cafe oom hwy 17?

Chp have imitated “maximum enforcement” for the holiday weekend.
The Santa Cruz area Chp showed how one officer on the A shift wrote 34 tickets on his shift on Highway 17 yesterday

 

Going too fast on 17 is like getting drunk and stupid on New Years. Amateur hour.

Nothern California has so many great roads in so many areas driving on the highly enforced ones is just insanity. Unfortunately that includes most of them on the peninsula down to HMB.

 

Truth. Not sure how long it’s been since you’ve been here, but driving fast on 17 is almost impossible now. It takes an hour to get over the hill on most days.

There are so many beautiful backroads around here that can be enjoyed without the paranoia of LE. But as always, be safe. If you want to test the car’s limits, go to a track. OK, That’s my PSA. And if my teenage self were reading this he would tell his future me to pound sand. [emoji23]


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Weekdays. When I worked in Campbell I used to take test drives over the hill south from time to time if I wanted to just take a scenic drive. I never went near it when I needed to go fast. Then it was either 17N or 85. I've seen 150 on 85 in an F50. We had much better test drive areas in CoCo County.

 

Anyone have insight on whether 9 is as heavily patrolled as 17 these days?

 

This is just anecdotal but I was up there this weekend and didn't see any cops at all.

 

17 has a patrolled (or monitored) regularly because of all the accidents. Usually CHP around Lex and further up by the summit.

Hwy 9 is usually pretty good police-wise but it’s also heavily traveled on weekends and a lot of boy racers doing stupid s**t. I had some morons try and pass me in my Jeep on the cliff side shoulder in a lowered Honda something with a 20” diameter exhaust.

They almost died trying. I almost died laughing.

So just be patient. Try Redwood Gulch off HWY 9 down into Saratoga and Cupertino.

Or try down towards LG. I like the Mt Umunhum drive. Plenty of other roads besides the main ones.


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PS. Old Santa Cruz Hwy is still closed down by Lexington due to landslide. No ETA on that. But that's a nice twistie that can take you all the way to Santa Cruz from Lexington. Used to be a great way to bypass 17 if you don't mind the drive.

 

Or a great route (old santa cruz hway) when someone got in a horrible accident on the 17......been frustrated for sure as I work on the SJ side and live on the SC side. 8-(

 

Hwy 9 isn't patrolled much. But recently there is a new younger CHP that has been sitting up either at the look out or near it with his radar off. He got me in my M5 but was was looking for people going faster and just gave me a front plate ticket.

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That's about one ticket every 15 minutes! Bet that cop had writers cramp at the days end!

 

Growing up in Cupertino, I remember when HWY 17 over the hill did not have a center barrier and the speed limit was 70. This was in the early 70's, lots of nasty accidents, especially on the Valley Surprise turn where the highway is not properly banked. Saw one head-on right in front of us when I was about 12, a lady went through her windshield when another car swerved in her path.

 

Wow, a fellow Cupertinian! MVHS (‘84) for me.


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Way cool! OK, here is a blast from my past to shed some light on the early days in Cupertino, it was a grand little town!

My home was 10408 Portal Ave, my parents bought it new in 1962 for $17K. It sure was small town America when I lived there. Went to St Joseph's (for church and 4th and 5th grade). We rode our bikes on Saturdays to Stevens Creek Dam and caught huge trout in the creek below the dam. I worked at Stevens Music in Portal Plaza when I was 10 to 14 years old before we moved to Reno, that is where I learned to sell. People would come in to buy Yamaha piano's from 'The Boy Salesman', I had the managers sales pitch down stone cold at age 12. Evelyn the manager was my mentor, I always wanted to sell like she did.

I remember going to Toys R Us on Stevens Creek Blvd and the land across the street was a dirt field. We walked to Cupertino High from my home through the apricot orchards. The only high tech in that area IIRC was HP. When Valco Park shopping was started, the orchard where Sears was located (don't know what's there now) was cut down to the stumps during one week and everybody was invited to come and cut firewood! When sears was completed, their truck ramp was THE place to skateboard. Cali Brothers at Stevens Creek and Highway 9 was where we bought feed for our rabbits, I think Apple owns all of that now. There was a big grain tower that use to load trucks. Frontier Village was the place to have fun on the weekends and gas was $.35 a gallon, long gas lines and all with odd and even days for filling up.

I remember in the 6th grade the valley seemed to be so quiet. I was looking out the window from my desk one morning and saw a blast (and heard it well) up on the Permanente pit above Stevens Creek Dam. When driving got congested, I remember when Lockheed implemented being off at 3PM and 4PM to ease up congestion on HYW 280. I remember when the HWY 101 to the 280-interchange flyover was left dormant for a few years, all you saw was the two big sections of the highway standing there (what rock band in the 70's used that picture on their album cover?). Before the world went PC, I remember the Coppertone billboard with the little black poodle pulling the girl's swimsuit bottom up and down exposing her white bottom against a dark tan!

Eating out was a real treat as we were not 'rich' people, just basic kinda middle class. The epiphany was going to Fjord's, an all you can eat buffet on HWY 9. If dad had an extra dollar after dinner, he would treat us to a Baskin Robbin's ice cream next door after dinner. Almost across the street was a Shakey's pizza parlor. I played banjo there when I was 13-14 with the Peninsula Banjo Band along with my dad there on Wednesday nights. Bridge was my mom and dad's every Friday night past time where 12-16 players in their group rotated houses each week. I remember all of the hard-core alcoholics enjoying their time at the house, playing until about midnight. How any of them got home safe was a miracle!

Hope you and maybe others enjoyed the above!

 

Oh my, you made my eyes water a little. Yes, it was a small town. I went to St. Josephs for Catholic School (on Wednesday evenings and Sundays). Stevens Creek was a small two-lane country-road to get to Foothill. I lived behind BlackBerry Farms where we used to sneak in as kids or catch crawdads in the creek after school. And pedaling everywhere. Good, wholesome times. My Mom was Steve Job's exec assistant when they just started out. She hated him and still curses his name. But we were one of the first families with an Apple II.

It's not the same there anymore. Not anywhere close. It's a concrete jungle. Except maybe the back-roads around Stevens Creek Res. They just tore down Bateh Bros liquors on the corner of S.Cr and Foothill to make high-density housing. I have to pause when I drive through there these days just to explain to my kids what it was like back then.

 

Had a reputation for being very difficult.

 

Yes. This.


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Wow….
Driving home from work tonight on SB 17 towards Santa Cruz….

…..can’t tell if it’s real but in this area…?…..CA vanity plate “CA Spydr”
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I saw that in downtown LG once.


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I saw it in the spectator parking at the Hillsborough Concours yesterday. Sounded like it had a Chevy V8.

 

Ferris Bueler car maybe?


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