Which Way to Millinocket?

Every day or so I seem to be reminding myself or Elly of the old Bert & I comedy sketch "Which Way to Millinocket?", in which the old New England saying "Can't get there from here" or "cahn't get theyah from heeah" originated.  You can listen to this classic bit below:

Out here in California, this New England saying often rings true.  The Pacific Ocean and the beaches are only 22 miles from where we live, as the crow flies. It takes a little over an hour to get there without any traffic.  There's a big mountain in the way, and you either have to go over or around it.  The  preferred route is around it!

Palm Springs is 45 miles away, again as the crow flies.  But again there is a mountain range in the way, so it takes 1 1/2 hours to get there.  Again the preferred way is around the mountains, not over them.  This is always the case here.  Mountain ranges or  mountains are always in the way of a straight road.  Even the hills which are often as big or bigger than Mt Wachusett in Massachusetts get in the way, and they are everywhere!  So you CAN get there from here, just not easily!

The other problem we seem to be having is getting used to the 4 lane roads that seem to be all over Southern California.  The main streets in any town are 4 lanes, usually with a median between them.  They widen to 6 lines to allow for 2 left hand turn lanes!  If West Boylson, Mass. was in California, Rt 12 would be like Rt 9 in Framingham around Shoppers World.  Even in a small towns like Murrieta, once you pull into a group of stores to buy something, you can't just pull out a go home the opposite way.  You have to find the right way out of the parking lot that enables you to cross traffic and head the other way.  All the parking lots are connected, so we find ourselves driving around parking lots a lot trying to find a way home thinking to ourselves that "we can't get there from here!."

Google Maps is wonderful on my Motorola Xoom, but a lot of road construction has outpaced the ability of Google to keep updated.  Following the Google maps voice to get on the highway, I get into the left lane to turn onto the on-ramp for I-15.  But, low and behold, the overpass was recently changed (long before we got here) and now the on on-ramp in on the right.  Now I am four lanes away (2 plus the 2 left hand turn lanes) from where I need to be and "I can't get there from here".  Needless to say, even with the Google Maps, we make a lot of wrong turns and backtracking.  As we learn the area better, we shouldn't have to rely on Google so much. Oh well, it's part of the adventure!