Vacation 2012: Down In Monterey

Young gods smiled upon the crowd
Their music being born of love
Children danced night and day
Religion was being born
Down in Monterey

 --Eric Burdon and the Animals, "Monterey"

That song was about the 1967 "Monterey International Pop Festival," which the movie Monterey Pop later immortalized. Insufferable much? You can accuse today's "pop stars" of a lot, but not even Justin Bieber thinks his "music" represents some newborn religion. The Baby Boomers didn't become self-obsessed and develop grandiose egos once they started making money. They were always that way. All that Dr. Spock crap about telling your little child he's the most important and wonderful and special little child in the whole wide world, and the "participation ribbon" syndrome, gets you a generation where Presidents nail their interns, business people (like bankers and energy traders) treat laws like they were used kleenex (then who rail against "petty crime"), politicians (and their sycophants) think that "truth" is anything that happens to escape their mouth at any given time, and athletes violate controlled substances laws like they were in the Zeta Cartel of human growth hormone. And people who take trips and incessantly post to their blog about them like they were Columbus finding new worlds.

And it all got off to a great start down in Monterey.

OK, rant concluded.

But that's probably Monterey's most famous connection. Well, that and John Steinbeck's Cannery Row. Which is one of those novels you were supposed to read your junior year english class, but just read the Cliff's notes instead because Joey Halvorson was throwing this wicked cool party on Friday after the game, and you were totally hung over the whole weekend. Its about canning fish or the American Dream or man's struggle against inhumanity or something like that.

Next stop on the Vacation Tour: Monterey. The hippies and sardine canneries have long gone, and in their place, tourists! And the Army, in a simple twist of fate. Since leaving Yosemite, I’ve been in Monterey, on the central California coast. I left Yosemite Monday morning and drove about five hours to get here, going through several vastly different types of country. Not long after leaving the park, the land turns into hilly scrub and the elevation lowers significantly the further from Yosemite one goes. Eventually, the land turns into flat desert, which these people call an agricultural valley. It’s a “valley” only because they divert billions of gallons of water to irrigate the dirt, growing all kinds of produce, nuts, and fruits. Every now and then I would pass a huge irrigation canal, and several large man made reservoirs. The few towns don’t resemble California at all. People have put up Romney signs and various other patriotic displays, all along the roads. There’s little evident wealth, but like many Texas towns, one can easily find a Mexican restaurant or place to purchase hay or fruit. And its incredibly hot, although dry so its not quite so unbearable. When I left Yosemite, at roughly 5,000 feet, it was around 70 degrees. Within about an hour, it was a little higher than 90 in Merced (at under 2,000 feet). I ate lunch there at a place called the BBQ Pig, where everyone seemed happy and…normal…no Californians here. It’s the kind of town where the high school kids go to Chili’s for prom. After a few hours, the rolling hills resume, which get higher and higher, with more trees and vegetation as the elevation picks up. Clouds and fog begin rolling in from the coast and it dropped from 92 to 62 degrees in just a few minutes.

 About 30 minutes later I arrived in Monterey and began freezing. Monterey is located on the Monterey Peninsula (shocking, I know), which juts out into the Pacific south of San Francisco. Monterey Bay previously boasted a prime fish stock, which spawned a widescale fish canning industry. After the industry just about destroyed the local stock (through overfishing), the state and Feds made Monterey Bay a protected marine reserve and the sea environment came back. Monterey features a world renowned aquarium and several other research institutions.  Monterey was also the first capital of California, when it was a Spanish possession, and the city managed to preserve many of that era’s buildings near the wharf. The Army’s Defense Language Institute is located at the Presidio of Monterey. Otherwise, Monterey relies on tourism for jobs. I stayed in a hotel by the “Fisherman’s Wharf,” the oldest concrete wharf in the Bay, which now consists of tourist restaurants and souvenir shops overlooking a commercial marina. There’s a really attractive trail (the Pacific Coast Trail) that runs right along the water for several miles, where I ran a couple of times.

 

Tuesday, I ran half an hour on the trail. Seals were lounging in the water all along the trail, barking incessantly. After finishing, I ate breakfast at the hotel, where the world’s happiest omelet chef works.  I’ve never encountered anyone so thrilled to serve breakfast (or so jazzed about the buffet’s local strawberry and chocolate scones offerings…really, someone needed to slap her out of it).  Some pear shaped guy ordered an omelet, making a big deal to instruct said chef to make it with “all vegetables” and “no oil or cheese,” then he walked over and loaded up his plate with pork sausage. True story. I walked from my hotel to the Aquarium, through the old “Cannery Row.” The latter is one of those streets that every tourist town promotes, with hotels, bars, restaurants, t-shirt shops, and other stuff you’d never think of frequenting except when you’re on vacation. Like, the Ghiradelli Store. Or Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, which had a line outside at 11:30 waiting to get in, when nearly every other restaurant was empty. These people must wait in line at home to go to Olive Garden. Or Applebee’s. Or Golden Corral. Or any of the other real gourmet dining establishment chains. Cannery Row does, however, preserve some of the old canning buildings, giving the street enough local charm to justify its extensive promotion.

