I love to take my bike places, but this time I took my 1969 Mustang Coupe on a tour of California. I plan on putting a trailer hitch type bike rack on the car but I just haven’t done it yet. This is the first time the Mustang has been driven a long distance in decades. We ventured mostly up and down the 101, covering 1,800 miles.
For the last couple of months we’ve been road testing Stang, and after repeated 100-200 miles drives we were fairly confident that the Mustang would do just fine. But… just incase we created a back up plan if the Mustang became inoperable along side the road or in the middle of nowhere.
Our plan was to keep enjoying the trip no matter what happened. If we broke down the plan was to tow the Mustang to the nearest town that had a U-Haul dealer. We’d rent a truck and trailer the Mustang home as we continued to enjoy our vacation.
We even packed our small tent and sleeping bags just for fun, just incase we got stranded on a backroad in the middle of nowhere. We were prepared. I know we over did it on the prepping, but we do like camping, so it would have been fun to camp. We never did use the camping gear.
Our first planned stop was the Sears in Burbank! Yes, there really is a Sears in Burbank and we wanted to see it!
We spent 2 hours wandering the store and the mall. We would have wandered the store longer, but it was getting to be the bewitching traffic hour in LA. We needed to leave or we’d be spending the night in Burbank. Our end goal for this 7 day adventure, is to drive thru Chandelier Tree and the redwoods.
Hubby loves driving my Mustang and did all the driving. This was the first time in the almost 52 years of Mustang ownership, I was 100% a passenger princess in my Mustang. For this adventure I’m the photographer and loving it.
Driving with the windows down (no A/C) keeps your senses alive. We could smell the citrus groves, the onion and garlic fields of Gilroy, the redwoods, the rivers, the salty ocean spray, the oil fields and the skunks.
The 40mph winds just south of Salinas made us roll Stang’s windows up tight and slightly open the vents at our feet. The blowing dirt was so bad! In a matter of a few hours Stang went from a gorgeous, shiny, blueish white to a creamy/brownish dull white. She was so dirty! Her shine was covered in dirt. We were thrilled to get out of the farming area. The wind was really whipping up all those fields of unplanted dirt.
As we drove the 101, we found ourselves stopping at all the quirky little tourist spots we both visited as children long ago.
In Ventura we visited the 1857 adobe home of Emilio Ortega the creator of the Ortega chili brand. His adobe home was also the first Ortega Chili factory.
We also visited 5 of the California missions. We wanted to visit one more mission, but it wasn’t easy to access. It’s called the “Loneliest Mission” Mission San Antonio. This mission is 26 miles from the 101 and we would need to enter the military base Fort Hunter Liggett. It was still early in the day when we arrived in the area, but the mission closes at 3pm, we’d never make it there in time.
A strange thing did happen at each of the other missions we visited. We kept meeting people who live just down the street from us in El Cajon. What a small world we live in. We’re planning to meet up again, at the El Cajon Classic Cruise.
It’s been 4 decades since the Mustang and I cruised San Jose, so before checking into the hotel, we drove around town. Thankfully Apple Maps was there to guide us, I was so lost. I lived and worked in San Jose for short while in 1980. Back then, I was always pulling out my gas station map and getting lost or running out of gas on my pretty, gold, Kawasaki motorcycle. FYI, 1.5 gallons of gas does not last forever. Honestly, back then I found it easier to take BART. But, now in 2025, I am telling hubby, take the 101, to the 880, to the 280, to the 580, to El Camino Real and the hotel. Mind you all that had to happen with 7 miles during the evening commute.
What became very obvious to us was that nearly every car around us was an EV and many were in the autonomous driving mode. They definitely react differently to some situations. Trying to predict how their computers were going to react in traffic, kept us on our toes in my 100% analogue car. All of a sudden a sea of brake lights would come! Our first thought was where’s the accident! There’s no accident, that’s how the EV’s slow down. They brake! But in Stang, hubby just took his foot off the gas.
In the morning as we were checking out of the hotel and loading the car, the drivers side window fell out of its track, then it fell inside the door. “Are you kidding me! Here! Now!” I guess we should be thankful the window stayed up during the high winds and blowing dirt near Salinas, the day before. What a nasty ride that would have been with no window.
Luckily there was an O’Reilly’s just a block away from our hotel. So with our screwdriver, pliers, and our newly purchased gorilla glue it was only a 45 minute repair. The window was good as new. Off we go to the Golden Gate Bridge.
As we inched our way thru San Francisco on HWY 1, the bridge came in view and the strong winds disappeared. What a beautiful day to cross the bridge. We stopped at the viewpoint on the north side of the bridge to enjoy the view and take some pictures.
It was a perfect day for some amazing pictures of the Mustang and the bridge. As we finished up the photoshoot, people started to gather and talk to us. They all wanted to share with us, their Mustang stories. It was so fun. We could have been there all day, but we politely excused ourselves. We had to continue north.
It was somewhere after the Golden Gate Bridge that Kevin noticed the decorative trim on the new steering wheel was rattling. The set screw backed out. Where did it go? We can’t find it. We need one tiny set screw and the only place open that we could find in Santa Rosa was Harbor Freight. To get one set screw we had to buy 150 for $8. We now have 149 left. Anyone need a tiny set screw? We have plenty! We also have a bright red bucket.
Today was make every Harbor Freight patron leave with a bucket? So for the rest of the trip we had a bright red bucket (with no lid) in the back seat. This was not the cool Mustang look I was going for.
