50 degrees in two days

We are at the Elks Lodge in Monterey, California (map), overlooking the bay. It was 62° when we pulled in here yesterday afternoon. Considering it was around 114° when we left the desert Tuesday, that's a drop of over fifty degrees in a span of just two days.

The drive up the coast yesterday was similarly cool, with temperatures in the 60s to 70s, but climbing into the 90s as we transited the Salinas valley through Paso Robles and King City. We elected not to take the coast highway the whole way, as we had just done that in February, and it adds several hours (and a lot of work) to the drive. It turned out that 101 was also a lot of work, as ~30mph winds through the Salinas valley had me struggling to stay in my lane.

After we left the Santa Barbara Elks, we stopped immediately in an on-street space to test my repair to the satellite dish, and I am happy to report that replacing the BUC fixed our problem, and we are back on-line. I called to close our trouble ticket with our HughesNet VAR, and they agreed to allow me to ship the bad BUC back to them for recycling. I'll eat the shipping, but at least it won't end up in the landfill -- electronics are full of heavy metals and other environmental pollutants.

We will be here in Monterey tonight as well, visiting family in the area, before heading to Silicon Valley tomorrow. I expect we will be in the bay area about a week, unless we get called to a disaster first. The hurricane map is blank right now, but wildfires in the northwest or even here in California are a distinct possibility.

Photo by djking