The weather hasn’t been all that great for us so far, although it could have been a lot worse. It is definitely cooler than it should be in California at this time of year, and we’re not seeing a great deal of sun. Most days start off cloudy, then clear up for a bit, then get cloudy again, but today we were hoping for better weather as the drive was supposed to be one of the trip highlights – the section of Highway 1 from Carmel to San Simeon, through Big Sur.
We didn’t have to check out of the campground until midday which was useful as Müfit had several work calls scheduled in for the morning. After the calls were done, and after we’d filled up with some water and dumped our sewer, it was around 12:30pm before we actually left. Had we known that it was going to be a long day, we’d have tried to get out earlier than this!
We followed the road past Monterey and then saw signs for the 17-Mile Scenic Drive. I remember this well from my California trip back in 1989 but I wasn’t sure if RV’s were allowed to drive this route. We turned off the highway and got to the entrance gate where I asked if we were ok “in this” and he said yes because they get big buses through all the time. So we paid our $10.50 and promptly went the wrong way! But I had this – turning around, that is – and we were back on the right road within a few minutes!
Most of the scenic drive is through residential areas where there are some spectacular homes. Of course, we could see most of them very well as we are so high up and could see over walls, so we were treated to a great variety of architecture. After a while the road went out to the coast and we stopped right by the ocean for lunch. We had a few more stops after that, including one where the ground squirrels are very tame (something I also remember from my 1989 visit!) and then we exited into Carmel.
Carmel is a quaint town, with quaint-sized roads, so again not the best place for an RV! But we drove through, trying to find the main route out and failing. We ended up down a tight residential street with trees on both sides that hung over the road, as well as low-hanging electricity lines that I’m amazed we didn’t end up hitting and dragging along with us. I eventually had to turn out of this road to the right, and very carefully maneuver around a tree, hoping that we didn’t hit the electricity lines. We scraped the side of Al with tree branches but didn’t do any permanent damage, luckily. Next time I’m going to be more wary about driving through places like this though!
The stretch of the ocean highway after Carmel is the best. The scenery is amazing, and although it’s a single carriageway road (one lane each way), there are dozens of places to pull off the road along the way to enjoy the views, and to let other traffic past.
As we were going south we had the ocean to our right, and most of the pull-ins and view points to our right too, so this made it easier for us. At Big Sur, the road goes inland and you tightly pass by towering pine trees. I was trying to remember if we had taken this stretch of road in 1989 but I came to the conclusion that we hadn’t, a. because I couldn’t remember it and was sure I would have, and b. because I don’t think we had time then as we were travelling north from Morro Bay to San Fran, which is a long way.
Towards the southern end of this road, it became more steep and winding, with some scary drop-offs to the side of us. We had been wondering how Al would cope with the winding and mountainous roads around Sequoia and Yosemite, but his performance today showed that it probably wouldn’t be a problem – the engine temperature always stayed around the halfway mark, and the brakes showed no signs of over-heating, so that was encouraging.
The only drawback with the road today was that it was slow-going, and ended up taking us quite a bit longer than we had expected. It was finally around 8:30pm when we reached the small town of Morro Bay, and the Morro Bay State Park where we’re staying for the next 2 nights.
Bolgil Family Adventures 