Tour Diary 25

Tour Diary 25 –

San Simeon Hearst Castle

Who has ever been there who can do it justice trying to explain what it is..

A young boys childhood dream made into a extraordinary manifestation of dream into reality.

Hearst as a young boy was bought to the San Simeon area by his father and they would go to the highest point along the coast and camp out.  This sounds simple but it is a huge mountain area and is so hard to envisage getting up to the top by horse when you make the journey by coach and it takes an ages going round and round a constructed road.

After years of doing this he finally found a lovely woman architect and said to her “I’m fed up of camping in tents up there build me a house”  Between them they constructed a masterpiece.

Hearst was a great campainger for treating all people as equals and this is what I think resonates so well with me in being in his home.  He did not have servants, he had people who were his friends and employees and he demanded that they be treated with great respect by all his visitors.. all the greatest actors and movie people of the time.

He had collected for years stuff from all around the world and this he bought to San Simeon.  Including all kinds of exotic animals.  Even now as we drove along the coast we saw Zebras in amongst the cows and Steve and I said how lovely it would be if all kinds of disparate animals could just be allowed to live free with each other… Cows included….

I remember from being here before the film on his life which said that he had a bigger ranch in South America where you reached the gate to the ranch and then went past that and finally got to the ranch …. 50 miles later…

Our tour guide was Whoopi Goldbergs sister… (At least that’s who Hi guys

The 60’s re-visited – Communing with the fishes – and Alan and Steve finally meet…. Oh.. Yes.. and Big Sur is shut!!

San Francisco turned out to be a delight and I am so glad our lost suitcases meant we had to hang around and couldn’t move on.  It was obviously their intention, they seem to know their way around America better than us and didn’t want us to miss Haight Ashbury, the 49 mile scenic drive around San Fran.., The Cha Cha café and Fisherman’s Wharf.

We headed for Haight Ashbury first as Steve thought I might like to re-visit my mis-spent youth in the 60’s as a hippie-druggie.  The fact that I was neither was completely lost on him especially when I found him buying himself a little bong pipe and some salvia.  What he is going to do with it is a mystery!… I think he will put it on the side at home and impress people with his knowledge of mind-altering substances… (a few minutes with Bonkers Denny’s man could do the same and it wouldn’t cost anything.) 

The houses were so amazing.. huge victorian  edifices which are painted so beautifully in the most dynamic colour combinations.  I know it wouldn’t do for our little suburban streets back home but here .. and again… in Galway/Ireland .. it works so well.  I just love them.  There were also countless beautiful murals on the sides of buildings and every shop we went into was just full of riotous colour.

We found an exquisite low-key… not!!... little café, which was organic and the food was delicious.  The décor was just unbelievable, so much so that I made Steve takes pictures of it all which he will download for me… and… I made him go into the toilets even though he didn’t need to go to take pictures in there because there the  décor was also breath-taking. 

There’s nothing that man won’t do for me.

I decided today that I could write a blog on the toilet life in the US of A especially after the curtains in the toilet saga, because I went into a toilet today in a lovely little town on our way to Hearst Castle and I was amazed to see one cubicle only and then a vast open space with a toilet out in the open in the corner, which as soon as someone came in everyone in the restaurant would see you sitting on the toilet.  The entry door did not have a lock.  If that didn’t put you off your French toast and totally-incinerated-so-that-you-forgot-what-it-was-supposed-to-be slices of bacon.. I don’t know what would.  So I sensibly chose to go in the cubicle.  However, the lock on the door did not reach the edge of the door let alone slice across and even if it had… it was an inch below the opposing lock.  I pondered this for a moment and thought well, this will be a hasty wee in case someone comes in and tries the door.  But…. The door was actually, when closed, only 1” from my nose, so they would have immediately collided with it if they tried the door and realized I was in there, so no problem there.  This particular toilet was one of the tall ones, which means my feet swing off the floor, I like the small ones which even for my tiny height make me think I am falling as they are about 4” off the ground.  I also laugh as I picture my really tall friends trying to sit down without falling over…  I think there are people in the Sanitary Ware business here in the states with great senses of humour.

