Sacramento really is a town of distinct haves (downtown and the area and have nots – cheap motels off freeway…) so in the area of the have not’s we decided to have breakfast. I made a decision to get breakfast – lovely McDonalds all have one level of service and same food- tea and coffee etc. Not this one. The experience was perhaps the worst possible service in a McDonalds I have ever had. Los Idiotos centrallos. I only wanted tea with Milk and not coffee creamer…but instead there was a really pathetic attitude of on no, surely not, milk etc.. etc.. I had words and frankly we haven’t been back to a McDonalds since! So if any McDonalds executive might happen upon this page, read it and weep, your restaurant in Sacramento Stockton Blvd sucks, with the very worst of the service I have experience so far around the world, you might even want to consider retracting their franchise. Long live Starbucks and the attitude of if isn’t right, we’ll make it right!
So anyway, on the road again towards Yosemite, the car climbing slowly up the hills from the fairly mundane flats. Driving through the flats through are hundreds of door sales for the various fruit farms there what treats at such low prices! $3 for 1kg of cherries, makes me happy that.
Eventually we headed off the larger roads and into the almost wilderness and the clouds began to make an appearance. The road windy and steep made our car work hard for its gas but the scenery was breathtaking. We had to reroute ourselves as the signposting was taking us to an eastern entrance to the park and that wasn’t quite what we wanted so saw more backcountry that we’d though- which really wasn’t a problem! We arrived into the Yosemite Valley eventually and it was pissing with rain. Plans for a long walk dissolved quickly with the rain. The valley is amazing though and really worthwhile visiting- negative aspects are the crowds of people- perhaps only that weekend? The soaring cliff faces make for fantastic waterfalls and made me wonder if I was set to perhaps see as many waterfalls as I could possible do this year.
Yosemite … very expensive place to go.. book early and go camping it seems to be the best way of doing things. The roads were pretty full up as were the hotels and valley centres, perhaps a nice trail walk would get you away from the crowds. Worth the drive through – it is amazing; with the rain pissing it’s being revisited.
Onwards, and downhill.. cruising through the landscape again, from the steep mountain passes and river valley systems back into the rolling hills and sunshine! With the drive down the coast the next day we opted for a longer evening drive once more and found a motel in Merced. Great value at $45 per room per night after a little negotiation with.. an Indian! Bar the motel, there were a few other motels, a train line, a freeway and well.. not much more. We headed south west from there the next morning and found the best example of a traditional diner in our entire US trip – Hollisters finest Diner called “Jerry’s” . Great service with a smile, meat mixed with pancakes and syrup and oodles of free coffee for Jen and her mom. They even did free refills for tea!
Feeling pretty full and ready for a snooze, but with no time to lose, we headed west again – headed for route 1 and the coast. The scenery again changing from flat lands to the dry mountain landscapes following the ocean, created by the fault line activities over the past millennia. The road changed too, from large scale freeway to normal size double roads hugging the coast line with a constant mountain view until we reached Carmel by sea. This is a quaint little seaside town with glorious white sand beaches built on one steep hill ending in the crystal clear pacific ocean. No one was swimming despite it being well over 30 Celsius as the water was bloody freezing!!! What a great place for a nice break in the driving.
From there we continued with route 1 and drove until we reached Big Sur, which in winter has great surfing waves apparently, not that we saw any though. The area is home to sea otters – and as much of the coast line is protected it is apparently possible to see them. Not sure if we did see one from the car. The Big Sur featured some smaller hotels and a very cool restaurant bar which featured a live band and in river seating for those looking to chill out. A short break later and onwards we drove. The coast road dipping and diving, climbing and curving around the coast line, the inlets and bays. To our amusement and possibly of many other foreign drivers, there are, as in Australia, a host of “historic” bridges.. perhaps 60 years or so old, frankly I don’t know why they bother!
As we continued into some flatter lands near San Simeon, we saw quite a number of cars parked and decided to pull over and have a look why. The air was filled with a stench not quite unlike poo, fairly unpleasant really, but with the seabreeze it was ok. Wandering over to a sign we were pretty pleased to see that there was a colony of male (and presumably female) Elephant seals who are seasonal visitors to the area. The bigger ones were giving a great show, competing for space and dignity in very awkward looking sumo wrestling style combat movements. The sea and the beaches were full of heaving seals which were amazing break from the road. The road once more beckoned and we headed south to San Simeon where it was definitely time to find some accommodation. What we didn’t see properly was the William Hearst Castle and it was shame. The place had closed sadly, but provides an amazing view into the opporunties that the very wealthy have, but also how easy it is for them to lose it. The exhibition at the base of the grounds displayed a lot, and while some of the building was very gaudy, it was still pretty nice- and would have been amazing to be living in. The charges for the tours aren’t exactly cheap. I reckon they should turn it into a 18 Star hotel instead, at least that way the poor can walk around it for nothing if they decide to visit the bar and have a drink J.
Having found a nice motel we popped open a bottle of very nice red wine - a Cabernet Frank from the McKenzie-Mueller winery that had been purchased and had a glass or two each on the coast line watching the sea and the sunset. Spotting a cloud of spray in the air, I was pretty excited by the possibility that there were whales to be seen from the shore. The sprays were soon joined by flukes and breaches as a school of whales we presumed must have been feeding. Sadly the light was to dim to take any photos but the sight was definitely one for the memory bank. Jen’s mom then kindly took us out for dinner and we had some great conversations into the evening. At around 1 am, we were joined by some Raccoons which provided hilarity as Mary took to chasing one to have a closer look, they then scampered up the tree and hid. Occasionally they’d have a little peak out to see if we were still there.
