I woke up once more to a beautiful view of both the ocean and the coastal hills. I quickly got started on the highway only to almost immediately have a police car change lanes all the way from the leftmost lane to be right behind me in the rightmost lane, lights on. I was very confused and worried, thinking I must have done something wrong, but then he went back all the way over to the leftmost lane again.
He got in front of everyone and started moving left and right across the highway, slowing down as he did. It was pretty clear this was a traffic slowing measure, and I recall seeing this in an Instagram reel before. Eventually after about a mile or two he came to almost a stop, did a 180, and used his speaker to tell everyone to wait here until he gave the all-clear.
Up ahead I could see yellow flashing lights from a tow truck along with another police car, so I presumed there had been some kind of accident. The police officer got out of his car and started laying down cones to block off the rightmost lane, and after about 5 minutes he got back in and told everyone to proceed with caution.
It was kind of neat having a front-row seat to that, especially as it meant the entire highway was clear ahead of me when we started moving again. As we passed the tow truck, I glanced over briefly and saw a semi-truck on its side in the sand (the highway is right next to a beach), very obviously having drifted or swerved off the highway in some manner.
Next stop was Balboa Park, San Diego. A huge park with lots of museums, trails, and other things to see. I wasn’t too sure what I was going to do when I got there, but I headed there anyway and arrived around 9:30 am. The park is right under the landing path for planes flying into the San Diego International Airport, so I kept seeing planes fly right overhead which was neat.
Once I parked I took a look at the map and almost immediately the San Diego Miniature Railway Museum stood out to me, and I made that my mission for the morning. I headed out and played Pokemon GO along the way, which makes things take much longer than if I just walked straight there, but it was enjoyable and let me take in the sights.
I walked past a large group of people who seemed to be waiting to get in somewhere, and as I kept walking I realized it was a Japanese garden, and it had a viewing platform up ahead (first photo is the garden, second photo is the botanical building).
I got to the museum and paid my $20 entry fee, which ended up being extremely worth it. The building was huge and had 2 floors to it, and the models were absolutely amazing. There were information pages everywhere explaining the history of the real railroads the models were based on, along with information about how the models were made and the club that makes them.
They even had a massive wooden trestle bridge over a canyon, which from the bottom of the canyon to the top of the bridge deck was almost exactly as tall as I am. The photo doesn’t do it justice, and I can’t imagine the amount of work that went into building it.
There was also a huge model showcasing Southern California’s rolling green hills that I’ve become familiar with over the past few days. The scale was epic, and the detail was incredible. This is the kind of stuff I’d want to do, if I had the long-term motivation, funding, and space to do it.
The museum gave me the idea that instead of driving up to San Francisco and back to see my friend Theo, I could instead take the train. I had seen the Pacific Surfliner pass me as I was driving on the Pacific Coast highway a few days ago, which initially gave me the idea, but the train museum just reignited that thought into more of a desire.
I finished up at the museum and headed to a more dense part of San Diego, about a 15 minute walk, where I could find a cafe to sit at and do some planning for the train trip to San Francisco.
After almost 2 hours of planning and faffing around with different ideas, I found that the most economical way of doing the train trip that worked within my schedule was to fly from LA to SF, hang out with Theo for the evening, then in the morning take the train back down to LA and pick up my car at the airport parking lot.
The whole thing cost about $300 CAD, which all things considered is not too bad for a flight, 10 hour train ride, and parking at the airport.
I walked back through Balboa Park, taking a less direct route and finding myself in a ravine with only a very steep trail out of it, but I eventually made it back to my car. I even found two cats along the way, though they weren’t at all interested in interacting with me.
The last stop for the day was Salvation Mountain, something I had known about for a while but never had a chance to go see. It’s very famous, being featured in many cultural works including Grand Theft Auto V. It took a bit to get there but I arrived just around sundown, golden hour. I drove down the very bumpy road into Slab City and parked at the mountain.
There were two caretakers there who were more than happy to share information about the mountain and the history behind it. I highly recommend taking a look at https://salvationmountain.us if you’re interested, it’s quite remarkable. Despite being a very clearly religious monument, it’s very easy to separate the art from the religion in this case, and even the caretaker wasn’t a religious person himself.
I had a lovely 20 minute conversation with Doc, who comes down from Palm Springs every Friday for the day to talk to visitors, take care of the site, and manage the staff who do regular maintenance and upkeep. They’re not expanding the site any further after the original creators passing, just maintaining it as best they can.
Afterward, I headed towards the Whitewater rest area where I planned to sleep for the night. The route took me along the east side of the Salton Sea, which was beautiful as the sun set over the mountains. I came alongside a train part way through which ended up matching my speed, and we drove alongside each other for almost 30 minutes, which in my own nerdy kind of way was pretty neat.