A killer drive home last night.  Four and a half hours after shooting like mad all day.  But we’re home and safe and I made it through work today.  All is well.  And the weather yesterday was full sun — giving me nearly 12 hours to shoot.  I did so well that we’ll be able to tackle Stockton and thereabouts next time.  But that won’t be til May.  In the meantime, I have loads of photos from this trip to add to the website.

I’m still wiped out — so let’s move straight to the photos.  From Gustine:

 

From Dos Palos — established, I believe, in 1966:

 

The Valley Bowl in Madera:

 

From Firebaugh:

 

Time for a little tribute to my traveling buds.   For you newcomers, my four dogs are present for each and every one of my roadtrips.  They are much calmer on Day #2.  Except for Gremlin (at the window) who’s always looking for something worthy of ear-piercing barking.  That’s Nik (Sputnik) and Fix in the foreground:

Griz (Griswold) has hopped on the dash a few times while I’m driving — like here.  It’s not a habit that I’m encouraging!  I think he’s just looking for sun-bathing opportunities.  Since this is not really a comfy place for that, I assume the practice will fade:

Since he’s so backlit in that photo, here’s a better shot of his face:

 

Onward!  From Madera — El Molino Mexican Imports (most likely not the original business name):

 

The top of the Cornaggia’s Bakery sign in Chowchilla.  From the plugged holes and amateurish paint job, this sign might have been really nice in the past.  Still cute enough now though:

 

The Century Bowl in Merced.   The bowling alley is long boarded up.   The “coming soon” illustration on the sign at the right shows a KFC, a gas station, a 24-hour restaurant — but not this gigantic sign.  Shoot it now, folks:

 

Also from Merced:

 

You may recall the Slumber Motel sign from Saturday night’s post.   Here’s the dayshot showing the atomic sign topper.  It was probably outlined with neon and flashed sequentially:

 

From Modesto — the Fraternal Order of Eagles Hall — with some very cool “mission style” architecture.  I don’t know if it was built for the Eagles:

 

Also Modesto — a repurposed Shakey’s sign:

Lastly, from Lathrop — this UFO has crash-landed on the roof of the Tower Mart gas station where I filled up for the long journey home:

 

The next mini roadtrip will be in two weeks.  It’ll be just a little jaunt to the L.A. area since I have an eye doc exam for Nik in Culver City.  I’ll be blogging again then.  Don’t forget to check out the other sampling of photos from this weekend over at Flickr:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/agilitynut/

Til then — happy Spring!

dj & the dogs