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| View from our balcony |
By motomynd
[Sequel to "Point Mugu to Pismo Beach"]
After two very short nights of sleep and two very long days of travel—flying from Raleigh, North Carolina to Atlanta to LA, and driving Highway 1 up the California coast—we awake in Pismo Beach feeling surprisingly well rested after six hours of sleep. We have a long day planned—driving and exploring from Pismo to Santa Margarita, then on toward King City—but we have to take at least a few minutes to enjoy the morning at Best Western Shelter Cove.
Made-in-the-room hotel coffee is not usually that great, but a cup of Seattle’s Best on the balcony is a fantastic way to start this day. The coastline has a rocky, craggy character to it, much like Big Island in Hawaii, instead of the flat stretch of sand we see most places in the Southeast. There the mountains are 200 miles from the beach. Here a knoll of mini-mountain proportions rises just the other side of the hotel, maybe 100 yards from the water. We love the beach; we love the mountains—we love this!
“Are you sure you want to spend the day driving all over the place?” I ask my wife, “Want to just settle for a place at the beach?” Anissa gives me that hands-on-hips red-head stare and says, “you can afford to buy 10 acres on the beach? Really?”
Details, I think, details. “On this beach maybe I could stand to live right next door to people.” I get another hands-on-hips stare. “You couldn’t. You need more space, a lot more space. Do I need to remind you what you thought of living in Raleigh? And Washington, DC?”
With that I dutifully carry the travel cooler and bag of snacks to the car. Anissa grabs cameras and jackets and we are on our way toward Santa Margarita.
Heading north on Highway 1/101 from Pismo Beach leads us inland through rolling mountains covered mostly in short grass that is already beginning to turn golden brown, even though it is only the last week of February. The landscape is sparsely dotted with trees and rock outcroppings.
One of my fondest memories of California is driving through “Steinbeck country” (biography) in late August, the golden grass clinging to the mountains like skin stretched taut over the bulging muscles of a lioness about to pounce. I grew up in the green lushness of the Southeast, spent much time in the almost absurd greenness of Upstate New York, and have roamed the Canadian Rockies—but these mountains tightly wrapped in golden brown speak to me as nothing has before. They have cast a spell on Anissa as well.
When we tell people back east we are planning to move to California, they all ask how we can stand the crowds, the traffic, the rushed pace of life. We try to tell them all of “The Golden State” isn’t like that, but it’s like trying to convince them that not everyone in Africa lives in a hut.
We leave the highway and discover there is no rush in Santa Margarita—there is barely a town at all. We joke that Clint Eastwood should be riding in from the other end of main street on a tall gray horse with a cigar clenched in his teeth. As we head out of town on West Puzo Road, we really do see a rider on horseback, but they don’t try to block our way.
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| Santa Margarita Lake |
Distracted by the eagle, we are nearly waylaid by scampering ground squirrels. The two are sitting engrossed in conversation on the right shoulder of the road, but as we approach at 45 MPH they inexplicably run in front of us toward the opposite side of the road. I hit the brakes and swerve and immediately recall the insurance commercial where the squirrels give each other “high-fives” after causing a wreck. Maybe a half-mile later, another squirrel does the same stunt, then two more. It is like driving through a video game.
If we hit a squirrel in a car it will be bad news for them. But if we move here and I hit one on a motorcycle it will be bad news for me. So here I am, Mr. Animal Rights Activist, having to consider proactively running over squirrels in a car so there are fewer of them to potentially kill me when I’m on a motorcycle: how messed up is that?
Despite the squirrel’s best efforts we arrive at the lake. “Is it really $10 to just ride in and look around?” we ask the ranger. He laughs and says “I can give you a free pass for a 10-minute drive through. Just don’t be too long.”
He is very friendly and talkative so we ask him if it is really as hot as people tell us it is in the summer. “Oh yeah,” he says. “It gets into the 90s and sometimes into the 100s for weeks on end.” We ask why all the weather websites say the average high temperatures are only in the 70s and 80s. He gives us the same answer as our other limited personal references: “I don’t know. It gets much hotter than that.”
Could be, but we are beginning to think there is some sort of cult at work, trying to keep this area a best-kept secret. All the weather websites are wrong, but all the locals are right? Really? Talk about a small town with a mysterious secret—we are wondering if we have found it.
