After leaving Asilomar this morning, we found our way to the Monterey waterfront and the famed Monterey Bay Aquarium, where we spent a couple of hours exploring exhibits on kelp forests, coral reefs and tide pools.
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| The otters were my favorite animals at the aquarium. |
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| Clare snapped this photo and quipped, "I found them." As in, Nemo and Dory. |
It was cool and overcast in the morning. But as we left town and continued on the Pacific Coast Highway, the sun came out and we enjoyed beautiful views of Monterey Bay. About 20 minutes up the coast we found a state beach, Moss Landing, where we had a picnic lunch.
After lunch, we continued on to Santa Cruz, and pulled up to the bookstore at UCSC in time for everyone to pick out their own Banana Slug swag before it closed for the day (at 3 p.m.?!). Before she locked up, the bookstore manager was kind enough to hand us a map and orient us for a quick self-guided tour of the campus.
Granted, we did not tour the entire university, but we found the layout to be unconventional. Perhaps that is the point: When it was established in 1965, The University of California-Santa Cruz was meant to be innovative in design and progressive in its approach to higher education. The campus is built around 10 residential colleges that each have their own small dorm buildings and dining halls -- even their own distinct architectural style.
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| Walking through the middle of campus |
Set amongst the redwood groves, the colleges seem isolated from each other, and it was unclear to us if there is a main quad or central plaza where students from across the colleges might convene. It’s not even clear that there’s a “Dinkytown” nearby – you know, the strip of bars, coffee houses, bookstores and copy-print shops that thrives on the edge of a university campus. (It’s called Dinkytown at the University of Minnesota.) Situated on the edge of town, on 2,000 acres of woodland and rolling hills, UCSC feels more like a national park than a college campus, which might explain why Charlie and Natalie are so smitten. Truly, it is a magnificent setting; one of the intramural fields on the edge of campus looks straight out over the Pacific.
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I just googled “Where do UCSC students hang out,” and I found an article that lists the “Top 5 Things to Do at UCSC.” This gives a little insight into the campus culture, for sure:
1.) The Porter Caves, an underground grotto described as “pitch black, unless you have a flashlight.” It says students go there to “explore, hang out, and have a good time!” Uhhhhhh, okay. Wink, wink.
2.) Volleyball Beach. “Believe it or not, there is an outside volleyball on campus with sand and everything!”
3.) Pogonip. “An open place for people to go hiking, biking, walking or simply exploring.” No kidding? So many things to do there! They can also: stroll, trek AND, if they’re feeling crazy, wander!
4.) The Quarry Plaza. This is, I think, the little sidewalk area outside the bookstore.
5.) I can’t make this shit up: Number 5 is Zumba. “Have you ever thought about taking a Zumba class? No? Well you should! Zumba is the most fun workout you will ever have. It gets your heart racing while also rocking out to some jams.”
The number-two hangout place on campus is a sand volleyball court? (“With sand and everything!”) And that’s only slightly more interesting than going to aerobics class?
Okay. Either that article gives tacit and cleverly coded insight into the campus culture, because it was written by a sardonic stoner as a class prank. Or it gives absolutely no insight into the campus culture, because it was written by a third-grader.
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From campus, we drove back into town and ended up at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, an oceanfront amusement park that was up-and-running at full capacity, as far as we could tell. Keith and I bought Natalie, Charlie and Clare enough tickets for several rides, then found a table where we could watch the crowds of mostly clean-cut, appropriately dressed teens and families stream by. After about an hour, we texted the kids to see if they were wrapping it up, and found out that they had been waiting in line most of that time, and had gone on only one ride. So, we stayed for another hour, and in that time they were able to squeeze in only two more rides. Bummer.
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| Literally hanging out at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk |
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| The view from the Sky Glider |
The sun hung low in the sky as we drove north along the coast from Santa Cruz toward Pescadero, casting a sepia glow on the rugged bluffs and green-blue Pacific Ocean on one side of the highway, and fields of tomatoes, artichokes, brussels sprouts and U-pick berries on the other.
