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Published: July 25th 2011
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Not much water
but plenty of wind inland This post should be just a little one. We don't want to mix up the main San Francisco post with the bits around and we don't want to swallow up the bits around in the main San Francisco post – if that makes just a little sense. San Francisco is the sort of place you need to circle so we decided that a run around from Monterey to Sacramento with a toddle through the Napa Valley and Sonoma would be a good approach.
We drove into Monterey keeping a close lookout for signs to indicate that it was now OK for Robyn and Ken to return! There were none. (It is hard to believe that they would still remember the havoc they caused those many years ago!!) Lovely place though. You can understand why they would want to keep standards up. Apparently Sue and Will were here once too and that is still remembered fondly at a place called Pebble Beach. Lot of green grass and big sandy hollows about.
Actually, and back to reality, the first night here we stayed in a place called Seaside. This is next door to Sand City. I am sure there was a
Windswept
On 17 Mile Drive parable about building on sand but it clearly didn't take here. Right next to the town, but across the freeway, is a massive dune. Covered in rough vegetation but still a dune. To be honest, we didn't pick the place out for its potential fragility or even its aesthetic appeal. It was just close to Monterey and there was a motel that, for this time of the year and in this area, was considerably cheaper than others.
The main objective in Seaside/Monterey (and they really are the same place to all intents and purposes) was to obtain drugs. Nothing dramatic. In Asia, Africa, Europe, Central America and most of South America you can purchase this particular medication without prescription. In Australia you need a prescription and in the USA it is the same. Perhaps we just care more about our people. Or, maybe we care more about our doctors. The consultation cost $187. Yes, she has been on this medication for 15 years or so at about the same dosage rate. Doctors do have a duty of care but it is a nuisance. A 2 hour wait to see a doctor and costly. Unfortunately, the drugs she has been
on aren't used here. The replacement was $78 a month but, after she fell about frothing at the mouth, they changed it for one that was $4 per month.
The pick of Monterey, from our perspective at least, was a meander down the 17 Mile Drive. There was a moment's pause when we realised that it would cost us money just to drive in, and a thought of how can they charge you to drive up a residential street; but it turned out to be a private road which was well worth the cost. The residents do have a lovely place to live. There are very flash houses along most of one side of the road. The rest is golf courses and such. Pebble Beach is the pick I suppose but there are a couple of others as well. We decided, while we were driving along, that this could be a very nice place to live. Lovely views over the type of coastline that it would be hard to get tired of looking at while you were sipping your breakfast coffee. But neither of us play golf so we have decided not to buy in at this stage.
There is a lot of pretty country around this part of the world, such as Half Moon Bay State Beach (where, for the info of the golfers among you, there is also a golf course). Some people possibly wouldn't include the area on the way there - around Salinas - in that category but it is definitely special and interesting. They call this area the 'Salad Bowl of the World'. Not completely sure about 'the World' bit but there is an incredible amount of salad and other vegetables grown around here. Thousands of acres of laser levelled land with furrows sufficiently precise that there is not an inch of spare ground between the roots of small plants and sides of the tyres of the machinery. Machinery seems to king here. You get some very sophisticated items working the fields and it is probably a reasonable assumption that these machines are one of the key factors in the commercial viability of these massive farms. Another key factor would have to be the impressive numbers of often Hispanic workers who do the picking, weeding and planting work that the machinery clearly cannot.
We told a local that we had stayed in
Stockton. He expressed surprise. Something along the lines of 'why would you want to go there?' Truth is that Sacramento was about where we wanted to be that night but Stockton, just an hour or so the right side, had a music festival advertised. So Stockton it was. Turned out that the place was full. We had booked a room and that was lucky, or not, depending on your perspective. Not all good news. The music festival was all hip-hop, rap and similar and obviously not aimed at the likes of us. The town was full because there was a track and field meet on. Nothing to do with music. But a long walk around the town was not without interest.
Sacramento has turned its old downtown area into an historical precinct. It is just a little twee but well done and fun, with couple of museums and theatres as well as the shops. The Amtrak station is also here. It is clearly a work in progress and will get better although, if it were to become more of a theme park, that would be a pity.
We decided from Sacramento that we would stay off the large
roads and try to have a look at the country. It was an interesting drive along the levies from Sacramento and then on through the countryside to Napa. Lots of grapes, wineries, tasting rooms, rolling hills and a few trees. We enjoyed the drive but weren't that tempted to pull up often. It would have been nice to taste a few wines but we weren't prepared to pay to taste wines that we weren't going to be able to carry.
Sonoma was a little more to our liking than the greater pace of Napa. We enjoyed a very nice breakfast and walk around Sonoma. It is a lovely little town that is a good place to visit. There seem to be a lot of people who have decided that it is an easy place to live in. It is worth staying here so that you can sample the wineries in walking distance of the town square. A pity that they decided to put the City Hall in the middle of the original Spanish-style square but it is still large enough to look pretty good, even though it is now a park rather than a plaza.
Just a short
run into San Francisco from Sonoma and our next post will be from there.
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