Sometimes you have a 24 hours that typifies the twists and turns of travelling.
When I left Yosemite I had a week or so left on my trip. I'd planned to take the last week easy, slowly driving back up the coast to San Francisco and hanging out in the Santa Cruz area for a couple of days.
On the decent from Nevada Falls however I'd been inspired by the party from San Diego who indicated they were going to drive back to their home in a day, a trip of about 7 hours. I've never been to San Diego, but the people I had met all seemed laid back and the reports of the town from other backpackers positive. So I decided to alter my plans and at 10am set off for San Diego from Yosemite, TomTom telling me I'd arrive about 5-ish.
Prior to this I'd studiously avoided the large interstate highways, but this time I wanted to move fast and had no choice. Prior to arriving my vision of California was a dry deserty climate with endless fast food joints all selling variations of the same cheeseburger and a concrete jungle of highways, and that's exactly what I found driving to LA on route to San Diego, with the addition of endless advertising signs and a highway surface in various states of decay. The State of California is in apparent disarray in terms of its budget deficit and through my travels this has been evident through the reduced hours of operation, or closure in some instances, of state parks. The road network also seems a fair indication, that something is not right and there's a certain Mad Max feel to it all as the 2 lane highway became 5 and the average speed of the other drivers edged up to 80mile / hour as I neared the edge of the LA city limits.
I'd been driving for a number of hours and was starting to really tire, which isn't that surprising as I'm the guy who gets tired on a two hour drive to Ballarat and hands the driving over to someone else, and like a surfer staring down the face of a big wave was just before take off, I peered down the face and saw LA, Orange County and San Diego traffic and baulking at the vision, pulled out at the last moment, turning the car towards the sun and sea in the form of Ventura and Santa Barbara.
Reaching the sea I looked out at the white caps on the sea, the sand and sea breeze and thought, this reminds me of,...ah, where I grew up, Perth. Hmm, this isn't very interesting...so at 5pm I decided to revert to my original plan and head up the coast to San Siemon, halfway between LA and San Francisco...due to arrive at 7pm. Settting off on the wrong side of the road and being alerted by blaring horns, I jerked the car back into the right lane and headed north
The last 2 hours I just wanted to stop driving, but even more so I just wanted to talk to someone after the hours of driving and singing to myself just wasn't cutting it anymore. So I stood up my Sam Siemon accommodation further up the coast and headed to the Bridge St Inn hostel in the sweet town of Cambria.
On arrival the owner Brandon asked me if I liked beer and music, which oddly I do, and was soon at the Cambria Ale House sipping some fine local brews and listening to an acoustic base played by a wispy guy from Idaho, I don't know exactly what he was singing about, but he seemed to like cats and puppies. The next artist Darcey Hile was very different and her melancholic folk tunes held the audience spellbound. It turned out Darcey was staying the same hostel and we hung out for the short time I was there.
The Bridge St Inn has a range of sustainability features embedded, from the grey water system to the water flush reuse system built into the toilet. While I photographed these features Brandon struck up an impromptu performance of his two environmental tunes after breakfast to add to the ambience to an audience of two French interns and me. Definitely one of the highlights of my trip to date.
I'd set off 24 hours earlier chasing another place to see and out of desperation had randomly experienced a great evening and morning in a small Californian town, highlighting that it's more often than not the people make the experience rather than the place.
When I left Yosemite I had a week or so left on my trip. I'd planned to take the last week easy, slowly driving back up the coast to San Francisco and hanging out in the Santa Cruz area for a couple of days.
On the decent from Nevada Falls however I'd been inspired by the party from San Diego who indicated they were going to drive back to their home in a day, a trip of about 7 hours. I've never been to San Diego, but the people I had met all seemed laid back and the reports of the town from other backpackers positive. So I decided to alter my plans and at 10am set off for San Diego from Yosemite, TomTom telling me I'd arrive about 5-ish.
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| Perth with RV's? |
I'd been driving for a number of hours and was starting to really tire, which isn't that surprising as I'm the guy who gets tired on a two hour drive to Ballarat and hands the driving over to someone else, and like a surfer staring down the face of a big wave was just before take off, I peered down the face and saw LA, Orange County and San Diego traffic and baulking at the vision, pulled out at the last moment, turning the car towards the sun and sea in the form of Ventura and Santa Barbara.
Reaching the sea I looked out at the white caps on the sea, the sand and sea breeze and thought, this reminds me of,...ah, where I grew up, Perth. Hmm, this isn't very interesting...so at 5pm I decided to revert to my original plan and head up the coast to San Siemon, halfway between LA and San Francisco...due to arrive at 7pm. Settting off on the wrong side of the road and being alerted by blaring horns, I jerked the car back into the right lane and headed northThe last 2 hours I just wanted to stop driving, but even more so I just wanted to talk to someone after the hours of driving and singing to myself just wasn't cutting it anymore. So I stood up my Sam Siemon accommodation further up the coast and headed to the Bridge St Inn hostel in the sweet town of Cambria.
On arrival the owner Brandon asked me if I liked beer and music, which oddly I do, and was soon at the Cambria Ale House sipping some fine local brews and listening to an acoustic base played by a wispy guy from Idaho, I don't know exactly what he was singing about, but he seemed to like cats and puppies. The next artist Darcey Hile was very different and her melancholic folk tunes held the audience spellbound. It turned out Darcey was staying the same hostel and we hung out for the short time I was there.
The Bridge St Inn has a range of sustainability features embedded, from the grey water system to the water flush reuse system built into the toilet. While I photographed these features Brandon struck up an impromptu performance of his two environmental tunes after breakfast to add to the ambience to an audience of two French interns and me. Definitely one of the highlights of my trip to date.
I'd set off 24 hours earlier chasing another place to see and out of desperation had randomly experienced a great evening and morning in a small Californian town, highlighting that it's more often than not the people make the experience rather than the place.
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