Steve, as always, likes to top any of my stories so when he came out of the gents he said that above the urinals were a row of windows which looked out onto the street and opposite were a row of benches where some ‘good ‘ol boys’ were sitting with their coffees and putting the world to rights.  So this view must be the day’s entertainment.  Men standing in the toilets having a wee.  What could they comment on?  How long each man takes, whether he is taking too long… you get my drift….etc…

Steve opted for the stall and did not take part in the mornings entertainment.  Such a spoil sport.

We took a stroll around Fisherman’s Wharf which was really tacky unfortunately, not at all how I remembered it 20 years ago, but Steve found a kite shop and wanted to re-kindle his childhood memories.. (real memories not like those he had conjured up for me with his little bong pipe)

He chose a snazzy looking red and black one and we drove to a picturesque bit of coastline with a fantastic view and also a big green play area.  His kite took off immediately much to my relief as he spent ages telling me that he used to make his sister run along until it took off and then sometimes… he might let her hold the string for a minute or two.  There was no way I was running along to get his kite going, but it was windy and it took off and he had such a lovely hour just letting it go up really high.  A woman near us called out to her kids…’Come on kids it’s time to go’ to which Steve replied  “just five minutes more pllleeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaasssssssssseeeeeeee Mum’ She, unusually, got the joke and laughed.  So much of his humour goes straight over the heads of American people.

The next day we moved on to Monterey and our big event here was the Aquarium, which is reputed to be one of the best in the world.  It cost a staggering £30.00 or £40.00 each to get in so it needed to come up with the goods and it did.

For some reason fish especially are drawn to me and on this day my energy must have been particularly magnetic.  Every tank I went to I just placed my hand on the window and said in my head ‘Come and say hello’ and every time all the occupants of the tank moved to my hand and my side of the window.  It was lovely to have all the penguins round our side and the sea horses all left the seaweed and moved to my fingers and the best trick was a shoal of fish which just went round and round and then a whole bunch of them broke off and swum to my hand and back.  Steve was filming me and the fish all the while, as  I felt as if I was in a bit of a trance.  There was a woman following me and taking pictures as she realized if she followed me the fish followed me and she could get a good shot.  It was magical.

We moved on the next day to Carmel where Clint Eastwood lived, I don’t know if he still does but it was  where he was the Mayor of the town  for a while.  This was to be the start of our big trip, which is why we were doing this Road Trip… the journey all the way down this part of the coast to San Simeon and Heart Castle. This journey is  called travelling down the highway 1 and Big Sur.  So I did not particularly want to spend much time in Carmel as those huge waves and rugged coastline were calling me.  I was waiting for Steve to get out of the car and saw a Tourist Information centre and thought it might be a good idea to have a better map and so I went in.  I asked if there was a map for the entire route down and she said she had one, but I couldn’t make the trip.  Flabbergasted to say the least I asked why and she said… I kid you not!! ….

It’s closed…

The Big Sur was closed…

Landslides..

I just stood there looking like a really dumb tourist whose whole raison d’etre – well with regards to her holiday anyway – had just disappeared.

I couldn’t speak except to say she must have made a mistake, didn’t they realize I had been waiting 20 years to make this trip and rekindle my memories of it from those times.  Steve had written a book which had taken 4 years out of his life.. just so we could come back to the States using the book as an excuse.. so that I could travel down the Big Sur.  It couldn’t be closed!!

WWWWaaaaiiiiilllllll!!!

She produced pictures of the landslides, which had happened twice in the past month and indeed a big stretch of the road was not open.  I then asked if we could go as far as it was open and then cut across country to the major arterial road the 101 – bypass the blockage – cut on back across and pick up the highway 1 past the blockage.  She said that was impossible.  There is a road across the Sierra de Salinas mountains but it is virtually undriveable and even the locals won’t try to go across it.  The only option was to see the first part of Big Sur just south of Carmel, which is the prettiest I have to say, then turn back.. drive back up through Carmel – back to Monterey and up and across to pick up the 101 then head south again back down to San Simeon.  We were later told this is a 200 mile detour!!  (Bit like going to Glasgow from London via Stonehenge… at least you would have something to remember if you did that)

I refused.  I just stood there like a petulant child refusing to believe it or to countenance going back to Monterey. 

