Well, it’s been a couple days since I last wrote in this blog as we have ran into a few snafus, but I will get to that in just a moment.
On Saturday Morning we decided to stay in LA for brunch, so, being the automotive enthusiast I claim to be, I drove down to one of the greatest phenomena that originated in California, the Irvine Cars and Coffee. This was such an amazing gathering of just random enthusiasts it was mind boggling. A full parking lot of automobiles from all around the world on not much more than just a whim. Basically, people drive from all around SoCal to meet in Mazda HQ in Irvine with all types of autos and motorcycles to sit and a parking lot and shoot the breeze. This may not sound all that exciting, but if you see what types of cars show up you would be amazed. Cars that you just do not see everyday or every year show up to Cars and Coffee. The Packard Club was there this weekend, many vintage and new Porsches, Ferraris, Lamborghinis, vintage race cars, Lotuses (sp?), Pro Street Drag Cars, Hot Rods, Rat Rods, Rolls Royces, Vintage American Cars, New American Cars, Vintage Japanese Cars, and New Japanese Cars. There were even a few Miatas in the crowd, however, I was unable to get a spot in their little area as I arrived late. If you can imagine it, it was there. There was even a work in progress hand built Ferrari race car replica with from what I could see possible a Testarossa engine in it at one end of the parking lot.
After I made my way back to Los Angeles we had brunch at a place called Blu Jam, I believe Misty already mentioned the place, but it deserves another mention based on their Crunchy French Toast alone, it was spectacular.
After saying our goodbyes and shoehorning all of our luggage back in the Miata we headed down Sunset to meet up with PCH. This is where things started going south, well, actually north, but not at any hurried pace. I am finally starting to understand that for all the reasons I really enjoy California are many of the same reasons I dislike it. It managed to take us about an hour + to make it just to PCH, then at least another hour was wasted in traffic in the larger cities along the highway near LA on the southern end of our trip. Once we finally got clear of much of the traffic there just wasn’t much daylight left so we decided to call it a night in the next town. We ended up staying in San Simeon where the hotel prices are outrageous because the Hearst Castle is near here and it seems to be a popular destination. We were a bit disgruntled about the pricing, but the clerk at the counter did work us a bit of a deal so we unwillingly stayed the night in this little town. In all actuality we probably could have moved on to Monterey to arrive in the late night, but we would have missed the Big Sur portion of the PCH which is probably most of the reason to take the highway. After a quick dinner at a little BBQ cafe in town, we decided to retire to our quaint, albeit expensive motel room.
We awoke this morning excited to make our stay worthwhile and headed out to San Francisco. We were clouded by quite a bit of fog this morning as we headed out, but did manage to stop at a beach where seals hang out and got to see a few in their natural habitat. They were being a bit lazy and were still asleep by 11AM so although they were not exciting I guess we did get to see them as they weren’t out hunting for brunch yet.
We then managed to make it to the best part of PCH around Big Sur just as the fog burned off and had a great time bombing down the road as well as taking in some spectacular scenery. We took some pics by the Naval light house and a couple of the outlook points and kept slithering up the coast until we made it to Monterrey.
We took the departure into 17 Mile drive, took a few pics, ran into the clubhouse at Poppy Hill Golf Course and headed out the 101 to San Francisco.
We arrived late this afternoon, got unpacked and headed down to Fisherman’s Warf for dinner before taking a bit of an extended ride on the trolley car as we had missed our stop.
Tomorrow we head out and about SF and Napa, hopefully we can get some good pics and stories!
