Penultimate stop: Santa Barbara

Well, our penultimate RV stop is upon us: a 3 night stay in the slightly-misleadingly named Santa Barbara RV park; it’s 18 miles out of Santa Barbara, I guess Galeto hasn’t got quite as good a ring to it. Despite that, the park itself is nice; bathrooms and a pool worthy of a hotel, and only a couple of minutes walk from El Capitan beach (more on that later). Not only is the site well appointed from the grown-ups point-of-view, it’s also got a (triumphant trumpet sound)… playground with swings! The girls are in seventh heaven: swings, pool, beach. So much to do! (We haven’t even mentioned the prospect of Disneyland to them yet, fearing excitement overload…)



So for the past couple of days, we’ve been spending a lot of time playing at the beach. It’s a nice one, with a combination of large stones and sand, and with warm(ish) sea and great waves; apparently it’s a bit of a surfers mecca at certain points in the year. Today we had a bit of a nature extravaganza too. First, while I was out splashing in the waves, I noticed a seal popping its head out of the water about 30ft away from me! Luckily Jen spotted it too from the shore, otherwise I’d have no doubt been accused of a ‘the one that got away’ style exaggeration. Then a bit later, Jen spotted a pod of dolphins frolicking just offshore. We’d seen them yesterday too, but they were much closer and gave us a good show, jumping out of the water just long enough for Jen to snap them. Result!

There are also loads of Sand crabs on the beach too. I’d never heard of them (have you?) but a guy just wondered up to us (as people have been doing quite often on this holiday) and said “have you seen the sand crabs?” He showed us that all of the little dimples in the sand as the surf went out were in fact little burrowing crabs, and that you could dig your hand (or a spade, if you’re crab-phobic like me) into the sand and scoop ‘em out. Not particularly attractive little critters, but the fascination/horror kept Lily going for hours.


Tomorrow is the last RV stop: Malibu Beach. We’ll see if it’s as glamorous as it sounds. Early the next morning we give the RV back, then it’s (cough) slumming it in the Loews Hotel for a few days. While I’m looking forward to not being in charge of an oversized vehicle any more, it’s sad that it’s the beginning of the end of the holiday.

Edited: August 14th, 2010

Dipsy Diving

Bit of a bad photo of Monterey Bay from my Iphone.

The girls like to call my holiday hobby Dipsy as oppose to Deep Sea Diving.  I think everyone prefers Dipsy, even the casual passer-by thought it better as the girls were skipping off to the aquarium with me correcting them whilst trying to get my kit on.

So while they went to look at the “static fish” as Divemaster Jim called them; I went out into the Ocean to spot them.  I’d booked a last minute trip with Monterey Bay Divers and for a change got a really lovely guide – the aforementioned Jim.  I’d try to get a boat dive but unfortunately all the boats were booked; it was the weekend of Monterey’s biggest Dive photography competition so all Jim could do was a shore dive.  Whilst I’m on the subject of underwater photography – I’ve tried it. It’s very difficult. Sorry no pictures.

My dive buddy was Jennifer from Pittsburg; she’d never dived in seawater before; only lakes with the visibility of an arm’s length, so it was nearly all new to her.  As we got in we saw a seal mucking around on one of the buoys, I was hoping he’d come and investigate us, and have a bit of a play but no….  I did see a heck of a lot of star fish and giant scary crabs in amongst the kelp. Kelp is a bit like a nursery tower block for small fish, all the young of the fish we like to eat hide in it. Kelp is also incredibly strong and wraps around you like rope so you do get a bit tangled as you’re going along.  We didn’t get too far on the first dive; we’d just got to the interesting bit when we had to head back – Jennifer was low on air.    

She decided not to do the second dive. I have to say it is a bit freaky trying to battle with kelp the cold (did I not mention the cold? Did I not mention the cold!?!  It was the most freezingest water ever!) ; and if you’ve never dived in the sea the force and currents can be scary.  

In between dives Jim told us about the previous days Diver. He’d taken out a Frenchman who worked at the embassy in Washington. He’d been busy on his phone during the dive break – important embassy business Jim thought. After the second dive he realised it had been important food business. Waiting for them on the beach was lunch. Table, chairs, china plates, wine, cheese, etc etc  and a couple of hotel staff to serve.   He’d actually been on the phone to his swanky hotel in Carmel and arranged a post dive meal. Wonder if he put it on expenses under “liaising with the California Dive community”.  

