A few days in Monterey

Faber and I spent a few days in Monterey this week. My sister Mary and her husband Gary were travelling through California and rather than have them travel to Auburn we met them in Monterey for a short visit.

We drove down on Tuesday morning, checked into the hotel and they arrived shortly after. We visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium, a must-see for anyone travelling to Monterey. Then we had a few drinks and met Dusty, Faber's friend from college, I guess, for dinner at an Italian restaurant on Fisherman's Wharf. Dusty brought his partner Faith and their daughter Katie, who entertained us with a side-splitting impersonation of her teachers.

After dinner Dusty spied a friend who was doing caricuters on the wharf. He did a group picture of all seven of us, which was pretty impressive.

The next day, at Gary's request, we headed to Salinas, where we visited the Steinbeck Center, a museum devoted to the life and works of John Steinbeck. We hadn't been there before and we enjoyed it.

Then we headed over to Carmel Valley, where we ate lunch at a fabulous restaurant called Cafe Rustica. Salads and sandwiches and pizza, California style. Very good. After lunch we headed to 17-Mile Drive and saw all the sights, except for pelicans. I tried to point out a pelican to Gary and Mary the whole time but they were nowhere to be found! We saw the usual otters and seals and so forth, but no pelicans.

Then over to the Clint Eastwood's pub, the Hogs Breath Inn for a few drinks. Dusty met us there with Faith, Katie and Faith's grown-up son Bobby and we went back to the valley for dinner at Dusty's favorite Mexican place.

Thursday morning we said our goodbyes and headed back home. Faber and I went over to the Elkhorn Slough SRA to check it out and see if we wanted to bring the kayak down and explore it. It looked very promising to us so we will go back in few months.

We followed Hwy 1 to San Francisco so we had quite a few beaches to look at. We arrived safe and sound Thursday night after a few busy and fun days.