California Highway One Road Trip (or "The Best Highway in the World")

A humanist cult, a Danish hideaway, a gravitational anomaly, towering trees, a spoiled rich kid's castle, clothing-optional hot springs, and the cutest animals (and weirdest) imaginable: welcome to Highway One, the most beautiful highway in the world! In this episode, we cover everything you need to plan your trip up the California Coast and all the weird history you never knew about the stops along the way.

Planning a road trip up the Pacific Coast Highway? We've got a few blog posts that will help:

• The Ultimate 10-Day Highway One Road Trip Itinerary
• 8 Places to Visit on California's Central Coast
• Self-Guided Los Angeles Brewery Tour
• Travel Guides: Mendocino, Morro Bay, & Paso Robles

We’ve also created a free, printable Highway One itinerary! The 7-page PDF also includes our San Francisco Self-Guided Walking Tour. Plus, we’ll also send you our favorite tips to help you plan an amazing California road trip!

For more ridiculous adventures visit us at PracticalWanderlust.com and follow @practicalwanderlust on Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook!

Audio production & music composition by Tyler Hafer.

Transcript

spk_1:   0:00
Hey, babe, what's up? You know how you're like a California stereotype?

spk_0:   0:03
I'm not a California service. Are

spk_1:   0:04
you serious? You grew up on the beach

spk_0:   0:06
next to the beach.

spk_1:   0:07
He went surfing every single day. Not

spk_0:   0:09
every day. Most of

spk_1:   0:10
you have, like, incredibly strong opinions about burritos.

spk_0:   0:12
Yeah, I'm a man of taste.

spk_1:   0:13
How you even heard yourself talk.

spk_0:   0:15
I don't know what you're talking about right now.

spk_1:   0:17
He just admit that you're a walking California stereotype.

spk_0:   0:19
You know what? Like I hear it now. Hi. We're Leah and Jeremy.

spk_1:   0:25
Were the accident prone travelers behind practical Launder, lest

spk_0:   0:28
we're here to dish out travel tips,

spk_1:   0:30
travel tricks, useful trivia, useless trivia, mildly entertaining anecdotes and everything else you need to avoid making all of our terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible mistakes.

spk_0:   0:40
And we make a lot of mistakes.

spk_1:   0:52
Hail. So today we are talking about one my favorite trips to take close to home for us, this was actually one of the first trips that we ever took together as a couple.

spk_0:   1:02
That's not accurate.

spk_1:   1:03
Yes, it is. We're talking about. Well, we went Teoh like your hometown. I met your dad,

spk_0:   1:08
right? But we didn't take this highway.

spk_1:   1:10
Oh, my God. We were your Your hometown is on highway one. It's literally like it runs through the center of town.

spk_0:   1:18
Just cause we saw Highway One doesn't mean that we took highway. We're

spk_1:   1:20
on highway. Okay.

spk_0:   1:22
Okay. Anyway, we're talking about highway One,

spk_1:   1:25
which is one of my favorite road trips close to home. It's very I mean, it runs through San Francisco so, tactically, we could go there now, but it's like that's not the part. That's exciting.

spk_0:   1:34
Yeah. So how everyone is this one of the most beautiful highways in the entire world?

spk_1:   1:39
I'm gonna say it's the most beautiful highway the entire world. And, ah, anybody who wants to correction and that can fight me.

spk_0:   1:45
Yeah, looking at you. Florida Keys, Highway fight us.

spk_1:   1:49
I don't know that one, but apparently there's one in Australia that actually looks a lot like highway one

spk_0:   1:53
or road to Hana. Get out of here with that trash. Hana is pretty great. I mean, banana bread. Yeah, they got a speak there. We have oysters. We do have oysters kind of different. Anyway, the one goes all the way from San Committee, which is down near, like, orange County, Southern California all the way up to a little town called Leg It, which is in Northern California. It's 656 miles long.

spk_1:   2:15
Yeah, and you definitely You can drive the whole thing, which is great. But you can also definitely just take out chunks. Um, and we're gonna be talking about all of our favorite stops along highway one today. Um, and it is something that, honestly, I've been tempted in core Indiana. Just hop in the car and drive.

spk_0:   2:30
I have to because it's like, right there. And it's gorgeous. And like,

spk_1:   2:34
you have to stop. You could just look out the window of your car safely with a mask on.

spk_0:   2:39
Oftentimes you like, end up just randomly on. And you're like,

spk_1:   2:42
Oh, hey, with

spk_0:   2:43
one, okay? Never awfully

spk_1:   2:45
very California experience. Most people don't just trip and fall over and end up on the most beautiful how in the world we didn't all grow up on a town that the central like Main Street was Highway one. I can't

spk_0:   2:58
help that. I came from a really cute town.

spk_1:   3:01
We are gonna talk about Jeremy's hometown today. Morrow Bay. Um, we'll get to that We're also gonna

spk_0:   3:06
highlight a little bit of the history of, you know, the one and the stops along the one.

spk_1:   3:10
There is some fascinating history and honestly, coming from somebody that grew up in the Midwest. I grew up in Kentucky. We did not talk about California history. It was like California. History only came in when California became a state. And then it was sort of just like Gold Rush. And then it was like Hollywood, and that was it. We didn't get, like, calm brands of California history, but it turns out California history is fascinating.

spk_0:   3:31
Yeah, we're not gonna go super deep into it because it's actually like thousands of years of native history, But

spk_1:   3:37
we are gonna managed to shoehorn and something about the Donner Party. I'm just mark my words.

spk_0:   3:41
Well, you already did. So we could skip on

spk_1:   3:43
this. Speaking of history, So how we want is incredibly historic. It was originally built in the late 19 twenties, and it was part of what was known as the Roosevelt Highway was 1400 miles long, and it basically traced the entire Western margin of the United States all the way from Mexico to Canada,

spk_0:   4:01
and it almost didn't happen. A plucky, tenacious woman, a May renge, fought for it to the nail.

spk_1:   4:05
Oh, she's sassy. Good for her, sticking it to the man.

spk_0:   4:09
Well, she was mostly concerned about keeping the public off of her 17,000 acre

spk_1:   4:12
range. Okay, so she wasn't exactly a hero of the common folk then. But she did eventually allow Ah, the how it to Be built and how We Won was designated an all American road in 1996. There's only 31 in the U. S.

spk_0:   4:25
Yeah, the the criteria for being an All American road. It's really funny because it's like you need to have to like to of the similar characteristics, such as leg diners. No, it's like so it's like a

spk_1:   4:37
weird like it's like a giant ball of yarn requirement. There, Miley and encounters

spk_0:   4:41
there might be there is a giant human drive rate 60. There is a giant human nest on everyone.

spk_1:   4:46
Yeah, we're gonna talk about that,

spk_0:   4:48
um, Highway one. I always thought was funny growing up because it has a different like names. And yes, I'm just going to say in the beginning, I am going to refer to it as the one because I'm from California and we do introduce highways with the and then the number.

spk_1:   5:02
We do not do that in Kentucky. We say you take 65 to 64 to the No, Wait, Damn it! I just did it. Oh, my God had become a California And

spk_0:   5:11
it happened. Guys can just gonna put in like a like some fanfare. Sound effects now.

spk_1:   5:18
Thanks. So some other nicknames for the one are the Pacific Coast Highway,

spk_0:   5:25
right? Also like the Redwood Highway calls it that Well, there's like, there's, like, little stretches

spk_1:   5:31
one redwood and it's all the way the North.

spk_0:   5:35
We're gonna highlight the redwoods here in this episode and you're gonna argue with me and tell me that there's one redwood.

spk_1:   5:39
Okay, so maybe there are, like California colloquial names, But generally speaking, there's only three nicknames. There's the one Highway one and the Pacific Coast Highway or PCH. If you're cool, that's it. I had uh huh. That's exactly what it sounds like.

spk_0:   5:55
It kind of does. Alright, that's enough history. Let's just get into it.

spk_1:   5:58
Here's a fun fact. Both you and my dad actually grew up in towns that were on Highway One.

spk_0:   6:04
We did. That's ah, you know, That's why we're so close. Actually, that's the only thing that kept us together.

spk_1:   6:08
Oh, what? Who? Wait. What?

spk_0:   6:11
Me and your dad.

spk_1:   6:13
So my dad grew up in an area in the South Bay in Los Angeles. Um, the areas are super super cute, but the highway that runs through there, it's not like what you think it was. Ah, highway. The one in that area is just like a big street. It kind of runs through like Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach, Supercute area. One of my favorite spots in L. A scenic.

spk_0:   6:36
Yeah, it's also kind of like an annoying street, so I usually just like, don't count. That is the one

spk_1:   6:40
I do love to stay in that area like I love Hermosa Beach. That's where we stayed, holed up for a while and we're taking care of Grandpa Bob when he faked his own death on our year long honeymoon, which, if you haven't listened to that episode, I highly recommend it.