We drive to the lake, which has fishing and boating and is surrounded by ruggedly scenic mountains with a trail system for hiking and mountain biking. It reminds me of Carvins Cove, my favorite outdoors spot back in my hometown, except here there are more rocks, fewer trees—and mountain lions. Back home we have black bears, which hardly ever pose a threat as we pass on trails. Sharing trails with mountain lions will take some getting used to.
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| Western scrub jay |
We turn in our visitor pass, get out of Dodge, as they say, and take a right up a narrow, winding road. On the web we have spotted some houses in this area, “ranchettes” of 10 acres each. They seem perfect for us and, miraculously, they even fit our budget. We find a local out for a walk, have a brief chat—he seems a very likable and harmless chap—then we drive on. The houses look nice, as does the land. It is a sparse, rugged and rocky landscape, but we love the wild look, and the texture and character of it. We drive up to a flock of wild turkeys right beside the road. We take photos; they seem unconcerned.
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| Wild turkey walking by the road |
Retracing our route back toward Santa Margarita we stop at a historic bridge to take photos.
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| Historic bridge near Santa Margarita |
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| View from the bridge |
Next time (Saturday, April 13): A surprise in Atascadero?
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Copyright © 2013 by motomynd
| Please comment |
Sure enjoying the tour ! Thanks !
ReplyDeleteAlso enjoying the travelog. Great photos.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed our trip through the Outback. I found that the locals, normally will tell you the straight scoop. Before I moved to Lake County, on our first and second trip,I was told that business died in the winter. However, all I saw were the thousands of visitors, and thought, it couldn't be that bad. It was; no one goes to a lake in the winter. In the case of were you are looking, come full summer, there maybe thousands of cars on the road to the lake. Things are not always what they seem---in Cali.
ReplyDeleteThank you, everyone! "Outback" is not a bad word to describe the hinterlands outside Santa Margarita - rugged country indeed. But appealing, in a rugged sort of way, just needs an Ayers Rock as an accent.
ReplyDeleteIronic that folks in Cali consider a sunny afternoon in the 60s to be winter - compared to what we live with that time of year in the allegedly warm Southeast - so traffic on the little back road to the lake may indeed be a completely different game in summer. I grew up near the biggest resort lake in Virginia: it was mayhem Memorial Day through Labor Day, and one notch above a ghost town the rest of the year.
Motomynd, your statement that Anissa said, "you can afford to buy 10 acres on the beach? Really?” seems to suggest that you and she don't commingle your money. Or does she just know that you don't have that much money, and is she simply reminding you that you don't?
ReplyDeleteOf course, maybe you do...I wouldn't put it past you.
Morris, isn't commingle a wonderful word? It can mean a happy, innocent agreement to split a tab or share a cab, or an arrangement one step short of hostage taking and paying a hefty ransom. Can you tell me a couple that isn't commingling somewhere between those two extremes, no matter what legalities and polite words may be involved?
ReplyDeleteTo your question: Anissa, being a wife, was in part just instinctively playing the role of making sure her husband didn't think too big. This seems a role all wives take to innately - to keep their husbands from being too confident and optimistic, possibly? Being a redhead, she may fulfill that role with particular relish...or it could possibly be she has never forgotten the time I took on a project that required my going to London for a weekend - with the promise I would be back by Monday evening - and I instead had to call her on that Monday evening and explain I was on my way to the Congo and would not be back for a month or so.
Either way, I'm not sure my share of "commingle" could buy acres of California Coast - especially without Anissa's "commingle" contributing its share.
Yes, I agree that "commingle" is one of English's wonderful words, and your response honors its worth.
ReplyDeleteWell Moto, that explains why the most creative people in the world are gay. It becomes hard to be creative and not be overly optimistic. Just think; if you were playing for the other team what lofty heights you could have attained.
ReplyDeleteI say this because you must have talent to be creative no matter what team you play for---and I must say you do have talent.(For any of my gay friends who are offended at being in the same post as Moto---I'm sorry!)smile it's Monday.
Konotahe, I haven't gotten it yet, whatever Motomynd said or implied about being gay. (Is there a typo I missed, or something?) Maybe I'll get it before someone explains it to me, but if not I hope someone will!
DeleteIt was about having a wife.( to keep their husbands from being too confident and optimistic,) I guess if I need to explain the joke...o'well back to the day job.
