Saturday 4th July 2009 – Time to Show Some Independence

Today is Independence Day. Although it starts cloudy and overcast, everyone in San Francisco knows it's going to be a lovely day.

But I have to be heading off south. My hosts have been most gracious, both with time and hospitality, but a person has to be on their own on Independence Day.

I demonstrate my independence by ignoring all advice about how to get to LA from SF. I'm going via the rest of the wonderful California Highway 1. I enjoy it, Rozzie is beginning to enjoy it. We just have to get the fair Dulcie in line and everything will be fine.

But Dulcie is recalcitrant. There appears to be no town on One which can't be reached on 101. Every town I ask her to take us to, she wants us to turn off immediately. I give her a few hefty gins and chuck her in the glove compartment.

This, I think, is the best bit of CA1.

[6102]

[6112]

Every bend has a turn-off on it. I stop at quite a few to admire the scenery. At one, a grown-up lady, noticing me on my own, stops to admire me. She pretends to want directions, but since the only possibilities are "go north", or "go south", she doesn't fool me.

I look at her sternly, and say "Zis is eendependence day – I vont to be alonn". She looks lost, but I am unbending. She continues on her way. One has to be hard sometimes.

I take a run round the Monterey peninsula. There are signs everywhere saying there will be no fireworks, public or private, under pain of $1000 fines. Now, here, on Independence Day, the public fireworks display is the culmination of the celebrations in most towns. So this is a serious omission. I guess it must be to do with fear of brush fires.

At the southern end of Monterey, I turn off into Carmel, to have a word with yet another mayor, get his autograph. The smell of money in Carmel is pretty overpowering.

Then it is on down One to San Lius Obinpa, my stopping point for the night. Almost the first free parking space on the Main street turns out to be right outside an 'English Pub', with a "Sierra Nevada on Tap" sign above the door. As Moslems like to say, though not in this context, "God is Good".

Two young Americans sitting in the open window with a pitcher, applaud my skilful backing-in of Rozzie. I accept their praise graciously, and neglect to tell them there is a huge plate-glass window on the other side of the road, making inch-perfect parking a dawdle.