spk_0:   6:53
Yeah, we were actually like living our best life there. We were waking up early and going on mice going on walks

spk_1:   6:58
again. Twice. You went surfing once.

spk_0:   7:01
I did go surfing once,

spk_1:   7:02
and that's also when we got into Pokemon. Go.

spk_0:   7:04
Yes, that is We were like we were like

spk_1:   7:06
a lot of match

spk_0:   7:06
carp nine months late to the book of one go train. But we did it.

spk_1:   7:10
So anyway, you definitely visit that area. But don't get discouraged if you're if you find yourself on the Pacific Coast Highway and there's just like a bunch of chain stores, and it just looks like I lay

spk_0:   7:20
right, but her most of beaches like I was like, I had some trepidation like, We're gonna stand L. A. Because I'm not in l. A person, but Hermosa Beach is beautiful and the neighboring towns a really cute

spk_1:   7:30
super kit. But my typically, if I'm doing a highway one road trip, I caught a speed through the L A section, and I had right up to Santa Monica in Santa Barbara, which are super pretty.

spk_0:   7:39
Usually people aren't from California and try to think about what the state looks like. More often than not, they're actually imagining Santa Barbara.

spk_1:   7:45
It's like long stretches of beach, these tall, waving palm trees, Spanish architecture, fog. If you know what California is actually like, that's all Santa Barbara. It's Gordon Santa Monica. Absolutely gorgeous.

spk_0:   7:58
One of the places that people like to visit in Santa Barbara is the Santa Barbara Mission, and that's actually really interesting, because all along the coast of California we have the Spanish missions that are like peppering.

spk_1:   8:10
It plays in really integral part in the history of California, cause before the U. S acquired California and it sort of just sprang into existence. According to my history textbooks, there was a

spk_0:   8:20
you mean white history textbook.

spk_1:   8:21
Yes, there was a long, bloody history with Mexicans, Spaniards and the Native Americans,

spk_0:   8:28
right? And so these missions, as beautiful as they are, keep in mind that they were there to convert Native Americans to Catholicism's. There weren't happy places. Um, it's a complex history. It is part of our history, but that's just something to keep in mind when seeing and visiting these places.

spk_1:   8:44
So if you had up from Santa Barbara and Santa Monica up the coast, you're gonna get Teoh a really quirky little town that looks super out of place, right? Like we talked about Spanish architecture in the Spanish missions. Suddenly you're gonna find yourself in a Danish town called Solvang.

spk_0:   9:00
Can we start winsome Danish music?

spk_1:   9:02
E. I don't know what Danish music sounds like. Clogs Is that

spk_0:   9:11
Yes, clogs, honey. They just sit around with a bunch of microphones and it clogs against each other

spk_1:   9:16
and, like eating butter cookies.

spk_0:   9:18
They just have their butter cookies smacking against their clogs. And then you hear all the crumbs dripping all that out, and then they do their little clog dance. He could make a durkin all over the crumbs.

spk_1:   9:28
I think that might be the Americanized version of a Danish town, which is kind of what's holding is

spk_0:   9:34
yes. So solving is this Danish town. There were a bunch of like Danish immigrants that came to America looking for business prospects in the late 19th century, and, you know, they moved to the Midwest because cheapness. So when they all came to the Midwest, they brought with them the Danish approach to education, Um, which involved Lutheran schools with an emphasis on creativity and poetry.

spk_1:   9:55
That explains why I am such a beautiful and creative artists grown growing up the Midwest. But how did they get to California.

spk_0:   10:01
So one of the day it's been ignored in Toft dreamt of having a dangerous Do

spk_1:   10:04
you mean Benedict Norden doffed?

spk_0:   10:06
Yes. So he dreamt of having a Danish school on the West Coast Uh, come mainly because, like their range, mainly because the weather,

spk_1:   10:13
I get it.

spk_0:   10:14
And so a plot of land open up in the Santa Ynez Valley and he bought it. And then he took some of his other Danish immigrants and they were like, Let's get the fuck out of the snowy area and let's go to the coast, Bro adjusted the shock of for our listeners eso They brought a danger school there with the data school. There was a Danish town and they just kind of put Danish architecture er and they just had a little slice of home spring up around the

spk_1:   10:35
school. It's actually a very American story.

spk_0:   10:38
Super American Danish story.

spk_1:   10:40
One of my favorite things to do in Solvang is eat a bullet pea soup at pea soup. Andersen's

spk_0:   10:46
yeah, not technically in solving, but I mean, it's right there, my favorite thing to eat while in solving our Ebert's keepers.

spk_1:   10:52
I'm sorry, able skippers.

spk_0:   10:55
What did I say Evers skippers, your Underachievers.

spk_1:   10:58
I don't know what that Waas.

spk_0:   10:59
I felt like a fairly Moya Rose doing the wine commercial. Herberger vendor,

spk_1:   11:06
which Okay, we've been doing a lot of TV watching in Ah, you know, in quarantine after we finished. Tiger King and Shits Creek has been great recommend.

spk_0:   11:14
Now we have to put an explicit tag on it.

spk_1:   11:16
We already dead.

spk_0:   11:17
I know.

spk_1:   11:18
Okay, so it once you've had a bullet pea soup, pea soup, Andersen's and looked around at this Danish town and admired the architecture. Um, if you had up north on the coast, you're gonna hit on area known as the Central Coast. And this is my personal favorite stretch of the entire Havilland Road trip A mind to. And that's because Jeremy grew up there. Hey, it's so gorgeous. The first spot that you're gonna hit is an area known as the Five Cities. Um, so there's Pismo Beach. Avila beach. Those willing to I know my name

spk_0:   11:48
Shell Beach. Grover Beach. And I forgot

spk_1:   11:52
that you grew up here

spk_0:   11:54
a rogue.

spk_1:   11:55
Wow, I'm not Tell them that you forgot them. Now, everybody knows

spk_0:   11:59
also, aval is not included in the five cities. It's actually Ocio. No, but whatever

spk_1:   12:03
I sweat, you're just making up California North's Shell Beach Oshie on Oh, come on,

spk_0:   12:09
La eso. It's not really there are really cities. We call them five cities, but it's their tiny little coastal, very tiny towns, and they're all bumped up together. So you'll be in Shell Beach of the needle across the street, in your leg, in a royal grounded. All of a sudden,

spk_1:   12:22
was the street that you crossed. Also have a one. I think it was called,

spk_0:   12:25
Um, Oceanside should drive whatever whatever the yellow card, whatever the yellow card saw you

spk_1:   12:31
should have. One of my favorite things to do in Pismo Beach is to eat cinnamon rolls like it's what I will drive hours out of my way just to go eat. Those cinnamon rolls are so good.

spk_0:   12:39
Yeah, it's called Old West cinnamon rolls and espresso. It doesn't look like much, but it is so good. Good, goddamn!

spk_1:   12:45
And if you if you ask for the icing on the side, they give you X raising Hashtag life. Um, one of the other coolest things doing Pismo Beach is to go Doon bugging. They have these giant natural sand dunes, much like when we were in Peru and we went June bugging in Wa Cocina. Um, and I was too scared, so I didn't actually do it. But wait, no, that was sand boarding

spk_0:   13:07
those sand boarding. But we did have to take buggies there.

spk_1:   13:10
That was really scary.

spk_0:   13:11
They still do sand boarding in Pismo. But doing bugging is definitely like the biggest attraction. Also, fun movie fact if you've ever seen the Charlton Heston movie The 10 Commandments that was filmed that was filmed in the sand dunes of Pismo And the director and studio had some disagreements about what to do with the actual set because they had spent so much money on it. But the director was like, This is my friend, My belong This belongs here. So they just settled on leaving it. There

spk_1:   13:36
s so there's like a random hidden set in the middle of the dunes.

spk_0:   13:39
Well, it got buried over the years, but and like an eroded but like, there's like that's on Super Bowl fragments of Egypt in business.

spk_1:   13:48
Have you been there?

spk_0:   13:49
I haven't I haven't been able to find it. Wow, I'm sure it's just like a quick Google search. But I'm I'm usually surfing when I'm there.

spk_1:   13:55
Oh, my God. That's the other cool thing to do in Pezzo is go surfing great waves. Super crunchy. I don't know if that's

spk_0:   14:04
a good thing or not. He still don't know what country means Way didn't tell that story. Should I tell that story? Yeah. Okay, so this happened in Hermosa Beach. But since we're talking about surfing, I'll bring it up. Now there was a storm, and after a storm, there's like, really like choppy waves.

spk_1:   14:19
You wanted to say

spk_0:   14:19
crunchy. I did want to say country. So I went surfing one day in Hermosa Beach and I a, like, got the crap beat out of me, and I came when

spk_1:   14:26
you got the crappy out of you because of the waves,

spk_0:   14:29
They were just, like, all over the place.

