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| big sur |
| one day in february (2001), i think, i was supposed to go sailing, but the winds and the tides and the weather were just not cooperating. still, i felt like i needed to get out of the city for a day, so i decided to take a road trip to big sur. i took off around 10 in the morning, leaving a foggy and damp san francisco (what else is new), but once i got through to pacifica and south, the clouds broke and it became a beautiful sunny day... it was my first trip south along the coast, so i just took my time and stopped to look at the view in a few places. i stopped in santa cruz on the way down for some coffee, and found a great biking / running trail along the water i would recommend to anyone. then i kept driving south, through artichoke country. it never occurred to me where artichokes were grown before, or that the center of artichoke country could be practically in my back yard... but there you have it. |
| i stopped in monterrey for lunch, having heard that it was really a nice place... i found it okay, but with just a cutesy little town with all the places like jamba juice and starbucks that i can find in the city anyway. and it was very pink. i skipped all of the tourist stuff, like the aquarium and all, since i was headed on to other things. next i went on down to big sur. driving and driving and wondering when i was going to get there... and not even really sure what i was looking for. what, look at a map or even postcards pictures? nah. i figured if i just stayed on route 1 i would get there eventually. which i did. and it was amazing. not so much the actual big sur itself, but the whole drive along twisting roads, where you could just plunge hundreds of feet into the ocean if you weren't paying attention. while at the same time, on the other side of you the hills keep rising above you for hundreds more feet. it actually seemed kind of desolate when i got there, way out in the middle of nowhere. it had gotten foggy again, and started misting a bit, adding to the whole atmosphere. |
| it looked like there were a bunch of trails that i would like to go back and hike around... put that on the agenda... although i'm not sure i will make it back there until i have a visitor who is just dying to see it. its a long drive. on the way back i stopped at a mission - the first one i had been to in california. it was sort of interesting, with all of the devotional things they used, and a cell all done up like it would have been back then. but it made me realize (again) how localized our education is when we are growing up. i could tell you a million facts about the pilgrims and the revolutionary war, but not a thing about the settling of california. oh well. put learning about that on the agenda too.... |
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