Napa Valley

Today we travelled through the vineyard areas of Napa and Sonoma taking in the thousands of rows of grape vines, all immaculately attended to with not a weed in site and rose bushes growing at the ends. The massive winerys, made of old bricks and supporting huge loft doors with ivy growing up the sides made us think we were in Italy or France.  The gentle rolling hills either side of the valley were parched and brown with only a few scraggly oak trees growing on them.  We took the back road through to Sonoma and saw a couple of squirrels which really reminded us that we were back in the USA.  The sun shone as we picnicked in the park and threw the ball before strolling the streets looking in the beautiful artisan shops and enjoying homemade icecreams.

NHRA Drags at Sonoma

We left San Francisco on a foggy grey morning crossing the Golden Gate bridge towards Sonoma and Napa Valley to head to the Drags, something our petrol head family always watches on TV.
We knew the cars, recognised the faces and had passes for the pre-race fun so were pretty excited about our day.  The track at Sonoma was fantastic; fully set up for all motorsports, very organised and welcoming.  We walked the track and were amazed at how sticky it was, it nearly pulled our shoes off!  Jordan slid in beside Courtney Force (who drives a Funny Car) for a photo and we wandered through the pits amazed at the haulers, trailers, cars and crew.  The money involved was mind-boggling.
With ear-plugs firmly in we headed to Thunder Alley, the area beside the track.  As the cars left the start, the noise and vibration through not only your body but the ground and buildings was intense.
After swallowing 1 gallon of fuel per second, the top fuel dragsters finished their 3.4 second run up the strip.  The crowd roared, the campers in their RV's on the bank cheered and I'm guessing that the visitors to the winery's on the distant dry hills just sampled another vintage.  Another great day.
The last photo shows Craig trying to unlock our new car, the officer asked if the key was going to fit, unfortunately it didn't!








San Francisco

Sunny San Francisco, her steep narrow streets and beautiful architecture welcomed us back to the USA late last week.  We spent the first evening wandering along the Fisherman's Wharf area, touristy but fun with lots of cool street performers, good food, amazing candy stores and views out across the bay.  The street cars (historic trolley cars) clattered past and the cable cars inched their way up and down the hills.
Friday saw us visit Alcatraz, an eerily quiet place despite the visitors.  We viewed the cell that housed Al Capone, talk about small, they were the width of Craig with his arms outstretched and the length of a bed and basin on the wall.  The ferry trip out to the rock saw us riding alongside Oracle as they practised in the bay, then our NZ team flew past, up out of the water with chase boats trying hard to keep up.  AMAZING!
We became locals on Saturday as we figured out the subway system and took the train south to pick up the Landcruiser we are using for our road trip.  The GPS brought us back past the ballpark where the SF Giants were playing and along the waterfront promenade full of people, markets and bicycles.
Later in the day the sea fog rolled in (common in summer) so the top of the Golden Gate Bridge was hidden but it didn't spoil our visit to one of the cleanest, laid back cities we've ever visited.

Waiting for the Road Trip to begin....

The countdown is on for the Richards family......one week to wait until we journey across the Pacific again to visit one of our favourite countries, the United States of America. 
It's been 6 years since we said goodbye to all of our friends over there and we are very excited to be returning to the land of 'big things'.
This time we will be starting our road trip in the North West Pacific, landing in San Francisco on 25 July and enjoying the sights of the city by the bay.
High on the list are of course the famous places...Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz and the Victorian Houses and we'll also be taking in a SF Giants baseball game, the NHRA Drags at Sonoma and The Americas Cup before we head east towards Yosemite & Lake Tahoe; high on the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
From here we'll make tracks along I80 to Bonneville Speedway and on to Mt Rushmore in South Dakota.  We plan to fly from Denver to Michigan to catch up with Jeep at a couple of speedway meetings before we return and head off again down through Pikes Peak, Monument Valley, the Canyon lands and on into Las Vegas.  Eventually we'll make our way west through the Mojave Desert to LA and take Highway 1 back up the coast to San Francisco where we will depart on 7 September.