Day 15: Could you be any more Pacific?

(Title courtesy of Eric, who made me use it).

What a pleasure to wake up near the sea on a glorious morning! We’ve been really lucky with weather this entire trip, but today we were especially thankful for clear skies. We had been warned that the Pacific Coast Highway was often socked in by fog in the summer, but today it was bright blue skies and gorgeous scenery the entire way.

When you wake up in a town like Morro Bay, you don’t want to leave. We prolonged our stay with an early morning visit to the shore, where the locals were surfing and the sea otters were frolicking in the kelp.

Our first stop for the day was Hearst Castle, one of many former “palaces” of William Randolph Hurst.  Hurst had an amazing art collection, and built several homes to house the collection.  The setting is magnificent — high on a cliff overlooking the Pacific coast.  The art collection, to our great surprise, was incredibly interesting and very much to our taste.  The tour lasted 1 1/2 hours, and didn’t even begin to make a dent in all there was to see.  The highlights were the two swimming pools: the outdoor pool a sparkling blue Greek temple, and the indoor pool modeled after the Roman baths.
The indoor pool has an amazing design: when you enter the room, it appears as if the pool contains no water.  It takes a minute to realize that the pool is indeed full, and what you are seeing is reflection of the room.

 

A short drive up the road from Hearst Castle is a turn-off where we saw elephant seals sunning themselves on the beach.  There were probably 50 seals, most lazing around but a few who were ‘play fighting.’

 

We stopped several times during our drive to take in the full ‘Pacific’ experience.  We stopped for a seaside picnic at a secluded cove, and took a hike in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park where we viewed an 80-foot waterfall cascading into the ocean.

We also made good on our promise to let the girls swim in the Pacific Ocean.  We had gotten a tip about an unmarked beach in Big Sur that was simply not to be missed.  The tip was a good one — this was probably the most gorgeous beach I’ve ever seen, and there were few people to mar the experience.

We’ve seen photos and movies featuring the Pacific Coast Highway, but none of them truly do this drive justice — our photos don’t, either.  It was simply a fantastic day.

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Day 14: We are introduced to L.A. traffic

As fans of the show American Idol, both girls wanted to see “Hollywood.” They pictured a place where TV and movie stars (and American Idol contestants) would be walking down the street, maybe performing on stage, around the clock. I think they were a little disappointed. We showed them the famous Hollywood sign, and pointed out the Kodak Theater (where American Idol is filmed — never mind that the Oscar ceremonies are held there as well). Next door was Grumman’s Chinese Theater, and we checked out some of the handprints and footprints, as well as some of the stars on Hollywood Boulevard. They recognized only the cast of Star Wars, and Shirley Temple.

We tried to get lunch at the famous Pink’s Chili Dogs, but the line was too long, and wasn’t moving. Some day I will try them.

We then headed up the coast, taking the Pacific Coast Highway through Malibu (which they also knew from a television show) and took a short walk on the pier.

Santa Barbara was our first real stop on our drive up the coast. The old Mission is beautiful, and though it was closed when we got there, we enjoyed the grounds — a perfect break from driving.

Our home for the night was in the old seaport town of Morro Bay. We arrived just at sunset, and took a look around before heading to dinner.

Oh yes, dinner. One of the most memorable we’ve had the entire trip. We took a recommendation from our Fodor’s guide, and headed to Taco Temple. They are known for their fresh-fish tacos, and they were amazing. Nora really enjoyed her taco, and wanted to buy a Taco Temple t-shirt. We even considered staying in town another night just to eat there again — it was that good. Go.

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