"How do you get to Sunset Zone 40? Take the Ventura Freeway to another
freeway until you get to the Slauson cutoff. Stop the car. Get out of your car.
Cut off your Slauson. Realize what a painful thing you did. Get back in
your car and travel until you come to ...the fork in the road."

Huh? Who made that up? I am not familiar enough with California geography to
get the joke. Sunset Zone 40 is a band of territory that runs east-northeast
from around western Ohio to New England, following the south shore of Lake Erie
and Lake Ontario. It begins several miles from the lakeshore. Sunset Zone 39 is
right on the lakes, primarily in USDA Zone 6. Sunset Zone 40 is primarily in
Zone 5. The original flora of the area was mixed forest, oaks, maples, pines
and assorted other trees & bushes. It is mostly too cold for rhododendrons and
fancy flowering trees. It gets a lot of rain and snow, but no earthquakes or
hurricanes. The summers can be buggy, but not too hot & humid. Gardening is a
challenge, but reasonably successful. The scenery is nice, but not spectacular.
It is well-known for drumlins & other glacier remnants. Plant aficionados who
do not ski have to grow indoors under lights in the winter in order to survive.
Iris,
Central NY, Zone 5a, Sunset Zone 40
"When you come to a fork in the road, take it." Yogi Berra