Monday, March 8,
2010
San Simeon to San Francisco
Good morning,
world!
Following a meager breakfast of toast and jelly,
coffee, and orange juice, we left the Days Inn at 9:00
a.m.
Since we finished our drive in the dark last night, we
backtracked about seven miles this morning to take in a
few sites we missed. Originally, we'd intended to
return north on the Pacific Coast Highway all the way
to San Francisco, but we didn’t want to get delayed for
hours at the rockslide again.
Southern Big
Sur
San Simeon sits beneath Hearst Castle, William
Randolph Hearst’s 90,080-square-foot hilltop retreat,
built beginning in 1919 and continuing through Hearst’s
death in 1947. Prioritizing our limited time, we didn’t
take a tour of the place. We live only a couple of
hours from America’s largest home, the Biltmore, in
Asheville, North Carolina, and we haven’t made it there
yet either. Anyway, the Hearst Castle looks pretty
spectacular from the outside, and you can’t beat their
view.
Hearst
Castle
Our main reason for backtracking was to see the
elephant seal rookery at Piedras Blancas. Seals are
good guys! You can view the seals from a bluff above
the beach. There were hundreds of them!
Baby seal
Play
time!
After taking an excessive number of photos at the
rookery, we drove again to the south, turned east on
the 46 just past Cambria, and headed for the 101 north.
The 46 weaves through beautiful green hills and
vineyards. We passed a number of wineries but didn’t
stop. After all, it wasn’t even lunchtime yet. Plus,
someone had to drive!
The verdant hills of
the Santa Lucia Range
We eventually stopped for lunch at Taco Bravo in
King City. Their grilled beef quesadillas and excellent
salsa washed the flavor of last night’s “Mexican”
dinner out off our mouths.
From the 101 we turned west on the 68 to Monterrey,
where we took the scenic “17-Mile Drive” along Pebble
Beach and Del Monte Forest, where the rich folks golf
and live. It seems like a poor location for a golf
course, on a peninsula jutting into the Pacific Ocean,
frequently battered by strong winds. The owners of this
private drive are very proud of their 9.6-mile-long
"17-Mile Drive" and charge $9.25 per vehicle for
access.
Jana and Tom on the
Monterrey Penninsula
Pacific coastline
from Cypress Point Lookout
Continuing north on the Pacific Coast Highway
(Highway 1), we stopped at Scott Creek Beach, north of
Santa Cruz, to watch some kitesurfing, a much more
reliable pastime in the coastal wind than golf, and
bound to be more fun! I found out later that this is a
nude beach. Darn the chilly afternoon!
Kitesurfers at Scott
Creek Beach
Pigeon Point
Lighthouse
South of Half Moon Bay we drove through some
rain, but consequently then enjoyed some great
rainbows!
Nice!
At 6:30 we returned our car to Enterprise at the
San Francisco Airport. We’d driven 528 miles on our
two-day road trip.
We caught a BART train to San Francisco and got off at
the Embarcadero stop. Since we hadn’t yet figured out
the city’s public transportation, we then caught a taxi
to our hotel, the Best Western Tuscan Inn at
Fisherman’s Warf.
Too tired to explore, and with the concierge gone for
the night, we ordered in a pizza from Gino’s Pizza and
had dinner and cocktails in our room.
Tom Goetz's
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