So we walked Carmel. We  tried to have a bite to eat in the Hogs Breath Café (Clint Eastwood gift to culinary names) and tried to decide what to do. 

We had to give up on the café as the trauma had somehow rendered us invisible.   Steve went and collected our own menus then tried 3 times to get someone to realize we were there without success so we walked out again, putting it all down to a time warp which meant we couldn’t be seen.  I think my misery was manifesting a shield around us.

In the car I said I would not go back, and if we had to miss it we would.  But we decided to go down as far as we could which took us right through to the campsites of Big Sur and the redwood trees and in fact only eventually missed out about 15 miles of a 90 mile coastline.  The rents for cabins and hotels were ridiculous in the £300.00 range, but luckily we spoke at length with a young hippie receptionist who told us that the trip over the mountains was completely do-able in our lovely new jeep car, he did it all the time in a car totally not suitable, and that it was a tricky mountain route but absolutely stunningly beautiful.

And it was!!

Without the landslide we would never have seen it and it is probably the best view I have ever had in my life of the ocean and the tall mountains and the wibbly – wobbly road on the Sat Nav was just a scream.. Especially when it wound back on itself and went back the way we had just come.

It took a while to do and Steve loved the challenge.  I’m not sure it would have been so pleasurable in a manual car mind..

We had lunch in the very famous restaurant Rocky Point restaurant, which has probably one of the best views of the ocean in the world.

As always for us though our trip is made so memorable by something happening with wildlife. 

We kept stopping the car to get out and take in the view and take some film of the area.  One of the rocks out to sea was called bird rock for obvious reasons but there were lots of seals calling and making a lot of noise too.  We sat for a moment on a bench and out of no-where came ‘Alan’

Now Alan is one of Steve’s most favourite characters and is to be found on the You Tube video of Funny Animals.

This is cute and you need to turn up your volume.
 http://www.wimp.com/animalvoiceovers/

  

He is a little  Gopher and the soundtrack has him kind of hiccupping and constantly saying…

‘Alan.. Alan… Alan… Alan’….as if he is calling someone…  Then he says.. ‘Oh no it is not Alan .. it’s Steve… Steve… Steve…’

For some reason Steve and his sister who also has his brilliant sense of humour have adopted this little Gopher character to have continual jokes with.

So there he was suddenly in front of us looking for some food.

I happened to have a tin of very exotic nuts in the car, which I got out for Steve and he ended up feeding Alan from his hand… After a while Alan’s wife joined us and then two little Alans or Allanahs joined us too.  They climbed onto the bench and took the nuts out of our hands and nuzzled our ears…

We thought that was it for the day but later that evening we went into a supermarket to buy a snack for the room and passed in the car park, a car with its windows down and 3 ferocious dogs barking at everyone.  I said they were a bit scary but Steve said he could see that they were chained to the seat.

When we came out we heard someone screaming and looked over to the car whose driver – a lovely middle-aged lady – was sitting in the front teasing a white parrot and it was the parrot who was screaming.  The lady was putting her hands over it’s eyes so it couldn’t see and it was screaming “Heidi don’t”…. and then she would take her hands away.  The parrot was sitting on the drivers wheel.

We couldn’t resist so we went up to the car, calmed the dogs down and the parrot came straight out the window and sat on Steve’s shoulder.  It had been loose in the car with the dogs when we had walked past but she said it never flies away.  When she walks the dogs she parks him on a tree and after a few minutes it yells out… “Heidi… help!!” and she knows it is time to go back for him.

He was gorgeous and very reluctant to let go of Steve.  Steve fell in love instantly and we were trying to think how we could have a white parrot loose in our house to live with us…When I told Steve that they live longer than humans he decided that it wouldn’t be fair to get one with my advanced age… so no parrot then…

What wonderfully bizarre people there are in the world who enliven the rest of us with their lovely quirkiness.  The lady told us that she had had a an incredible life of travel and adventures with a fantastic husband who had died last year of cancer and without her dogs and her parrot she would not have been able to go one.  I could well understand how the animals kept her going.. Once the dogs stopped protecting the car they were lovely too.

So what a day… hands-on with the fish… Alan… and a parrot….  More wildlife stories in one day than the whole trip so far.

Hearst Castle tomorrow and the incredible dream building of just one man…and his female architect.