TRAVEL DAY
From: Golden Shore RV Resort, Long Beach, CA.
To:John L. Whitehead, Jr. Campground at Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park, Earlimart, CA – Pixley National Wildlife Refuge & Kern National Wildlife Refuge.
Day 136 – Today was a long day on the road, but between the Los Angeles traffic and the sheer size of Los Angeles County, it took us a long time to get out of the sprawl and into less populated territory.
We departed our campground in Long Beach at 9:50 a.m. and immediately encountered a traffic jam that lasted about two hours. Most of that time we were barely moving, the freeway jammed with container trucks, everyone just creeping along. Of course, there was the obligatory accident on the freeway, that did not help. It was solid city until we were on “the Grapevine”, a very long climb up and down the mountains on Interstate 5, going north. Only then did the traffic move a little faster, but being a large vehicle, we were stuck in the truck lanes which had much slower speed limits. It seemed like it would never end, then things began to move for everyone and we were surrounded with hills & mountains, some with recent snow on them as we descended into the smoggy valley beyond. We stopped then at a rest stop, let the girls out from their bedroom sanctuary, and we all had lunch.
As we approached Bakersfield, there were less mountains and lots more agricultural lands with many flowering fruit trees. We stopped in Bakersfield for gas in the RV, and soon after that left city life behind. We were off the freeways, traveling two-lane highways again, not seeing much of anything. Then we relaxed. We are just plain NOT used to heavy traffic anymore!
The land was now flat as we approached our campground. We saw plenty of Hawks flying over the fields. Soon after turning off the highway to the Park, we were greeted by two Great Egrets in the field right in front of us. Killdeer were flying in a group to the side of the campground road. Sigh. It felt good to be at our destination. We arrived at 3 p.m. It was sunny with little wind, 54 degrees. There were only two other campers here. The only thing we heard was the birds.
We were at Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park. The small campground adjacent to the Park had only 15 campsites. We drove through and picked site #10; there was no one near us. The John L. Whitehead, Jr. Campground and the Historic Park are located ten miles southwest of Earlimart, CA. The Historic Park is a wonderful group of restored and reconstructed buildings where the town of Allensworth used to be. When we have time, we’ll include the story of Allensworth – a very interesting part of the history of this area.
By the time we settled in and unpacked, it was late afternoon. We sat around with the cats and relaxed. They were excited by all the birds flitting about; so were we. There are two National Wildlife Refuges a reasonable distance from here, so between exploring them and the Historic Park, we’ll probably be here a couple of days.