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<blockquote data-quote="BillB" data-source="post: 997755" data-attributes="member: 9985"><p>I won’t bore you with all the details of our trip to California this year as it was mostly a time of revisiting our favourite haunts taking in, among others, San Juan Bautista, Monterey and its aquarium which had a special exhibit on octopus, squid and nautilus, Pacific Grove, Carmel by the Sea, Capitola, Santa Cruz, Natural Bridges State Park and a few other places.</p><p></p><p>The biggest variation from our usual routine was when we hired a car and drove down to Cathedral City, adjacent to Palm Springs, where our youngest son and daughter in law have just bought a house. Our eldest son had flown out five days before we departed and stopped off to visit with our friends Claire and Terry before continuing on to Cathedral City.</p><p></p><p>We chose to rent the car from Enterprise, a company we had used before in Florida and found to be excellent and without any of those hidden charges that come back to haunt you when you get your next credit card statement. Our experience this time was just as before, so we were happy bunnies.</p><p></p><p>We picked up the car and headed off towards Southern California a couple of weeks after arriving. We decided to take the slightly longer route driving down Highway 1 as it takes in Big Sur, one of the world’s most breathtaking coastlines and is a far more interesting drive than the monotonous Highway 17 which is further inland.</p><p></p><p>The drive was comfortable enough without much heavy traffic as it was a Sunday, though there was a considerable number of private cars with people taking advantage of the beautiful Fall weather. We stopped off at Cambria, a pretty little coastal town where we had stayed before. We had lunch in the Moonstone Grill and decided that we could spend the night here and finish the journey the following day. The first call we made was to our favourite hotel , the Whitewater Inn where we had stayed before, but it was full. However, a very friendly receptionist went online and discovered that the Blue Dolphin had a couple of rooms free and she was kind enough to call through and reserve one of them for us. The Blue Dolphin had all the paperwork ready and we were soon checked in and relaxing for a half hour or so.</p><p></p><p>A walk along the beach was our next task which we very much enjoyed, then it was back to the hotel for a shower and a period spent horizontally with our Kindles. Then it was back to the Moonstone Grill as the other nearby restaurant had a longish waiting period and the diners already there seemed more intent on drinking beer, talking loudly and laughing even more loudly.</p><p></p><p>The Moonstone had a lot of seafood on the menu and Jackie and I both settled for shrimps with button mushrooms which were really, really good. I enjoyed a Jack Daniel’s while waiting for our meal and Jackie had her traditional gin and tonic which barmen in California prepare superbly.</p><p></p><p>Next morning we took a light breakfast, paid our bill and were soon underway. The GPS took us out towards Paso Robles and then down some back roads. Along this stretch after Paso Robles we saw a sign that said “James Dean Memorial Highway”, followed shortly afterwards by another sign that said, “James Dean Memorial Junction”. I was somewhat taken aback as I knew James Dean died in a traffic accident at the town of Cholame which by my reckoning was to the northeast of Cambria. It turned out that my geography was faulty and we had just passed the spot where the actor’s Porsche crashed into a car that was turning across his lane and he died shortly afterwards.</p><p></p><p>We plugged on and started passing great plantations of trees that had been laid out in rectangles or squares, thousands of yards long. Jackie and I tried to decide what kind of trees these were as we drove past great numbers of them. We caught a glimpse of a sign announcing the name of a company that produced dried fruit and nuts so we were none the wiser and continued on for another 45 minutes or so until we passed another sign announcing a firm that produced almonds. Bingo! I didn’t realise that California produced so many almonds but we had been passing hundreds of thousands of trees, so it’s plain that almonds generate a great deal of money for the state.</p><p></p><p>The road turned south(ish) and we found ourselves bypassing Los Angeles. Even as far away from the city as we were, there was an enormous amount of traffic but as we were on a 5-lane highway it wasn’t too stressful. In fact I really appreciated the American custom of staying in your lane to pass any vehicles on your left without changing lanes – in effect, undertaking. I thought of the chaos the European system of pulling out to overtake and then moving back to the right would create here and I had to admit that driving on this crowded road was so much less stressful.</p><p></p><p>The road began to climb and the slower vehicles began to drop back. We climbed up through a pass in the hills, though they looked big enough to be mountains to me. We began to feel hungry and kept an eye out for somewhere to have lunch, but most of the places we saw were fast food outlets – McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, etc. – and finally succumbed to hunger and pulled into a McDonalds where you can, at least, get a salad.</p><p></p><p>Feeling refreshed we resumed our journey, leaving LA behind us. Our car was proving to be very abstemious when it came to petrol consumption and we didn’t need to stop to tank up. Around early afternoon we began to approach Palm Springs. We were in the desert and we could see great forests of wind turbines, only half of which were turning. We entered the Palm Springs city limits and continued on. Our son and daughter in law had bought a house in Cathedral City, close to Palm Springs. So close, in fact, that they are contiguous and you have to watch for the signs that tell you when you leave Palm Springs and enter Cathedral City.</p><p></p><p>The GPS was essential here as I had seen their house on Google Earth, but had no idea how to get there. But get there we did, passing street signs indicating Gene Autry Trail, Dinah Shore Drive and Frank Sinatra Road. Soon enough we pitched up outside our son’s house and pulled in next to our older son’s car. They all came rushing out to greet us, dogs to the fore, and we had an emotional reunion. We went inside where our son broke out the whisky and the gin and we relaxed while we filled them in on the journey.