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- Tuesday, April 16, 2002 |
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After leaving LA, we were excited to take the beautiful drive up the PCH to San Francisco and spend some quality time camping in Heimo. Our 1st stop was Los Osos (near Morro Bay/SLO) where we pulled into the pitch black campground late in the evening and were rewarded with a primo spot near the outhouse. woo hoo! It turned out to be a HUGE State park with limited camping facilities, leaving the former coastal ranchland uncrowded and relatively untouched. Heimo performed well of course, and we were rewarded with a great night's sleep and a hot Heimo-cooked meal of soup (again!).
We continued up the PCH the following day entertained by a very intersting book tape and begrudingly left Heimo to stop at the Visitors Center at the Hearst Castle/San Simeon. Unfortunately, all the tours of the castle were booked for the day, but we did take a liesurely stroll through the museum. Very interesting... We plan to revisit next time we are in the area. One great thing about Heimo is the ability to stop at any random scenic overlook for lunch. This was one of those days as we stopped at a state picnic spot right on the beach. We tied Chuy (the dog) up to the car on her long leash and went about cooking a great lunch on the shores of the Pacific. We continued listening to our book tape, soaked up the scenery, and relaxed for a while. This is what we have been trying to do for weeks.................
That night we found the last spot at the coolest campground on the planet (at least to us so far!). We were right on a cliff overlooking the Pacific. At sunset we hiked down to beach with Chuy and watched the sea otters play in the kelp beds. We cooked a great dinner and sat by the campfire looking at the stars. The folks in the campsite kept us entertained with great 80's music up until quiet time of 10 o'clock. Then next morning we got moving pretty early as we wanted to get to SF prior to sundown. Our trip continued up throught Big Sur area (definitely going back here for more camping/hiking, etc) and into the town of Monterey for lunch. Marisa and I ate on the Marina and watched Sea Lions devour some old bait from some of the fishing boats. Quite entertaining.
The second half of our day we continued up the beautiful PCH highway to SF with plans to camp just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. Well, the campsites aren't for car camping so we had to scratch that idea. We ended up pulling the van up on a quiet street in Sausalito down by the marinas. On Monday we had breakfast with Ron Porter (Chuy's original Dad) and compared notes on our Campers. It ends up that our vans (the same color) went through the Westfalia factory in Germany the same month back in 1990. How weird, such a small world. He let us use his house to shower and do laundry, which was a welcome relief since we hadn't showered in 2 or more days.
Later that day we met up with Julie Phillips and her boyfriend Brent in SF for dinner. We had some great Asian food and got to catch up. We stayed with her for a couple of days. She offered to take Chuy while we go to Europe but we're not sure what Ollie (her cat) has to say about that. I'm sure Chuy will get a few smacks in the nose. Tomorrow we are off up the coast on our way to the Portland area to visit with Dave's brother Jon and his wife Jen. More later.
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