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Trick is to gas up in Vancouver, WA, just before you cross the border. That way you can make it across the California state line before you have to stop for gas again.
As you work your way further South in CA, you'll have to choose between the Sierras (Eastern) or Coastal (Western) routes. Do not take the middle (central valley) route, Hwy I-5; it is hot an boring this time of year. The Eastern route would roughly follow Hwy 395, and is stunning. Western/coastal route would follow roughly Hwy 101 & CA-1, which is also beautiful.
If you take the Coastal/Western route, my recommendation would be to find your way to the town of Hollister early one morning and do all of Hwy 25 southbound from there to Route 198. That section of Hwy 25 is fabulous (and includes the Eastern entrance to Pinnacles Natl Monument). Its all beautiful rolling hills and farms, oak trees and fast 2-lanes. After nearly 70 miles of heaven, the junction of hwy 25 & hwy 198 is a T in the middle of rolling farm country, and from there you'll have a choice of going East to Coalinga or West to San Lucas. I would do both: If you leave Hollister in the morning, you could get mnake it to Coalinga for a great Mexican lunch, then reverse course and drive 198 again (westbound this time), to reach San Lucas, then turn South on the 101 corridor and make it to Paso Robles easily by dinner time. Stay at a nice B&B in Paso Robles and explore the wine country there for a day or so. Your wife will love it. Leaving Paso Robles, you could shoot out to the coast on Hwy 46 toward Cambria, then south on Hwy 1 along the coastline, San Luis Obispo, Pismo Beach, etc. back on 101. Then near Santa Maria you could turn East again onto Hwy 166, take that into the hills to the junction of 166 and Hwy 33, go south on Hwy 33 through Los Padres National Forest to Ojai (another great overnight spot).
I'll let others chime-in on how to best get across the LA basin from Ojai to San Diego.
The drive described above ranks among the most scenic & best Porsche roads in CA, I promise you.
Spoiler is extended of course and the oil temp runs steady at 234 F. Coolant at 194 F.
Just as an FYI, your coolant temperature is a lot higher than 194 in normal mode. The coolant gauge is 'buffered', meaning if it's between 185 and 240 or so, it'll always say 194. Normal mode elevates coolant temperature to about 235 (it's in the manual), which coincides with your oil temperature, since the oil is cooled/heated by the coolant. That's why I always use sport mode, which keeps oil temp right around 200 if not pushing. That was done for emissions purposes, probably for a fraction of a MPG. Normal mode feels lethargic to me. Sport has the perfect throttle mapping IMO, and even if you drive in auto PDK mode (I always drive it manually), sport even shifts a bit too early IMO. Porsche is the only car I know that doesn't have a regular 185/190ºF thermostat for the coolant. Instead, it has this complicated system that often causes issues. Keep enjoying your trip.
Trick is to gas up in Vancouver, WA, just before you cross the border. That way you can make it across the California state line before you have to stop for gas again.
Just the opposite experience here. In Oregon they pump your gas for you and if you choose the topless service (M/F/X) it's better than WA. As for going all the way to the CA/OR border on I5, your screwed!! No gas till you to get to Weed,and it's very expensive. I've found gassing up in Medford,Or then climbing the pass and getting to Redding works best for me.
This little anecdote will probably sidetrack this thread, but that's fine with me...
A little while after I took that photo of Mt. Shasta, we pulled into the I-5 South rest stop near milepost 705 in California. The buildings were on the left, with slightly angled pull-in parking spaces on both the left and right sides along the road. The parking area wasn't crowded and, since there was some shade, we chose to park on the right across the parking lot from the rest stop buildings. There were a few empty parking spaces on the driver's side and there were many empty parking spaces on the passenger side. My wife and I spent a few minutes cleaning the bugs off the glass. She was being very meticulous. I had to pee. I bugged her to please just stop – it’s fine! Then we both headed for the restrooms.
I finished up first in the restrooms (no surprise) and made a bee-line right back to the car intending to fire up the air conditioning (it was really hot). I noticed a black SUV had parked alongside somewhat close to the passenger side of my car. As I approached my car - I was about halfway across the road - I peripherally noticed two people on the far side of the SUV both abruptly begin moving within less than one second of each other. The first, just ahead of the SUV's passenger door moved to the front and the other (who was quite tall) by the rear passenger door moved toward the back of the SUV.
I've never had an experience like this, but somehow their motion fired off some kind of alarm bell for me and I got scared. I thought "maybe they don't know it's my car" and I casually veered left toward the car parked a few spaces away from my driver's side. I didn't pull that off very well and I wound up on the sidewalk between my car and the next car parked to my left. I pulled out my phone and started looking at the screen (because nothing looks more casual than that, right?) then I walked slowly back beside the nearby parked car where a teenage kid was stowing something in the trunk. I stood there for a few moments – probably making him a bit uncomfortable - until I saw my wife coming out of the restrooms. I waved to her and walked back across the street to meet her.
