Our way on Pacific Coast Highway.
After leaving northern Malibu, we head further northwards on Highway One to Santa Barbara, a gorgeous coast hugging town. Money drips from the walls, creating affluent rivers on the sidewalk that trickle magnetically towards the sea (business is good and gears towards the brine of the bay). The town appears immaculate, carefree and seemingly halcyon. We peruse the town on foot, avoiding bipedal, pedal powered vehicles and do a bit of lunch in an open air restaurant on the pier. More gourmet Sliders glide in our direction from waitresses working hard for their tips. Hungry herons overhead are kept at bay by thick netting and swoop around the windows of the elevated restaurant. Reminiscent of pterodactyls on the hunt, they dive bomb seagulls who rock up on their air turf. Due to the location of the windows, we go eye to eye, enabling us to see the prehistoric lineage in the large covetous sea birds.
Every day on the road seems to bring the sun a little lower as the season tips towards winter. We make the most of the continuing heat wave for as long as the temperature will let us. The west coast journey has us darting from campsite to RV park to motel and all iterations inbetween.
The coastal drive is incredibly beautiful, picturesque and the backdrop for many North American car commercials we subsequently view in the USA. Every winding corner seems to reveal a another breathtaking variation of shapely coastline, busting out of its land bra like a buxom supermodel. The elevation of Highway one allows us to look outwards and be enveloped by the copious levels of the colour blue emanating from the sky and sea. Fade to blue. None more blue. Blue is the colour. Blue levels reach an unacceptably high rate. Blue, da boo dee ba doo bai…
A stop at Ocean Mesa campsite has us soaking in the oversized swimming pools and hot tub, wrinkling our outward appendages and exceeding the recommended immersion time. A warning sign on the jacuzzi prohibits anyone that has experienced Leakybumitis within the last fourteen days from entering the pool. We gloss over this directive and luckily a bathe in the bubbling waters ends without a leakybum incident.
As we near the Big Sur area, the giant upstanding Redwood trees propel themselves into the sky, surging for the best spot in the forest canopy, roots elongating onto their highest tippy-toes. Necks are craned upwards to view the tops of the trees but their incredible height denies all this view. The Redwoods give off an almost sweet cinnamon-like scent and in dense areas the smell almost becomes thick, tickling the back of the throat. Lucy is in camping heaven, making no secret that this is her favourite part of the trip. She is also in charge of formulating music playlists and we rock out to a plethora of tracks on the road.
We stop for a huge breakfast burrito and eggs Benedict in the harbour sided town of Morro bay. My burrito is loaded with a central mass of potato that is so plentiful, it tests the elasticity of my stomach (I swear it gives me stretch marks). Lucy’s shiny new ipad sucks up an entire series of Community that we intend to consume on the road.
As we continue we happen to come across the directly titled Elephant Seal beach which is home to hundreds of basking Elephant seals catching plentiful rays on the beach. The males are particularly large and seem excessively fat even for something called an Elephant Seal. The mightiest seal has an impressive pod of lady seals at his disposal but is far too busy to be canoodling in the midday sun. We are delighted to witness millions of years of flipper evolution being harnessed to scratch the king of the Elephant seal’s bottom.
After reaching the gorgeous Big Sur area, we stay a couple of days at the Fern Wood campsite which is situated amongst a dense crop of Redwood trees. We dine in (Pot noodle? Excellent choice sir and madame) near a calm stream that flows peacefully a few metres away, offsetting the dappled rays of the sun creating perhaps the most perfect campsite location ever. The onsite bar serves a mean cold beer and the Denver broncos are kicking ass on the big screen HD TV. All is well. Lucy makes the most of the rare presence of draft cider and smashes down three pints pretty swiftly. She loses the feeling in her legs.
When we return to our van we are approached by a pair of near hysterical campers who had been pursued by a skunk that had sniffed out their campfire provisions. Terrorised by the harbinger of stink for two consecutive nights, the pair go speeding off looking for a non lethal, none noisome inducing deterrent.
The next day we make use of our guide sheet from the camper van company to locate a hidden beach in the area. The locals love Pfieffer beach so much they take down the entrance signs to confuse and evade visits from tourists in the area. We almost miss the semi-elusive entry point ourselves.
As we get to the car park we arrive to find an angry Russian man shouting at a group of people, arms full of what looks like film equipment. He barks Russian orders at his crew and gestures with sharp stabby hand movements. The gentle vibe of the place is dissected by his words, heavy with aciculate.
A friendly park ranger strikes up conversation and tells us a music video is being shot here today. A female Russian pop star named Bahktin (after a Russian dog that went into space) is dressed in short sultry pop star clothing and drapes herself over some scary looking rocks. The sea smashes angrily against the shore threatening to turn her bones into sand. Bahktin is diminutive (but bigger than an actual dog) and seems to take a lot of abuse from the tubby director. We root for her to fight back. She takes direction and does as she’s told. Probably a smart move.
The director uses a gopro camera mounted to an AR parrot drone over the choppy waters for a budget crane/chopper effect and he seems to be happy with what he has achieved with his devices. Personally I would have loved to see him lose control and crash the mini RC helicopter into the sea as karma for spoiling the peace of a perfect beach setting. Karma, where are ya?
We move round the corner to find the sand a pinky purple colour, a unique freak of nature owed to the makeup of the rocks in the region.
Then the park ranger returns and tells us a tale of how he recently saved Hollywood starlet, Scarlett Johansen’s life. She had been filming an advert on the part of the beach which was known for its notoriously high gusts and waves which hit the caves and rocks with extreme force. The morning of the shoot, the filming had been going well but the ranger had become increasingly concerned with how the weather was turning. Despite the directors protests the ranger moved the crew from their immediate location. Minutes later a large boulder was blown onto the spot in which the cast and crew had been filming. The most photographed spot on the west coast of America was nearly the spot for the demise of a Hollywood megastar. The ranger played his part down in the tale but i really hoped the yarn was true .
Back at the Fern Wood campsite we are just about to leave for San francisco when we witness an obscenely drunk couple drool and stumble their way around the car park. At first this is hilariously funny as the woman keeps on falling into our van. She can hardly stand but the situation changes when she attempts to get into the drivers seat of her vehicle to presumably drive home. Too drunk to speak she mumbles at her husband who removes her from the drivers seat. Unfortunately he is equally drunk and repeatedly speaks in slur telling her to shut up so as not to alert anybody watching (Anybody like us). The guy starts the car and wheelspins dangerously out of the car park, perhaps conscious they have been observed by us.
Feeling guilty about not intervening we note the licence plate and car colour, and report it to the police through the bartender, seriously hoping the couple hadn’t killed someone already. We drive off in the opposite direction towards the city of San Francisco. Looking forward to the urban sprawl, the shops, the nightlife of the city by the bay.