The Aquarium operates within one of those buildings. Its one of the world’s largest. Star Trek IV, the awful one with the whales and time travel, used it to represent the institute where they nabbed some whales to bring back in time to communicate with the invading aliens (you see why the movie was so awful?). I hate superlatives, but this place is phenomenal. It features a huge variety of marine life, and easy to read, informative explanations help enhance the displays. Part is outdoors, but most is located inside the building. It takes about three hours to work through the place, including one marine biologist’s live presentation. The exhibitions run the gamut from sharks to the tiniest jellyfish imaginable. I didn’t see any whales though. Or dolphins. But I’ve already swam with a dolphin so no big deal. So much for Hollywood accuracy. Its appalling. If you can’t trust movie producers, who can you trust?

Later that afternoon and the next day, I saw several groups of soldiers running on the trail in formation. The trail provides a great running location. Probably not one of the best I’ve ever found, but really good. What makes a good running trail? Well, many factors. Surface (gravel vs. concrete), width, scenery, elevation, hills, babeage (err, “people watching”), climate. My top 5 trails: Central Park (both at the Reservoir and throughout), Lady Bird Lake (Austin), Burke Gilman (Seattle), Golden Gate Park (San Francisco), and Lakefront Trail (Chicago). Houston’s Memorial Park trail doesn’t make the list. Too humid for most of the year, and after the drought a few years ago, so many trees have died and been removed that its no longer very shady. After the Aquarium I had thoughts of driving up to Santa Cruz, but instead stumbled upon a really interesting farmer’s market on the main street downtown, so I walked around there instead. Not only did it feature the usual fruit and produce, there were several flower, jewelry, and various other vendors, as well as low-scale food trucks of all kinds. Several musicians were playing, and the place was packed. Hey, white folks love their farmer’s markets, right? I bought a jar of spiced pecans. Chalk it up to vacation craziness; La Dolce Vita.

 That night I ate dinner at Schooner’s Restaurant, located within the Monterey Plaza Hotel right on the water. I ate outside at a table next to one of those fire columns (something about those things strikes me as extremely hazardous, but whatever), with a view of the bay and the lights of Santa Cruz in the distance. I could also see the Monterey lighthouse beam as well. They served an exceptional dinner: cioppino using locally sourced fish and shellfish. It would have been a great date place, then again, I’m not a cheap date so if I’m going to take myself somewhere, it better be classy.

The next day I took the Mustang for a spin. But first I went on a longer run, all the way past the Aquarium into the neighboring town of Pacific Grove. The Grove seemed much nicer and less touristy than Monterey proper. Less trashy. Ocean Drive, then Scenic Drive, run along the water, and tacky tourist spots didn’t mar the bay views. No Fisherman’s Wharf.

After breakfast, I headed to 17 Mile Drive. The Del Monte company developed the Pebble Beach area, with golf courses, homes, and the Pebble Beach and Spanish Bay clubs. This includes 17 Mile Drive, a publicly accessible scenic route that winds past numerous sites through the development. Monterey Cypress grew all throughout the area, including the “Lone Cypress,” the Pebble Beach Company’s trademark. I had lunch at the Lodge at Pebble Beach, feeling like Danny Noonin out of place at the country club. Just suppose I never saw myself hanging around the same place that displays the U.S. Open Championship trophy. The public can’t get on the golf course, but you can see parts of it from the road and it appears every bit as beautiful as on television. On the other hand, the homes don’t exactly measure up to what you might expect. No doubt they cost millions, but most weren’t the sort of Buckingham Palace affairs I expected. In fact, most were surprisingly modest, almost like something you could see in parts of the Woodlands or Kingwood. Where’s the fun of that? No doubt their owners ran out of money after buying the lot. From there I went down the Pacific Coast Highway to Carmel. Yeah, the place where Clint Eastwood was Mayor. It’s a nice little community right on the water. Mostly it’s a bunch of upper class families whose kids play soccer and worry about getting in to Stanford, or Princeton, or places of similar ilk, and "crime" consists of badmouthing your neighbor's recent cocktail party. They have a huge, well maintained beach, and the downtown area has a “boutique district.” I noticed a lot of the stores were closing or vacant, and many homes were for sale. I guess recession eventually reaches everyone. The place had a great natural “tree” aroma; I can’t think of any better way to explain it. Similar to the pinon aroma that permeates Santa Fe, only it’s the cypress trees. I arrived at Big Sur around 5:30 so I didn’t get to spend much time. I wasn’t clear what Big Sur was; turns out it’s a series of smallish state parks all in a large natural preserve that runs throughout the Santa Lucia Mountains. There’s many forested heights all around and Highway 1 links them on the west side. Big Sur is a very attractive area but time had run out, so I couldn't do anything by the time I arrived, which was just fine because I don't think I could have hiked much anyway.

So I turned the red shark Mustang back north, and headed up the PCH back to Monterey into the night.

Next-on to San Francisco!