So it was just me n’ Jim for the next dive and it was excellent. We followed an old pipe on the seabed that was used by the canneries to suck the fish up from the fishing boats. Ironic that it’s a haven for marine life. The mouth of the pipe had a big fishy sitting in it and all along there were teensy tiny pretty sea sluggy things, tons of star fish and  a giant star fish with the body the size of a dinner plate and about 20 legs, he was more like a sunflower than a star. And he was blue so not a lot like a sunflower or a star fish ….   At the end of the pipe we went over to this amazing stand of strange anemone. If you can imagine very soft cauliflower on the end on a fat stalk about half a meter long sticking to a rock in clusters of 100’s. Very  very beautiful.  Unfortunately I was incredibly cold at this point so I did the “I’m cold” sign and we headed back.  On the way back down following the pipe we found some kind of underwater bunny. Jim said his latin name back on land, but its commonly known as a rabbit. It’s like no bunny I’ve seen – its red, bunny sized but has more slug features than a bunny.  When you stroke it, it kind of puts up its “ears” but there the similarity ends.

We made our way back to shore and dragged ourselves out like some tired elephant seals (more about them later) The thing about shore dives is it’s not that you see any less than on a boat, it’s just the walk to and from the sea with a huge load of kit and a tight wetsuit is a bit of a bugger.  And I was cold.

As per usual I had loads of air left, and if it had been warmer I could have stayed in for ages living out my “I am a sea otter” fantasy amongst the kelp. I have this habit of getting into some kind of relaxed low breathing or something when I’m diving – Jim joked “are you practicing not breathing?”  The amount of air left is a kind of sign of experience or that you’re not panicking and puffing away or something; I always have about the same as my Divemaster despite my holiday diver status. So I guess I’ve finally found something I’m a natural at. Breathing. .… it’s so easy I dunno what the fuss is about.

One more thing. I haven’t seen a sea otter….Gutted. But I have seen elephant seals – huge monsters!

Edited: August 13th, 2010

Car-parks, castles and class war

Odd day today. We started off with a spooky overnight stay in an empty parking lot in the Big Sur state park. It was pretty disconcerting being all on our own, in the dark, in the middle of the woods, with nothing but the strange noises to keep us company all night. Guess that’s what we get for not booking ahead in the campsite itself. The girls didn’t seem bothered, but Jen and I had a night of disturbed sleep with the rustlings and scufflings of various unknown things outside the RV.

In the morning we set off bright and early (for us) at 9am, with a fairly long drive ahead to get to Morro Dunes RV park. On the way we had a stop planned at Hearst Castle (another excellent last-minute booking by Jen) but as it turned out we also did a couple of interesting stops on the way.

As we’d been driving down highway 1, we’d noticed how much of the land was private property, It was fenced off at the roadside with large “no trespassing” signs, and we’d been commenting about what a shame it was. Then we came across a lovely looking waterfall down to a little cove, so we screeched to a halt and went to take a look. It was just on the outskirts of the catchily-name Julia Pfeiffer Burns state park. Disappointingly there was no access to the cove from the road, but we followed the path to see where it went anyway. The story was that a very rich family had owned the land, including the beach, and had had a house on the cliff above with magnificent views of the ocean. When the last remaining family member died, she bequeathed the land to the people, but with a couple of, frankly bizarre, stipulations. First, the house should be demolished on a certain date. Secondly, there should be no public access to the beach, to “maintain it’s beauty”. That’s the one that really got our goat. The fact that “the plebs” can’t be trusted to preserve a piece of natural beauty, but the rich can.


A bit further down the coast we made another impromptu stop at an elephant seal sunbathing spot. It was full of lots of large, ugly creatures, lolling about on the sand, slowly shedding their skin. Insert joke about English beaches here. We had a good gawp, then set off for our scheduled appointment at Hearst castle.


Hearst castle was weird but interesting. The result of a wealthy American buying up all the ancient artifacts he could get his hands on and putting them in one place in a vain attempt to look like a member of the European aristocracy. And those were (almost) the words of the tour guide! It was another scarily well organized tourist centre and interesting to hear that the family still use the house when they want to. My favorite bit was definitely the Neptune pool, as featured briefly in Spartacus.

What a day; from car parks to castles.

Edited: August 10th, 2010

Nature

Nature

Yes I’m finally doing a post! Since Ian has covered everything chronologically I’ll just add in a bit about the wild life we’ve spotted.  Starting with Vegas lions!

Yes lions.  On a super hot venture out via the other casinos, we happened across the MGM lions. As per Vegas they were in an artificial environment, in the middle of the casino, sealed behind glass but with a sprinkling of natural light – lucky things. There was a glass tunnel we could walk under with the lions asleep on top; they were pretending not to notice the crowds passing underneath, but they knew.  I took Lily through the very crowded tunnel, she was “all scared” but funnily enough wanted to go back when I took Jasmine under.

If you can make it out there’s a picture of the male lion with his faced pressed against the glass. He looked quite cute. I guess it’s the only chance I’ll get to be 6inches away from a lion’s mouth.

Aside from the lions, nothing in Vegas could be described as natural – particularly some of the “enhanced” individuals wandering about.

