DAY FIVE – 24 October 2014
I slept
pretty good, but woke up early (4 am). I attempted to get some work done
before breakfast was open, only to find out that both their internet and cable
were out. I did what I could on the phone, but that’s harder to research
things when I can’t access all my systems. Breakfast today was much like
yesterday (cereal and past-ripe fruit), and not the substance I’d need to get
me through the long day of traveling. Evert and I had one more dealer to
visit, and our plan was for us to drive there independently. Since I was
flying out in the early afternoon, it was logical for him to pick me up, then
bring me back here to check out, and then I drive over the same route to get to
LAX.
After
packing up and checking out, I cruised up PCH, and went over some of the same
sections of road we were on earlier in the week. Some of this section I
also remembered from the September visit too. I like the feel of the Sunset Beach
and Seal Beach
areas, and would certainly like to come back here on my own time, when I’d have
the opportunity to explore. There were a number of establishments which I
thought would be worth checking out. Considering how filling my breakfast
had been (not very), I wanted to find someplace where I could get a decent
breakfast reasonable quickly. I opted for the first Denny’s I could find,
as I knew I could get something protein-heavy without being bready or greasy
(unlike most breakfast places).
It was a
half-hour well spent, and I’d left early enough with that in mind, so I
wouldn’t be late for the last meeting with Evert. I passed the Los Alamitos Traffic Circle
again to continue on PCH, and went past the “Out of the Closet” place I’d
laughed at earlier. Traffic was still too thick to allow me to snap a
shot of it. PCH is a pretty nice artery, and goes all the way up to LAX,
so on future visits I wonder if I could make this my main route (so I could
avoid the 405).
Once I
crossed the Los Angeles River , I came into the Wilmington
section of Long Beach .
Yeah, not the prettiest place at all. This was certainly driving through
the hood. I paid more attention, because I didn’t want to stop here for
any reason. Glad I’d had breakfast earlier. PCH was nice prior to
that, and then once I crossed the 110, it became nicer again. I was
looking a golf courses and middle-class neighborhoods. Ah, welcome to Harbor City
and Lomita .
Figure if you travel far enough on any road you’ll pass both good and bad
areas. To me, that was more part of the experience.
Interesting
with my Garmin, it had me turn off PCH on to a side street which brought me to
Lomita Blvd once I’d hit the city of Torrance, and directed me to Hawthorne
Blvd for my destination. My handy-dandy trusty paper map showed me I
could’ve stayed on PCH as it would’ve crossed Hawthorne Blvd. I guess Garmin
would rather have me see the Crossroads Shopping Complex and Torrance Medical
Center , as opposed to going past the Torrance Airport
After the
meeting was done, and I had to boogie to the airport, it would’ve been nice to
continue up PCH to pass through Redondo Beach
and Manhattan Beach .
But Garmin was set to “fastest route” and decided to bring me north to the Lawndale , so I could pick
up the 405. Downtown Torrance and Lawndale were pretty nice
areas with a lot of shopping plazas. Not too many gas stations, and I
needed to locate one to top of the rental before bringing it back.
Interstate 405 was extremely slow due to a disabled vehicle in the center lane,
but once I was around that, I made good time to LAX. The area around LAX
has never been the most-inviting looking. I don’t know if the airport was
built in the crappy section of the city, or the crappy section just sprang up
around it. I’m sure housing is very cheap when you’re only blocks away
from an international airport which runs 24/7.
With the
rental dropped off, I took the shuttle from the rental agency to the
airport. LAX is huge, and there were a lot of lines for checking baggage
and getting through security, but things seemed to move at a pretty decent
rate. After the mandatory pat-down by TSA, I was able to hang out in the
airport lounge and respond to some emails before it was time to board the plane.
The flight back was fine, although the couple next to me wasn’t very
talkative. We arrived in Austin
on time, and it was only a short time later I’d retrieved both my luggage and
my car. Guess what, it was about 7 pm, and I was hungry. I’d
nibbled on the last of my Kashi bars while in the airport, but I needed
something of substance for dinner.
Since
there was a Mighty Fine on the way home, and I’d been craving one before this
trip, that was my target. I left my suitcase sitting in the backseat, as
I knew no one was going to disturb it (and I could see where I parked from
inside). When it was my turn to order, I greatly amused the employees by
telling them I’d just come from the airport and since no one in Los Angeles could make a
good hamburger, that’s why I was coming here. I topped that off with a
milkshake, and considered that a close to the trip.
This was
different than my previous jaunt out there, because the first time all the
arrangements and the internary were made by my manager. This was all
me. The one-on-one interaction with my contact Evert was great, and we
built a great working relationship. It was nice that he’d offered to
drive me around, because it gave me the chance to observe the area, and learn
more things than if I’d driven solo. Subsequent trips will have a lot
more solo driving, but learning your way around an area (and having a
navigation unit) makes it a lot easier.
My plan
for following trips is to spend a morning or afternoon at a specific dealer, as
opposed to visiting them all again. That will allow me to be on site if
they need to utilize me, but I can also have a guaranteed connection to get my
own work down. That means once I’ve put in my “face time” and had an
early dinner, I’d have the remainder of the evenings to explore whichever areas
I was in. Since most of my localations are in the vicinity of Sunset Beach Riverside area for at least
one day next time, so they don’t feel left-out.
For more information on the places visited or mentioned:
Lomita (CA): http://www.lomita.com/cityhall/
Torrance (CA): http://www.torranceca.gov/
Redondo Beach (CA):
http://www.redondo.org/default.asp
Mighty
Fine: http://mightyfineburgers.com/
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