spk_1:   14:30
Oh, this was after you went surfing. I thought you were, like, walking down the beach and just got beat up because you looked like such a California stereotype or something.

spk_0:   14:37
Why would they beat me up? Because I looked like

spk_1:   14:39
That's why I thought it was so weird

spk_0:   14:41
anyway, so I got out of the ocean and this guy came up and he looked like Matthew McConaughey's brother.

spk_1:   14:47
He might have actually been Maddie McCann. A.

spk_0:   14:49
He was on like a BMX bike, but the BMX bike had an attachment. It was like a hook off the sides of the He could balances surfboard while he rode his bike on the bike path. That schools. And he was just wearing board shorts and a shirt. Or that I'm sorry. Board shorts and a hat. No shirt.

spk_1:   15:04
Did have a six pack. I just want for our readers an image.

spk_0:   15:07
No, he had a six pack under his beer belly because he was a middle aged man in a surf town.

spk_1:   15:12
It may have been Matthew McConaughey preparing for Not a sexy role.

spk_0:   15:15
Um, every Matthew McConaughey role is sexy. Anyway, he came out

spk_1:   15:20
right. All right, all right.

spk_0:   15:21
Hey. Came up and leg pulled his bike in front of me. He was like, Man, it's crunchy out there, brother.

spk_1:   15:27
Oh,

spk_0:   15:28
I gave the

spk_1:   15:29
shock. Did the shock again. You can't help yourself.

spk_0:   15:32
I can't. And then he just rode off into the distance

spk_1:   15:35
and did the sunset.

spk_0:   15:36
Yeah, and then he probably That's probably when you started filming interstellar.

spk_1:   15:39
I also once went surfing. Should we tell that story?

spk_0:   15:42
Oh, yes. Can we please tell you the serving story?

spk_1:   15:45
So I decided Teoh attempt surfing because I married a California stereotype and he talks about a lot. And I thought if my clumsy ginger husband could do it, I can probably do it kind of

spk_0:   16:01
preface this You keep saying that I surf a bunch. I am really bad at it.

spk_1:   16:05
No, you are like you shockingly bad. I've never seen you stand upon away if we've been married for, like 18 years. OK, so this is a kind of only we've been dating for like, I don't know, six months or so. Um, so I was like, All right, You can teach me how to surf. So the very thing you have to do is get a wet suit because the Pacific Ocean is freezing cold, not unlike the Titanic.

spk_0:   16:26
Yeah, people think that it's gonna be really warm and never It's not

spk_1:   16:29
absolutely not. It's It's horrifyingly cold.

spk_0:   16:31
The beaches are nice

spk_1:   16:32
in the south. Yes. So I go to the wet suit shop in this dude with dreads hands me a size medium

spk_0:   16:38
Didn't have drugs. You

spk_1:   16:39
definitely that

spk_0:   16:40
sun bleached hair. I went to high school with him.

spk_1:   16:42
Of course you did. He hands me a medium, even though I'm a size 16 and five foot, you know, 11 or whatever. So it takes me a while to try to put that on,

spk_0:   16:51
like, a two hour ordeal. Because he was

spk_1:   16:53
it was like trying to squeeze my leg into, ah, garden hose. It took a very long time to figure out that I'm actually a size XL men's, but actually, five hours later, we get out to the beach with are extremely heavy surf boards and drag them across the sand, which is like five miles. And then you showed me how to pop up for a while, which I did not grasp at all. And then we got in the water.

spk_0:   17:15
In my defense, I also don't grasp how to pop up. So

spk_1:   17:19
why were you teaching me that? I

spk_0:   17:20
don't know. You want to serve?

spk_1:   17:22
I might head. It was it was romantic and cute. Um, anyway, so go into the water and he's like, Oh, you should just swim out to where the waves are breaking it all the way out there and just points like off into the horizon like

spk_0:   17:33
you mean where the waves are obviously breaking.

spk_1:   17:36
It's like marijuana. It was like that, except for instead of singing me a song, he's like, You have to travel your arms in the freezing cold water forever.

spk_0:   17:43
Yeah, you're really strong swimmer, but you can't use your legs when your

spk_1:   17:45
keys your legs because they're on a surfboard tied together basically. So we're like treadmill ing in this freezing ice water for what felt like a new E on just millennia. And then I looked up as yet another wave is gonna crash into my face and burn my eyes. Then I see this just like horrifying, slimy giant blob of tentacles just blooming at me. And I realized there's like a cloud of a 1,000,000,000 jellyfish just staring at me straight in the face.

spk_0:   18:14
Okay, so this is cute. Except in actuality, the one jellyfish that you saw was about the size of a baseball.

spk_1:   18:23
It was menacing at me. It was it looked like it was going to attack me, right? My face.

spk_0:   18:29
It was the tiniest cute as snugly ist jellyfish I've ever see.

spk_1:   18:34
Actually, in Jeremy's own words, he referred to it as a harmless jelly, Which sounds adorable, I realize, but it did not feel adorable or charming in the moment. So I start screaming my head off. All these other surfers are looking at me thinking I saw a shark because Jeremy didn't tell me this. But there are sharks there.

spk_0:   18:50
Yeah, we're on the shark highway.

spk_1:   18:52
What the fuck is the Shark Highway?

spk_0:   18:53
You know, but it wasn't shark season,

spk_1:   18:55
but focus. Shark season, huh? Oh, my God. You're like a Discovery Channel special. Well, she started screaming, and

spk_0:   19:02
there's all these surfers and they're like, Oh, shit, because, like, yeah, we get sharks there from time to time, but people killed

spk_1:   19:07
three from time to time. You're like Jaws was how jaws happens.

spk_0:   19:10
So she started screaming, and people just assume shark. And so they all start freaking out looking around, and then they all see, like the like, these friendly jellies as

spk_1:   19:19
friendly jelly. It's not a toxic jellyfish. It wasn't gonna attack

spk_0:   19:22
you, which you didn't found out. That I'd like know the difference from jellyfish

spk_1:   19:27
who learns that like what class taught you how to identify friendly jellies and not so friendly jellies by sight.

spk_0:   19:34
Did you guys not have marine survival classes in public schools? God, what? What do they teach you there?

spk_1:   19:39
So I, like, jumped off of my surfboard. Not that I was very much on it, and I tried to swim towards shore, so I'd like flop off of my surfboard and I try to book it back to shore, except for your attached the surfboard like a horrible anchor. So I wasn't getting anywhere, and I'm just screaming and flailing around like I'm drowning. Eventually, Jeremy comes over and freeze me, and I, like, made my way. Terrified Doctor Shore.

spk_0:   20:02
It looks sort of like the opening of Jaws meets like Baywatch, but Baywatch, starring like deer, assumes they're born. She was flailing around the water

spk_1:   20:13
and my Pamela Anderson in Baywatch. Or am I like a deer that somebody throw into a pond?

spk_0:   20:19
Both. That's what that's what they

spk_1:   20:20
works. I don't know if that's a compliment, anyway, I never went surfing again, but I did get back in the water that day and helped Jeremy look for jellyfish. There's a good time actually save his life.

spk_0:   20:32
Um, well, we're talking about surfing on Morro Bay. So more of a was also the next stop on the

spk_1:   20:37
road trip tomorrow. Base Jeremy's hometown A. It is. It is the cute is most charming little hometown. It's like right on this little bay, Um, and there's a little boardwalk. And then there's this giant rock sitting in the middle of it in full view of the town, which used to be all volcanic plug.

spk_0:   20:54
Yeah, it's called Morro Rock. And it was. It acted as like a natural beacon for Steve Fares as early as the 15 hundreds, and it was considered sacred ground for the true mash insulin in native tribes.

spk_1:   21:03
See, it makes sense for you to have learned that in high school like that makes sense.

spk_0:   21:07
I mean, we've barely touched on it.

spk_1:   21:09
Speaking of high school, Jeremy's high school is literally on the beach like not like near the beach, literally on, like the touches the beach.

spk_0:   21:16
We had a really tough time, though, like sand got all over the place.

spk_1:   21:20
Oh my God. Didn't you also say that it was like a rite of passage to get pooped on by Siegel?

spk_0:   21:24
Oh, Yeah, definitely. It happened to me. My freshman year was semester one. I was about to go into a drama class final and a bird pooped right on my crotch.

spk_1:   21:33
Your life growing up in California was just a torrent of horrors. I can't wait to read the biography version of your life. Did you used to like surfing on your lunch break? That happened

spk_0:   21:44
one time. Oh,

spk_1:   21:45
my God. Didn't your teachers used to go, like, go serving and got high?

spk_0:   21:49
Oh, yeah, definitely. It was like three of the social studies teachers. They're all retired at this point, so But I'm still not going to name them. They used to pile into one of their this one of them had a like a blue Miata, and they would put surfboards in there and then just drive the block to the sort of the parking lot, get high and surf on there because they had a shared prep.

