California Car Trip

Mission mural in Lompoc

When I was a young woman, I’d hop in my car and go for a long drive at the drop of a hat. Not so much now. I’ve become a real homebody: with my work, gardens and favorite TV shows, it’s been several years since I’ve left the house for more than just a few days.

Recently, I either read an article in the AARP Magazine or saw something on the Today Show about traveling and how it can actually generate new brain cells and improve one’s memory—I am, after all, turning 60 at the end of the year. So I decided to take a weeklong car trip, starting in the Central Coast and then heading north to Monterey and San José before stopping in Fresno, where I had scheduled a workshop. I had various job-related meetings along the way and also saw friends, making the week a nice mix of work and pleasure. 

Here’s what I learned (in no particular geographic order):

It’s almost impossible to avoid traffic in California. No surprise that it took me nearly two hours to drive out of Los Angeles, but I was shocked, as well as exasperated, when it took three hours to drive from Monterey to San José, Sunday afternoon—a ride that should have taken a little over an hour. As I found out two days later, it can also take three hours to get from Gilroy to Fresno via Highway 152 if there are enough slow-moving trucks ahead of you. Maybe I shouldn't have spent the entire afternoon at the Gilroy Premium Outlets (?). 

We’ve always loved antiquing in Cayucos, a cute little beach town north of Morro Bay. Now there’s another reason to stop there: the Brown Butter Cookie Company, an unassuming storefront that hides a bevy of activity inside. The friendly staff offer newcomers an array of samples as soon as they walk in the door. The cookies are impossible to resist, made with natural ingredients and a touch of sea salt. They ain’t cheap, but boy are they tasty! I bought two dozen, plus a bag of lemon cookies. YUMMY!

Moss Landing, a small town north of Monterey, hosts a highly anticipated flea market, once a year, that draws hundreds, if not thousands, of bargain-hunters. Lots of great items; but get there early or you may have to park a mile away. Interestingly, Moss Landing is also home to several well-known local restaurants. But, again, plan to eat early or you may have to wait forever for a table, like we did. 

Lunch (at last!) at Haute Enchilada 

Downtown San José is a fun place to stay: historic buildings, the light rail, a new mini-Safeway market, and a movie theater across the street from my hotel. While taking my morning walk, I discovered the San José Museum of Art and a new exhibit, called “Pilgrimage,” by photographer Annie Leibovitz. The exhibit is absolutely wonderful: digital images of private artifacts that once belonged to an eclectic assortment of iconic figures (e.g., Abraham Lincoln’s hat and gloves, Virginia Woolf’s room, the television that Elvis Presley famously shot, a bullet hole made by Annie Oakley, Freud’s couch, etc.). From here, the exhibit moves to the Columbia Museum of Art in October and finally the Lincoln Presidential Library next year.

You can take the librarian out of the library, but not the library out of the librarian. So, of course, I visited many libraries—old and new—on my trip. My favorites were the Lompoc Carnegie library, local historical landmark no. 1 and currently the Lompoc museum, and the Pacific Grove library, where I helped administer a grant, last year, to create a much-needed teen area.

The former Lompoc Carnegie Library

Pacific Grove library's teen area

On a whim, I decided to take the beautiful but (oh so) harrowing two-lane Highway 1 from Cayucos to Monterey. I thought I saw my car smile when we started to ascend the notoriously winding road north. I, on the other hand, was terrified. As magnificent as the scenery was, it’s hard to enjoy the view when you’re constantly worrying about accidentally driving off the edge of the continent! I didn’t dare stop to take pictures for fear of not wanting to get back into the car again.

I did, however, take lots of photos of Lompoc’s amazing murals, which the L.A. Times once called “an outdoor art gallery.” Sprinkled throughout Lompoc, the best murals are those that decorate the walls of older buildings on the town’s south end. Themes range from historic Central Coast scenes to artistic military tributes. Here are just a few of the many murals I saw in Lompoc (click on images to enlarge):

Bridge School Concert

I’ve been a fan of rock legend Neil Young for more than three decades. I, of course, have always loved Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, arguably the most popular of all the bands he’s played with. But it wasn’t until I heard his solo album Harvest in the late 1970s—many years after it had been released, by the way—that I became a huge fan. I have followed him ever since. We don’t always like all of his music, but Tim and I have seen him perform on stage countless times. Each concert is as youthful and as memorable as the one before, even though Young is now well into his 60s.

