Driving down I5

Driving during the holidays is always gonna be crazy but this past Thanksgiving weekend was just horrible.

We drove from the Sacramento area down to the San Diego area. We left the Saturday before and it was smooth sailing almost all the way down. There are two major areas that you can stop in for food and fuel. There are of course gas stations along the way but pricier and food is very limited at other exits.

We passed thru the 'Grapevyne' without a problem. Whats the Grapevyne? Well on the way down I5 between Bakersfield and Los Angeles is this beautiful mountain range you have to drive thru.  Your ears will pop!  As you drive you climb and climb and on the other side you fly down the road!  Have good breaks! lol....  I think the locals call it that because on the base there is an exit called Grapevyne.  Once on the other side you hit the LA area and thats when the traffic started.  Whats worse was the rain that came and went throughout the day!

The Mountains

The clouds over the moutains.

According to the GPS our total trip was 517 miles and it should have taken just 7 hours. I used a regular GPS because last time we took the trip our phones lost signal during most of it. Our total trip took us 9 hours door to door because of Los Angeles traffic.  Its strange traffic, it wasn't like there was an accident or active construction or detours... it was just stop go traffic that didn't make sense.

So we spent Thanksgiving week in San Diego and decided to return on the Sunday after the holiday.  What a mistake that was!  We figured if we left before noon we will get home at a decent time, wrong!  LA was so horrible it took almost 5 hours to go barely 150 miles! Once we hit the Grapevyne traffic was moving again and we were excited, but delayed.  Until we get to the other side and once again there was traffic, stop and go and stop and go... the volume was ridiculous!

Traffic didn't start flowing smoothly until we were almost in the Merced area, by then it was so late we were dying... a total of 13 hours driving to get back home. We finally arrived home at midnight.  Next time I don't think we will leave so late next time wait until Monday lol.