DeleteAh, thanks! Subtle! I wonder, though, whether "wife" and "husband" absolutely imply gender. With the transformation of marriage to include gays, won't we still use the terms? A lesbian couple I know (they were married in Connecticut) just had twin boys (by artificial insemination of one of the partners), and the boys were given the surname of the other partner.
DeleteI suppose, though, that the continued use of "wife" and "husband" in this context could get a bit confusing. At any rate, it will be interesting to see how the expansion of marriage to include same-sex marriage will affect the terminology we use in talking about married couples....
The day job is trying to keep my wife happy, by the way. (smile)
ReplyDeleteThere is a quote from someone famous that goes something like: "a woman marries a man hoping he will change; a man marries a woman hoping she won't change; ultimately they are both disappointed."
ReplyDeleteThere is also an old joke I remember from a 60s or 70s era comedian: "of course gay people should be able to marry; why shouldn't they have to go through the same hell as the rest of us?"
Combining the twisted logic of those two jokes with my limited personal observation of the gay lifestyle - a former girlfriend who it turned out was also in a "committed lesbian relationship" (her term, not mine) during a time she and I were having some really great weekends together - yes, we will probably need some new terms to keep it all straight as gay marriage is finally made official and accepted across the country. With those new terms, however, will arise the same old problems, only now - as the long ago comedian noted - gay couples will have just as much trouble sorting out the legalities involved in maintaining and ending their relationships as hetero couples. Which brings to mind another axiom: "Be careful what you ask for, you may get it."
Konotahe, thank you for yet another mind expanding side trip down a path I assume was rooted in your trips along Highway 1 in the '60s? And Morris, thank you for the brilliant bit of April Foolery in pretending you did not get Konotahe's joke.
Now I must return to a very important part of my day job, looking after the "commingle" by tidying up the house a bit while my wife works down the hall in her office.
There are a few books out, mostly to help children understand. One is called (name may be wrong but you'll get the idea) Johnny has two mothers. Or Tommy has two daddies. While one may take the part that we males play, I don't know of any gays that have given up their gender. Moto my education on the matter did come from living in Cali but not in the 60s. A friend in Lake County, who owed a small resort and bar, his sister-in-law was a 'Bayside Bomber'. Roller Skating was big in the Bay area. One week each summer the team would rent out his resort. They were all lesbians and some mean drunks. We were invited to a party by Jim and his wife, they wanted us to meet her sister. A very nice person by the way. As more and more drinks were put away, suddenly, a very large lady came to our table and asked my wife, at the time, to dance. My wife declined, but the lady didn't want to take no for an answer. Anyway, if not for Jim's sister in law I would be living with the bitter memory of having my butt kicked, by a Roller Derby Queen.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteKonotahe, think of the great stories all your friends were deprived of thanks to that intervention. You could have been "the guy who got his butt kicked by that Roller Derby Queen" and would therefore have lived forever in local legend. Instead, you will likely be the forgotten "guy who used to live here and moved south of the border."
ReplyDeleteGrowing up in the Southeast, on TV and at county fairs we were force fed "professional" wrestling. Even though they were big dudes, anyone with much of a working brain could tell the action was fake. Lucky for them, in the SE there were - and still are - many, many people lacking much of a working brain. The "sport" proliferated and became the juggernaut known as WWF - with masks, fireworks, fake blood, and all the other made-for-TV trappings. It is now known as WWE thanks to the gorilla hold infringement smack down put on it by the original WWF - World Wildlife Fund - but it is the same deal we grew up with. It was awful then, and I assume still is now, and how it ever became big business is beyond me.
On the bright side, we would occasionally receive a roller derby broadcast - and we adolescent guys would go nuts over it! The blockers weren't particularly interesting to us, but after one look at those lithe, tough "jammers" being hip whipped (if I remember the term correctly) out of the pack and careening around the track - well, we knew who we wanted for our girlfriend. When we finally got to attend an event in person - in Greensboro, NC as I recall - the bubble burst, of course. Not only were the "little" jammers much taller and heavier than any of us in our pathetic "guy pack," they were also sort of mean and scary looking. As for their larger teammates - yes, they looked like they could have kicked all our butts, all at one time. We went home crestfallen, and I have not thought of Roller Derby in the four decades since...until I read your comment.
