By,by California

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People apparently just stopped there to pee on the side of the road and throw their garbage out of the car ...
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Those out-of-state tourists have no respect. I wonder what they'd think if we went to their state/province and did that  ???
 
The men who pee in a bottle and drop the bottle by the side of the road are worse than the ones who just pee into the bushes or on the road. At least the free pee will wash away eventually while who's going to pick up those icky bottles while on litter patrol ?


And litter, how many of you will pick up a piece or two of litter when you see it and find a place to dispose of it properly, hmm?
 
SeilerBird said:
Absolutely correct Wendy. And 100% of that trash seems to be broken beer bottles.
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Well, there are also beer cans, fast food soda cups, and dirty diapers.
 
Wendy said:
BTW, some of the worst trash we've seen on the highways is on the Navajo Reservation.
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I agree with your observation; however, I haven't noticed very much trash along CA highways.  Maybe I've just been too busy dodging pot holes.  8)
 
I've been in all 50 states and California quite often.  I can't say California is any worse or better than the other states when it comes to trash along the side of the road.  And I doubt that all the trash in California comes from out of state travelers.  I don't understand the mentality of people that throw things out.  It is so easy to carry along a bag and dispose of it properly later.  And so hard to clean up the highways.
 
SeilerBird said:
As a life long Californian your remarks do not offend me at all. Trashing California is a full time job for many people. Mostly it is jealousy. If you live in any other state but California you are probably jealous if you feel you must trash the state constantly. No, California is not perfect. None of the other 49 states are perfect either. Just mention any other state and I can trash it too if I wanted to.

I can't give your remarks too much weight considering the title of your thread should have been "Bye bye California."
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Well it seems as though I struck a nerve or maybe a few nerves. It was not my intention to trash California I was merely telling what I saw in the 25 days that I was there. Was there good , was there beauty you bet there was will I return, you bet I will ,but in the spring so I can see the state when a bit less hot and dry. Your right , none of the states are perfect,all have their faults just as the Canadian provinces do. I knew it was going to be hot and dry but the extent of it surprised me. I did not however expect all of the trash along the highways. The people are clearly to blame for that weather it be locals or tourists there is no excuse for it I don't care where it is.

Now I realize that I am not an expert on the English language but I learned at a very young age the meanings of the words by,bye and buy. I spelt it the way I did on purpose,maybe to see if I would get a reaction from someone or maybe just because I wanted to.

Bye the way I probably have not posted a note about it but it is not that I have not been following the post about your illness. I was sorry to hear about your problems and I am glad that you have returned to the forum in great form. You were missed by a lot of people including me and it is great to have you back...Alan
 
hpykmpr said:
It was not my intention to trash California I was merely telling what I saw in the 25 days that I was there.
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I didn't read your post as trashing CA.  I thought that claim made early on was a bit of a reach. I'm sure you will enjoy it here in the Spring.
 
I didn't read your post as trashing CA.
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Neither did I, nor did I feel it hit a nerve. But I felt it appropriate to help explain the microclimates we have here, how they affect folks who aren't used to them, and how things can be different at different times of the year. In this part of California, inland we have two seasons - hot/dry/breezy/gold and wet/stormy/green. San Francisco year round is either foggy/cool or sunny/comfortable.

Coming from a place where it rains "366 days a year" and the landscape is green and lush all year round, it took some getting used to California climate and microclimates. I first experienced the extremes in the 70's when I  visited during the fall/winter and later during the summer.
 
Alan, you've just experienced a severe drought year which is worse in the summer so you didn't come at the most opportune time.  Did you hear that at one point about two weeks ago there were 51 major fires burning in CA, OR, ID, and MT?  Some are still burning.  That's what happens when there's a drought out here.  The underbrush is tinder.  All it takes is one lightning strike or one person who doesn't put out a campfire properly (e.g. like the Rim Fire at Yosemite) and our western states turn from summer brown or golden to black.  We lived in CA for 39 years and had two seven-year droughts with water rationing on the San Francisco Peninsula.  We didn't have much in the way of green lawns then, even in the winter, but it was more important to conserve water than to have green lawns!  You easterners are used to having green all the time but have to recognize other parts of the country aren't so lucky.  While we lived in CA, Jerry's sister came to live near us - straight from nice green WET England!  We had a really rainy winter that year and I was raving about how green the hills were.  She asked "what green?" because they didn't compare to England but we thought they were gorgeous!  It's all a matter of perspective.  By the way, did you happen to see Lake Mead in Nevada?  It's down more than 120 feet and there's a white "bathtub" ring around it where the water level used to be.  The Colorado western Rockies didn't have a very wet snow pack this year so the Colorado River and downstream lakes will be down even more.

