Big Sur

Had a very busy week last week. Spanish class on Monday, Step class at the gym on Tuesday, Stereophonics concert at the Great American Music Hall on Wednesday, dinner at a friend’s in Oakland on Thursday, drive down to Salinas for the start of our Big Sur weekend on Friday! Salinas is the birthplace of John Steinbeck, but we didn’t see anything to do with him. Instead, we just stayed at a cheap motel there and took advantage of a cheap Mexican supermarket the next day for our camping supplies. It really was like Little Mexico from the food to the huge array of piñatas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi%C3%B1ata if you don’t know what they are!) to the fact that a little Spanish certainly helped with communications at the deli counter.

We’d planned to get in touch with Oli and Karine (my colleagues from work, who were accompanying us on the trip) when we arrived at the Big Sur coast, which starts some 120 miles or so south of San Francisco. There was a big flaw to this plan, however, since there is absolutely no cell phone reception along this coastline, which is basically a narrow belt nestled between the Pacific and a range of high, forested hills. As a result, we didn’t see these friends until we got to the campsite that evening. However, we spent a pleasant day with our other friend, Cassie, driving down the gorgeous coast and taking little walks to the shore. We spotted a sea otter during one such stroll, visited a cove where it’s possible to find jade (aptly called Jade Cove) and photographed an absolutely gorgeous 80 foot coastal waterfall (McWay Falls), before heading to the campsite at Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. Our camping spot was among trees, but not as spacious as some others I’d stayed at. However, there was just about enough room for all of us (six, in total, including Karine’s cousin, Marlène, who is visiting). After an initial crisis with the barbecue (it went out, after half-cooking the sausages), we had a great dinner of grilled meats and Mediterranean veg. with salad, topped off with apple pie warmed over the charcoal. I even got to practice my French with Karine’s cousin! For me it was pure delight to be camping and not to be freezing cold, after the Yellowstone experience! Having said that, I didn’t have the best night’s sleep, in spite of not having grizzly bears, wolves or even raccoons to worry about!

After breakfast the next day, we decamped and headed to nearby Pfeiffer Beach. I have a photo of that beach, taken on our road trip in 1999, when the wind was so strong that you could barely stand up! It’s a lovely photo, though. It was very windy this time too, although not as bad, but we still ended up with sand in pretty much every exposed orifice! However, it’s a beautiful beach with interesting rock formations that include perfectly formed tunnels. After admiring the beach for a while (and marvelling at the surfers), we took our leave of everyone and headed off to do a hike in Andrew Molera State Park. Oli, Karine and Marlène had been lucky enough to see a bobcat there the day before, but we weren’t so fortunate, although we saw some seals and lots of birds. We supposedly did an eight-mile hike, but we went the wrong way a couple of times, so it was probably more like nine. It seemed quite hard work, anyway, but it was quite lovely, taking in views across the dunes and bluffs to the ocean, as well as back to the steep hillsides. We hadn’t seen any fire damage from the recent violent forest fires until this point (which surprised me, since several trails were closed in the State Park where we camped), but now, with the aid of binoculars, we were able to spot a few blackened trees high in the hills.

Lazy weekends

The lovely weather that we returned to from Yellowstone continued – at least for a while. Friday night was really balmy – we went to a party just a few blocks up, at our friends’ place on Green Street, and took in their views from the roof. Last Saturday was gorgeous and, even though I had chores to do, I still managed to take full advantage. This included a stroll down to the little beach less than a ten minute walk away, with its views of the Golden Gate Bridge and historic ships, followed by ice cream enjoyed in sunny Washington Square Park. I also had a dip in our pool and a sunbathe on the terrace. On Sunday, we went on our customary run along the waterfront to Crissy Field and back, then had a pretty lazy day, topped off by a visit to the cinema. We went to see “Bottleshock”, which is about the competition in 1976 involving a blind tasting of select French and Californian wines, in which the Californian wines won all categories, putting Napa on the map. It starred Alan Rickman as the wine merchant who organized it all, and was good fun. I longed for Napa to be as it was then, however, with free tastings and wine at $5 a bottle. Those days are long gone!