spk_1:   22:08
You do stuff like that like you're cool high school teacher. What do you do on your perhaps,

spk_0:   22:11
um, for those of my students listening and you know, there are some of you you can attest. I am not the cool teacher.

spk_1:   22:17
Oh, well, my bad

spk_0:   22:19
on my preps, I play with. Move on.

spk_1:   22:22
Well, sometimes you watch Netflix and a frozen burritos. Anyway, moving on. That's my lunch break. So there's this giant rock, and you can see it from every part of the town. Like it. It's It's the icon of the town.

spk_0:   22:34
Yeah, the rock and be seen all over the place. And it's actually like a It's an icon for our town and people will come by trying to visit moral rock, but they don't understand that it's actually a volcano. Some people think of it more of like the Blarney Stone, or like a moon rock where it's on display. And so everyone that I grew up with had some sort of customer service job. And it's a very common thing. If you are dealing with tourists, tourism's our biggest industry. Um, somebody will ask you, Where is the rock?

spk_1:   23:00
Literally. You can see it from every single

spk_0:   23:02
anywhere in the town. You can sit, um, and so we kind of have this running joke where we try to come up with the best like fake, like fake locations for the Rock. What's your favorite? My favorite was Ask Me Where the Rockets.

spk_1:   23:17
OK, where's the rock?

spk_0:   23:18
Oh, it's seasonal. You just missed its on its tour of North.

spk_1:   23:22
That's soak. You see it? Disney, when we get asked, What time is that? Three o'clock parade? We couldn't give them a sassy in.

spk_0:   23:27
Okay, we did the Disney episode. You need to drop it.

spk_1:   23:30
And then you guys also have that lame hand signal. I'm sorry, that really cool hand signal, because there's like there's the Roman God. He's doing it right now. So there's the giant rock. And then there's also these three smokestacks that you can see all over town, which I assume we're part of, like a jelly fish canning factory is right. So you guys have the three stacks in Iraq hand signal, which is kind of like Wakanda forever, except for one hand, is holding up three fingers very, very cool. Also, I just want to mention speaking of amazing moments in Jeremy's life that will be in his biography. He was his senior high school class president, and he ran as a joke, and he won because he looks a lot like Napoleon Dynamite, and it had just come out that. Whatever, you know, it's you know, it's true.

spk_0:   24:15
Yeah, well, I got stiffed with having a plan. The 10 year reunions for the rest of my life.

spk_1:   24:18
So that seems fair. Didn't you also promise everybody that you were gonna install roller coasters in the parking lot?

spk_0:   24:23
Yeah, we had, like, a candidate debate one lunch, and it got, like, sprang up, and I had no idea was gonna happen. So I just made these, like, very obvious empty promises, and people thought I was funny. So

spk_1:   24:35
I don't know what happened to the rest

spk_0:   24:37
of your political career. I'm glad that it ended there. Actually,

spk_1:   24:39
you sound like a shoe in for president. Honestly, So the other thing that I love about Morrow Bay other than the charming little boardwalk when there's, like, saltwater taffy in link really good restaurants, there are a bunch of otters because murmur Morrow bay is a marine wildlife sanctuary with a natural water birthing spot. Like right in the middle of town with a bunch of the Fisher fisherman ship was the very word this Fisher ships just sure people ship. Why are you looking at me like that?

spk_0:   25:07
I was gonna leave this

spk_1:   25:08
in. We're

spk_0:   25:08
not gonna help us out. Fishermen ships. Yes.

spk_1:   25:11
Okay, there's a bunch of ships where people fish. They're called fucking boats. It's not like it's not like

spk_0:   25:17
pirates like Dr, although that is a high school mascot. And we do have a long, long boat that shows up once a year

spk_1:   25:23
from a bunch of like a pirate bars that you called crusty dives. There some crusty dives. Anyway, there's a bunch of otters in the bay. One time we were there, and it was like in the middle of breeding season, I guess on, and it was like 40 different orders. And they all had tiny little water babies on their little chests and stomachs, and they were so cute.

spk_0:   25:40
It's a curious thing. There's also just like shitloads of harbor seals and sea lions that hang out around because it's a harbor and

spk_1:   25:46
the natural sanctuary. Yeah, you can spend all day just like hiking Santa Paddleboarding. It's really cute. We actually do have an entire post about Morrow Bay. Um, so that'll be in the show notes. Or you can just Google things, too. And Morrow Bay Particle one. Let's go home

spk_0:   25:59
when you leave Morro Bay to go north, you actually have an optional detour that you can take, which is one of your favorite destinations on the Central Coast.

spk_1:   26:06
El Paso. Vera Bliss.

spk_0:   26:07
Okay, Yes, but we all just a pasa. Robles,

spk_1:   26:11
that's that's horrifying.

spk_0:   26:12
Oh, yeah, We really amplify it.

spk_1:   26:14
Yes. Speaking of things that you pronounce like a Californian, can you order a taco for our listeners, please?

spk_0:   26:20
Um, play Turton air Dis tacos day Pasquato for from or

spk_1:   26:26
make my ears are actually bleeding. It's one of your favorite things that you do for your students. Actually, they think it's hilarious.

spk_0:   26:32
They dio um So anyway, Pasa Robles or El Paso Dayro Bliss is our wine country.

spk_1:   26:39
It's like really chilled wine country like I'm gonna be honest. You not making me a little fancy shmancy. Hoity toity. Little potentially a very expensive pasa Robles is really laid back. There's like free tastings at a lot of the tasting room is really cheap. Chances are you'll walk in and, like the owner of the winery might be there. Everybody kinda knows each other. It's a really small, cute town, and we actually have two different posts about pasa Robles, cause we love it so much. One just about wine and one about all the other things to do in Pasa Robles that aren't wine.

spk_0:   27:09
Yeah, I mean, Paso's like town motto is the only thing better than the vines or the vibes.

spk_1:   27:14
No, it's not. Oh, my God, I believed it, though. It's so realistic. So if you go back to the one, um, the next stop north after Morrow Bay is Cambria, which is a really cute little town that we honestly, only ever stopping for. One reason

spk_0:   27:30
in a lull. A berry pie,

spk_1:   27:31
which sounds made up, especially when you explain what it's made out of. It's a hybrid between a Logan Berry and a young very, which, I swear to God those air. Not really fruits.

spk_0:   27:41
They're just both different types of raspberry BlackBerry hybrids.

spk_1:   27:44
Why don't you just say it's a raspberry BlackBerry hybrid? Done?

spk_0:   27:47
Um, because we're cultured.

spk_1:   27:49
Anyway. You got a lens bakery. You order the Allal, a berry pie with fresh, which cream? It is really good, and it's well worth stop.

spk_0:   27:56
Yeah, it's a great breakfast, lunch or dinner spot.

spk_1:   27:58
Morgan, just take one to go. Whatever. So, if you're driving north from Cambria. The next thing that you're gonna hit wasn't my favorite. Like interesting, quirky historical stops along the one Hearst Castle.

spk_0:   28:10
Yes. So Hearst Castle was built by the famed newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst. His life was like Sword of Adapted and Citizen Kane, although it's not official because he tried to shut down production so they couldn't base it off of his life. It's the whole thing.

spk_1:   28:26
Sounds like it's definitely based off of him. If you got that pissy

spk_0:   28:29
Oh, it's super based off his life.

spk_1:   28:31
Eso He built this like giant mansion in the hills and then filled it with exotic animals. There still zeros there if you pass it now. So it's kind of like William Randolph Hearst is like if Donald Trump and Joe Exotic were combined into one human Ah, with a giant castle living in the forties.

spk_0:   28:50
Oh, my God. I was really accurate.

spk_1:   28:52
Yeah, yeah. So this joy enormous castle is like 123 acres of just gardens. There's 165 rooms, and nothing in it makes any sense. It was literally like he would just go around the world and pointed stuff and say, I want that one. And then somebody would card at home for him and he'd stick it in his weird mansion.

spk_0:   29:15
Yeah, there's like no architectural identity. There's two pools that are like the best parts of the house of the pools, ones done in like a Roman style. Another one is supposed to look like Mount Olympus, and then you walk inside and there's like Gothic windows. But then you have, like, a Moroccan fireplace, like he basically just walked around Europe, which is how he got the idea to make a mansion. He walked around Europe with his mom and was just like, I want to castle one day money and then

spk_1:   29:38
he even walk out. He was on vacation with his rich family and was just like, I'll take that one. I want to Castle of my oh,

spk_0:   29:45
so he actually stole the land from like stole native land, shocked and really shocked, hired Julia Morgan, who's one of the most. She's like, probably the most famous female architect of all time to build this like Super Gadi mansion.

