We would take Sunday drives up the coast, or to eat Italian Dinners in Occidental, or to Lake Berryessa for burgers, just driving the back roads in the old Datsun. Gas was so cheap then. I remember a sign in Forest Knolls that said $1.75 a gallon for several years–that was too high, by 25-50 cents. We’d get stuck somewhere and have to use our wits to get home.
Too far for AAA, sometimes. No credit card to speak of except for emergencies. So, we’d figure it out. Dumb Luck, sometimes.
We would check out old houses, beautiful properties left derelict, later to find they had burned to the ground, like this beauty, or mowed over for vineyards.





