Sacramento

It has been over two months since I arrived home from my double transatlantic adventure. But who is counting….. and even longer since George and I took a weekend away. So, after warning all the kids (and making sure that Noah was going to be mostly home over the weekend so that the house wasn’t empty) we took all of ten minutes to load up the car and head out of town.

It has been years since either of us had been to Sacramento. Me? Visiting my friend Ruth, fellow knitter who has since relocated; George, I think from Law School days while working on environmental legislation. But I could be wrong on either. I know that it is a stop on the Amtrak transcontinental route – so there many have been a few more pass throughs in the middle of  the night.

In any case, I hadn’t ever visited the old historic part of the town or the California State Railroad Museum.  Our first stop (not counting picking up lattes from Pete’s down the hill from our house on the way out of town) was the hotel where we had planned on leaving the car before walking along the river to old town. From there it was. the Sacramento Historical Museum. It is bright, well laid out and provides background beyond just what was local.

for example, the exhibit on the old Sacramento newspaper also featured information on the presses and developing of printing.

The section on the Gold Rush included a clear topographical map with rivers, camps, towns

and the historical section also included a model of a map we saw at the Bancroft Library’s map exhibit when one cartographer was sure that California’s coast was partially formed by an rather large island –

and then there is the historical clothing –

which I would love to have/make but have no real reason to invest the time or effort. It is not exactly like I spend anytime dressing up anymore…

From there we headed to the Railroad Museum which is well worth the trip in and of itself. The history of the transcontinental railroad is well spelled out in the exhibits including frankness on the use (and abuse) of the imported Chinese labor force, the challenges of the environment, and the social changes that took place once travel and goods movement across the country could be accomplished more easily.

A discussion of the construction of the last tunnel through the Sierra’s complete with models

reminded me of my several journeys through that tunnel and looking out over the Colorado River…

There were a couple of cars you could walk through –

and an extensive section on model trains which included layouts, examples of all the common gauges and lots of encouragement to join in the hobby.

From there, we walked along the river, over the Tower Bridge built in the 1930s and features a section in the middle which can be raised in order to let through river traffic.

It is only from the river that you can really see the section of Sacramento that was raised after major flooding

unless you want to take a tour of ‘under the city” which we elected to not do.