Best Western The Beach Resort Monterey

... caught up on sleep after San Fran. Up at 9am and headed towards Fisherman's Wharf and looked in lots of gift shops. Rich got tempted by clam chowder so we had lunch on the pier, sitting next to lots of huge pelicans outside the window! Very scary. Then drove down Cannery Row, named after a John Steinbeck novel! Went in a shop that sold things that ...

... and barefoot was painful with rocks.<br><br>On the way down to Morrow Bay where we stayed at a campsite (bathrooms nicer than mine), we stopped for a half hour or so to watch the sun set off in the distance on the blue Pacific Ocean. Just sitting there on those rocks was nice.<br><br>Randoms:<br>-Brits called the Mojave (Mo-hauv-a) Desert the Mojave (Mo-jav) Desert, lol.<br>-Matt accidentally driving Lola on the left side of the road<br>

... had a falafel wrap), we drove down to New Brighton Beach a couple of miles outside town. Unfortunately, as the beach is part of a state park we had to pay to enter, which pleased us no end. We forgot all about the charge though as the beach was beautiful and deserted. Driftwood was scattered all over the sand and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw one of the bits of wood move. On closer inspection we ...

First all, PCH is one of the best roads we've been down as well. Mark it up with Rt 50 and 270, I think. A few different times we just pulled over to the side and got out to enjoy the view. Not that the wide screen and split-screen TV's weren't enough...best channels ever, but being outside is always different. Fantastic bridges almost just sitting in the canyons between mountains, ocean on the right, nothing below, canyons on the left. I tagged a couple signs headed down as well I believe ...

... of course, and witness this rather unusual site. Apparently elephant seals were nearly extinct a few decades ago, but there are now over 15,000 living off the Pacific Coast.<br><br>The signs announced we still had around 250 miles to go to reach LA, so I put my foot down and we sped off. We stopped once more (for an "In n Out Burger" in Santa Maria), and eventually rolled into Nottingham Avenue at 9.45pm. Wow - a LONG day, but very worthwhile.

... this stretch of coast, but the Americans have a really great ability of ruining every half decent vantage point with a fence. And they're not exactly subtle fences.<br><br>You clearly have to be of a certain character to live along 17 Mile Drive. Not only do you have to have a ridiculous amount of money (anything that is for sale seems is being dealt with by Sotherby's) it is also clear you have to have the special characteristics that are demanded of you to be a total ...

This morning we went Whale watching! It was soooo good! We saw a pod of 5 Orca's really close up by the boat, and we were lucky as they said this time of year they only see them about once a week! But when we saw the Orca's the captain said it might make it more difficult to find Humpbacks as they will go nowhere near Killer Whales...just as he said that I (Sal) glanced down by the side of the boat (that was ...

... passiert.<br><br>Nach diesen vielen Eindrücken sind wir doch recht hungrig geworden und finden ein nettes Restaurant, wo wir uns einen Salat bestellen. Obwohl wir nur eine halbe Portion bestellt haben, ist das so viel, dass wir beide nicht alles schaffen. Unglaublich, was hier überall für Portionen serviert werden. Es fällt uns schon sehr auf, wie viele extrem übergewichtige Leute es hier gibt, nicht nur Erwachsene, nein das fängt bei den kleinen Kindern schon an.<br ...

... that scratched out a living back in the 30's and 40's when the Sardine Cannery's where still in their prime down there. If you like rough hewn poetry, and grand schemes from the flop house give it a try. He's written other great books apart from just Cannery Row. The pastures of heaven is another good one Anyway, enjoy the pictures..

... with plenty of time to spare; and with the luxury of having only a three hour flight meant that I could even try to take a nap before the wheels touched down in Minnesota. I'd be a liar to say there weren't any nerves either on the plane or when I stepped of it. Being confident is one thing but on occasions like this it pays to be slightly apprehensive as it keeps you in check. I could easily have panicked as I didn't know ...