spk_1:   30:01
I don't think she's like proud of it, but it was definitely a good paycheck for her. She worked on that thing for years and years

spk_0:   30:07
was 18 years

spk_1:   30:08
adding on random shit, cause he'd be like, I bought a fireplace from Morocco and I want it in that room. He wasn't British, by the way. Let's just made do she Willy Wonka voice. Um, but if you're the kind of person who goes toe like verse I or like the Biltmore Estates or any of like those mansions full of rich people doing ridiculous rich people things you might enjoy a tour at Hearst Castle it is really, really weird. The thing

spk_0:   30:34
is, is that even though we're judging and you know, we judge all of these places and these, like ostentatious mansions are really judging, um, a lot we really appreciate when those places are like self aware. They're like, Oh, look at how like frivolous this was and how ridiculous, like for side is that

spk_1:   30:50
Yeah, like they talk about how Marie Antoinette builds a fake farm because she was idealizing how fun it would be to be fake and work on a farm or even in the Biltmore States they showcased, like the slave court or the servant quarters. I should say they don't do that in Hearst Castle. It's the opposite of that.

spk_0:   31:07
Yeah, you watch a welcome video and then the tour guides. And like Alex Trebek, who narrates the bus trip up the hill, random. All of them paint Hearst as this like pioneer and like,

spk_1:   31:18
like lived the American dream and built the modern newspaper blah, blah. And it's like, No, he was just like a rich, spoiled dude who, like, built of Fun Mansion and then had a bunch of really cool parties with famous Hollywood starlets. Which, Okay, that's cool. But can we not, like, make it into, like, a heroic story,

spk_0:   31:35
right? I mean, it is not a hero like to us, but I mean hers. Castle. It's like super interesting to see when you do tour it. There are three different tours, like there's the inside the Garden tour and, like the servants, how very expensive. They're all very expensive, and you never see the whole house, but it's definitely worth a stop. Um, and you can decide for yourself if he was just if he was a hero of the American dream or just another rich white dude

spk_1:   31:59
who's just rich white dude. So if you see zebras, look up the hill and look for the giant palm trees off in the distance. That's the castle. A couple minutes up the road from Hearst Castle is my favorite stop in this area. The Piedras Blancas elephant seal rookery and son Simeon.

spk_0:   32:20
Ah, they're cute.

spk_1:   32:22
They are the dirtiest animals ever. They are like if you took like a walrus and a manatee and then crossed it with, like, an elephant and then dropped in the ocean.

spk_0:   32:33
You know what? I got it. I got it. I got it overweight manatee, And then you just pull it to be longer.

spk_1:   32:39
That's weird. Also, I love manatees know their Derby or the manatees. Listen, Google Elephant Seal right now, they also make the weirdest noises and, like, just roll around flopping even their babies like way.

spk_0:   32:53
Can we just put in some elephant seal noises right now?

spk_1:   33:00
It really assaults your ears. It sounds like a bunch of monkeys.

spk_0:   33:03
They're like, but like they're my patrol.

spk_1:   33:05
Even the pups, like they start out really cute. And then they hit like, adolescent age, and they just start like molting and all of their skin comes off and it's horrifying and they're just not cute. But like

spk_0:   33:16
super cute. I love them so much. They also can only move like three feet at a time. They do this like had a pillar crawl, and then they're just like flop on the ground for like 20 minutes, because that was a lot of energy.

spk_1:   33:27
I do that when I wake up in the morning.

spk_0:   33:29
I'm surprised that you're like making fun of them when the both of us have so much in common with these with these majestic.

spk_1:   33:34
So you can just, like, pull up in the parking lot and goal and stare of the elephant seals for a while. It's free. It's awesome. Definitely don't miss it.

spk_0:   33:42
And then once you are done getting your fill of elephant seals, it's no that is even possible. Keep going north and you will reach Big Sur.

spk_1:   33:55
This is the most beautiful stretch of the coastline. It confused me at first because big syriza necessarily like a destination, like a police or like a town, kind of okay, like technically, yes, it's a town. But when people say Big Sur there really referring to the stretch of coast between Hearst Castle and Monterey up north, and it's it's just absolutely the most beautiful coastline in the world.

spk_0:   34:18
It's beautiful. It's rugged, isolated like mountains and redwoods and valleys on one side, the ocean on the other on and then throughout the whole coastline. There's not really much, except for like, some really expensive houses and sell expense. And if a small cluster of businesses,

spk_1:   34:34
you can get so Big Sur any other way than driving on Highway one and electricity didn't even get there until the 19 fifties, it's actually a really interesting history.

spk_0:   34:41
Oh, is it? Can we jump into that?

spk_1:   34:42
Yeah, it's all history. Oh, what a surprise. So after California magically popped into existence when white people history began, the area was quickly inhabited by early home centers. Taking advantage of like Freeland Connie, you just would show up, and they would just like hand you 160 acres of beautiful coastline.

spk_0:   35:00
And some of the home centers are like pretty familiar names for the area, like the Bixbys, the Pfeiffer's the Andersons.

spk_1:   35:05
So basically, you could say that it was kind of worth it to risk a whole Donner party situation. Would you say that? Would you say that? Do you have to state parks named after your family?

spk_0:   35:16
Um, my last name is the eighth most common last name in the world. I'm pretty sure that we have a park somewhere. Anyway, So there was a bunch of industry in the area for a while. Like lumber and limestone quarries and gold digging, Obviously.

spk_1:   35:29
Yeah, because you know, the best thing to do when you live in such a beautiful area is to ruin it and make a buck by everything that makes it wonderful.

spk_0:   35:35
Yeah, but still, the area didn't really develop more than just like a post office in a schoolhouse.

spk_1:   35:39
Eventually all that industry just gave way to tourism. And in the early 19 hundreds, they started building fancy resorts. But you still couldn't get there easily during heights. Hide the road to Big Sur back then was literally covered in water.

spk_0:   35:50
So they blasted the shit out of the coast and put up a highway.

spk_1:   35:53
They built the highway between 1921 in 1937 and it was so rugged and difficult that it required 32 bridges. The it was all built by convict labor on, and there were like a lot of casualties. Ux. So then big star opened up Teoh the world, much to the horror of the early home centers who were like We Were Here First, which hilarious in the forties and fifties there was kind of like a group of bohemian artists and writers that flocks to Big Sur and started to call it home and it began to get this reputation is like a creative artist enclave, which then led to these like wild salaciousness tales and local newspapers. Of all the goings on in Big Sur,

spk_0:   36:33
one of the most famous people that went down with author Henry Miller. And he tells the story of a man who showed up on his doorstep one day to announce that he was there to quote, join the cult of sex and anarchy.

spk_1:   36:43
Which is exactly the reason that I moved to San Francisco. Actually, but much like San Francisco, there is no actual cult of sex and anarchy. And even if there was, you can't just show up and asked to join. We have to be invited, Um, but it was really just like a bunch of artists and writers working on stuff really quietly and like looking out of the ocean or whatever. Supposedly,

spk_0:   37:02
this modern reputation is attached to creatives and artists. Still, like folks like Jack London, John Steinbeck, Jack Kerouac, Ansel Adams many others have either lived there. Spent a lot of time in Big Sur.

spk_1:   37:11
Lot of writers were inspired by banks are, for example, Jack Kerouac. In the early sixties, he took a taxi from San Francisco to Big Sur totally wasted cause he, like, wanted to sober up. But, like in a really nice place, sounds like Kerouac. He fell in love with Big Sur and was inspired by it to write a book. Ah, which was definitely not just about himself, about a published writer who is overwhelmed by newfound fame and escapes to the Big Sur wilderness to sober up and ah, get some inspiration, which, you know, is what I just said. Anyway, he ends up really lonely, returns to San Francisco and keeps drinking. So I'm gonna be honest with you. I own the book. I have picked it up and read like, thumbed through it several times, but I've never actually read it

spk_0:   37:51
in the back of the book. He also includes a poem called C Sounds of the Pacific Ocean at Big Certain.

spk_1:   37:55
Well, it sounds like one of my favorite playlist on Spotify.

spk_0:   37:57
It does. It's the one that you play when I'm trying to go to sleep.

spk_1:   38:00
Well, he wrote a while overlooking the sea and listen to the ocean. Ah, but it's actually just like a very long list of gibberish words. I think he might have still been drunk while he wrote it. I don't understand it at all. Just goes right over my head.

spk_0:   38:15
So today the residents of Big Sur is still relatively isolated and have to travel either to Carmel or Monterey for supplies. It's also frequently cut off by storms and road closures, especially during the reign, because that causes landslides.

spk_1:   38:28
Yeah, you're not, like guaranteed self service or WiFi or electricity or road access, but you do have to be really wealthy to live there.

spk_0:   38:35
But it's also like insanely beautiful to drive through.

spk_1:   38:39
There's this quote that Henry Miller wrote about raising his Children in Big Sur. Jeremy, would you do me the honors, please?

