Blogs from Santa Cruz, California, United States, North America - page 6

Ollie once again enjoyed the complimentary breakfast, either because Mark and Dale were scared of the culinary delights that lay ahead, or because there was cold pizza in the room that had to be eaten. Either way, we were on the road by midday and heading south towards Santa Cruz. We drifted the 100 miles south and arrived around 2pm. Luckily, Dale had booked a hotel before-hand and we checked into our mini-apartment, which was rather nice. In the afternoon Dale and Ollie ventured out onto the Santa Cruz Boardwalk, only to return very quickly as there was nothing there except closed shops and drunk bums! In the evening we made the most of our kitchen facilities and Ollie made a delightful vegetable pasta dish. After dinner we whiled away the hours with some beers and ... read more

by Austin Girl http://www.austingirlblog.blogspot.com Just flew in from Santa Cruz, CA. I saw Shakespeare's "Romeo & Juliet" and "All's Well That Ends Well" in the redwood forest. Does anyone understand the latter play? It wasn't the playwright's typical tragedy or comedy. OMG! When the sun goes down, temperatures descend faster than Angelina Jolie can adopt another baby. Holy crap it was cold! There are raccoons in the redwood forest. Bunches! And, the lil critters never miss a rehearsal -- this is what I was told. They would sit in the outdoor chairs during the day watching the actors practice on stage. I fell asleep during "All's Well That Ends Well" until an orphaned raccoon rattled a garbage can nearby jolting me from my dream -- a nightmare actually centering on a family of problem raccoons. The ... read more

Monday 18th August Another early start, and a trip along the coastal road, brought us closer to our next major destination - San Francisco. However, we made a couple of stops en route before hitting the big city. First of all was a stop at Santa Cruz. Another coastal town, very much geared up for sunbathing, surfing, and swimming. However, we were beginning to notice a consistent difference in temperature between North and South California - the sun was still shining, but the heat had been reduced from averages of 110 degrees in San Diego to 70 degrees at our current location. A gentle stroll on the beach was followed by a quick look round the town centre. Then it was on to the Redwood State Park for a short walking trail that took in an ... read more

Hi the second installment of the blog! Well yesterday we started off getting up early going to the north beach area to the city lights book store, where jack kerouac and allen ginsberg grew with their populairty and city lights was the first book store to publish and stock their material! I purchased some items :-) Then we went to the greyhound bus terminal and sorted our tickets out, which was boring as hell but also necessary! We had lunch at a "cafe" pizza slices all round! Very filling and...cheap! We then went to Coit tower which is a monumnet to firemen built in the 19th century amazing view of city, with interesting frescos below. We then got the bus across town to look at the golden gate bridge (without the fog) it was AMAZING. Then ... read more

So the first night in Santa Cruz we had two British people staying in our room, pretty boring but was niceto hear a familiar accent! We woke up reasonably early had a FREE (yes free...) breakfast and left for downtown santa cruz early morning, we looked round some shops, sam bought some CDs from the place he discovered Thrice (the holy shrine) and he got a rare one for rown, the peel sessions by the smashing pumpkins! Sam then lured me into a vegan/vegetarian cafe for lunch which turned out to be filling as hell, and really nice, choclate milkshakes and pancakes with syrup for me and a stick of carot or something for sam....maybe. Just before lunch we had spent quite a long time searching for the mystical dennys but alas we could not find ... read more