Pick up enriched August paycheck, eventually pointing the car towards the equator on 680, past oak-studded Diablo Foothills,
east (where "Jesus Saves" on a hill -- a little hard to read at this angle) up
and down Altamont Pass and
south on 580 curving around the notorious Speedway,
connecting with I-5 beyond quixotic Corral Hollow,
in a violence of blues, browns, and greens near Buttonwillow,
to the Transverse Ranges, marred
scarred,
but still starred.
Up to Tejon,
over the Summit and below Gorman,
the route undulates above Pyramid Lake
and Piru
Canton Canyons,
then down the upstairs of Violin
to Castaic and
Valencia,
back up and
down
semi-Big-Cone-Douglas-Fir-clad Gavin,
to 210 before the Front Country of the San Fernando Valley.
One more ascending
sinuous,
canyonic
descent of the Verdugos,
leaving Sunland,
and Pasadena behind in the shadows of
Mt. Wilson,
the silhouettes of Baldy (Mt. San Antono),
Ontario and Cucamonga Peaks beckon,
into the darkness of Yucaipa, greeting John Browning and family,
then retiring in the palmy
moonlit night.