spk_0:   38:48
They had skies of pure azure and walls of fog moving in and out of the canyons with invisible feet, hills and winter of emerald green. And in summer mountain, upon mountain of pure gold, they had even more for their was ever the unfathomable silence of the forest. Blazing immensity of the Pacific days drenched with sun and night spangled with stars.

spk_1:   39:10
You know, in Kentucky we had a drive your tractor to school Day, so same same comes in.

spk_0:   39:17
Miller did make a huge mark on Big Sur, and there's like a memorial library, the Henry Miller Memorial Library, right in town. It's like the cultural heart and soul of Big Sur.

spk_1:   39:26
It kind of just looks like a quiet little bookstore, gallery and cafe on the outside. But it moonlights as like the hippest place for giant musical acts to show up totally unannounced while they're on a Highway one road trip and give impromptu concerts

spk_0:   39:39
we're talking about like red hot chilli peppers, the Pixies, Philip Glass, Yola Tango, Joanna Newsom, Arcade Fire. The December is just anybody cool, ghastly. There

spk_1:   39:48
there's like a redwood grove next to the library in any way. It's just the coolest thing ever. Big Sur has literally been the cool place to be for everybody since like the sixties. Like if you were like a creative and famous person in California and you weren't just like hanging around in Big Sur, dropping LSD and hugging redwoods in the sixties like, What were you even doing with your life? And I directing this directly at my dad because he lived in this area in the sixties and he was not dropping acid in Big Sur, which disappoints me.

spk_0:   40:15
He doesn't say that he ever did.

spk_1:   40:18
I mean, a

spk_0:   40:21
I'm just getting your dad probably does not other than the library. There's honestly, like not a lot else to see in Big Sur. But it's not the place. It's not a place that you go to do like beings.

spk_1:   40:32
You should go to do like, outdoorsy things. There's a lot of hikes. There's three different state parks located Big star Julia Pfeiffer, Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, Faith for Big Sur State Park.

spk_0:   40:43
While the fibers really come up,

spk_1:   40:44
I'm telling you, Donner Party is worth it anyway. Then there's Andrew Malaria State Park, and there's a ton of different hikes, and all of them are Favorite. Hike is actually from the Kirk Creek campsite up Suva sent a flats.

spk_0:   40:55
Speaking of camping, That's the other best thing to do. There's a bunch of campsites, although a lot of them are hike in,

spk_1:   40:59
which is actually good because you can't get a reservation in Yosemite. So you might as well take your chances in big thermal right? I'm all right.

spk_0:   41:07
There's also a lot of natural hot springs in the area. If you're up for a 20 mile backpacking trip, you can hack to Sykes Hot Springs, which is insanely popular. But because of the popularity, it's gotten a little bit like there's been a lot of, like littering and stuff, so something will close it periodically.

spk_1:   41:22
Then there's also the excellent hot springs at the easel in Institute. I don't know

spk_0:   41:29
the way I always just assumed it was a cold.

spk_1:   41:31
Um, no, it's something medical. Here's the description from Google. The Esalen Institute is a nonprofit American retreat center, an intentional community which focuses on humanistic alternative education, also the birthplace of the human potential movement in the 19 sixties. Oh, you know what it is? A

spk_0:   41:48
cold Yeah, that's that's That's just cold moves are there.

spk_1:   41:50
Here's a fun fact hunter S. Thompson, who is from my hometown label, Kentucky, was involved in the founding of the Eastland Institute along with Aldous Huxley and like Joan Bays and like everybody else, cool in the sixties, he also really got tell all about the hot springs back when they were this hot spot for hip cool San Francisco gaze on getaways. And honestly, we could just spend ages talking about Big Sur because there's so many crazy stories like this.

spk_0:   42:13
Luckily, you don't have to join a cult to enjoy the hot springs like I think you you can take a dip here between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. including, obviously is optional

spk_1:   42:23
broken a big there. Another iconic thing to do in Big Sur is to seem equate Falls, the giant waterfall that's also a tight fall, which means that during high tides the waterfall spills directly into the ocean. There's only 25 of them in the world, and two of them are not only in California but along how we want.

spk_0:   42:40
Honestly, this is like a wonder of the world, and somehow it barely sounds nearly as exciting as the rest of Big Sur.

spk_1:   42:44
I don't know how you would measure that up to the human potential movement founded by Aldous Huxley.

spk_0:   42:48
Anyway, if you're incredibly wealthy, there are several luxury resorts, a Big Sur as well. All of them are just unreal. So there's the new pence and Ventana, which are the best known.

spk_1:   42:59
It's like It's my dream to stay there or even, just, like, eat in a restaurant or

spk_0:   43:03
even, just like be allowed in the doors.

spk_1:   43:05
Yeah, they don't let people like us. And but you forgot about tree bones. Oh, yeah, tree

spk_0:   43:09
bones. So okay, they have, like, yurts in this human nest, which is made out of like driftwood sticks. I mean, it's like completely open air. You have to bring your own bedding for the nest, and it's definitely not water Proofs provides very little shelter from the freezing cold. Um,

spk_1:   43:24
but it's expensive, right?

spk_0:   43:26
Yep, it's like the your its air Super nice, but the nest is mostly like it's just really cool. I actually spent my bachelor party in a year. It there with a few friends,

spk_1:   43:33
just I want to just quote you. Your bachelor party was in a year in Big Sur, and yet you tried to argue with me that you weren't a walking California stereotype. Whatever. Our final must stop place in Big Sur is the Big Sur bakery. They have amazing Cristante. All their food is good, honestly, but if you get there early enough, before they're sold out, you have to get the Christians. We like to take a little bag across Sants and pack a little picnic lunch. And there's a spot up near the Ventana parking lot where you can sit and eat it, overlooked the ocean and pretend that you're rich enough to go to Ventana or cool in the 19 sixties and an artistic LSD person.

spk_0:   44:16
Once you're ready to leave Big Sur and you continue to head north, you'll hit the charming little town of Monterey. Monterey was made famous by the local darling literary giant and one of my all time favorite authors, John Steinbeck, in his novel Cannery Row.

spk_1:   44:30
It's named after the real life Cannery Row, which is where they can sardines in downtown Monterrey, historically

spk_0:   44:36
and the centerpiece of Monterey. Hands down is the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

spk_1:   44:39
Have to be honest. Aquariums have been ruined for me because the Monterey Bay Aquarium is so much better than all of them.

spk_0:   44:46
It's a world class aquarium that's like a four on the forefront of scientific research and conservation efforts. If you've ever seen if you've ever seen finding Dorrie the aquarium there and they said that it was a Morro Bay is not actually in Morro Bay. It's in Monterey.

spk_1:   44:57
Oh, yeah, We should have talked about that. There was an aquarium in Morro Bay that you took me to on the first time that we went. It was kind of just like a sad seal alone in a cement room.

spk_0:   45:07
Yeah, it was super abusive, and they actually closed it down because they realized like, Oh, this is terrible. It was rated as, like, one of the lowest qualities aquariums in the world in the world. Yeah.

spk_1:   45:18
Ah, and somehow that ended up being where finding Dorrie was set. But actually, it's set in Monterey.

spk_0:   45:23
Yeah, so they modeled it after Monterey and Monterey is phenomenal. It's also a wildlife refuge.

spk_1:   45:29
Well, the best part of the aquarium is definitely the orders. Hands down, they're all, like, rescues or like rehabilitation. Um, and so they're like, you know, they, like, have little injuries and stuff, and they're really cute. And you can watch them on live webcam.

spk_0:   45:43
Yeah, uh, we have spent half the day while writing the outline for this episode, just watching orders on with him.

spk_1:   45:48
I mean, I was getting inspiration, but wow, murder is surrounded by a kelp forest, which we learned all about at the aquarium. It's like built into it, right?

spk_0:   45:57
Yeah, The aquarium kind of goes into the ocean and you can see the kelp forest. It's not like they took the Cal forced in, brought it in. It's like you're in the actual ocean.

spk_1:   46:06
It's a pretty bowler requiring guys.

spk_0:   46:07
Yeah, it's also nearby. There's excellent scuba diving, and you can actually scuba dive through the kelp forests and see all the wildlife. And there's like it's a really good sight of seeing, like the giant Pacific octopus

spk_1:   46:19
am Sounds awesome. You are also pretty much guaranteed to sea otters. And even if you just go kayaking or like I don't know, hang out around Monterey Bay, you'll see some otters. The moral of this story of this episode is otters. Honestly,

spk_0:   46:34
this road trip is better than all the otters.

spk_1:   46:37
Oh my God! Stop

spk_0:   46:40
I guess I just really sealed my fate with them.

spk_1:   46:43
Oh, my God. Are you harboring any more terrible puns?

spk_0:   46:47
You liked it? Don't be sea lion.

spk_1:   46:49
That is why you're my BAE. Okay, come on. That was the best one. That's

spk_0:   46:54
a bit much. That's a bit much. Okay, So what happens after moderate?

