Lone Pine to Cambria to Santa Cruz

Changing landscape along the way, as we headed through the Sequoia National Forest  towards the ocean.  

 It was terrific to see this change in landscape.

 Sequoia State Forest

 

We came upon lots of orchards, and figured out that Almonds were being grown here.

We drove through vineyards and then orchards. 

One very interesting scene was rigs that were definitely extracting something from the ground, not sure if it was water or oil, but they were everywhere. 

 Cambria

More desert style landscape and then we hit Cambria just at Sunset

Phoebe in Cambria – she certainly turned to the bottle.  You might think she looks incredibly long in this photo, we think she has grown enormously this past couple of weeks.
 

Sunrise in Cambria

Santa Cruz

The drive from Cambria to San Francisco was too long, so Amanda found us a place in Santa Cruz.  It was another 2 bedroom apartment, one block back from the beach.  This had to be one of the best finds.  It was half price on the Internet, really big rooms with fantastic facilities. 

Lots of beautiful murals in the town.

 
I was tempted to try out a Segway, you can hire them for 30 minutes, but I knew the photos would be ridiculous. I was glad I didn’t try a push bike as we came across a woman who had caught the wheels in the tram tracks and had fallen somewhat heavily.  She looked in a lot of pain.  

We had a lovely leisurely walk around town

We walked down to the wharf on the first night and had fish and chips and Woodies, one of the local cafes.  Kurt was very excited about the surf gear and bought lots of Tee Shirts.  O’Neill and Ripcurl are half the price over here apparently.  I did manage to get Andy a nice one from Santa Cruz.

 

This beautiful old apartment building

The amusement Park

Santa Cruz murals

On the pier at Santa Cruz

Santa Cruz Silhouette

Especially for my friend Kris

Love Boat??

Smooching at Fancy Restaurant

Mischief anyone

On the Wharf at Santa Cruz

On the next morning we literally cruised around Santa Cruz for an hour or so, walking back to the jetty, along the beach front and ended up having lunch in a somewhat flash café with a water view.  I had my first fish taco, a bit of a specialty over here.  Shall I say it was OK, probably wouldn’t rush back to try it again, but it was quite edible.  

We have to say that we all loved Santa Cruz, a really sleep little town.  Oh, and as we were leaving we found out that the Coldwater Classic surf competition was on, over the other side of town. 

The surfing competition was held at the point behind Kurt

 They told us also that the weather was unseasonably warm, usually this time of year it is foggy and quite cool.  It was glorious sunshine and about 30 degrees.  

As we drove from the seaside to San Francisco, again there was another huge change in countryside.

Off we went to drive the Big Sur.  Here is a shot of Amanda and Kurt enjoying the view