Getting closer and closer to LA….
But first we found Santa Barbara, and it was a much needed break for all. The car journey had been fairly long and we’d definitely felt the wine we’d been drinking the night before, thankfully automatic cars do make things a little easier so a quick walk around and a break was appreciated! The town is incredibly neat and tidy, each area is maintained with love and attention to detail it seemed. The shopping street had the required number of Starbucks, I think there were around 100. We spent far too little time there sadly, it warrants a return and some time surfing nearby! The car return time was creeping up on us and then we hit LA we think. The outskirts through the hills might have been LA.. not sure. Through the hills we toured until we randomly came across the turn off for Santa Monica and somehow managed to squeeze into the road. No signs as to which way to go, so we took a chance, turned right and eventually arrived at the beach! The motel we were looking for was closer to Venice Beach than Santa Monica but the distance between the places is minimal. The next trick was to get the car back to Hollywood drop off. Have a look at a map if you’re bored and count the number of traffic lights between Santa Monica and Hollywood, driving there was deadly and we arrived well over an hour late. Turning off from a busy road before a junction was no easy feat but we bullied our way across and slid into the car rental. Made that sound easy didn’t I. First we actually found a different one in Beverly Hills- that seemed to be an option, but we were told would cost us another $200 for returning there. That one was pretty nice, the place looked like a millionaires garage complex…every flash car under the sun. I think our PT cruiser just didn’t quite fit in.
LA has public transport that works. Thankfully. We found the right bus – all the way down Santa Monica Blvr right to the beach again- the end of the car adventure was.
We were very kindly picked up from the Motel by to be Mrs Khristine Roberts and taken back to her flat after a quick and excellent Italian meal opposite the motel which was kindly sponsored by Mary Gray J. Once we arrived at the flat we immediately crashed and woke up 12 hours later or so, pottered back to the Motel- again an excellent bus service- and from there we headed into town. Not exactly sure what we did on the first day, it seems like we might have spent a lot of time on the buses again. The second day we emulated the first to a certain extent. Only the afternoon was much more amusing.
The tour bus around LA was perhaps one of the funniest bus rides I’ve ever been on. Celebrity this and that, eats here, farts there was constant and how much this cost and that didn’t was almost as common. The bus ride did deliver though, we saw Larry Flynnt getting out of his car into his wheel chair; only recognizing him by his RR’s number plate: Hustler. The highlight of the tour was tea and coffee at the famous Chateau Marmont which was very nice and welcoming and calm. The city is mental to say the least, mental but fun.
Tour highlights included the farmers market which is a huge shopping mall and carpark, the hustler media centre, the Hollywood blvrd and more very random stuff inclusive of the chicken restaurant Brad Pitt worked at while like so many of the aspiring actors/waiters. We got off shortly before the end and wondered down Santa Monica blvrd again- it’s a bloody long road if you don’t know! Found a Mexican bakery and tried some utter repulsive deep fried somethings which I am sure doesn’t exist in Mexico!
So.. notes on the tour. Drinking on the street and I assume on the bus is possibly illegal. Go to a pub first, it will only make it bearable, or… don’t go at all.
LA back and forth in the cars and buses, we took Khristine out to an Ethiopian restaurant that evening which was in part a thank you and a new exotic food for Jen’s mom also as a thank you as she’d paid for so many of our breakfasts and dinners. The usual great food, full of spices and jeerba all located in Little Ethiopia in LA, I think the London restaurants know how to serve the food with more panache, but the food was just as good!
Having spent so much time exercising only our bottoms and sitting abilities we hired bikes for a ride down the huge beach. Cycling past marina’s and loads of people taking it easy was great. Definitely not the place for skint people who’d like a boat, so cycling past as quickly as possible was a must. There is a pretty amazing chain in the US called Ralph’s and they do great hot lunches, a bit like in the UKs Sainsbury and Co, but city centre and hot… and more choice with free top ups of the drinks and so on.. (why do we only get ripped off in the UK and not get great food at supermarkets like this?- I could rant for hours.) We popped in and bought some lunch, and headed to the beach to find a place to eat it. Just north of LAX we found a nice spot shaded by the palms with a little grass. There are three runways at LAX and it looks pretty amazing to see three planes take off at the same time… We got back to Santa Monica later that day and headed for a last evening with Jen’s mom, Mary. It was pleasant, relaxed and easy, I didn’t get the impression that Mary was all too keen on leaving the holiday mode behind though. The next day we took to pottering as one does. Up the beach to the pier where we went on a fun mini rollercoaster and ship thing before heading to the end of the pier to listen to a crooning electric piano playing dude who sang lots of sad/quasi romantic songs. They must be easier to write than the more fun stuff as so many people seem to write and sing it…. Yawn.
Further pottering around the Santa Monica and then our good byes to Mary! To mark the occasion we headed to a bar called Brenans to watch a final NBA playoff game between LA and Orlando (Jen wasn’t aware of this when we left the house though) and then the infamous TURTLE RACING. This is possibly one of the funniest things I have seen and if you want to get an idea of what goes on, look it up on YouTube. Jen and I paid for a racing turtle, aptly painted british racing green (or is that how they come?) When our round came, Jen in a fairly drunken state took the turtle and placed it into the pen. Sadly our Turtle who we’d named William the Conqueror didn’t win. But we had managed to get a lot of fans all shouting Go William! Jen’s bending over straight legged (a requisite method for putting down a turtle) brought on a lot of whistles too.. hehe. The evening was pretty funny, but Kristhine regretted it the next day as some of us other may have too. Except we went to Universal Studios!
MT
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