Guesthouse Intl Santa Cruz

Finally left the noisy dorm room yay. Saw some massive waves along the coast towards Monterey. Stopped off in Santa Cruz, not much going on in Fall! Apparently it's wooden rollercoaster is a national monument! Got to Monterey and found a visitor centre for a map. Hotel man upgraded us to a deluxe king, had a microwave and a fridge! Watched lots of TV ...

... rundown, so instead we picked a little town just outside Santa Cruz called Capitola.<br><br>Although not quite the Big Sur that we would be travelling down later on in the week,the drive along the coast was fantastic and we stopped off a number of times at beautiful deserted beaches with rough, Pacific waves. <br><br>When we arrived at our b&amp;b, The Jewel Box, we were so pleased, it was really sweet and had a ...

... br><br>Into Santa Cruz we arrive, parking Lola somewhere up a hill...somewhere that I wasn't paying full attention to...yikes (you'll read soon). We locked her up and headed into town for food and drinks. Along the walk we found a colorful, post 60's era, Grateful Dead loving, gray bearded, slightly drunk fellow, who was friendly to the max. "Latest member of the group"-Matt. We stood there with him for a bit while he meandered along in conversation about Jerry Garcia (Jerry told me to do ...

all the way west!!<br><br>Sunday September 13th Andy dropped me off at a hotel only minutes from the Atlanta, GA airport. The big draw was a free shuttle ride in the morning! Decent deal! <br><br>Andy came on in and checked out my room which had been upgraded to a suite for no reason I understood. Sweet suite! Wish Andy had been able to stay! But he was itching to get on the road and head ...

... Maps on my cell phone, yay! Driving over the Golden Gate Bridge was really cool. I know, it's "just" a bridge, but it's a famous bridge, and a rather neat one at that. Though I couldn't help but worry about it as we went over... after all, how many disaster films are there in which the Golden Gate Bridge is destroyed? *sigh* But we made it across safely, and I got pictures of the spires of the bridge disappearing into the mist. It was ...

... all of which she slept in) and had crazy peroxide blonde hair. She talked to herself the whole night, which was a little strange, and none of us were too sad to leave in the morning! We caught the train to Santa Barbara. It was an 8 hour journey but it went along the coast so we were given beautiful views of big cliffs, deserted beaches and huge mountains. It was really cool. Next stop: Santa Barbara!

... Moon Bay Brewery to taste some of the local beers and enjoy the afternoon sun. Got chatting to a local guy, Mark and his friend Mike from Atlanta. Mark has traveled to 49 countries so was a wealth of knowledge and had some great tips for us in Central America. We were still an hour away from reaching our destination of Santa Cruz so we reluctantly jumped back in the car to continue ...

... last night to stay at Pigeon Point lighthouse which is a backpackers recommended during our skype chat with Terry last night - more soon. Our first stop was Hearst Castle, the major tourist attraction on the coast. Cam had read it was worth a visit so we decided to go have a look. Hearst had a huge media empire and entertained the rich and famous in LA around the 1930's and 40's. He built this enormous home on top of the hill - miles from the sea complete with guest ...

... institutions to shame. Perhaps the universe is providing me guidance for helping Mom. I have made another observation while sitting in the not-so-buena vista of the Buena Vista... that is that there is beauty in oblivion. My bar mate Gary pointed out a pair of folks getting wasted at the bar around the bend from where we are sitting. They had been there drinking for a while, apparently, and had the vocal volume to prove it. At first I imagined they had come to the bar ...

... I'm gonna run out of $$ in two weeks' time... It's still windy and cold but sunny all the same and we had free pancakes this morning... other than that, lots of sagged shoulders because of the disastrous outcome of the elections (?). And there's an anti-bush spray on the counter of the hostel... There are also some heavily leaking pipes in the kitchen area and kettles like to explode as well. A lot of hotel employees are on strike. They ask that you don't stay at certain ...