We pulled into Costanoa, an “eco-adventure resort” with lodge rooms, cabins, tent bungalows and a KOA RV campground – truly the most charming and upscale KOA I have ever seen. We did not pass many restaurants on the road from Santa Cruz, so we were relieved to find that the resort has an elegant and inviting eatery – the Cascade Restaurant – offering creative dishes made with local fresh produce from Costanoa’s organic garden.
A charming young server who confessed that it’s his second day on the job took our order. While we waited for our food, I wandered outside and admired the setting. The rustic restaurant is surrounded by a California coastal garden brimming with succulents, sea lavender and Mediterranean beach daisies, and set aglow with strings of sparking lights. I made my way across the parking lot to the lodge, where I checked in at the front desk and received a map of the property and the keys to our two tent bungalows before returning to the restaurant for our delicious dinner.
It was getting dark when we finished eating. Sadly, it was time for Steve and Hélène to head back to Berkeley after a fun weekend. It was also time for us to say “goodbye” to Natalie.
Early in our trip – on the first morning, to be exact, in San Diego – Natalie learned that she has been accepted into an internship program at the Archeological Research Institute in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, near Cincinnati. She will be spending two days a week working at dig sites and participating in field survey and excavation, lab work and public education. Her six-week term starts July 16. She is over-the-moon excited.
Our last day in California is July 16. In order to get her home in time to start her program, I had to jigger our itinerary a bit, on the fly. After Natalie found out that she was accepted into the internship, I logged onto our Southwest Airlines account and changed her flight to July 13 (tomorrow). (It’s a good thing we flew Southwest! No change fees!) Steve and Hélène were already planning to spend a couple of days with us in Monterey, so it worked out for them to take Natalie home with them to Berkeley tonight. Tomorrow Steve will take Natalie to the airport so she can catch her flight back home. Her friend Abby will pick her up at the Indianapolis airport tomorrow night.
We are so grateful to Steve and Hélène, and to Abby, for their assistance. It has been such a relief to know that Natalie will not miss out on a single day of her internship, and at the same time, the rest of us Longs have not had to detour off our planned itinerary to get her where she needs to be. So far, the shift of plans has been seamless. Cross your fingers that Natalie makes it home safely!
After Natalie left with Steve and Hélène, Charlie and Keith adjourned from dinner to a game of lawn chess and played until it was too dark to see. Then we piled back into the car and followed the map that had been provided to our tent bungalows – which are basically canvas walls stretched across a wooden frame that has been built on a platform floor. While the walls of each tent are canvas, the frame supports an actual, solid front door that latches and locks. And I mention this only because by the time we got to the tents, I realized that I had misplaced the keys at some point since sitting down to eat dinner.
Keith and I drove back to the parking lot of the lodge, and I retraced my steps, in the dark, between the front desk and the restaurant. Inside the restaurant, our table had already been cleared, but I explained the situation to our sweet young server, and he went back to the kitchen and dug through three trash cans looking for our keys, to no avail. My god. This poor, poor server. On his second day I had him digging through the trash! If he had been any more experienced, he would have rolled his eyes and told me to bugger off.
In the meantime, while I was beating myself up over the lost keys, combing through the parking lot and the garden outside of the restaurant with the flashlight on my phone, and making our newbie server dig through the remains of our dinner looking for them … Keith went in to the lodge, to the front desk, explained our situation to the host and promptly received two extra keys.
“Happens all the time,” she said with a shrug.
Our two platform tents are side-by-side in a neighborhood of similar tents. Keith and I have a queen-size bed, and the kids have two sets of bunks. The tents are cozy and comfortable, although, by definition, they have very thin walls and we can hear a group of people loudly enjoying themselves nearby.
We don’t have huge plans for tomorrow, so we are looking forward to relaxing a little bit and playing it by ear. And I hope Natalie has safe travels tomorrow! Love you, Nat! See you soon!
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