I've heard the Honolulu 146 04/64 traffic in San Diego where the Otay Mountain repeater shares the same split. I've had opportunities to work San Diego to Santa Barbara on 146.52 with a 1 watt Standard HT fitted with a rubber duck antenna. It was neat to hear traffic from the space station when it was passing over San Franciso.
After moving to Idaho, I upgraded my license to Extra Class. That said, I'm hardly on the air anymore. By 1985 I had moved to principal operation on 2m packet. My wife and I work ARES, RACES and Animal Rescue Reserve assignments when needed.
I packed my radios up when I deployed after 9/11/01, and I'm just getting back to setting up a station. CW is a joy, but I REQUIRE a DSP filter to be able to copy. (and it's good I'm single, because the volume stays high). Hearing loss sucks when you are single, not so bad when married.
The nice thing about Amateur Radio is the niches we can find. Sad part is the low solar minimum.
That said, this weekend, I did hear Italy, Canada, lots of little former soviet countries, both US coasts, and copied the ARRL bulletin from Connecticut 10 over S9 with a G5RV up about 34 feet.
/johnny