I had my final Italian class on Wednesday this week. Then, on Thursday, we had the good fortune to have tickets for Robin Williams (yes, THE Robin Williams of Mrs Doubtfire, Good Will Hunting etc. fame) do stand-up comedy at a cute little venue just a stone’s throw from our apartment. We can – literally – see it from the window. Robin Williams lives in San Francisco – over in the posh Seacliff area – and he was doing this gig to raise money for charity. I have to say that it wasn’t all my type of humour, but the guy is such a legend, that it was great to see him anyway. We only found out about the event on the grapevine – Jon heard it from someone at work, who in turn had heard about it from her dentist. I told everyone at my work, and we ended up with quite a gang from the office, including the big boss! Afterwards, most of us went on to the Belgian beer cellar on our block, which was a perfect way to end the evening.

This weekend, it’s been cooler, but still quite sunny. Jon had to work yesterday, so I took myself off to Golden Gate Park, in the hope of getting into the Chihuly exhibition at the De Young museum. Chihuly is a famous glass sculpture artist who makes some amazing pieces. Anyway, the place was so busy that I gave up without waiting in line (they had a timed ticket system, so I was pretty sure I’d be out of luck), but I had a little stroll around some of the park nonetheless, taking in Stow Lake and the gorgeous rose garden. I then took a bus back to the Marina and had a very cold smoothie in a nice café there before heading home. In the evening, we had an invitation to go to my colleague and friend, Molly’s place for dinner. She lives quite near work, in the Pacific Heights area. Well, I must say that I loved her place! It didn’t have the views that we enjoy, but what a lovely characterful building! She lives in a 1930’s Spanish-style mansion in an apartment on the fifth storey, with wooden floors and lots of built-in closets! We had a really pleasant evening.

Today, we did our run again, then headed out over the Golden Gate to Marin in the afternoon. We’d planned to spend a few hours on Tennessee Beach, but we ended up walking from the sunshine straight into the fog, so the beach was rather chilly, to say the least, with a stuff wind blowing. We lasted it out for a little while, stoic Brits as we are, trained in the art of sitting on freezing cold beaches pretending you’re enjoying yourself, but then decided to give up and go somewhere sunny. We went over to Tiburon, on the other side of the Bay from here, and enjoyed some absolutely amazing ice cream at a café there, before taking in the sun from a spot with amazing views across to Angel Island and beyond back towards the city.

Yellowstone & Grand Tetons

I’m behind again. I haven’t told you anything about Kate’s visit nearly three weeks ago, or about the Outside Lands music festival we attended the week before last. I’ll leave the musical critique to Jon (when the poor guy has finished his maths assignment), since I want to tell you about the trip we’ve just returned from to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks.

Susie (my good friend from school days) and her husband Dave arrived for a visit on Wednesday last week. They were lucky with the weather, because they arrived at a time when San Francisco is emerging from the fog of summer into warm, sunny early fall days. Thursday was so nice that I left work early and had a dip in the pool.

Susie had very kindly invited me along on their great adventure through America’s national parks. This began with a flight to Salt Lake City on Saturday. We just had time for a trip to Temple Square (Mormon central!) and dinner. Salt Lake ranks with Las Vegas as one of the strangest places I’ve been to. Temple Square is a perfectly manicured 30-odd acre site in the city centre. The instant you walk through the gate, a very nice man emerges with a free map and details of the free tours on offer. We went on one of these tours, led by two (also very, very nice) young Mormon missionaries. They showed us the temple, tabernacle, museum and (huge) office skyscraper. It was all rather surreal. The city itself was dead (on a Saturday night!), but Jon had no trouble getting a beer with our meal in spite of Utah's weird alcohol regulations.

