Ocean Pacific

Still numb from our LA experience, we hopped on the 101 and headed northbound toward San Fransisco.

The farther north we push the nicer the weather gets. Its a big change from the 107 degrees in Nevada.

Ah... the Pacific Ocean. The weather's perfect and people are out para-surfing.

Aparently there are some gas stations in the remote regions of California that do not know that the war with Iraq is over.

Hearst Castle

We've heard from many people how great the Hearst Castle is so it was definite destination on our map. When we got there it was right after 4 pm. We asked about buying a ticked, but it turned out that there were no tours until the next day. After 15 days of driving and sight-seeing, Liz and I have grown a bit callous. We decided to forget about the castle and move on.

Up on the hill is the Hearst Castle. This is about the closest that we got to it.

This is the visitor center at the castle.

The Beach

Across the way from the castle was a pier and a small beach. We decided that since we couldn't see the castle we'd go to the beach instead.

This is the pier to the secluded beach area. Its a really great area with great weather. You have the beach and mountains back to back, which is pretty spectacular.

Off in the distance, waves can be seen crashing on the rocks.

This picture looks kind of like paintings on a wall to me, but it is actually sea weed hanging on to the support pillars of the dock.

This is a shot of the small beach area. There were very few people out here, probably because of how out of the way this beach is.

The Western Shoreline

After our brief stop in the Hearst Castle area, we continued our trek up the Pacific shoreline.

Most of the way up the California shoreline winds through mountainous areas. It makes for magnificant views though. Look out points were set all along the ride.

Because of the type of terrain involved, there were many of these bridges crossing shoreline chasms.

This big rock has one of the several light houses that are along the shoreline.

These grassy mountains are typical along this drive.

Also along this drive, we began to see some of these funky trees. They look like trees from Africa to me.