The trip so far . . . .

We have managed a couple of entries for the family blog while we have been travelling, but I have not done any. So here's a quick summary of the trip so far.

Left Perth Sunday 15th at 7.45, arrived Los Angeles at 5.30 Sunday 15th - the vagaries of the date line . When we come back we will lose a day. Picked up a hire car, registered at the motel we had prebooked, had an evening meal (huge servings left unfinished) and crashed. Neither of us had slept well on the plane.

Next day we set off to travel north, aiming to be at Hearst Castle (halfway to San Francisco) for the final tour of the day at 4 pm. What actually happened can be found here.

We spent the night at Cambria which is a lovely little town. We found an internet cafe there, and a restaurant which served excellent Asian food. We left early to go on a morning tour of Hearst castle. I am glad we did it - the place was very interesting and such an example of conspicuous consumption! But I guess if you have the money you need to flaunt it.

Because we didn't leave San Simeon until 11 am and had decided to drive up the coast, we were rather behind in our planned timetable. There was no way we would be able to get to SF, so we decided to stay in Santa Cruz which is about 90 miles from SF. The drive up the coast is spectacular, but very time consuming.

Wednesday we drove from Santa Cruz north to Eureka. We had originally planned to drive along the coast, but due to traffic chaos the 90 minute trip to the Golden Gate bridge took more than 3 and a half hours, so again we were pushed for time. So we took the freeway and totally at random pulled off at a town called Healdville to find a spot to have our lunch. It was a great find - very touristy, but lots of charming buildings and interesting shops, and a lovely park. The rest of the drive north was very interesting too, through great scenery and fabulous redwood forests.

Eureka has lots of beautifully restored Victorian timber buildings, including the Carson Mansion which must be the best example of Victorian wedding cake architecture in existence. It is also reputed to be the most photographed building in North America. We both took lots, and I will post at least one example later.

Today we just drove, again through redwoods at first, then up into the mountains and down. We are now at my friend Jennifer's house. Tomorrow we need to do some shopping then there is the wedding rehearsal dinner in the evening.