Day 15, Down Highway 1 to Pismo Beach

On the road about 10am this morning. Seems a lot longer than 12 hours ago. First stop was about 5 miles up the road, Carmel by the Sea. Such a quaint little place but very upmarket by all accounts. We had time to stroll down to the beautiful sandy beach for some snaps and try and capture some of the local wildlife on 'film' too. There was a blue jay just waiting for Mary to get her camera out, so it could fly off and a family of ground squirrels scampering about. One nearly came up and nibbled my finger but not quite. We weren't lucky enough to see Clint Eastwood, though he is often seen walking about, according to Larry.

Hard life being a ground squirrel in Carmel!

From Carmel we rode a few more miles for a fuel stop, then it was back onto the highway for the ride along the coast. We had a brief stop at a vista point, then Dean let us loose to do our own thing until we would regroup for a refreshment break, at a place called Nepenthe. This a restaurant set up on the hillside, with the most spectacular views of the coastline.

The view from Nepenthe

En route to Nepenthe, we stopped at, the most famous bridge on Highway 1. Deans says that it is used in a lot of car commercials. It has a certain charm about it and you can see why car manufacturers/commercial makers would be attracted to it.

Bixby Bridge

As we sat at Nepenthe, sipping our refreshments, a superb real lemonade, for me, we were amazed when a little hummingbird came down to sip nectar from the flowers alongside us. There followed a mad scramble to get photos of the tiny thing. I didn't manage to get one but Cheryl's looked pretty good, the bird's wings a mere blur.

From Nepenthe we were on our own again. The next regroup would be at Ragged Point, a late lunch stop. Dud had some soup, old people like soup, you know, especially when it if 85 degrees, whilst I had a packet of crips we picked up yesterday and a muffin I acquired at this morning's buffet brekkie.

As Dud and I were down to visit Hearst Castle and time was ticking on, with some people still waiting to get their food, Dean said he'd run us over to the castle and then go back for the rest of them, or at least meet them somewhere in between. And so, Dean, Dud and I took to road to ride the 10 or so miles to Hearst Castle.