On to Willits the “Gateway to the Redwoods.”
We stayed the night in Willits, but everything on this road trip did not go as planned. I had to make a quick visit to the ER in Willits. Our first thought was, a rural hospital, this is going to be interesting, but it was only a 1/2 mile from us. Let’s give it a try. What a cool/sad yet wonderful history this hospital has.
Willits has a hospital because of the winning race horse Sea Biscuit. Sea Biscuit was owned by Charles Howard and trained at the family ranch near Willits. In the late 1920’s the teen son of Sea Biscuit’s owner was injured in an automobile accident. Yes, an automobile accident.When the doctor arrived he said, “I can’t do anything we need a hospital”.
There was no hospital anywhere even remotely close by and the teen died. That’s when the Dad and owner of Sea Biscuit, donated a large portion of the horse’s winnings to build the needed hospital. Sea Biscuit continued to win races and so did the hospital. Today there’s the Sea Biscuit Foundation and a beautiful, super modern hospital in Willits. A life size bronze statue of Sea Biscuit was placed at the entrance.
The next morning we awoke to the prettiest day we’ve had so far on this roadtrip. Once we were up and fed, we were back on the road with our new companion the red bucket (groan) in the backseat. Our goal was to drive the Mustang thru the Chandelier Tree.
As children both hubby and I experienced going thru the tree with our families. Then, we brought our kids here too. This time we brought the Mustang. The Chandelier tree was carved out over 100 years ago and it’s still as healthy as can be. The only difference now, compared to the last time we were here 20 years ago was how many cars had to back up as they entered the tree. So many drivers were afraid to drive thru it, while the large SUV’s and the large EV’s just didn’t fit thru the tree. Back in 2003 our minivan went thru the tree with ease and today so did my Mustang.
After lots of pictures and a stroll thru the gift shop we continued our drive thru the redwoods to the ocean. Fort Bragg is on the coast and only 45 miles away via Highway 1, but when you’re going 15-30 mph on the little, narrow and winding highway, it took hours. Driving thru the redwoods was spectacular and that made it all worth it.
By the time we got to Fort Bragg it was late on a Sunday afternoon and the shops were closing. But that’s ok, we’ve been here before. Decades ago we camped nearby and explored Glass Beach with our kids, so back to Willits we went before it got too dark.
The next morning we left Willits and headed home, down the 101. We ventured off the highway many times just to look at the old buildings and towns.
We definitely had to stop at Snoopy’s airport. Yep, the Charles Shultz Airport has Snoopy flying on his dog house as their logo. There’s a bronze statue of Charlie Brown and Linus at the entrance and a huge Snoopy inside the airport to welcome visitors. To our surprise the airport was extremely busy.
We didn’t stay long, Stang wanted to go, so off we went to San Rafael. Our plan was to cross the Richmond Bridge to East Bay. That’s when we heard a huge bang! What the heck was that? We looked at each other and around the car. The car is running fine. We didn’t hit anything. What happened? We saw nothing wrong and kept going. It took me a good 5 minutes to realize what was wrong.
I was about to take a picture thru my brand new 3 month old, windshield when I saw the spider cracks. Look at that chip! Well, this sucks! Thankfully it never got worse.
We stayed the night in Santa Clara, where we were treated to some Indian mango ice cream. We also tasted a few other fun Indian treats. We turned in early knowing we’d need our rest in order to deal with the morning commute.
Thankfully the morning commute was light going south out of Santa Clara. After a couple of hours of driving we found 2 more missions and by then the leg stretch was very welcomed.
We could have driven the rest of the way home but we found a beautiful hotel in Goleta for a great price. The Best Western Goleta. We’ll be back with our bikes. The hotel was so beautiful and the area bike trails are amazing.
The PCH is still closed in many places so the 101 is crowded day and night. We had to figure out the best time to start our final day of travel.
The concierge at the hotel said, “it’s bad all day and night” and he was right. It was tortuous. We inched our way to the 405 in near 90 degree temps. Look, a McDonalds! It had cold A/C! We felt like we’d hit a jackpot! I will admit the drive home was a little warm (almost 90) in bumper to bumper traffic. Not only were we getting a little warm so was Stang.
From the passenger seat, I reached over and turned on the heater/defroster. Why the heater you ask? You see my Dad (who was a trucker) told 17 year old me, “If your car (the Mustang) is getting hot, turn the heater on. This lets the hot radiator water travel further and the water will cool as it goes thru the heater core before going back into the engine. Your car will cool down a little.”
Of course this preventative measure works best if your car has gauges and you’re watching them. Turning the heater on, might of helped those 2 fairly new cars we saw stranded on the shoulder with their hoods up and steam bellowing out.
For 7 days we cruised and saw so many cool places. In October, we may head north on the 395, with the windows down of course. After all we need to maintain that one nicely tanned arm we each have.
Side note
I’ve owned Stang almost 52 years, and she has never left me stranded. That’s an amazing past.
As we got closer to home we had the feeling of victory. 1,798 miles! Stang did great. We pulled into our driveway and unloaded the trunk. Now, it was time to put her into the garage. Wait, what’s happening? URR, URR she doesn’t start. Are you kidding me! The starter gave out in the driveway.
Stang held it together and got us home safely. What a trooper!
The very next day she was back up and running, ready to start(er) a new adventure.