magnus_drives
Member
- Joined
- Jul 5, 2021
- Messages
- 31
On Sunday I rented from U-Haul again and hit the road to Los Angeles.
The most cost-effective option was to rent the truck and trailer for a two-day round trip. I considered a one-way rental + flying home, but the one-way charge was considerably higher.
With the goal of minimizing mileage and time, I broke my usual rule and took I-5 instead of the 101.
Not much to see out here, just five hours of straight and mostly flat.
I took a break just before reaching the grapevine to fuel up and grab dinner. It's not an SF<>LA road trip without In-N-Out.
I picked up two thumbs-up along the journey - one from a GR86 driver, another from an FK8 CTR.
I finished up in Santa Monica, where I unloaded the car and street-parked the truck and trailer. My friend has secure parking and let me crash in his guest room.
G&K is open 8-5p weekdays, so I intended to get up early Monday, drive the last leg to Costa Mesa, and get there around 8a. Well...
Los Angeles just really isn't like that. I managed to nail the worst-possible traffic timing and sat on the 405 for about 90 minutes. I finally reached G&K a little before 9a. I like to imagine the Civic looking around and thinking... NOW where the hell am I? It spent the first half of its life in Japan, the second half in the UK, and now it's in an LA traffic jam.
G&K is basically the only game in town when it comes to bringing cars in California emissions compliance. I spotted an R32, R33, Ferrari 360, and BMW Z1. My R32 GTR came through here in 2019, though the process was handled by the importer when I purchased the car. This is my first time working directly with G&K.
I checked in the car with Eric. After taking down the vehicle info, he performed a general inspection around the car and under the hood, and told me that they'd need about 6-8 weeks to modify the car and take it through the California BAR certification process. I asked what they'd have to do to the car - "we'll need to put a US cat in it." And...? There was no more. We'll see when I get the car back. He told me that this will be the third 2000 model year CTR they've done.
I signed the paperwork, handed over a check, and left with an empty trailer. I worked from our LA office before hitting the road again to head home. To avoid traffic, Google routed me through downtown LA surface streets during rush hour. Top 5 most stressful drives of my life with the trailer on the back.
When I did finally reach I-5 - you guessed it, traffic. I guess nine lanes isn't enough - one more might fix it?
The highway cleared out once I got out of the metro LA area, but I did lose half an hour to a burned-out semi in the middle of nowhere.
Now I anxiously await the call that the car is ready for pickup. Stay tuned, we're inching closer to California plates...
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