Travelling the West Coast

The next two days will see us in the car for 570klms, stopping overnight at Monterey and then at Santa Barbara. The third day will see us drive another 350klms into San Diego where we will stop and rest for three days. Knowing we were travelling significant distances for the remainder of our trip, Dick Johnson decided to upgrade our moderate SUV into a BIG SUV; more legroom and more space for additional baggage. The TAHOE is a very BIG American car.

En-route, Bear Grylls thought it would be good after the Tour de Sausalito, for our legs to go on a hike through a National Park to see some of the biggest sequoia trees in existence. "Yes, " we all say compliantly knowing that he was the driver and we had little to no choice. Limping and heaving our heavy legs into the car, we let Mr Grylls be our adventure guide for the day. And what an adventure it was. We left the highways and headed into the windy, narrow roads of the Big Basin Redwoods State Park in our big TAHOE, thus the roads became very narrow, but what a drive. Naturally, on such a drive there is a need for the restrooms, and as you could imagine there is not much in a state park. However, we did come across a small corner shop with some outdoor toilets, which were essentially a hole into a plastic container ...... needless to say 'when you need to go, you just have to go into whatever is presented to you'. Miranda was so horrified that she went in and promptly came out and ran back to the shop to tell Bear Grylls, who replied with a simple "it's the middle of nowhere, what do you expect?"

Further along and over some even more windy and narrow roads, we made our way to the Rangers Headquarters and the place where all of the trails began. With some lunch in our bellies, we braced ourselves (and rubbed our legs) for the big hike .... thankfully it was only 30mins and very flat; the trees were impressive. As we walked we predicted the tallest trees could be at least 4 telephone posts high; we discovered that the 'Father of Forrest' stood 76.2mts tall (250feet). Suffice to say we ALL felt very small. Its circumference at ground level was 20.35mts (66ft 9in) -> a very impressive tree. To think, if we were able to get to Yosemite State Park, we would have been able to drive through two trees .... yes drive through!! It was a great adventure and well worth the tiny walk.

Monterey is (perhaps at this time of the year) a sleepy coastal town of

28,300 people which has its version of Fisherman's Wharf and a great little inlet beach. After our motel check-in, we gathered our bearings and realised we were in very close reach of the beach and park areas. So back into the car, with Grant Kenny donning his thongs in pursuit of sand between his toes, we drove to the little beach and enjoyed the setting sunshine and a wander around the Wharf. Obviously, at this time of the year, there aren't many tourists which meant that the wharf was literally empty with the many restaurants having their staff standing out the front asking us to come inside to eat. Instead, there were many locals/tourists running and running, literally, everywhere we looked there were people in pairs or groups running.

There was one restaurant at the wharf that proudly posted a sign at its door that said children make too much noise and are disruptive to our clients, so they are not welcome!!! Hmmm!! After doing a little shopping for breakfast and lunch, we headed to a little restaurant called 'Buffalo Wings', which for the sporting enthusiast is Heaven. We entered in anticipation of yummy wings (which we did in fact enjoy) to find it was half price Tuesday, Happy hour and there were four walls of high definition televisions with an array of different sporting events being played live or replayed. Also, the music was as loud as nightclub music, AND the girls were given min iPads to 'play with' rather than the usual crayon packet and paper with naughts and crosses. It appeared that I was the only one not catered for .... so I had a Carona and enjoyed the College Basketball on TV.

We left sleepy Monterey after a play in the big park called "Dennis the Menace Park" (which was closed yesterday for maintenance) while Peter purchased coffee as Peets Tea & Coffeehouse. The park was established in 1956, and is clearly an iconic attraction for tourists and locals; there were more people at the park this morning than at the wharf yesterday. An enjoyable morning, ready for our 4hour travel day.

Further along the coast, the temperature warmed significantly and the landscape changed to flat, open planes existing between two mountain ranges. They tend to grow berries of some kind; we think strawberries in large open fields much like we would grow wheat in Australia. So as we left Monterey we thought we were driving to Dalby, except for the strawberries (& the hills). We made it to Pismo Beach for lunch, and with some skilful use of brown paper bags, ice held in lunch bags we were able to transport roast chicken, cheese, salad and wraps to make a quick lunch in the back of the big car.

We arrived in Santa Barbara, and it was certainly sunny and warm. We checked into our downstairs room which meant the girls could walk straight throughout onto the grassed area and the pool. After a little test of the water, the pool was slightly heated and having the outside temperature in the 20's; it was a clear sign to the girls that they needed to swim. So our plans of unpacking and hopping back into the car to get to the beach and have an explore were halted and the girls donned shorts and T-shirts and jumped in. I, on the other hand, found a treadmill while Peter was Mr Lifeguard. By the time I jumped in, the girls had found the spa.

After a comfy evening watching "The Princess Bride" on DVD borrowed from reception, we decided to drive to the beach for breakfast. We stopped at what is considered Santa Barbara's main beach called 'East Beach'. While I prepared brekky in the Tahoe, Peter & the girls began to explore the beach and promptly returned saying we were getting back in the car and driving down further. Apparently, the beach itself was littered with rubbish and homeless people. So 800mts further south on the same beach, we found a cleaner section. While the ocean is blue, the sand isn't the crisp white colour we are used to - Yeppoon and Coolum are just beautiful. Looking out past the few boats in the inlet, we counted at least eight oil rigs, and Peter discovered that 45 years ago there was a catastrophic oil spill which is most probably still in the sand today, thus the colour. No one was swimming or even paddling; Miranda and Hayley even made a comment about how lucky we are in Australia. Mind you this is only one beach.

Our trip took us further south through LA; we entered a bubble of smog and a myriad of traffic. At 2pm, who would have thought the traffic was going to be busy .... well this afternoon it clearly was. We had planned to stop at about half way of our three-hour trip; however and unfortunately this wasn't going to be the case. There was so much traffic getting off and onto the freeway that we figured it was easier to keep going. So Dick Johnson powered onwards, and we made it to our new resort in San Diego.

Here, the girls discovered another pool, a tennis court and a beach area. We are located in the Bay Area of Mission Beach, which means our little balcony opens to a beautiful ocean view with some yachts and little boats. Thanks to great planning by our illustrious tour guide, our room has a little kitchen, so with a trip to the shops, it was back home to a pork chop & salad dinner, followed by ice cream. The plan for the next few days is to get to the San Diego Zoo then have a rest and laze around this resort before heading to Anaheim and our final destination of Disneyland.