An outspoken liberal, Neil lives in northern California on a ranch close to where counter-culture author Ken Kesey once lived. For the past 24 years Neil and his wife Pegi have organized a benefit concert for the Bridge School, which Pegi helped found in the mid-1980s. The concert traditionally attracts megawatt artists, like Bruce Springstein, Paul McCartney, Brian Wilson, Sheryl Crowe, Jackson Browne, and The Who. The announcement of each year’s lineup is always highly anticipated. Although I’ve wanted to go forever, the thought of schlepping all the way up to Mountain View for a concert was never appealing. That is, until I opened the newspaper one morning last month and read that Buffalo Springfield, Young’s first band, was reuniting for this year’s Bridge School benefit. We had been wanting to visit Tim’s brother, who lives in Sebastopol, north of San Francisco, anyway, so we bought tickets to the concert and made plans to fly up on Saturday, even though all weather reports were predicting a wet weekend.

We landed in Oakland at 9:15AM. The sky was cloudy but dry. We congratulated ourselves for having such good fortune. By the time we got to Sebastopol, however, the skies had opened up, pouring down rain through the night and into the next day. The concert started at 2PM on Sunday.

We spent the night with friends in Bodega Bay and then left at 10AM to head south to Mountain View, where the outdoor Shoreline Amphitheater is located. The drive was harrowing. I am not the most adventurous driver even in the best of weather, so my brain was on major “red alert.” My biggest fear was crossing the Golden Gate Bridge at the height of the storm; but surprisingly the bridge ended up being the least scary stretch of all, even though (as you can tell from the photo) we could hardly to see the other side!

It took us nearly three hours to drive 100 miles, but when we arrived in Mountain View the sky was only partly cloudy. Could Neil Young possibly control the weather, too? We were ecstatic, though I took my rain parka along just in case. I also convinced Tim to buy a cheesy $5 parka when we were paying for our souvenir t-shirts. And, lucky, too, because about 30 minutes into the concert it started to rain and pretty much didn’t stop till we were back in the car several hours later.

The audience was fairly mixed: some young people, but mostly folks our age or even older. Tim was thrilled when a woman came up to him and said he looked like Mike Love of the Beach Boys, though I didn’t think that was much of a compliment!

The musical lineup was incredible: Kris Kristofferson, actor Jeff Bridges, country legend Ralph Stanley, Elvis Costello, Leon Russell, Elton John, Pearl Jam, and, of course, Neil Young and Buffalo Springfield. Bridges sang a couple of songs from his Oscar-winning movie Crazy Heart, while Stanley treated us to some old-time country standards, which drew a standing ovation. Tim was most moved by Kristofferson who, even though sounded kinda creaky, can still break your heart singing “Me and Bobby McGee.”

With all the rain and marijuana smoke in the air, we pretended we were at Woodstock, though we doubted garlic fries and pulled pork sandwiches were part of that particular outdoor festival!

The Bridge School concert is typically an acoustical event. Still, Elton John and Leon Russell, who just released a joint CD together, managed to rock the theater with their pianos and unplugged band. It was wonderful seeing the white-maned Leon pounding the keyboards after walking on stage using a cane. Elton, too, looked fabulous and sounded as good as the last time I’d seen him playing at his now historic Dodger Stadium concert in 1975. They brought the house down.

Russell and John were followed by Neil Young’s protégés Pearl Jam, whose music we don’t know, though they did open for Neil when he was touring in 1993. We went to that concert, but stood outside the arena until Pearl Jam was done because their music was just too damn loud. Playing acoustical, though, was much easier on the ears—so much so, I might even buy a couple of their songs on iTunes.

After a break, the stage was then set for Buffalo Springfield. We had by now been sitting in the on-again-off-again rain for six hours, but it was well worth the wait. Although the first couple of songs were a bit shaky, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay and Neil Young then launched into their biggest hit, “For What It’s Worth,” and we were suddenly transported back in time. The young woman in front of Tim turned around and asked him if Buffalo Springfield had originated that song. “YES!” he answered incredulously as I joyously sang along with the lyrics.

The set ended with “Bluebird,” another big Buffalo Springfield hit, before Neil, who had briefly played with many of the acts throughout the concert, invited all the performers back on-stage to join him in singing his anthem, “Keep on Rockin’ in the Free World!” The audience sang gloriously in unison. It was the perfect ending to an unforgettably phenomenal day. I can’t wait to see who Neil Young plays with next year.