San Diego Trip - Missions - Day 3

After the second and last day of the Coastwalk Board Meeting, we left Sebastopol around noon for the the two south bay missions - San Jose and Santa Clara.

We arrived at the San Jose Mission around 2:00 PM which is actually in Fremont, adjacent to San Jose. Mission San Jose, the 14th Mission is the latest Mission to have its church restored. It was founded in 1797 and like many of the other Missions fell into neglect over the years. The restoration completed in 1985 cost over $5 million dollars and closely reesembles the Mission as it looked in 1809. It is also a working Catholic church seving the Fremont community.

Day 3 Pictures - San Jose Mission

The Mission at Santa Clara (Santa Clara de Asis) is the 8th Mission and is on the camapus of Santa Clara University, the first college of higher learning in California. The Mission was transferred to the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) in 1851by the Dominican Bishop who could no longer afford to maintain the Mission. Since then, Santa Clara University has become one of the top universities in the country. It has a full-time enrollment of about 5,000 students and tuition costs $35,000 per year with room and board another $11,000. It is a beautiful campus and a great school, but it looks like you either have to be very rich or very poor to go there, but in any case, I am sure you would have to be a good student to stay there.

Today, the Mission church serves as the student chapel and is the spiritual heart of the university. And again, like other Missions it has been rebuilt and restored over the years. There are however, some initial Mission walls remaining and the bell tower holds the original bells sent from Spain when the original Mission was constructed.

Day 3 Pictures - Santa Clara De Asis Mission

Arriving back at the RV Park around 6:00PM, we ate take-out BBQ in the RV and watched the rest of the Eagles-Cowboys game on TV. Not a good game, but the BBQ was good.

We break camp early tomorrow morning and head for Monterey with two Missions enroute (San Juan Batista and Santa Cruz) and another (Carmel) after we sent up camp at the Naval Post Graduate School RV Park in Monterey.

San Diego Trip - Missions - Day 2

Pat attended the first day of the Coastwalk Board Meeting in Sebastopol and Judy went shopping. After dropping Pat off at the meeting, Judy went to the factory outlet mall in Petaluma and bought a few more things for the upcoming cruise.

The meeting was over at 2:00 PM and we then traveled to San Rafael (:45 minute drive from Sebastopol) to tour the San Rafael Mission (San Rafael Arcangel- Mission 20). This Mission was originally established in 1812 as a sanitarium and hospital for people housed at the Mission in San Francisco. Due to its success, it was raised to full Mission status in 1817. The Mission chapel is a replica of the original chapel, rebuilt on the same site in 1949 by William Randolph Hearst after the original buildings were demolished in 1870 for firewood. It is adjacent to a large working Catholic Church and school with what appears to be a diverse ethnic congregation.

This evening, we went to the Coastwalk Executive Director’s house in Sebastopol for dinner with the Coastwalk Board of Directors.

The weather has been great so far and the itinerary timing worked O.K. Tomorrow will be a busy day with Day 2 of the Coastwalk Board meeting until noon then a road trip to San Jose and Santa Clara and back for two more missions.

Day 2 Pictures - San Rafael Arcangel Mission

San Diego Trip - Missions - Day 1

Well, we are on the road after a delayed start. The goal was to get going by 8:00 AM but it was 10:00 AM before we were ready to go. We then discovered we had an electrical connection problem with the towed VW – nothing too serious other than the brake lights and turn signals on the VW wouldn’t work when being towed.

We then went to the RV dealer in Sacramento where the tow package was installed. It was a connector problem and they were able to fix it, but it took another hour or so to install new connectors. We finally left Sacramento at 12:30 PM for Sonoma. We then stopped along the way at our first Mission – San Francisco Solano (Sonoma) – Mission 21.

This Mission was the nothernmost CA Mission and was established in 1823. It was the site of the "Bear Flag Revolt" and the effort to establish the CA Republic in 1846. The Mission is now part of the Sonoma State Historic Park. The present Mission Chapel was rebuilt in 1840 after the original building was destroyed in a storm.

We had a nice visit, then traveled to the RV Park in Rohnert Park, arriving about 4:30 PM. Due to the delays, we canceled the trip to the San Francisco Mission and met Kevin for dinner at Angelino’s Restaurant in Sausalito instead.

Day 1 Pictures - Sonoma Mission (San Francisco Solano) 

San Diego Trip - Day 0

We are going on a major road trip with the RV to San Diego and beyond on November 6, 2009.


Starting with a trip to Sebastopol for a Coastwalk Board meeting on November 7 -8, we will travel down the state, visiting each of the California Missions and arriving in San Diego on November 12th. Kevin and Phinneus will fly in to San Diego on November 14th and we will attend the San Diego Chargers/Philadelphia Eagles NFL game on Sunday, November 15th. After Kevin and Phinneus fly home on Monday, November 16th, we will depart on a 6-day cruise to Mexico, returning to San Diego on Saturday, November 21. If all goes well, we will then take two days to drive home in the RV, arriving on Sunday, November 22nd.


As we are also hosting Thanksgiving dinner for 20 family and friends the following Thursday, November 26th, it is going to be a busy November.


More to follow