spk_1:   46:57
Um, it's high tide that we moved on. So you are going t o

spk_0:   47:03
nice. That was good.

spk_1:   47:05
So if you had in order that you're gonna hit Santa Cruz. Really? You little college town Scott. This, like, charming, walkable, downtown area. Then it stretches all the way from the redwoods down to the beach. And there's even a cute little steam train that will take you in between the redwoods and the beach.

spk_0:   47:19
It's really cute. And if you spend like five minutes there, chances are you're going to see a banana slug.

spk_1:   47:24
Almost. This kid is an honor. Almost. They're really hard to miss. You'll definitely see them because they are giant neon yellow slugs,

spk_0:   47:31
their slimy friends. And they're the mascot for UC Santa Cruz as well as the patron saint of the area.

spk_1:   47:35
I love that you called them slimy friends And it explains so much about why you think jellies are adorable. Can you imagine

spk_0:   47:42
a little Julie being friends with the bananas log?

spk_1:   47:45
I feel like that. If that was a kids like TV show, I would get high and watch it. That's like, Oh, my God. Babies that were SpongeBob came from

spk_0:   47:53
sponge or does a sponge. I

spk_1:   47:54
know, but come on, it would fit right in.

spk_0:   47:58
I mean, a squirrel lives in bikini bottom, so why not?

spk_1:   48:00
Okay, we got really up topic. So speaking of giant neon yellow slugs, great transition. Okay, Santa Cruz is really, really weird, but big, like, kind of love being weird. Like, have you ever heard of something that sounds like super really hippie granola? And you just roll your eyes? You're like, Oh, my God. California. Which I do several times a day. You're probably actually thinking of Santa Cruz without realizing it. Either

spk_0:   48:22
that or Berkeley.

spk_1:   48:23
Yeah, things like drum circles. Surfers wearing Santa Claus costumes walking through clouds of weeds, meeting hippies who never actually stopped when the sixties ended. The Bigfoot Discovery Museum.

spk_0:   48:33
Okay, you First of all, Bigfoot Discovery Museum sounds awesome. Second, while you said clouds of weeds.

spk_1:   48:41
Well, it's a legal work. I grew up. I just outed myself. I have to leave California now. Speaking of the Bigfoot Discovery Museum, if you like super weird, kitschy can't be stuff, you should definitely visit the mystery spot.

spk_0:   48:55
What's the mystery spot? As though I don't already know?

spk_1:   48:57
Well, I'm glad you asked. The mystery spot is the gravitational anomaly tucked deep into a redwood forest. It's a place where the laws of physics cease to apply. Where up is down, writers left and balls roll uphill before your very is it alien activity? Is it a magma vortex? Could it be die electric, bio cosmic radiation? Or perhaps radius? Spezia? Just making aboard was having the reason the spots remains story.

spk_0:   49:29
Oh, that's why it's called the mystery

spk_1:   49:32
spot. I get it now. Okay, But really, though it's a blast blast, and I did not make those words up there, actually, on the mystery spots website

spk_0:   49:39
fun fact, we want stayed at an Airbnb redwood tree house, which shares a driveway with the mystery spot.

spk_1:   49:44
Those combination of words are just Wow,

spk_0:   49:46
Yeah, I mean, nothing weird happened. We did see a lot of anise looks.

spk_1:   49:49
There's also some really creepy history around this area. Santa Cruz is rumored to be super haunted.

spk_0:   49:54
Oh, because of all the Aloni Native Americans that were massacred to make way for the mission in the Spanish and everything.

spk_1:   49:59
Ah, well, yeah, there's that There's that. But I was also thinking of the coed killer, the Santa Cruz UC Santa Cruz serial killer who murdered eight college age girls and also his mom and also his grandparent's and also one of his professors at UCSD.

spk_0:   50:12
It's also the location of the villa where Hitchcock based the base mansion off of it. We used to be known as the Hotel McRae, and employees reported like Hi cold spots, ghostly voices, hauntings, e Reliance and even Satan.

spk_1:   50:23
This stating that something.

spk_0:   50:25
My God, Well, the hotel has since been renamed the Sunshine Villa, and it's a senior living home.

spk_1:   50:30
Well, that sounds nice. I also heard speaking a Hitchcock that that's where the real life incident that inspired the birds came from. But apparently it was just like a flock of birds that got really confused by the fog. So not actually that scary.

spk_0:   50:43
I mean, I grew up with a lot of like a lot of Siegel, so I get it.

spk_1:   50:46
No, we get it. You grew up on the beach in California, off of Highway one. No, we were all aware. Now we're all caught up.

spk_0:   50:51
Yep. Okay. Something you cannot miss in Santa Cruz is also the boardwalk. It's like a proper boardwalk with, like, games and really courses and stuff. If you've ever seen the movie us, then the boardwalk should look familiar. But don't worry, because there are no tethered to speak of. But, I mean, how do you know you can trust me

spk_1:   51:06
like Jeremy? Literally. No one gets your references. It's not just me. Nobody understand your references. Speaking of what the boardwalk looks like, Disneyland, the boardwalk, a Disneyland, is based off of the boardwalk in Santa Cruz. That's much more recognisable,

spk_0:   51:19
he said. Sandy Cruise, Santa Cruz. Who's Sandy Cruz?

spk_1:   51:23
She's the character in SpongeBob

spk_0:   51:26
anyway. While you're there, take the steam train from the redwoods to the beach, hang on on the boardwalk, drink some verve, coffee, the friend of slug and question your perception of the laws of physics. It's great.

spk_1:   51:36
This is a great time. Just are the Santa Cruise up the coast, you will finally make it to sun from Cease goal, arguably the best destination on your Highland Road trip.

spk_0:   51:50
I would love to argue with you on that,

spk_1:   51:51
honey. No. Our listeners already getting uncomfortably intimate peek into our marriage without us, needed to do that on air

spk_0:   51:57
anyway, A lot of stuff to do in San Francisco, but we're not

spk_1:   51:59
going to talk about it because, hey, we already did an episode on an noise, noise, noise, noise, noise, noise in this first Episode two. So it's easy to find.

spk_0:   52:06
Yeah, just goto the first episode anyway, much like L. A Highway One gets a little weird in San Francisco like it stops being a coastal highway, and then it turns into just like a street and then back to the highway and then, like a street and in a different way than the street.

spk_1:   52:20
But like, it's like Highway 101 So it's like the one and it's the one on one that's the one on one in the one, and then the one becomes the one on one and then goes back to being the one. But then it's the one on one. It's very confusing. This is actually I'm just gonna give, like, a little brief insight into my life. Before Jeremy, When I first moved here to San Francisco, I took ah, Highway One road trip on and I actually was on the 101 the whole time. And I was, like, really confused. I couldn't figure out what the big deal was because it was just like farms and stuff. And I was like, I don't get this. I didn't realize that I was on the wrong highway until I did the one with Jeremy for the first time. He made fun of me the whole time.

spk_0:   52:57
I did. But not because of that. It was just Wow, we had a contentious, like beginning of a relationship. I'm just gonna never ended. I'm just getting were obsessed with each other. From day one.

spk_1:   53:05
I have the divorce papers drawn up, if you want to, just after after this is done.

spk_0:   53:09
Type anyway. So the about the confusion about the one the easiest way to find it Golden Gate Bridge is the one slash the 101

spk_1:   53:17
See how it's confusing, though, anyway, if you continue north the one and the 101 become the one in the 11 again instead of the one slash the one, the one where the same. But then they come.

spk_0:   53:28
But wasn't neo the

spk_1:   53:28
one France? But then, who is the one? 01 No, honestly, we have the same confusing thing in level because there's like the 64 the 65 to 64 in the to 65. So

spk_0:   53:40
way more confusing with one and the one on

spk_1:   53:43
one. Then in Oakland, there's the 80 the 80 to 80 the 4 80 But I feel like I'm just making things up now.

spk_0:   53:50
You made the 40 0 it's to 80. The 80 the 9 80 the 85 80

spk_1:   53:55
16. Okay, one of us definitely made about.

spk_0:   53:58
And when you do a 1 80 here and get back to the

spk_1:   54:00
O anyway, so you drive over the Golden Gate Bridge and then just north of San Francisco, we have a national monument called Near Woods. It's the closest old growth redwood forest to San Francisco, and it's named after famed environmental philosopher John Mirror, who is the father of our national park system.

spk_0:   54:20
If you've never seen old growth redwoods. This is like a must do unless you like, really hate crowds, in which case you should go to Big Basin State Park south of San Francisco or Avenue of the Giants up north. But more on that one later.

