Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Bakersfield In Spring

Monday: (04/06) We were up early and on the road quickly due to evening preparation. We stopped at the Crossroads Cafe en route for breakfast. Three visits in five days here. we do like the place and breakfast was as good as expected. I had a beef hash with scrambled eggs covered in cheese. Lou had  a Greek omelet. That mission accomplished, we were back on the road.

The weather was nice and the breezes calm so the trip was nice. We stopped at a couple of Ralph's markets to get canned ruby red grapefruit. We can't find it at home and really like it. Evidently most people don't because it  can't be found most places other than Smith's and Ralph's markets neither of which is in our area. There also are usually just a few cans in a store (markets don't stock anything anymore. When the shelf is bare they'll order more and it will be on the shelf tomorrow. Our just in time world.) We collected a dozen cans from two stores in Apply valley and Victorville and were off again.

Next stop was lunch in Mojave at Mike's Roadhouse Cafe. Lou had some very good grilled fish and I had a bowl of pea soup, and peach cobbler. We then made the final leg of our trip today to Bakersfield stopping at Don's Aunt Helen's place for a couple of nights.

Lou and Helen made a thrift store run while I relaxed.

Not to ruin a perfect day of eating out, we went to the Woolgrowers, a local Basque restaurant for dinner. We all had just setups (everything but a main course soup, salad, spaghetti, pickled toung, tomatoes, basque fries, beans, etc) We did get on meal with a main course of lemon fish and shared it. It was excellent.

Tuesday: (04/07) Another nice day. Lou is fixing breakfast burritos this morning. We visited all morning and then took off for a shopping trip. We rode in Helen's new car, a Toyota Cameray. We drove by our old house that we sold in 2005. Prices have really dropped and this house recently sold for just over 1/2 what we sold it for then. We fixed it up pretty nice before we sold it and now it looks like it's been abused and is the worst looking house in the neighbor hood. We were always lucky with our renters but obviously the new owners weren't.

We also stopped by the Winco market. It's always a nice stop and we do wish they would open a market near us. They have a great bulk foods area and we picked up a couple of things there. We also stopped by Fresh And Easy market, a new chain something like Trader Joe's without the service. There are no checkers there, all self checkout. They are just opening several locations here. Somebody has money to spare. Helen got a few things there.

When we returned home was visited some more and Helen and i removed a stuborn root left from a recent tree removal.

For dinner, we went to Bill Lee's Chinese restaurant downtown. This is brother Ernie's favorite restaurant in Bakersfield so we had to stop by. It's one of our favorites as well. We had the #2 family style combo. The food is Cantonese style. Chow Mein, almond chicken, fried shrimp, BBQ pork, fried rice, started with egg flower soup. We also like the Rice Bowl next door and alternate between the two. We haven't found any Chinese restaurants as good as these two anywhere else.

Helen's DSL Internet connection wasn't working. The modem had been replaced but it still didn't work. Then there was confusion over the userid and the password. I tried a little yesterday until it maxed out the login attempts. Because it hadn't been connecting for a while, McAfee was complaining it needed to be updated as well. An hours conversation with a  very nice and patient tech rep at ATT got the problem corrected. It will be nice to have her back online.

Wednesday: (04/08) Not to change a good thing, we went out for breakfast again this morning. Bakersfield is famous for good restaurants. This morning we went to Dona Keys Cafe. We haven't been there before. It was mostly good but Lou and i shared a corned beef hash and eggs which we thought would be home made but was canned hash. The home fries were excellent and the pancakes also excellent. Helen had a very good omlette. We'll probably return but not for corned beef hash.

Highway 58 Looking East toward Bakersfield Highway 58 East of California Valley
After breakfast, Lou and I hit the road toward Pismo Beach via Highway 58. It was overcast in Bakersfield but it rained rather heavily throughout the drive in the mountains on either side of the California Valley. We arrived at the campground in Pismo Beach to find mostly clear skies.
The hills do look nice this time of year.

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