I was feeling foolish and paranoid and didn't tell her about the sudden fear that I had just experienced. I told her I wanted to get a cold drink from the vending machines and we walked toward the little vending machine building. I kept shooting furtive glances at the SUV people. They were still there, one behind the SUV and one in the front. Just standing there.
She asked me if I had a couple of dollar bills in my wallet since she had left her purse in car. What? Where in the car? Right in the middle of the driver seat. Where’s your car key? In my purse.
So while we bought a can of Dr. Pepper I told her the situation.
I had to discourage her from craning her neck and obviously staring at the people at the SUV. She believed me without question, but her first reaction was to just run back to the car to save her purse. I assured her that the car was locked – even with her key inside. I outlined some possible scenarios, some of which involved having a gun pointed in your face and being told to hand over your keys. We decided to go have a seat at a picnic table and think it over while we kept an eye on them.
My wife and I sat opposite one other, pretended to play with our phones, and she watched. At one point a third person (a tall woman) that I hadn’t previously noticed got out of the SUV's backseat on the passenger side and walked around to open the SUV driver's door. The SUV wasn't pulled up all the way, so this effectively made it impossible to open the passenger door on my car. She stood there for a few seconds and then returned to the passenger side of the SUV, leaving the SUV driver's door open. A minute later, the tall man crossed the street and went into the restrooms. Two minutes later he returned, and then stood between the two cars peering intently into the windows of my car. In addition to her purse, there were some overstuffed duffel bags and a backpack in the backseat. He studied the car's contents intently for 30 seconds or so. My wife began insisting that we call the police and get them to send a patrol to the rest stop.
I was still feeling foolish and paranoid, and I didn’t want to call the police, but my wife was now convinced based soley on her personal observations of these three people that they were up to no good. I convinced her to wait a bit longer to see if they'd get bored and either try a smash and grab or hopefully give up entirely.
This sounds like a story with a climactic ending - but, fortunately, it is not. We waited at the picnic table for another 10 minutes or so, and eventually the three got into the SUV and pulled away (very, very slowly). We waited a bit longer to make sure we didn't see them loop back around, then we sped over to the car, fired it up, and got right back on the highway.
All told, these three people spent 30 minutes at the rest stop doing pretty much nothing at all except scoping out my car. I suppose am I being paranoid, but when you drive a car like this, it's probably safer to assume everyone is out to get you.
Remember that the Coast Highway below Big Sur is still closed due to winter road slides.
Wow, thank you! Thank you! I completely forgot about that huge slide - now that I check the maps it looks like CA SR-1 is closed for a huge stretch south of Monterey. It makes me sad because I wanted to drive on that stretch this trip.
Originally Posted by onedae
Avoid I-5 below Sacramento - very boring.
Good call. I followed your advice. I spent a night in a Hilton Garden Inn in Sacremento, and then we went I-80 to I-680 to US-101 and then on to Los Angeles. Not the best part of the trip driving-wise except for some of the 101 along the coast, but we decided that for the south bound leg of our trip we'd shift west and drive along the coast where we could.
My wife has a twist on an old adage: Driving all the way to San Diego is optional, but driving back to Seattle is mandatory. So she wants us to just drive as far away from home as we can without meandering, and then cut back on the number of hours behind the wheel each day on the return.
Nevertheless, we're going to hang out in L.A. for a couple days. Last night we had a fantasic meal at Via Veneto on Main St. in Santa Monica. The valets had already parked two Porsches (a C2S and an Panamera hybrid) right out front so I already liked the place even before the meal!
Just as an FYI, your coolant temperature is a lot higher than 194 in normal mode. The coolant gauge is 'buffered', meaning if it's between 185 and 240 or so, it'll always say 194. Normal mode elevates coolant temperature to about 235 (it's in the manual), which coincides with your oil temperature, since the oil is cooled/heated by the coolant. That's why I always use sport mode, which keeps oil temp right around 200 if not pushing. That was done for emissions purposes, probably for a fraction of a MPG. Normal mode feels lethargic to me. Sport has the perfect throttle mapping IMO, and even if you drive in auto PDK mode (I always drive it manually), sport even shifts a bit too early IMO. Porsche is the only car I know that doesn't have a regular 185/190ºF thermostat for the coolant. Instead, it has this complicated system that often causes issues. Keep enjoying your trip.
Interesting. I've been tracking mileage pretty assidously (my average for about 1200 miles is 27.1 mpg and that includes some really bad stop-n-go traffic). I think I'll switch over to Sport mode and see how the oil cooling works and also if the mileage drops significantly. I'm really impressed with how this car is actually a GT and also how it's been handling the extreme temperatures without complaint. According to the car it was 112F in Gilroy on Friday although the internets only said it hit 108F. The tires went from 30/35 F/R cold to 38/42 on the hot pavement.
@digits awesome trip indeed and I would like to do something similar in the future.
