DAY SIXTEEN – SACRAMENTO, CA TO SAN FRANCISCO, CA

Last night we stayed at a Comfort Inn right outside Sacramento, across the street from the hospital in an area actually called Medi Park. What I’ve come to learn is that if you’re going to travel through real towns, you can’t always be a Hilton person… even though I absolutely am. Sometimes you have to be a different kind of hotel person. Last year I leaned into Choice Hotels because Moab had a Comfort Inn, and if I took out their credit card I basically earned five nights for free. Between Moab, Kanab, and one other stop, we stayed for free five of our 16 nights. The same logic applied to Sacramento. I could have paid a fortune for a Curio or Tapestry Hilton downtown… or stayed at a steamboat‑themed boutique hotel with no secure parking… or I could stay here, beside a hospital, quiet and safe. So, I picked this one. They even upgraded my room, and we slept like babies.

It was a nice neighborhood zoo, small but charming, and they had a quiet little sensory garden which I love seeing for those who need it.

The red panda habitat was surprisingly good… maybe even a little better than the one at the Columbus Zoo, and I think it was bigger. Red pandas aren’t in a lot of zoos, so anytime I see one it feels like a gift. The only thing I love more than a red panda is a hippo.

I also liked their train ride; it wasn’t on a track, just free‑roaming around the grounds, which was kind of fun and different.

There were of course other animals and even heard the lion roar a bit which I had not happen before… it’s impressive.

It was another one of those zoos that scatter dinosaurs everywhere, which I personally dislike, even though I understand the educational angle of linking prehistoric animals to modern species. We lasted about forty‑five minutes and then got back in the car to make our final descent into San Francisco. By 10:15, we were officially back on the Lincoln Highway.

The drive time today was three hours, and when I planned the trip I doubled everything because of back roads, so by about 2:30 I started getting nervous about making our dinner reservation. We settled on quick stops only — just enough time to grab pictures of the last few Lincoln Highway markers before pushing on. One of the best ones was at a park in the little city of Gould, Derrick Tower Center at shopping center called Lincoln Center in Lincoln Village, a small tribute outside of a Holiday Inn in Lathrope,

But our true mission of the day was lunch. Or as I like to call it… the mothership. In‑N‑Out Burger. We got our traditional order: Hunter’s Double‑Double, and my Double‑Double animal style and protein style with fries. As per my Official California Field Guid, Joe, I should have ordered them well done instead of double fried, because she had no idea what I meant… even though I’ve always ordered double‑fried fries. I have learned my lesson. Everything was delicious nonetheless. And yes, I will have the same lunch tomorrow. I would have had it yesterday as well, but it was too late when we finally passed one.

We continued on through Altamont Pass, which has one of the largest and oldest wind farms in the country. It was once the largest in the United States in the 1980s, but newer wind farms in Texas have surpassed it. Still, it is an iconic sight. I asked Hunter to get one really up close… you get what you get, and you don’t get upset!

We came upon Duarte Garage, which I had all but forgotten about. They were supposedly turning it into an official museum, but it was — you guessed it… closed or maybe never opened? And I didn’t even realize there was a front entrance until we passed it, which meant I had to loop around, slip into a private community, and park in a numbered spot just to get the picture. Nothing says Lincoln Highway pilgrimage like one last trespassing‑adjacent photograph.

Our next stop was a detour at Bell Plastics, which has nothing to do with the Lincoln Highway but everything to do with Route 66. They save old Muffler Men and even create new ones. They also have a toy museum, which we didn’t go into because we simply didn’t have the time. The owner was incredibly kind — the kind of roadside‑legend energy you hope for but never expect. He walked us through the Muffler Men in the parking lot, then brought us inside to see the offices and some of the pieces they were restoring. He showed us hundred‑year‑old bells people had dropped off, a carved ship figurehead, and a tapestry that looked Buddhist. They had just built a huge Muffler Woman and were keeping her, and they’d refurbished another one that was headed to Connecticut. They’re doing amazing work preserving these roadside icons, and it felt like stumbling into a little workshop of American folklore.

Then it was a full scramble to get to San Francisco. It was already four o’clock, and I genuinely do not know where the entire day went. A drive that was supposed to be three hours — even six, if I doubled it for back roads — somehow became ten and a half hours. I have no explanation other than traffic. That’s all I have. Traffic. By 4:30 in the afternoon, sitting at a red light in Oakland, I was sincerely worried we wouldn’t make our seven‑o’clock dinner reservation. We crossed the Bay Bridge and finally wound our way through the streets of San Francisco, in and out of the Presidio, and set the car in Lincoln Park in front of the Legion of Honor to finally lay our eyes upon the western terminus of the Lincoln Highway. I don’t have to describe Hunter’s reaction — you can watch it.

And my reaction… I’ve done a bunch of road trips now, and I don’t think I’ve ever felt more accomplished than this. I drove clear across the country and not on highways. Most of the time not even on secondary roads. I would say at least sixty percent of this drive was done on tertiary roads. And I promise you this is the last time I will ever do such a thing.

My original plan had been simple: go to the terminus, do a little victory drive down Lombard Street, head to the hotel, get refreshed, change, and then go to dinner in a Lyft. I did not intend on racing to dinner. There is no world in which I expected it to take ten and a half hours to get from Sacramento to San Francisco. Even doubling the time, it should have taken six hours. I cannot explain why it took ten and a half.

We headed to North Beach because it looked really cool in all my research. Fior d’Italia is the oldest continuously operating Italian restaurant in America, having opened in 1886, and it felt perfect for the end of our Lincoln Highway trip. I called the restaurant as we were leaving Lincoln Park because we were going to be late, and they assured me it wasn’t a problem. We walked in at 7:15 and were greeted with a “welcome home.” It was really nice.

And then it went downhill. I think I had the worst waiter in the world… completely inattentive. It took half an hour just to place our order. Hunter got tagliatelle Bolognese. It was fine. I tasted the sauce. It wasn’t bad. But the spaghetti sauce in Ely, Nevada was sooooooooooooooooo much better. I got Coniglio ai Funghi con Polenta — rabbit braised in wine and wild mushroom sauce. I added salt. That is all I will say. Remember that burger in Omaha? Now that’s braising something in wine! Oh, I guess that’s all I will say.

It took forever to get the check. All I wanted was to get to the hotel. And when the check finally came, he had added a party‑of‑six charge. He apologized. He said he went to bed at two and meant to hit two. Which would have been fine if he had not already been terrible.