Re: west coast vacation!
Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 1:40 am
How how, Is is, Cali Cali???
well i got back a few days ago but here's a rundown of the rest of stuff for anyone still interested!
*next camp night was rough. no cooking gear, no open restaurants in the area (we neglected to stop for snack stuff earlier) and the first-come-first-served campsite was full. next one was full as well. next one was closed. finally found something at like 10pm and ate gas station snacks for dinner... luckily we had a bottle of port.
*next day stopped for breakfast somewhere really yummy which was next to a neat glass-work supply store (my gf used to work with glass a lot so she was psyched). stopped later for a juice at some random town that was full of all of these really funky antique stores with rad shit like lots of old electronic test equipment, etc. overpriced though. drove down the "avenue of the giants" which is a unbelievably amazing stretch of highway that runs right through the redwoods and we even paid our tourist-y $5 to drive through the tree! (which was dumb).
** (same day) getting off route 101 and onto route 1 was breathtaking. you're driving through the woods up and down this super windy road for a long time and suddenly you come to the ocean, everything opens up and you go around a turn and see the entire ocean on your right and miles and miles of cliffs with a tiny winding road on your left. the whole drive was beautiful ocean vistas on one side and cliffs, mountains or cool farm valleys with goats or cows on the other. i did grow weary of the windiness of the road after a while though, mostly due to the fact that i did all of the driving. camped at a cool campground in fort bragg that night where we could hear/see the ocean from our site and had a little skunk encounter which was entertaining.
*stopped the next day in mendocino to walk around a bit. super cute little coastal town where we ate wild blackberries and sat on a cliff enjoying our breakfast. continued down route 1 to stay with a friend who recently moved to bolinas, which is a crazy hidden little hippie surf town just northwest of SF. (small detour/wrong turn which led us to petaluma - no biggie, we hit the whole foods and got wine) to give you an idea of what it's like, they have an honor system "bookstore" with no employees where you just leave money for a book if you want it... my friend's place was amazingly cute and cozy. she had very nice friends fixing up/living in a bus in her driveway who were really into synthesizers(!) and we drank wine all night and went skinnydipping in a hot tub.
*next morning i made everyone tacos and we bid our farewell. drove into SF, picked up some friends and we drove down to santa cruz to camp. i was supposed to make the campsite in big sur but i fucked up! the site was comfortable and sweet though with a huge view of the ocean. we took some mushrooms, had a smoke on the beach at sunset and just hung out drinking whiskey and talking.
*next morning we woke up early and drove to big sur to eat breakfast at a lovely little b&b called deetjen's. SO CUTE. look it up! then we just drove down the coast a bit more (almost to cambria i think) and stopped on a random beach to hang out for a bit. ate at an ok taco place on the way back and we were crashing at their place on 48th ave which is waaaaay west in SF, right near the ocean. went to my friend's studio that night and hung out, played some instruments.
*next day my gf and i mostly did our own thing and just walked around the city. lots of haight ashbury area stuff - hit up robotspeak (i really disliked their setup) and amoeba music, among other little places. nothing too exciting. met up with my homeys and we went to an aquarium shop and then to burmese food (which is an interesting mix of thai/indian). went to see a friend's band afterwards at bottom of the hill - they're called yesway - which was really, really good. exceptionally good folk stuff with a slight psych element.
*next day we hit the massive alameda flea market to look for trinkets. so HUGE! but kind of overpriced IMO... then we drove to berkeley and went to the starving musician - such nice dudes who really liked my stuff and will likely be getting some soon-ish! next we drove to the mission and walked around a little bit, got a burrito from taqueria cancun (awesome) and hung out in dolores park, which was it's normal crazy random rave-like scene in dusk on a sunday. dropped friends off and said our goodbyes and drove back to nob hill to have dinner at a little vietnamese place with my gf's cousin. we booked a random hotel in san mateo that night since it was cheap and near the airport - at least it had a pool/hot tub for the morning and a trader joe's nearby.
all in all... great trip!
