phone in another country, even one as close to us as Canada. Up there we would be using the system of Rogers Communications and pay by the minute.

• Know how to access a phone card if you don’t want paying for those minute charges, or in emergencies. While most convenience stores seem to carry these prepaid cards nowadays you can now also purchase phone cards wearing only your jammies through the internet. Delivery is through your email and almost instantaneous and the rates are competitive.

• Check with travel agencies or their websites for travel requirements. These days you need a passport to get into and back from Canada, not so back in 2007.

• Bring a map with you, or print out directions as a backup to your GPS. Thankfully I did not have to use either of these.

The trip is supposed to take 10 hours, non-stop. We budgeted 2 hours for necessary stops and planned to arrive around 4 or 5 pm, still early enough to go around since we only planned to stay for the weekend. We traveled up through scenic New York State and arrived at a surprisingly short line at the border crossing. We were asked some standard questions like “Are you carrying anything like tobacco and wine? Anything to declare ” and “Are you citizens of the US and can you prove it?” As I had mentioned earlier, we did not have to bring our passports but this was as easy a proof of citizenship that we could bring. That done, we crossed into “foreign territory” in search of a rest area.

The first thing we noticed was the speed limit, 50 kph. How much in miles was that? There was a sign that posted a rough estimate of the speed in mph, and it was slow. I wondered how we were going to get to Ontario by 5pm. At the gas station they were selling by the liter, and as luck would have it, the Canadian dollar now was worth more than the green buck. I did not want to get a ticket so I followed the speed limit, and I was the only one. All the other vehicles zipped pass us, occupants looking at us with our Maryland tag in a sea of Ontario license tags. For the first time, I really felt like a tourist!