Day 13–Hairy Otter

I was up at 6:30 again and while I let Aryn sleep until 8:00, I got on the computer to find a place for the night close to San Francisco.  I settled on Santa Cruz, but Priceline has only one bidding zone for that area and rejected my $70 bid.  They did counter-offer at $85 for a 2.5-star, so I took it and wound up at the Best Western Plus in Scott’s Valley.

As we drove toward the coast and the Pacific Coast Highway, something ominous loomed on the horizon.

The morning fog rolled in and Aryn’s first experience at a California beach was foggy and 55-degrees.

We headed up the coast and stopped at the elephant seal beach.

A gorgeous drive with lots of scenic overlooks.

Aryn coined the perfect description of the hillsides – a flower reef.

I wish they’d had these signs when we took our trip in the 70s – maybe my folks would have seen them and not let me play so near the surf that pulled me into the Pacific when I was seven. 

	Traumatized me for life, that did.

We tried to stop for lunch south of Big Sur, but the area’s sparsely populated and the restaurant was pretty expensive, so we moved on.

When we got near Monterey, I saw a sign for the aquarium and remembered that it’s supposed to be pretty cool, so we hopped off the highway and went there.

In addition to the sea otter exhibit, they have telescopes on the deck to view the kelp beds in Monterey Bay and the wild otters there.

There’re a dozen or so otters out there.  They’re the black dots.  Really.

After the aquarium, Aryn made another new friend.

And we had dinner on Cannery Row and Aryn got a new t-shirt.

And Aryn composed an interesting picture of a tree … I’m not sure what’s tilted … the tree or the world … or just her.

Finally, it was back into the fog and on to Scotts Valley and the hotel.

What are the odds of finding another silver Prius with roof racks at the hotel?  Pretty damn good, apparently.

And now a quiet evening in the hotel, some laundry, and then on to San Francisco in the morning.  But it seems Aryn had too much caffeine today, because she’s hyper, bored, and watching Univision soap operas … could be a bad evening.