Awaking in California, and getting back on the road to move deeper into
wine country – the first thing I see on the freeway is a California Highway
Patrol motorcycle officer, making a traffic stop. And he’s wearing riding breeches! CHIPS!
I’m headed toward Sonoma and Napa, and thinking I’ll have a late
breakfast in some poncey little wine-country bakery-café with unpasteurized
sheep’s cheese in quails’ eggs omelets with organically cultivated purslane. Curiously, despite this ambition, when I see
an El Torito bad-chain-Mexicali restaurant in a strip mall in Rohnert Park, I’m
seriously tempted. The first Mexican
restaurant my suburban-Boston hometown ever hosted (it was actually in the next
town over, by the entrance to the interstate) was an El Torito. Ah, memories.
Despite the beauty of the day, blue skies and sunshine again, I
consider closing the sunroof. There is a
strong aroma of fertilizer abroad. And
when I say ‘aroma,’ I mean ‘stench.’ And
when I say ‘fertilizer,’ I mean the non-chemical kind. You get that, right? Little Macy is right when she says cows’ poo
smells bad. Plus, the 18-wheeler in
front of me, which seems to be loaded with grapes in an open container, is
screeching in agony every time it brakes, and on the side streets I’m hoping to
find bursting with poncey little breakfast shops, there are many, many
opportunities to brake. But my hardy
Yankee heritage wins out, as it so often does, and the sunroof remains
open. Yes, I am a tough guy.
I find a semi-poncey roadhouse with chickens’ eggs and a choice of
Swiss or cheddar. Breakfast is
excellent, for which hunger is at least partly to thank. This is not a great restaurant. Then it’s back on the road to San
Rafael. On the way, I see a cement mixer
with a bright orange, revolving tank painted with the San Francisco Giants’
logo. My nephew is a big Giants fan (his
dad’s fault; the good side of the family pretty much goes Red Sox), and if he
were still five and into trucks, I would have followed that machine until I
could take a photo for him.
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| Retirement living in Marin County |
My dad lives in San Rafael, at 89 qualifying for an apartment in an
active retirement community. One of the
places he is most active is at the breakfast table. A night owl, he doesn’t wake up until about
noon, so he’s ready to eat when I arrive.
His first choice isn’t open on weekends, but his far-distant second
choice is an unexpected delight. They
stop serving at 2:00pm on weekends, and we arrive at 2:05 – but the owner
invites us to order anything anyway, as the cooks haven’t cleaned up yet. Dad spots eggs benedict on the menu, learns
there are no more English muffins, and declines eggs benedict on toast. He settles for scrambled eggs, sausages, home
fries, two thick slices of house-made toast and two cups of high-test. He does not finish all the potatoes. That’s right, folks: 89, and this is his standard breakfast. So we’re both thrilled with Eduardo’s – that owner
is so nice – and Dad vows to return
for those eggs benedict another day.
Probably tomorrow.
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| When I asked Dad whether he still notices the impressive views from his home, he talked about the architecture. He doesn't think highly of it. "But the HILLS," I said. |
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| View from traffic jam |
I get more quality family time, with Dad and his wife, in the afternoon
and evening, but press on south at night.
On Day 21, I awake in Redwood City, just east of Half Moon Bay, and with a convenient
Jiffy Lube where I can change the oil three weeks after the car’s last oil
change. Since I do most of my driving on
weekdays, in the middle of the day, I am currently spoiled rotten, and it does
not occur to me that driving to the coast – driving to a renowned coastal
resort town just south of the Bay Area’s many cities – on a bright, sunny
Sunday is more or less insane. The 13
miles of two-lane (one in each direction) Route 92 take about 90 minutes; a
solid line of cars pointed west is literally parked at frequent intervals. Two cars ahead of me, driver and passenger
both get out, stretch a bit, and change sides at a stroll, and no one in the
line cares at all. They are not slowing
us down. In my notes I wrote, “The
back-up is so bad it must be something more than volume,” but it’s not.
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| Closer to ocean - note cars on switchback, center right |
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| And closer still |
Fortunately, the view from the jam is lovely and soothing. Watching the various greens – dark green and
shaggy trees and shrubs in the drier parts; puffy and mid-greens near water – I
am unconcerned by the sight of the road ahead, switchbacking downhill with cars
creeping along, at about eight miles per hour, on every inch. The smell is also soothing. I think it includes ocean scents, but I may
be deluding myself; there’s certainly eucalyptus and the cedar-y smell of the
redwoods, and more. There’s something in
the mix, or maybe a combination of somethings, that smells like cloves.
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| Yard art, but not my yard, thank you. |
Finally I am past the pumpkin patches and landscape-art stores of Half
Moon Bay, and headed south on Route
One, with ocean on my right and marshes on my left, exuding their muddy,
low-tide stench.