On to the Grand Canyon.  And off to a great start with a lone boy Elk wandering through the campsite as we’re having breakfast. Like any teenager he was completely oblivious to the fuss he was creating – about 10 tourists pursued him with cameras. 

A top tip for spotting anything rare and interesting is to start chatting to someone with a scope. I ‘d spotted a hawk  flying past and perching on a branch so I pointed it out to a couple with a massive scope. They pointed out a couple of turkey vultures then just for dramatic effect a Condor comes swooping by. They’re incredibly rare only about 70 pairs in the US.  They do like the Grand Canyon though, and to the trained eye they’re easy to spot. I would never have spotted it. It’s a massive bird with a 10ft wing span but the Canyon makes it seem the size of a seagull.

Next day we did a little walk in the forest. The girls were constantly asking “are we going to see any bears?”  and we kept saying “I hope not….” We did spot a huge bug with orange wings – he kept Jasmine a mused for about 2 minutes – she loves orange.  Way more exciting was a lizard me and Lily found. We went to investigate a big green plant in the middle of a charred patch of forest; and out scuttled a lizard. I chased him to a log and carefully lifted it so as not to squash him. He was lovely; just sat there trying to stare us out. Me n Lily got some great; pictures for scale he was about 25cms.  According to Tom the Jeep man he’s a collared lizard on account of his turquoise neck collar. Lily loved him but I don’t think he was impressed with us; he looks a little angry no?

Ian’s already posted the pic of the Elk we spotted on our jeep tour so I’ll skip over to our stop off in Inyokern. I have to say; I was preparing everyone for an overnight stay in an RV park that looks like a car park but we were pleasantly surprised. We pulled up into a tree shaded spot (it was a cool 39degrees) and we had cute bunnies for neighbours.  We gave them a couple of carrots and some left over apple and they joined us for dinner, they hopped over for a munch while we ate pasta.  They ran off quick when Jasmine showed them her knife & fork. I think its genetically imprinted  into them to run at this point.

Unfortunately I don’t have a picture of our next nature spot. He was too bloody fast. Here’s a picture though– looked just like him, well sort of… bit more dusty brown than blue and he didn’t say meep meep!  He did run off down the road…and then back up the other side in true comedy style.

“Road Runner Road” -  the stunning view of the Sierra Nevada Mountains from the back of the RV.

I was going to end my post there but then we moved on to Mammoth Lakes (near to Yosemite National Park) and we just keep bumping into impossibly cute chipmunks. Here’s one who performed for us at breakfast.

Here’s another up by Rainbow Falls. This one was a pro, working the crowd for bits of apple, crisps, nuts etc. He was a bit more brave, he’d fliff his tail about if you ignored him.  Lily has been keeping a chipmunk count; she thinks we’ve seen 28 but its way more than that. You’d just walk along a few paces and the just pop out and run along with their tails in the air. Stupidly cute and I love them.

End of 1st post…. phew!

Edited: August 6th, 2010

San Francisco – Glad to be Gray?

Well, what a shocker. After mumbling and grumbling for all that time about the heat, when we hit SF we were in for a shock… a damp, cold shock. Much to Jen’s horror, San Francisco (at least for the 3 days we’re here) is colder than Preston! That officially makes it ineligible as a holiday destination. She is not amused (especially so because she didn’t pack any warm clothes).

Weirdly, on the first day here, after leaving the gray, cold RV site and getting on the bus and then the BART (their tube), we emerged into a warm, sunny central San Francisco! It’s the same kind of localised fog that we found in Point Reyes. It can hang over one area like a damp blanket, while another nearby location is sunny and fine. We made the most of the sunshine by letting the girls muck about in a playground in Yerba Buena, then blew it by splitting up so Jen could get some shopping in while the girls and I went to see Toy Story 3. If we’d have known the weather was going to get worse, we probably would’ve saved that ’til another day.

On the second day we did some shopping in cool Hayes Avenue, a street that apparently used to be under a fly-over until the 1989 earthquake. It’s all the better for being out of it’s shadow. Then we hit Japan Town, which seemed a bit odd (going to Japan Town while in America?!) but we all found something to enjoy; me: some cool toy shops, the girls: the Sanrio Hello Kitty shop and Jen: a new designer bits-and-bobs shop. We finished up with some good Japanese food and headed back to the chilly RV (where luckily the heater works better than the air conditioning).

Today we ventured on the cable cars up the famously hilly SF streets to Fisherman’s Wharf. To be honest it was a massive disappointment, simply because it wasn’t much more than a gigantic tourist trap. I’ve not seen so many silver-faced-pretending-to-be-robot beggars in one place for a long time, and living in London that’s saying something. Still, we got to see the (stinky!) sea-lions on Pier 39, and had some good seafood in the Blue Mermaid. We didn’t quite make it to Industrial Light and Magic offices in the Presidio district, but made our way wearily home instead.

