Californ-i-a

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We arrived in California with half a plan and without really any clear idea of what we were going to do for the next six weeks apart from catching up with our friends Ellen and Florus in LA. And thanks to their kindness in putting us up in their gorgeous beach house on Venice beach, we didn't have to start thinking about what we were going to do immediately. We had a great few days enjoying Venice and Santa Monica - cocktails at Shutters on the Beach, breakfast at the Fig Tree watching the craziness start up along Venice boardwalk.
We had a flight booked from Vegas to Toronto in six weeks time (we had planned a cross country drive from LA to Toronto but had struggled to get a good deal on a car). Then Ellen and Florus told us there were a couple of places free on a planned sailing trip to Catalina (some five hours off the coast of LA) and plan started to come together. The sailing trip was in two weeks so Eric and I decided to head off and explore the Californian state parks for a couple of weeks then return to LA for the sailing trip, then to head off again for another couple of weeks camping in state parks and then to return to join Ellen and Florus for a week long road trip through Utah, a bit of Arizona and Nevada - finishing inVegas.
And so with the complete ignorance of Europeans in a big country we set off with our hire car - aiming for Yellowstone. It really didn't look that far away but we should have known having once managed to ruin a good holiday by driving halfway down Baha California to a beach which really didn't look that far away on the map (one week and 2000 miles later....). We made it as far as Santa Barbara or to be more exact to the state beach Carpenteria - just beneath and although the campground said full we managed to secure a spot right on the beach. A short walk up the beach was the small town centre with a few shops and Billy's Guitar Garage where Zoe picked up both a guitar lesson with Billy Stewart (and got to see his pics from his glory days as a rocker - Bon Jovi had nothing on him when it came to a perm and leather trousers) and a full size guitar for a bargain price - no more weird little Bolivian banjo for her!
Cooking dinner that night over our fire pit we decided we loved the area so much that we decided to stay for a few days.. however sadly that wasn't going to happen. The next morning we had to join the queue first thing in the morning and managed to secure our camp spot for another night. However due to the some weird booking system we were not allowed to book in for any more nights. And so sadly after another lovely day the next morning we were kicked off the campground as it was full for the weekend - and, we were warned, we were unlikely to find anywhere to camp in the area as there was a big festival on that weekend in Santa Barbara. We decided to head north and stop at the first campground we could find a free spot. And so it was we headed up through Big Sur (no space there - no way) on through Carmel to Monterey where we spent the night in a prohibitively expensive motel having been unable to find the Veteran Memorial Campground. This did mean we could have night on the town rather than under the stars and we had a good time at Fisherman's Wharf. Next day we got ourselves onto the campground - a lovely spot just on the hills between Monterey and Carmel. We spent the next few days there - exploring the area, visiting the amazing Monterey Aquarium and, tragically having John Steinbeck knocked rather in Zoe's esteem (I never knew he travelled and wrote about his cross USA trip with his poodle...his poodle for heaven's sake). Eric learnt that it's not a good idea to fall asleep in the tent with food when there are hungry raccoons around (a good trial run before we headed into bear country).We also used the time to book our campgrounds for the next few weeks having wised up to just how busy it gets on campgrounds in state parks in August. We booked in on Lassen Volcanic Park in the north, then into Napa-Botha Park for the return journey - planning to stop once more in Santa Barbara before we returned to LA for the sailing trip. We also planned and booked our second camping trip, booking into Sequioa for a few days, Lake Tahoe for a few more and then onto Yosemite park. So our next stop was Lassen. We spent a good few days in this amazing park on a beautiful quiet campground called Butte Lake right next to the surreal conical cinder cone. There was a controlled burn off going on which meant on arrival we were confronted by a huge plume of smoke on the horizon and we had to wonder if there had been a volcanic explosion - fortunately it was all under control although a few of the walks were closed. The stars were amazing and on the first night we were treated to a meteor shower. We got used to using the bear cages and had our first very close bear encounter when we were hiking early one morning. Although we were enjoying cooking over the campfire it was pretty cold in the mornings and the lack of hot coffee was affecting us so we headed to Redding to buy a little cooker, which made us very happy because while the days were really warm it was really cold in the mornings and a hot drink was the best! We did most of the walks in the area - including Brokeoff (which we kept calling Brokeback) Mountain and through the boiling sulphuric pools that form Bumpass Hell (so named after the unfortunate Mr Bumpass who discovered it and then managed to fall through the crust and into it burning his leg off in the process).
Happy and relaxed after many nice hikes and views we went onto check out some wines in the Napa Sonoma area. We drove around through both valleys in a day and it is lovely - we preferred the more laid-back Calistoga to snooty St Helena. We were especially impressed with the square in Sonoma and visited a beautiful gallery with pictures from Lisa Kristine. She travels the world in search of beautiful images and it was great fun to see pics from the many countries visited on our trip. We ended the trip with a tasting at the On the Edge winery where the happened to have some very surprising and great wines amongst which a Charbono and anoaked Sauvignon Blanc- both highly recommended! As mentioned the last stop would have been Santa Barbara again and you would think we had a booking given our previous experience...we didn;t and once again the place was rammed. We stayed one night in a really gorgeous little bed and breakfast in Carpentiria - very chintzy with free cakes and a great breakfast. However we couldn't afford to stay another night so luckily El & Flo had no issue with us returning to base a day early- and neither did we!
That weekend we headed off together for our sailing trip. After meeting John and Cory and their numeroud inflatable floaties we set off- fully stocked up with food, beer, beer, and beer - to Catalina from Long Beach. We immediately spotted dolphins playing around and managed to get a bit of sailing in. We hoped to stay in Avalon on Catalina and hoped there would be a mooring there. We were out of luck but found a great spot just a bit further north. Staying on the boat was fantastic great company and food and we decided to sleep on the deck under the stars- a new experience for Eric. The next day started with a slight challenge as the engine wouldn't start. Not a huge problem you'd think on a sailing boat but it is when there's no wind and you want to check for moorings in Avalon harbour. After a jump start we managed to get the boat to the town and had it checked, our luck turned when the engineer could not only sort out the boat but also pointed us to a verymooring that he knew would not be used that night. Very valuable info as the harbour was still packed. We celebrated our luck in the local tequila joint and got reminded that tequlia really is a very very tricky drink to handle...Our good luck continued when we met a guy who was moored right next to us and gladly offered us a lift back. The next morning aching heads aside we had a great trip back to LA. Sailing along we were joined ons again by some very playful dolphins! A much needed good night's sleep and then we were ready to pick up our hire car and head off for Camping California round 2.

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Photos

Fab Shutters at the Beach
with El & Flo

Oh no! the park is burning
...they claimed they were controlled fires

Zoe at the Hell
all limbs intact