As to roads, we noticed last month that I-5 had improved since we were there last year.  But everywhere we went this year there was road construction.  It seemed like we went from one orange cone forest to another, in all the states not just CA.  Even road surfaces change from year-to-year.  The last time we were on the Trans-Canada Highway some years ago, I thought it was awful.  I'm sure it's better now but there just aren't enough highway funds to go around for everything, whether the USA or Canada.

There are other places that have bad trash too.  Sad, but true.  There are pigs everywhere.  :(  We've always tried to leave our campsites cleaner than they were on our arrival.

ArdraF
 
Tom said:
No offense taken, but I can't help smiling every time I read similar messages.

The inland areas of California are always hot in summer, while the coastal areas are much cooler. We live in the Central Valley, and the temperature difference between here and San Francisco (65 miles away) can be 40 degrees. We've had numerous overseas and out-of-state visitors who ignored our warnings and insisted on wearing shorts and t-shirts when we took them to the Bay or the coast; It would be 105-110 degrees here and, when we arrived, they wouldn't get out of the car because it was cold, foggy, and drizzly.
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" I know what you are saying as we camped at Travis Air Force Base and there it was hot ,mid 90's during the day and we went three trips to San Francisco and there it was in the very pleasant high 60's and low 70's for 2 days and the other day it was low to mid 60's and very foggy. What a temp. change in 50 odd miles. We knew what the temp's were like because we experienced almost the same thing along the coast verses inland in both Oregon and Washington."

I'm not sure how much of the state you'd "see" in 25 days. We've lived in or near the greater Bay area for 33 years, have RV'd and boated up and down the state for almost 30 years, and we haven't scratched the surface.
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"We did experience a lot of the different areas of California in that 25 days but you are right we did not see nearly all of it . I have lived in Florida for almost28 years and have not scratched the surface of the things to do and see there."

Sorry about the roads; As others have said, California ran out of money a long time ago. OTOH I see some major road improvement projects within a 30-mile radius of us; There's some hope.

Glad you came away with some fond memories. Hopefully, your next visit will be a better experience.

Hint: A google search on a place you plan to visit will usually find a Wiki which includes climate info.
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Edit: Fixed quote tags.
 
Wendy said:
California is brown in the summer and green in the winter. You want green all the time, visit Colorado in the summer and California in the winter. Go spend the whole year in the south. As you said, there are a lot of spectacular places to visit in California. And it is hot in the summer, so are Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Kansas, Mississippi, Florida, and a lot of other places. Give California another chance, maybe in the spring or fall. It's a BIG state with a lot of places to see and things to do.

Wendy
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I did not say that I needed green all year long it just came as a great shock to me to see so much brown, or as someone else corrected, golden brown grass. There is beauty in all things and we saw a lot of it in California this trip and hopefully we will see the state earlier in the year in the next couple of years. We actually saw something that probably most of the people on this forum has not likely seen . We got to see the giant cloud of smoke, created by the rim fire , from atop of Glacier Point in Yosemite. I suppose this would not be classed as beauty in the natural sense but it was beauty in a magnificent , destructive way. Now I'm not saying that I'm glad it happened so we could take pictures of it but I am saying that I'm glad we saw it. We stood in front of and had our pictures taken in front of three or the largest trees in the world and was amazed at the beauty of walking among the giant redwoods and sequoias. We saw a lot while we were in California and am looking forward to returning to see some more. I have lived in Florida now for almost 28 years and my wife a lot longer than that, yes it is green but to me there is not very much scenery. I'm sure a lot of people will disagree with me on that. We can not wait to leave Florida in the summer because of the heat. I'm glad we left this summer and that we got a chance to spent some of our summer in California....Alan
 
Tom and Margi said:
What Seiler, Wendy, Molaker, and Tom said! 