Being back in an urban environment has really taken it out of us. Looking forward to seeing some hopefully sunny beaches over the next few days. Can’t say any of us are particularly enamoured with the place, but that’s probably more to do with the weather and our lack of options when it comes to exploring ’cause of the kids.

Edited: August 6th, 2010

Not quite beside the seaside

Next stop Point Reyes. This was to be our first sight of the Pacific. Or so we thought. As the sat nav took us closer and closer to our destination, we were playing “who’s first to spot the sea” until we realized we were almost at the campsite and the sea was still 5 miles away!

Somehow Jen and I had both gotten confused over how close (or not) the site was to the sea. Turns out it wasn’t at all. You really needed a car, or a 5 mile hike to get there, so we were kinda stuffed. Instead we settled for a day of chilling and laundry, finished off with a campfire and marshmallows. I’ll give you one guess which bit was Jasmine’s favourite. As it was a Saturday night the campsite had a guest storyteller in, so the girls had bedtime stories of Purple Monkeys told around a roaring fire. Not bad for a “quiet day”.


The next day on the way out we hit-up Point Reyes lighthouse; contender for the award for America’s Stubbiest Lighthouse. To get there it was an interesting drive across 15 miles of landscape which could’ve easily been in Scotland. It was also our first taste of The Fog, a thick, well-defined blanket of grey that sits, unmoving at a certain height over the landscape. The lighthouse itself is cunningly placed _below_ the fog line, so you approached it from the top of a hill shrouded in thick fog, and descended 300 steps to the lighthouse in the clear.

While we were there we were lucky enough to spot a gray whale from our vantage point on the cliffs. They’re quite frequent visitors during spring, but this one just seemed to be stopping by for a snack. It definitely made the journey to the diminutive lighthouse worthwhile.

Edited: August 5th, 2010

Idyllic Tuolomne

Tuolomne Meadows campsite and the surrounding area is gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful. It’s so full of idyllic countryside cliches that it’s almost unreal.

We went for a walk down the river itself, across a grassy meadow, over the large flat rocks where the clear, cold water flowed and on through the dappled shade. We stopped to have a paddle where the river was shallow, and sat on a grassy bank eating cookies when Jen spotted a dear just across the river having a snack itself. We watched it for ages, the girls asking questions and watching as it nibbled away at the grass then eventually turned and went back into the forest. It was a really magical moment.

The next day, before heading into Yosemite valley for our second bonus camping day, we went for a walk to Dog Lake, a couple mile hike that we thought the girls could manage. On the way we came across more stunning forest scenes and although the lake itself wasn’t anything special there were loads of dragonflys to watch (and no mosquitoes!)

On to Yosemite Valley…

Edited: August 3rd, 2010

Mammoth Lakes – a ski resort in summer

Mammoth Lakes felt like our first taste of real California vacation-land. There’s a massive ski and boarding scene in the winter, and this time of year it’s all about the mountain biking. So of course we decided to go for it and get bikes for us and trailers for the kids (or rather a trailer-bike for Lily, which she took to really well).

The only problem was, our RV park was at the bottom of the mountain, which meant that everything was uphill. We were in a pretty bad state after dragging 2 kids up a hill at 9000ft (it’s all the altitude to blame, y’know). Luckily the views were stunning. If we’d had any breath left it would’ve been taken away. The place has a real Alpine feel to it, there was even snow on the mountains at this time of year.

We did a long day out on the first day, with the cycle exertion, followed by a bus trip to the main lodge (another 1000ft or so up, where the cable cars run from) then another bus trip to the trailhead followed by couple of mile hike to Rainbow falls. It was nice, but the hike was a bit desolate because of the forest destruction caused by a massive fire a few years ago. It’s shocking how it can change the environment so completely.

The park where we stayed was nice, with sites nestled among pine trees, the ever-present smell of wood-smoke (from more controlled fires) and the company of lots of chipmunks, which kept the girls amused. Lily was chief chipmunk counter and reached a grand total of 24 after a few days.

On the last day in Mammoth we got absolutely soaked by a storm. As one of the guys on the buses said “we get 3 days of sun, then 3 days of this”. It’s not a bad thing as far as they’re concerned ’cause it’s exactly what gives them the massive dumps of snow in the winter and makes it so popular. Unfortunately for a family of 4 on bikes with only a hastily-purchased umbrella and Grand Canyon yellow plastic poncho to protect them, it’s not so good. We sheltered for about an hour in a doorway and a Starbucks before the price of the coffee ($5 for a cappuccino!) forced us to just go for it and damn the rain. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the bikes actually had mud-guards. By the time we got back to the RV Jen and I had muddy stripes on front and back, but the girls were both quite happy (and fairly dry, dammit) in the trailer.

Edited: August 3rd, 2010