That was but a moment in time. I've done far less intelligent things to be remembered by.
ReplyDeleteOh please do tell...at least a Cali-related story or two...
ReplyDeleteMost of my stories are best left for a pint of Ale, in a Pub, on a rainy day. This forum is far too family friendly to be able to share in the really funny stories. There was a time, as manager of the Lake County Chamber of Commerce, that my call for help had people shaking their heads from one end of the lake to the other.
ReplyDeleteThis story might be better saved until ‘Fish Friday.’ But you know what they say about fish and visitors to your home: “After three days they begin to stink.” With that in mind, let me get to the tell....
The C of C had a budget of $150,000. for promoting the tourist trade. My first year we were able to double the number of boat shows we attended. This was due in part, by me doing all the work. I had met all the sells reps for ‘Travel Lodge Motels’ reaching from LA to Seattle. This by chance was the where we were attending the shows---from the bottom to the top of the coast, I stayed in the VIP suites for the cost of cleaning them up. It pays to know people. (They were all very nice looking woman---strange there were no men.)
My first show was in Anaheim. It was the year the Rams had moved to Anaheim and went to the Super Bowl. A number of the players appeared at the boat show to promote the big move from LA, across the street, to Anaheim. The cheer-leaders were on skates and made a lovely sight flying around the displays. A friend, whom I had met at the Jackson Hole booth, called me over to meet a couple of the cheer-leaders. There was a large party that night and they wanted to go, but they could not drive their car. They came and left on the Ram’s bus. My friend offered our services.
Across from my booth a small bar had been set up. The bartender, a nice Italian gentleman, and I became friends; he slipped me free drinks and we swapped stories. At noon, on the day before I met the cheer-leaders, there were so many people around the bar, upon my return from lunch, I couldn’t get to my booth. It seems like my bartender friend was the Rams bartender. Whenever the team threw a party he handled the details for them. He was pouring free drinks as the team filled the space between our booths. Later the next night, I found out he supplied the coke for these parties.
Well this was a story about fish so let me end the prolog. We got catch going down the backstairs from the dressing rooms. The girls were to report to their boss and we were told, because of some kind of a contract we could be sued. The big-ass bodyguards told us that we were lucky they didn’t kick the hell out of us.(more next post)
Next part of post
ReplyDeleteWe went to the party alone. Had a great time; hung out with Jack Youngblood most of the night. The players only drink beer or at least that is all I saw them doing. There was coke and grass being passed around; I think everybody but the players were high. The Rams lost the Super Bowl. They may have had one party to many.
I packed up everything and headed to San Francisco. For us it was the big one. A large number of our tourist came in from the bay area. I had not put the large fish tank up in Anaheim, but in San Francisco in was front and center. Some friends were to meet me with 10 fish from the lake to place in the tank. The first thing I did was set the tank and its pumps up. I filled it with water, then put the rest of the booth together. At about 3:00, my friends arrived with the fish. We placed the fish in the tank and watched them swim around for a while before the guys headed home and I headed to the Motel for some sleep. It was the VIP suite. There was a nice bottle of wine and a phone number waiting for me. Both would have to wait until tomorrow---I crashed.
The show opened at 10 am. At 9:30 I walked pass the other booths and noticed that the displays, which had fish tanks, had a number of dead fish. My first thought was that someone had poisoned the fish. Once I reached my tank; it was o’shit. Every fish was belly up and the doors were opening in 20 minutes. I ran across the street to a Quick-stop and bought a cooler and bag of ice. I took the fish out and placed them on ice, but now I did not have a display. The other booths faired better than I did. Their one or two fish swam slowly but were still alive. By the next day they were dead, also.
Before I took the job as manager, a gentleman by the title of ‘Catfish George’ had been paid to attend the shows and care for the fish. I thought, why pay someone to fill up a tank and throw a few fish in.
Once Catfish George answered his phone and I explained what had happened. I waited for what seemed a long time for him to stop laughing, before I began to plead with him to come to the show and please bring more fish.
I fish, but there is a difference between catching fish and keeping fish. I had the tank emptied by the time George showed up with more fish and jerry cans of lake water.
Something about the PH level or some damn thing. To me water is water; to fish I guess not. The board, between laughing and asking how stupid a person could be, that they would use tap water in a fish tank, said Catfish George would be in charge of the fish tank from that day forth.