Concerning the "anecdote" I would have been way more "pushy": I would have just called 911 and got quite a lot of photos or a video of their car and people to give them to the police enforcement. Those "dudes" are obviously trying to do something bad.
Last, I would recommend not to leaving anything in your car. A purse is too much of a temptation...
".... Last night we had a fantasic meal at Via Veneto on Main St. in Santa Monica. The valets had already parked two Porsches (a C2S and an Panamera hybrid) right out front so I already liked the place even before the meal! ...."
Many great restaurants to choose from in West LA and lots of Porsches sitting out front. If you are staying in the Santa Monica/ Venice area, some good places are - Meat on Ocean, The Lobster, Red O, Herringbone, Ivy at the Shore (although all tough to get into on a weekend in the summer).
oh man that sounds/looks like a lot of fun! I only wish I could do a trip like this sometime soon. I have relatives in Monterey/Carmel area and was planning to do a driving trip back in May but was really caught up with tight schedule and nonstop incoming things to deal with, sigh.
You have a safe and fun trip. Enjoy.
As you work your way further South in CA, you'll have to choose between the Sierras (Eastern) or Coastal (Western) routes. Do not take the middle (central valley) route, Hwy I-5; it is hot an boring this time of year. The Eastern route would roughly follow Hwy 395, and is stunning. Western/coastal route would follow roughly Hwy 101 & CA-1, which is also beautiful.
If you take the Coastal/Western route, my recommendation would be to find your way to the town of Hollister early one morning and do all of Hwy 25 southbound from there to Route 198. That section of Hwy 25 is fabulous (and includes the Eastern entrance to Pinnacles Natl Monument). Its all beautiful rolling hills and farms, oak trees and fast 2-lanes. After nearly 70 miles of heaven, the junction of hwy 25 & hwy 198 is a T in the middle of rolling farm country, and from there you'll have a choice of going East to Coalinga or West to San Lucas. I would do both: If you leave Hollister in the morning, you could get mnake it to Coalinga for a great Mexican lunch, then reverse course and drive 198 again (westbound this time), to reach San Lucas, then turn South on the 101 corridor and make it to Paso Robles easily by dinner time. Stay at a nice B&B in Paso Robles and explore the wine country there for a day or so. Your wife will love it. Leaving Paso Robles, you could shoot out to the coast on Hwy 46 toward Cambria, then south on Hwy 1 along the coastline, San Luis Obispo, Pismo Beach, etc. back on 101. Then near Santa Maria you could turn East again onto Hwy 166, take that into the hills to the junction of 166 and Hwy 33, go south on Hwy 33 through Los Padres National Forest to Ojai (another great overnight spot).
I'll let others chime-in on how to best get across the LA basin from Ojai to San Diego.
The drive described above ranks among the most scenic & best Porsche roads in CA, I promise you.
As you work your way further South in CA, you'll have to choose between the Sierras (Eastern) or Coastal (Western) routes. Do not take the middle (central valley) route, Hwy I-5; it is hot an boring this time of year. The Eastern route would roughly follow Hwy 395, and is stunning. Western/coastal route would follow roughly Hwy 101 & CA-1, which is also beautiful.
If you take the Coastal/Western route, my recommendation would be to find your way to the town of Hollister early one morning and do all of Hwy 25 southbound from there to Route 198. That section of Hwy 25 is fabulous (and includes the Eastern entrance to Pinnacles Natl Monument). Its all beautiful rolling hills and farms, oak trees and fast 2-lanes. After nearly 70 miles of heaven, the junction of hwy 25 & hwy 198 is a T in the middle of rolling farm country, and from there you'll have a choice of going East to Coalinga or West to San Lucas. I would do both: If you leave Hollister in the morning, you could get mnake it to Coalinga for a great Mexican lunch, then reverse course and drive 198 again (westbound this time), to reach San Lucas, then turn South on the 101 corridor and make it to Paso Robles easily by dinner time. Stay at a nice B&B in Paso Robles and explore the wine country there for a day or so. Your wife will love it. Leaving Paso Robles, you could shoot out to the coast on Hwy 46 toward Cambria, then south on Hwy 1 along the coastline, San Luis Obispo, Pismo Beach, etc. back on 101. Then near Santa Maria you could turn East again onto Hwy 166, take that into the hills to the junction of 166 and Hwy 33, go south on Hwy 33 through Los Padres National Forest to Ojai (another great overnight spot).
I'll let others chime-in on how to best get across the LA basin from Ojai to San Diego.
The drive described above ranks among the most scenic & best Porsche roads in CA, I promise you.
Enjoy!
Missed this opportunity
It was incredibly hot in Gilroy (108F) - which made my wife and I grumpy - and then when Google decided it was quicker to take 101 to L.A. we wound up on that stretch rather than toward Hollister. Boring. It got very nice as we approached Santa Barbara, though.
07-07-2017, 04:29 AM
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