Thursday 19 March 2015

SF to LA via Monterey and Pismo Beach on the Pacific Coast Highway

Sorry for the haphazard posting, between some dodgy internet (which I didn't think I would say while we were in the US) and too much time for adventures I haven't had time to post. Will hopefully be doing more posts soon!

After saying goodbye to the Silver Cloud, we were heading out of the city onto the Pacific Coast Highway...or so we thought.
We got stuck in a major traffic jam for over an hour, and the typically just as it the traffic started moving we realised that I had left my phone back in Napa. Major Fail. We turned around and did a 2 hour round trip to pick it up. The silver lining is that the traffic had cleared by the time we had turned back, so there's that!

On the way to the coast we stopped off at a few places in Silicon Valley where Jeremy's inner geek could come out. I must say all the places looked like pretty cool places to work. Unfortunately we didn't get too many pics of the places, so you will just need to trust me :)

Apple HQ

FB HQ
After the phone debacle we got into Monterey much later than we had planned unfortunately as the little we did see of it, it seemed like a cool place. Wish we could've spent a bit more time looking around.
Anyway just before we headed on our trip I saw a Diners, Drive - ins and Dives show which featured a restaurant in Monterey so I knew we had to check it out. We were not disappointed.

Rosines is a family style Italian place with some huge portions. Jeremy went for the lasagne and I went for the chicken parmesan. Both were really good and ginormous. We got talking to the person next to us, who told us that the original Rosine's son makes all the desserts they have on display himself and that we had to make sure to try some. So thats what we did! Chocolate brownie cheesecake. It was delicious and we had enough leftovers for lunch for the next day.


Chicken Parmesan

Lasagne

Delicious Cheesecake


The next morning we set out to explore Carmel by sea, which is a chocolate box town, with some cute houses. Some of them looked like they should be in England rather than the USA. 




After the exploring we got ready to drive down to Pismo Beach via the Pacific Coast Highway. Everyone you speak to who has done a similar trip tells you the PCH is a must do. And I would definitely agree. The drive is breathtaking, taking you down the coast with some sheer cliffs and some bends. Both the views and some of the hairpin bends literally take your breath away! 







On the way down we stopped to see some sea lions and eat our leftovers from the previous day. Although sea lions are similar to seals it's incredible how big and fat some of them are The males are on average  2.4m long and weigh up to 350kg, which is pretty impressive sight. 

Once we got to our hotel in Pismo we saw it has amazing views and a great deck for some sundowners, so we decided thats exactly what we would do. 

Drinks with a view
Even better we saw it had a jacuzzi too, bonus! After all that we head into San Luis Obispo which is a university town just outside Pismo. We walked around a bit and then headed to a bar called the Creaky Tiki, which made me feel like we should be in Hawaii somewhere. It had a pretty chilled and cool vibe. Jeremy had some nachos which once again are American sized and could've probably fed a small family. When will we learn?

Apparently we don't learn because on our last day on Route 1, we decided we have to stop for a proper breakfast, and thought we would give IHOP a visit. This place is known for pancakes and breakfasts and it didn't disappoint! The restaurant inside looks like the diner style eating you see in movies, which for Americans probably isn't fun but we found it really cool :)



Once again we got some generous portions so left feeling nicely stuffed. We made our way down to LA, going inland on through a lovely mountain pass and the stopped off at Santa Barbara on the way. This is a very chilled place, and with the sun shine blazing down it made for a nice stop before the crazy of LA.




We eventually made it to our LA base, after some typical LA traffic. The place we were staying in is another airbnb gem in an area called Hancock park. It was boiling hot in LA, we managed to arrive as an unusual for that time of the year heatwave, with temps at around 30+ celsius. We weren't complaining though, after the winter we've had in London, the heat felt amazing.

Gorgeous home from home!
We dropped off our stuff we headed off for some shopping at the Grove center which is a open air shopping center and is quite impressive. It even has a tram running through it! After a bit of shopping we headed home for an early night before exploring what LA has to offer for the next few days.