As a side note: I cleaned the fish, and as there was nothing wrong with the meat, and I held a drawing. Went over pretty good.
Konotahe, this reads like it could be a much more interesting five-part series than my ramblings around Central Coast. I will hope to read it in several installments as your time allows.
ReplyDeleteYou too ran a Chamber of Commerce at a resort lake? For several years I wrote and photographed a magazine for the largest and most upscale resort lake in Virginia. During that time I was also liaison between the publishing house that actually produced and printed the magazine, and the board of directors of the chamber. Which meant - as you probably know from your former job - that I sat through some of the most boring, petty and biggest waste of time meetings imaginable. One year I apparently walked out of the room at the wrong moment and found myself president of the chamber. Even though I took two months that year to drive from Virginia to Alaska and back, and do several magazine projects along the way, I still refer to those 10 months actually running the chamber as the longest decade of my life.
I must say my time was very interesting. From the first day I was hired 48% of the board was trying to fire me. Each day was a new battle. It was the entire county I was manager of and each little town had their own C of C. But, I had the promotional money. I went through 4 presidents in the year and a half I was there. Each one elected with the promise to make me a one term...wait a minute that was someone else.
ReplyDeleteTo be so lucky as to only have to serve one term...
ReplyDeleteBeing the head of something like that is not unlike the old joke about winning a trip to Cleveland. 1st Prize: a weekend in Cleveland; 2nd Prize, a week in Cleveland.
When my second year contract came up. The president at the time called me aside and said, " Ed, we think it would be a good idea if you sold your Headshop." They couldn't have made me sell it, but this was one time I thought they were right.
ReplyDeleteIn a post last week, did you not say something about also running a liquor store? Is it safe to assume your chamber's president had no problem with that? If the chamber I ran hadn't had the best bar on the lake right next door, I don't know how we would have gotten anyone to attend a meeting.
ReplyDeleteI owned the liquor store in Clear Lake Oaks. One day a guy came in and asked to leave some pipes on consignment. There was a 200% mark up on the pipes, which sold out in two days---that was when I opened the Headshop--called it 'High Country'. All of our meetings took place at one of the Resorts/with a bar. The Chamber has a wonderful office building in Lakeport---but no bar.
ReplyDeleteHigh Country could be the best name ever for a headshop. Almost impossible to hold a chamber of commerce meeting without a bar.
ReplyDeleteI agree, "High Country" is superb.
ReplyDeleteKonotahe, how much of your memoirs have you got written so far? When they're made into a movie, maybe Johnny Depp could be interested in playing you as a younger man.
Will Ferrell would be better, although I do like Depp. A lot of the things that have happened in my life were unforeseen and were more of the result of people I came to know along the way. In the 60s I joined the Army--my friends headed to Mexico. They became mixed up in the drug trade and the CIA. One became dead the other became rich.
ReplyDeleteThe closest I've come to writing anything down is my novel: "Boystown." 90% of the events are true.
So which one became dead, and which one rich? Or do we need to order an advance copy of "Boystown" to learn the rest of the story? If so, are you self-publishing and when?
ReplyDeleteThey both made money(a lot). One knew when to get out of the business, the other got himself and his nephew killed. Their family name died with them. He had no children and his sister had the one boy. She lost her son and her brother within a month of each other. Did I tell you I got shot with a 45. This is the friend that did the shooting.
ReplyDeleteHe thought the gun was empty and was fooling around. I was in a coma for 7 days, in the hospital for 6 weeks. Got out on a Wen. and was partying with the same guys in Mexico that Friday. I wrote the novel because, after awhile people start to think you are lying or just making up stories so I thought it would be easier to start off telling everybody it was fiction. I'm retired and so is the book. It will never be in print. If you get bored and want a good story to read, just ask and I'll be happy to e-mail it to anyone. Or anyone else that might wonder about the drug trade of the early 60s.
Please email it to me, Konotahe. Thanks.
DeleteHope you enjoy it Morris. Don't let your wife read it--it is a mans book. I found one female that liked it. It's pretty raw as were those days.
ReplyDeleteKonotahe, I wonder what it was about your caution that made Blogger ask me to moderate whether to publish it. Maybe the phrase "man's book" or the word "raw"?
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