“It happened in Monterey”, so goes the song. This is another beautiful region in California, which we are visiting for the third time in a couple of years. Many more times, we hope.
“No way we’re going on a Harry Potter hike,” we said to our editor assertively. ‘Don’t be so silly,’ she laughed, ‘I said Garrapata’. “Oh!” We keep noticing there’s not a lot of bliss in ignorance.
The notice board at the entrance read: ‘The most beautiful place on earth’. Ha! Where have we seen that before? We were not being cynical but San Diego has ‘the finest’, New York the ‘tallest’, Miami the ‘widest’. You get the point. After hiking through the forest, crossing the river a number of times, casting our eyes on the overpowering mountains, looking out over the ocean, watching the thick, white clouds gently roll over both the land and water while a clear and bright blue sky smiled upon us; who could but agree it is a very beautiful place indeed. We climbed just under 2,000 feet in three miles of this seven-mile loop. There were no switchbacks so the path was directly upwards which made it strenuous but most enjoyable.
The walk along the summit with the views of the ocean and rugged, rocky coastline on the one side, the inland mountains on the other sides, took the breath away. The steep trail is closed, that is, officially. It is in ‘bad shape’ but is unofficially open—whatever that means. It seemed the longer we struggled up the mountain, the stronger we felt. That is indeed a wonderful feeling. We have a beautiful world to inhabit, all of us. B’H.
We once again made one of our less wise pronouncements to our editor. Apparently, we are a little slow to grasp what we should and should not say. “This is one of our top ten hikes,” we mentioned. She of course replied that we already have twenty-two hikes in ‘your’ top-ten and therefore should consider removing at least one if not thirteen before adding another. One thing led to another and before we could have a meaningful argument, we ‘met’ two snakes and that brought some perspective to our discussion as well as closure. As we mentioned yesterday, the snakes are a most unwelcome reminder to us that it is their land, too.
After spending some time working and watching the bulls drool over stocks and shares, we decided to make this a ‘green Monday’. The closest we want to get to a ‘blue Monday’ is on the horizon at the coast. Everyone spends time talking about the weather. So far, we have noticed on the Central California Coast, there is not much sunshine yet it is not cold. The cloud formations, the mist, the mountains and cliffs make this a spectacular place. Frankly, Hawaii has a lot of competition from this region.
We think the pictures substantiate our assertions; they always make up for our lack of ‘pen power’.
Cheers,
Jenni and Jeffrey
No comments:
Post a Comment