The ocean is calmer than the Oregon one, but still keeps changing colors
constantly according to cloud formations and the angle from which I see it as
the sun strikes it, or doesn’t quite.
One moment it’s a cloudy indigo green (that’s a real color; it is);
another it’s as blue and glittering as a star sapphire in a sterling
mount. I am wondering whether the ocean
is more beautiful seen from this small distance, and low height, than it is
when I’m on foot right there on the beach.
I think not, eventually; both perspectives are beautiful, though very
different.
Route One seems less touristic than 101 did in Oregon. The small towns along the road have more
going on than serving vacationers. For
instance, several of them are clearly heavily engaged in serving surfers, who
may be nomadic but also bring a sense of permanence, as a culture, that I don’t
feel with the tourist population. Santa
Cruz is one of the bigger towns on my way, and a handy place to fill up with
gas. Since I’m stopped anyway, I get a
sandwich at a bagel place and then head out of town – making a dramatic swerve
when I see a sign for a chocolate shop boasting it was selected by National
Geographic as one of the ten best
in the world. Richard Donnelly himself is staffing the
shop, and we talk about La Maison du Chocolat, where he trained, and other
makers (did you know LMdC is owned by Valhrona?) as he plies me with
samples. The cardamom is excellent. I buy an ice cream sandwich concoction that
would be better for a trip to Moorenko’s. I think pretty much everything would be better
for a trip to Moorenko’s.
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| This is just south of Carmel. |
Past Santa Cruz, the view changes from ocean and beach towns to cultivated
fields. These aren’t, mostly, the corn
and soy fields I’ve seen in the midwest and Washington; these crops are lower
and bushier, and mostly green of various shades. There’s an enormous field of something
cruciferous growing right next to the ocean, and I suspect most of what I’m
seeing are table-vegetable crops. In
Monterey the farm stands start: kiwi or
avocado, ten for a dollar; artichokes, too.
Oh, imagine paying a dime for the avocado that costs you two bucks on
the east coast.
And glory, I do love how it smells around here. Except, of course, when it smells like a very
wet seal with a digestive disorder writhing in the mud of low tide, as for
example around the Big Sur area. That
may not be Big Sur, though, but the nearby Esalen Institute, home of Gestalt
therapy, which many people think stinks.
I am feeling pretty good about my own ability to maximize my human potentiality,
so I keep driving.
I’m generally quite happy to keep driving today. The road is interesting; the twists and turns
keep me engaged with steering and the small towns require plenty of shifting as
speed limits drop and drop again. And
the scenery is varied, and I’m always wondering what might come next, and I’m
actually quite curious about what is causing this filmy schmutz that is coating
my windshield. Could it be salt spray?
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| About 7,500 seals live here at least part of the year. |
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| This guy looks like the dragon/worm of the movie The Lair of the White Worm, a very peculiar campy/ funny/sexually-bizarre/really bad Ken Russell movie. |
And then... there’s a sign about seals on the beach up ahead, and I am
quite, quite happy to pull over, slide into a parking spot and leap from the
car into the gloaming (it’s been getting cloudy and cool for a while, and now
the sun is getting serious about setting, too) with my camera in one hand and
the telephoto lens in a pocket, and rush to the walkway that makes it easy to
look over scores of elephant seals on the sand.
They are awkward and weird looking here, not the sleek creatures they seem
to be in the pool at the aquarium, but wonderful. A little boy walking up the boardwalk catches
my eye; we’re both grinning. “Whaddaya
think?” I ask, and he answers, “Pretty cool.”
“Pretty stinky,” I say; “Yeah!” “And
really loud.” “Yeah, really loud.” “But great.”
“Yeah, really great.”
There are a ton more seal pictures here, plus a video. Please forgive the peculiar few seconds at both beginning and end of the video. I think it's the first one I've made with this camera.
Once it’s dark the seals get even spookier, and then back on the
highway there’s a sign advertising scarecrows.
It has an arrow, pointing west, toward a clump of palm trees that look
like scarecrows. Their trunks are long
sticks, topped with old palms that curl down and in to form a kind of
stuffed-pillowcase ball, topped with the spiky hairdo of new palms sticking out
and up. I don’t know that they’d scare
any known bird, though. I reflect happily that as much as I enjoy seeing elk, or deer, or moose, at least with seals I needn't be afraid I might run into one on the highway.
I get a bit of a scare when a pick-up truck high beams me from behind
while I’m passing an 18-wheeler. I pull
back into the travel lane as soon as I can, and the pick-up passes me, moving
briskly. About 15 minutes later I see it
pulled over to the side of the road, in the company of a police vehicle with
its blue lights flashing. Oh, dear.
There’s a tiny bit of sunlight still left, off to the west, as I pull
off at Santa Barbara. It is backlighting
the hills. How kind of it.
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