Super 8 Salinas

... with over our years of traveling has been trying to find good Sourdough bread - it doesn't exist east of Arizona, along with Italian dry salami and Artichokes. Well, Castroville is the Artichoke Capitol of the WORLD and we hit the mother lode. We found a stand selling artichokes. In fact you could purchase 10 for $1. They are little, about fist sized, but really good. Who cares if you ...

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 ...

... on the high street of fresh homemade half sandwiches and soup for a very reasonable price of $5 each. I saw a hummingbird in some foliage but it was gone before I could take a picture, doh! We drove down the road to the missionary church which was on the outskirts of the town which was very pretty but we didn't want to pay to go in, so we just ended up taking pictures of the outside and nice garden (which is only what we wanted to see anyway!). We ...

... her determination to walk with us for several blocks. Graciela continued with us for a couple more miles and acted as guide through the maze of bay-front streets in Santa Cruz. We were excited to see our first ocean waves and surf-boarders of the trip. We also enjoyed coming to know Graciela, including her stories about living in a kibbutz in Israel for several years before moving to the U.S. All along the way that day we were constantly being ...

... than I am remembered quite a bit more than I did. She kept on pointing out places and certain landmarks that didn't even register to me. The only real thing I remembered on the drive up was Gilroy, The Garlic Capital of the World, but i think it's more because of the Food Network that I remember that place. We had to make a quick stop into Marina which is about a 20-30 minute drive from Salinas to drop off some Hawaiian local goodies to an ...

Heading south I loved the town of Santa Cruz which was a real surf town & very cool. Nath & I walked for miles along the foreshore which was covered in pretty dune flowers & had lovely ...

... reverse this time. No problemo, after all. Topped the car up with gas (USD40!! Family and friends in Asia, be grateful for the price of oil in your countries!) and enjoyed cruising down the highway. Again, it was easy to find the Monterey Bay Aquarium and parking. Queue was long but moved fast to get tickets (USD24.95 a day). Grabbed some lunch while sitting on the ocean front looking out into the sea. The Monterey Bay Aquarium is definitely a great way to ...

... is a sense of energy and hope that used to be synonymous with the US. True, there are a lot of difficult social, political and economic issues that the country must solve but the warmness of the people on a whole makes me wonder about working in China in the future. The people have been very inviting to me. I guess being ethnically Chinese and having fluent language skills helps a lot. In the US as a 1st generation Chinese ...

... the only place you can get a sausage roll. I had a great time in LA catching up with Jenn, hanging out with her family and being awestruck by the freeways and I really appreciate them putting me up and showing me the sights. I promise I'll be back again! San Fran Getting through airport security is interesting and after being told "You can't walk through there in those (shoes). I can't let you through with them on." I then waited for my 100% bag search to be ...

... out. As much time as I spent on the road I figured I would be in similar situations, which I was-one time being out in the middle of nowhere up in northern Minnesota. But it wasn't a give to get thing, it was more what you would call the code of the road. Or people who live in isolated areas understand that helping others is part of survival. So we headed north to Seaside, just past Monterey, where he treated me to ...