Big Meaning

I didn't take a lot of photos mainly because joe took them all of animals, and because I didn't feel the need to take pictures of animals layed out in front of me against their will. The Zoo was extremely crowded, and seemed like it had more food stations and courts than it had animal exhibits.

It is required for all vehicles registered in California to get regular emission checks, and have to have "improvements" done on the vehicle to remedy anything that may bring that reading up, which usually lower gas efficiency, to minutely reduce emissions. Nearly every car parts, or vehicle repair shop had one of these signs outside it. This only effects State residents, and cannot be enforced outside of the state, so tourists, like us, are scott free for needing to be tests. This is great bec ause the tests can be expensive, ranging between $30 to $70. This is for a 20 or 30 minute procedure. If a vehicle is over 4 years old, before a seller can put it on the market, he or she must provide a "proof of current smog certification". Within these regulations, it must be noted, that there are many holes and exemptions, but they are not all encompassing, and often far over specific.

     These stop lights needed their own explanation. They are there for allowing traffic to enter the highway, supposedly to assist with merging. They fire off rapidly, changing from red to yellow to green then back to red, all in about 4 seconds. To add to the confusion, there is a light for each lane, and in several cases, multiple lights for each lane, firing at different rates, so usually you end up running a red light, inevitably. The thing is, this does nothing to help with traffic merging, but only slows traffic more, and cars let through the lights end up backing up to merge anyways, as you can see in the second picture. The freeways, side roads, parking lots, and pretty much everywhere a vehicle can go, throughout the places we've been to in California, have been perpetually grid locked, and they are not properly maintained, in fact California has the worst roads that I have ever driven on.

     So I have several of these picture groups that I'm going to do separately, mainly because they take in depth explanations. So there will be several entries for the state of California. California is a complicated subject, and I'll do my best to remain unbiased. The first part of California we drove through was a poorer part of town, the place where my father grew up. He says it's a lot different from when he was living there. The roads and highways wh ere all lined with garbage and dead animals. Also, along the sides you will find numerous "No Parking signs", completely ignored and unenforced. Along with that things are ridiculously expensive. By things I mean everything. Gas, on the cheaper end, was $3.14 a gallon. In fact, there was little price fluctuation between areas of affluence and areas of less so, which is not the case in many places we've been on this trip. In most areas, all of which had lower gas prices, there would be some change, generally ...

Death Valley