I-40 is an important east to west corridor here in the United States, and we get reminded of that time and again. For this trek, we’ll take 3 1/2 days to head for Monterey Bay. Since we’ll be on the freeway most of the journey, we will make the drive at a pace of 69.4mph. That means our 2012 mile journey will be broken into chunks of about 555 miles a day. Respectable!

DAY ONE (Friday)

High pressure remains in place over the Tennessee Value, and is going to stay there through tomorrow. A lee trough is going to start churning some navigational trouble for drivers on I-40 by late in the day tomorrow. At the southern base of the trough, expect some showers and maybe a storm to fire along the dry line from western Kansas into the Panhandle. This means that we could see a spot of rain anywhere from Oklahoma City west to Clinton, Oklahoma, where our day will conclude.

DAY TWO (Saturday)
Showers will linger overnight in Clinton, and there will be some residual clouds, mist and fog west to the Texas Panhandle, and even as far west as Shamrock, but from then on, we should be easy breezy. Amarillo to Albuquerque will be in the clear, and we will make it west to Prewitt, New Mexico, and cease driving for the day.

DAY THREE (Sunday)
This is going to be a weird thing to call out driving through Arizona, but we need to mind the tropics for this stage of the journey. Hurricane Polo, off the Mexican coast, is prognosticated to cycle back towards the Baja Peninsula. As it does that, expect the monsoonal flow to be enriched on Sunday, with an increased chance for showers around Williams, Arizona, south of the Grand Canyon, though the real threat will likely pick up after we are in California. The day will end in the desert east of Barstow, in Newberry Springs.

DAY FOUR
Polo is going to be a problem, but not for us. We can continue on westward towards the coast, unbothered by things like “weather”. Monterey Bay will be as fabulous as it ever is upon our long awaited arrival.