We had a night in Salt Lake, then picked up the rental car and (after some very logistical packing, because it was only a compact car), headed off on the long drive through four states to Yellowstone. That’s right – we started in Utah, drove much of the length of Idaho, crossed a small patch of Montana and finally entered Wyoming just past the entrance into the park. We stopped to buy supplies at the immense Walmart in a rather sad town called Idaho Falls (followed by more packing logistics). We also passed through a fairly wild storm, which sent tumbleweed scuttling across the highway. It was a really long journey – some 380 miles – and we couldn’t resist seeing some of the sites when we finally got there, so took time out to photograph a herd of elk by the road and also got our first taste of hot springs and bubbling mud pots at one of the volcanic sites on the way to the campground. We didn’t actually arrive there until about 8 o’clock, by which time it was dark and raining hard. Pitching the tent in the pouring rain was not fun. Fortunately, we were close to a restaurant, into which we retreated in order to get away from the weather.

I didn’t sleep well either of the first two nights. Most probably because, in spite of my five layers, I was still cold, because my 35 degree F sleeping bag was not capable of withstanding the plummeting night-time temperatures at ca. 8,000 feet. There was even ice on the tent when we awoke one morning! By the third night, Jon sweetly offered me his sleeping bag (good to 18 F), so I managed to get some shut-eye. Sometimes, in the middle of the night, you could hear what were probably wolves howling in the distance, which was rather eerie, to say in the least.

Our first full day in Yellowstone began with a drive up to the canyon of the Yellowstone River. We saw bison along the way, plus a wolf that was really just a black dot in the far distance, and also visited the Mud Volcano area of steaming, sulphurous pools and mud pots. It’s impossible to exaggerate the extent to which you find steam pouring out of the ground all over Yellowstone. It’s one immense volcano with a caldera that covers much of the park, and apparently, it’s due an eruption, which would purportedly destroy all life on the planet.

We did a hike along the canyon to a lake, then circled back past some more steaming holes, before continuing around the immense loop road to see Old Faithful, a geyser that erupts approximately every 90 minutes and shoots water some 120 feet into the air. We arrived at the right time and managed to see the event before heading back for a tasty meal by the camp fire.

The next day was a much brighter day weather-wise (although still cold), and we enjoyed clear skies for most of it. We headed up to Mount Washburn, and hiked up to the top past trees covered in the first sprinkling of snow, to the summit at just over 10,000 feet. On the way back down, we chanced upon a flock of bighorn sheep, which stuck around and let us photograph them. We then decided to head north a little way, hoping to see bears in the “prime grizzly country” of Antelope Creek. We didn’t see bears, but we did come across a commotion along the road that turned out to be caused by a moose grazing by a nearby stream. On the way back to camp, we got stuck in traffic in Hayden Valley, where bison were crossing the road.

The final day of our trip began with heavy rain. We drove into Grand Teton National Park, afraid that we wouldn’t get to see any of the famous mountains. However, it began to clear, so we stopped by the side of the road to watch the clouds lifting slowly off the jagged, snowy peaks. As we were there, we noticed another commotion just down the road. There was talk of a grizzly bear. Before we knew it, the grizzly in question (a female), had bounded across the road and into the willow on the other side. Too fast for a photo, but impressive nonetheless! After stopping at a couple of lovely viewpoints, we decided to take the boat across pretty Jenny Lake and walked to a waterfall before making our way back around the edge of the lake. We were rewarded with another wildlife sighting – this time a female moose knee-deep in a pond.

Finally, Susie and Dave drove us to tiny Jackson Hole Airport (they were continuing on down to other parks the next day), where they dropped us off and we caught a propeller plane to Denver, where we transferred to a connecting flight back to San Francisco. It was a really amazing trip, although I must say that it isn’t too hard – after freezing your socks off for several days – to return to the balmy climes of September in California.

Photos are available here: http://public.fotki.com/EllenHardwick/yellowstone-and-gra/ (password: moocow)