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="BillB, post: 997755, member: 9985"] I won’t bore you with all the details of our trip to California this year as it was mostly a time of revisiting our favourite haunts taking in, among others, San Juan Bautista, Monterey and its aquarium which had a special exhibit on octopus, squid and nautilus, Pacific Grove, Carmel by the Sea, Capitola, Santa Cruz, Natural Bridges State Park and a few other places. The biggest variation from our usual routine was when we hired a car and drove down to Cathedral City, adjacent to Palm Springs, where our youngest son and daughter in law have just bought a house. Our eldest son had flown out five days before we departed and stopped off to visit with our friends Claire and Terry before continuing on to Cathedral City. We chose to rent the car from Enterprise, a company we had used before in Florida and found to be excellent and without any of those hidden charges that come back to haunt you when you get your next credit card statement. Our experience this time was just as before, so we were happy bunnies. We picked up the car and headed off towards Southern California a couple of weeks after arriving. We decided to take the slightly longer route driving down Highway 1 as it takes in Big Sur, one of the world’s most breathtaking coastlines and is a far more interesting drive than the monotonous Highway 17 which is further inland. The drive was comfortable enough without much heavy traffic as it was a Sunday, though there was a considerable number of private cars with people taking advantage of the beautiful Fall weather. We stopped off at Cambria, a pretty little coastal town where we had stayed before. We had lunch in the Moonstone Grill and decided that we could spend the night here and finish the journey the following day. The first call we made was to our favourite hotel , the Whitewater Inn where we had stayed before, but it was full. However, a very friendly receptionist went online and discovered that the Blue Dolphin had a couple of rooms free and she was kind enough to call through and reserve one of them for us. The Blue Dolphin had all the paperwork ready and we were soon checked in and relaxing for a half hour or so. A walk along the beach was our next task which we very much enjoyed, then it was back to the hotel for a shower and a period spent horizontally with our Kindles. Then it was back to the Moonstone Grill as the other nearby restaurant had a longish waiting period and the diners already there seemed more intent on drinking beer, talking loudly and laughing even more loudly. The Moonstone had a lot of seafood on the menu and Jackie and I both settled for shrimps with button mushrooms which were really, really good. I enjoyed a Jack Daniel’s while waiting for our meal and Jackie had her traditional gin and tonic which barmen in California prepare superbly. Next morning we took a light breakfast, paid our bill and were soon underway. The GPS took us out towards Paso Robles and then down some back roads. Along this stretch after Paso Robles we saw a sign that said “James Dean Memorial Highway”, followed shortly afterwards by another sign that said, “James Dean Memorial Junction”. I was somewhat taken aback as I knew James Dean died in a traffic accident at the town of Cholame which by my reckoning was to the northeast of Cambria. It turned out that my geography was faulty and we had just passed the spot where the actor’s Porsche crashed into a car that was turning across his lane and he died shortly afterwards. We plugged on and started passing great plantations of trees that had been laid out in rectangles or squares, thousands of yards long. Jackie and I tried to decide what kind of trees these were as we drove past great numbers of them. We caught a glimpse of a sign announcing the name of a company that produced dried fruit and nuts so we were none the wiser and continued on for another 45 minutes or so until we passed another sign announcing a firm that produced almonds. Bingo! I didn’t realise that California produced so many almonds but we had been passing hundreds of thousands of trees, so it’s plain that almonds generate a great deal of money for the state. The road turned south(ish) and we found ourselves bypassing Los Angeles. Even as far away from the city as we were, there was an enormous amount of traffic but as we were on a 5-lane highway it wasn’t too stressful. In fact I really appreciated the American custom of staying in your lane to pass any vehicles on your left without changing lanes – in effect, undertaking. I thought of the chaos the European system of pulling out to overtake and then moving back to the right would create here and I had to admit that driving on this crowded road was so much less stressful. The road began to climb and the slower vehicles began to drop back. We climbed up through a pass in the hills, though they looked big enough to be mountains to me. We began to feel hungry and kept an eye out for somewhere to have lunch, but most of the places we saw were fast food outlets – McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, etc. – and finally succumbed to hunger and pulled into a McDonalds where you can, at least, get a salad. Feeling refreshed we resumed our journey, leaving LA behind us. Our car was proving to be very abstemious when it came to petrol consumption and we didn’t need to stop to tank up. Around early afternoon we began to approach Palm Springs. We were in the desert and we could see great forests of wind turbines, only half of which were turning. We entered the Palm Springs city limits and continued on. Our son and daughter in law had bought a house in Cathedral City, close to Palm Springs. So close, in fact, that they are contiguous and you have to watch for the signs that tell you when you leave Palm Springs and enter Cathedral City. The GPS was essential here as I had seen their house on Google Earth, but had no idea how to get there. But get there we did, passing street signs indicating Gene Autry Trail, Dinah Shore Drive and Frank Sinatra Road. Soon enough we pitched up outside our son’s house and pulled in next to our older son’s car. They all came rushing out to greet us, dogs to the fore, and we had an emotional reunion. We went inside where our son broke out the whisky and the gin and we relaxed while we filled them in on the journey. [/QUOTE]
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