Tell me true, now ... does every place you visit have to be perfect to afford you a good time?  If so, my sympathies, fellow RVer, because you will miss out on a lot of beauty yet to be experienced in this wonderful USA we live in.  California is no more perfect than any other state in our Union.  Why, then, do visitors expect it to be?  Maybe because in many areas it is?  Food for thought.

Margi
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No I don't think that every place we see has to be perfect. I gave up using the word "perfect" many years ago as perfect means so many different things to different people. We had a good time in California ,saw many things that we had never seen before and saw the beauty in them all. Many visitors may expect California to be perfect but that was not me. Maybe a lot of people expect that California is perfect but not me . We enjoyed our time there as we have enjoyed our time in all of the other places we have visited on this 6 month trip  so far and I am sure that we will continue to enjoy the things we see on the rest of the trip. No I do not expect perfection but I think the USA is a great country and I hope to see a lot more of it yet while I can. Maybe some day I will get to see a perfect place but I sure hope it is a long way off as there is so many things that I want to do and see yet.. ...Alan
 
I gotta agree. For those of us who live in the southeast, the prevalent browns & golds of California (and much of the rest of the Western states) comes as a bit of a shock. Even the green regions are a darker shade.  At first it is breathtaking, but after spending a few months there, we begin to long for the emerald greens of the Southeast again.  It's not that one is prettier than the other, but they sure are different.
 
This has been an interesting thread to follow.  We have our share of brown in the summer months but then you take in to consideration that the Salinas valley (the next valley over from the Sacramento/San Joaquin valley aka the big valley) is known as the salad bowl of the world.  http://www.californiabountiful.com/features/article.aspx?arID=563

And green...you want green.  Green that even those of the southeast can't relate to.....a little further north we have Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity Counties more commonly called the Emerald Triangle.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerald_Triangle  Many of you will probably be surprised to learn that marijuana is California's #1 cash crop....  http://norml.org/legal/item/california-top-10-cash-crops  :p

OK, the true ever green of California that can be found no where else in the world.....the California redwoods.  http://www.google.com/imgres?q=California+redwoods&um=1&sa=N&rlz=1R2ADRA_enUS478&biw=1280&bih=560&hl=en&tbm=isch&tbnid=zGtvXom6nt21UM:&imgrefurl=http://www.thegreenhead.com/2007/04/california-redwood-giant-sequoia-coast-redwood.php&docid=BrBcjdOtZf_tbM&imgurl=http://www.thegreenhead.com/imgs/california-redwood-2.jpg&w=500&h=500&ei=oY0sUsPFEqSYiQKVp4EI&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=265&page=1&tbnh=136&tbnw=140&start=0&ndsp=19&ved=1t:429,r:4,s:0,i:100&tx=86&ty=67

So you see, California is green year around.  It just depends on what shade of green you're looking for and where...in this beautiful state...you're looking.

Seriously Alan.....as a native Californian I did not take any offense or issue with your original post.  I do believe that you came the wrong year (after years of drought winters) and the wrong time of year.  And, for the first time in my 62 years in this state, we finally have more people moving out of this state than we have moving in.  I only hope this trend continues.  http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Californias-Population-Moving-Out-182914961.html

So come visit.....in the spring if you want total green.  See the redwoods, the Napa Valley, Lake Tahoe, the waterfalls of Yosemite, Death Valley, the rugged coast line of the Calif. coast and the extravagance of Beverly Hills if you will.  Then all can go back to their snow ridden northeast or the bug infested southeast and us Californians will stay here and do what we do.....year around.  :p
 
We enjoy enough of California to use up a tank of diesel but when it is time to refuel I like to be elsewhere. With the 150 gallons in the 2006 Tradewinds we got to see more of CA this spring. ::)
 
Jeff said:
We enjoy enough of California to use up a tank of diesel but when it is time to refuel I like to be elsewhere. With the 150 gallons in the 2006 Tradewinds we got to see more of CA this spring. ::)
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OK Jeff.....I believe all Californian's would have to agree with you on this one.  And it's not just diesel....I believe we also have the highest gas prices in the nation.  There may be isolated areas in other states that have higher priced fuel but it's the whole state of California.  And you sure don't want to have to buy fuel in Death Valley.  :'(
 
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