Oct 20, 2008 Monterey

Well we left the Santa Cruz Fairground yesterday and drove the 25 miles to Monterey. The Watsonville area is a big agriculture area with large fields of artichokes, strawberries, Brussels sprouts and other crops that I didn’t recognize from the road. The fairgrounds was very nice and had lots of activity. While we were there they had a horse show, a dog show, and car races. We toured a dinnerware factory called Annieglass. Annie came up with the idea to make plates and serving pieces from thick building glass, they are thick and do not break easily. They are sold at Nordstrom’s and other high end shops. We drove the 17 mile drive at Pebble Beach admiring the beautiful seashore and cypress trees and golf courses with multi million dollar homes placed among the trees. One of the tours at the rally was the Roaring Camp Steam Train Ride on a narrow gauge steam train thru an old growth forest of redwoods. We are both in awe of these trees.
At Monterey we are staying at the Elks club. It sits on a hill and overlooks the bay. Last night while we were walking the dogs we could hear the seals barking. Monday Norm drove to Big Sur to have a massage at the Esalen Massage Institute. He got to soak in their hot spring tubs located just above the surf and had his massage outside overlooking the ocean. I met with a girl we met at the region 12 rally and we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and then walked around cannery row. The aquarium is a great one, I have never seen so many different kinds of jelly fish! Also the sea otters were a lot of fun, and when you walked around cannery row you could see sea otters out in the bay.
Yesterday Norm and I punched in attractions in the gps and started searching them out. She took us to the monarch butterfly gardens in Pacific Grove. Millions of Monarchs return here each year to winter among the eucalyptus trees. We were a little early to see the millions, but they had started to return and we saw thousands. They fly as far north as Canada and lay their eggs on milk weed pods. They really don’t live long as the butterflies we saw here now are the great grandchildren of the ones who were here last year.
We also went to fishermen’s wharf where the clam chowder was the best Norm has tasted so far!
Today we will head for Carmel and turn on Gypsy (GPS) and let here guide us again.