December 27, 2008

This morning we were again up at 6 so that we could eat breakfast and be out the door at 7:45. Scott and I slept really great and were ready to go. We took the 41 all the way to Hwy 1 and saw Morro Rock which we had not had time for the day before. We drove the rest of the way to Hearst Castle, enjoying the scenery of the pacific along the way.
We enjoyed our 2 hour tour of Hearst Castle despite the fact that most of it was outside and it was only 50 degrees. The outdoor pool was really spectacular. The kids thought it was really funny that all of the statues were naked, and Luke decided to point it out during a photo. It was amazing to see how much money one person can spend filling up a house especially when you consider that they only lived here about 3 months out of a year. The views of the ocean were awesome and the castle was still decorated for Christmas, not as wonderfully as the Biltmore but the still very nice. The kids were hungry and we ate lunch as soon as we finished our tour.
About 4 miles North of the castle is the Elephant Seal Rookery. The babies are being born this time of year and we got to see babies and parents sleeping on the beach. One male woke up and snorted at us. They smelled bad but it was fascinating to see the large creatures up close.
We hopped back in the car with plans to stop at Jade Cove to walk on the beach but the kids were tired and the winding road and ocean breeze made them fall asleep. They both slept for over an hour and we missed all of the stops in the state parks and Big Sur that we had planned to make. We stopped just north of the Bixby Bridge so I could take a few pictures and they woke up. The drive was curvier than we had anticipated and it was strange to see that most of the way, there were no beaches just rocky cliffs that dropped into the ocean. Every once in a while we would hit a patch of trees that came out of nowhere but most of the time it was rocky barren mountains. We did see a few sections where fires had burned everything on the hillsides and we passed more than one area where there were signs for rock slides. At one where there were fences and wires to hold the rocks back, we had just commented on how menacing those fences looked when we heard a rock hit the roof of our car. The kids did not wake up but it sounded hard and when we arrived at the hotel this afternoon, there is a new dent on the top of the car. Let’s hope the rental car company doesn’t notice.
We drove through Pebble Beach and took some pictures at the lone Cypress tree. Then we checked in at the hotel for some down time. We went down to Cannery Row, which is cool and annoying all at the same time. The buildings are cool because they are the original cannery buildings but they are now filled with all kinds of tourist junk shops. We had to go to say we had been there and we ate dinner at Louie Linguini’s. The food wasn’t bad and the sour dough bread was good.
We then came back to the hotel so the kids could have play time. Lorelei said at dinner that she misses home. I think she mostly misses her toys and stuffed animals. We are hitting the sack early tonight and will actually be able to sleep in tomorrow morning before we go on our whale watching excursion.