spk_1:   54:32
It is pretty popular, but while you're in the area and you're driving right through it any way you should stop at Stinson Beach in nearby Mount Temple, Pious. They're both beautiful places to walk around, stretch your legs and also the place where Jeremy told me he loved me for the first time, which is a story that we've already told, but just for a little bit of review for our listeners who don't remember. Ah, he was drunk and he was wearing a Batman onesie and we were camping and he screamed it and the whole camp heard it. So that's that's

spk_0:   54:59
a fun chapter in our in our lives.

spk_1:   55:01
I think so.

spk_0:   55:02
Anyway, if you keep going north, you'll pass Point Reyes National Seashore, and it's a beautiful coastal area with again shocker. A lot of marine life.

spk_1:   55:10
Why do you sound so like over that you're just like, oh, I usedto wave it Rusty the seal every morning when I walked to the I don't know for between my work and my school because I lived on the beach. By the way, did we talk about Rusty the seal?

spk_0:   55:23
No, we didn't. So there was. Ah, there's a restaurant in my hometown where there was a seal outside and his name was rusty and people were just, like throw crab at him and he would pose. He was adorable.

spk_1:   55:32
Oh, my God. I can't believe you literally walked by Rusty the seal every morning. It wasn't every

spk_0:   55:37
morning. I wasn't like, on my way to school. It was on my way to work.

spk_1:   55:40
Meanwhile, growing up in Kentucky, we had a dirty truck day.

spk_0:   55:44
Yeah, you mentioned that. You're very proud of that. You guys also

spk_1:   55:47
not do the tractor one

spk_0:   55:48
you did? Was that not the same thing, didn't you? Don't you guys just drive tractors around?

spk_1:   55:52
No, There was drive your tractor to school day, and then there was dirty Truck day. They're different days.

spk_0:   55:57
I feel like you're making things.

spk_1:   55:59
No, I'm not. Look, Spencer County High School.

spk_0:   56:02
Okay? You guys also got the day

spk_1:   56:04
before. No, that sounds like I went to Spencer radicals. That's got that would be embarrassing.

spk_0:   56:10
You guys also got the day off for the day before the Derby so their parents could drink 24 hours earlier.

spk_1:   56:15
It's the Oaks Day and you can't go to the actual dirt because that's where tourists, the locals, I'll go to the oaks and they leave their kids at home unattended because they're gambling of the tracks. Do you? Does not do that?

spk_0:   56:25
No, We did not get the day off of school so that our parents could drink. God,

spk_1:   56:29
I don't know. I know it sounds like you should have grown up in Kentucky to

spk_0:   56:32
I mean, we just kind of were at school while their parents were drinking. Just kidding. I got that. I was just totally kidding. I'm sorry. Anyway, back to California,

spk_1:   56:41
California going back to Point Reyes. So you'll be driving by these absolutely beautiful coastline. And there's a lot of really great hikes in the area, including the hike toe Allomere Falls, which, if you've got like a little bingo card that you're working on your Highland road trip, that would be the second tied fall on this road trip

spk_0:   56:57
Yeah, There's also heard of Tule elk that live in Point Reyes. And during certain times of reading season, like the fallen winter, you can see them tussling with each other, which is adorable. But do it in a safe distance because they are beasts.

spk_1:   57:07
When you say, like reading and tussling, are they just like fighting each other, but with adorable names?

spk_0:   57:13
Yes. Okay. They're just slapping their antlers together to the death so that whoever is the winner impregnates everyone else

spk_1:   57:20
and we call that tussling. Okay, that's just wanted to make that clear. Our favorite hike in point Reyes is to tamales point, and the trail goes all the way through the area where the tule elk are hanging out. So for 10 miles, or just like looking at elk Ah, giant elk tussling with each other and coyotes and like their seals and shit and it's really, really awesome.

spk_0:   57:39
We saw this seal their one time where you just see its little snout like bobbing in and out of the waves. It was the cutest thing I've ever seen

spk_1:   57:46
other than hiking and wildlife. The best thing to do while you're driving through Point Reyes is to get fresh oysters, and I know that sounds really gross, and I was very, very not sure about it when I first moved here. But I've actually grown to love raw oysters. You can like stopping an oyster farmer and oyster stand off the side of the road and get really in a sense of oysters. You get him like pre shocked with, like shooters or grilled or barbecued, or there's all kinds of different ways to do it, and they're all delicious.

spk_0:   58:13
Or if you enjoy the manual labor, you can pick up a bag for the cheap and shuck them yourself. And we did that one time. We got 60 oysters, and we were gonna do ah, oyster strata gansa.

spk_1:   58:22
I thought it was oyster pollutes. That was a waste job again.

spk_0:   58:25
Extravaganza with my roommates. And then we yes, we about 60 of them. And we started shucking, and it was just like 20 end. Yeah, and we're do later. The way too many was

spk_1:   58:33
not worth the effort, but they are delicious, continuing up from Point Reyes Next, My next favorite stop is Point Arena, which is a lighthouse most of because it's just a really beautiful picture

spk_0:   58:45
and continuing up from that. You'll eventually get to the Mendocino area. And Mendocino is another famous wine area in California on the coast.

spk_1:   58:52
So you have so many menace, you know, is one of my favorite places to take a little romantic weekend. Get away! There's wineries. There's this charming little town, really good food, a lot of really cute places to stay. You can go kayaking through sea caves. It's just a really great time.

spk_0:   59:08
And of course, we have a post about it. We'll put it in the show notes, or you can find it

spk_1:   59:14
real quick. If you do go make sure you have brunch at circa 62. Ah, they. So it's this, like, really cute, dog friendly place to eat really good food. But my favorite thing is that they spread bird seed and, like little snacks outside for critters. And so, while you're eating, you can watch like, well, California quails like scribbling around and the dirt and like little bunnies and out of you.

spk_0:   59:37
Yeah, it looks like the beginning of like a Disney movie.

spk_1:   59:39
It does, um, moving up from medicine known north. You'll hit port brag and glass speech

spk_0:   59:46
on a glass beaches. Trash,

spk_1:   59:47
baby. Can't just say that's very nice.

spk_0:   59:49
No, I mean, the beach is literally made out of eroded dress.

spk_1:   59:52
Oh, no, that's true. Yeah, I used to be a dump and then nature, which is amazing. Um, pounded. How did, like waves on it over and over again and turned the everything in the dump into this, like beautiful, colorful glass?

spk_0:   1:0:03
Yeah. So instead of walking on bits of glass, you're walking on this, like, really shiny like sand. But it's

spk_1:   1:0:09
I mean, they are bits of glad you are walking on bits of right,

spk_0:   1:0:11
but it's not sharp, like the sound of

spk_1:   1:0:12
soft bits of class.

spk_0:   1:0:14
Yeah, it's just colorful. Sand is what it looks like.

spk_1:   1:0:17
It looks pretty

spk_0:   1:0:17
cool. Not far north of Fort Bragg is like get which is, sadly where the one ends and for the last time turns into the 101

spk_1:   1:0:26
Oh, so the one turns into the 11 and from when they were the one and then the one on one is over there. But now that the one slash 11

spk_0:   1:0:32
No, it's just the one on one

spk_1:   1:0:33
that was just the 11 Yeah, it's on the one one.

spk_0:   1:0:36
No, it's it's It's just the one, which is the one No. One, Not the one.

spk_1:   1:0:41
I'm so confused. But if you keep driving on the 101 you will eventually get to the avenue. The Giants, which is, I think, well, worth the detour because it's like a 30 minutes stretch where you're just driving through these giant, majestic old growth redwoods. And it is just the most beautiful drive ever

spk_0:   1:1:02
like in camp There, too. It's a six super humbling to be there.

spk_1:   1:1:05
Humbling is absolutely right. Word for what's that one song that we always listen to you by bond of their,

spk_0:   1:1:09
uh, Holocene.

spk_1:   1:1:10
Yeah, yeah, that's the one where he's like, um,

spk_0:   1:1:15
once I knew it was not magnificent.

spk_1:   1:1:16
No. Yes, but then there is the part where he talks about, like, cornflakes or something.

spk_0:   1:1:21
No, you just always think that he says, shaken. Bake and stick with us. That's not what he says.

spk_1:   1:1:27
Shaken bacon Stick with us and shag did some things up anyway. It's a really good thing.

spk_0:   1:1:35
It's on our California road trip playlist, which we should put in the show notes.

spk_1:   1:1:38
Yeah, we Well,

spk_0:   1:1:39
okay, Okay, so that's the entire route. But is there like, a best time for them to

spk_1:   1:1:45
go? I think the best time to go is February and March, because the winter rains turn everything bright green. So like in September and October, when you drive the hills or bright yellow and like gold because all the grass is dried out. But in February and March, each their bright green and it looks like island or something. And you can also catch wildflower season so you'll have all these different colorful wildflowers popping up all over the place. And it's absolutely beautiful, and the waterfalls will be like, heavier. That's the right way to say that, guys. Heavy flow.

spk_0:   1:2:17
Oh my God S O R. Route was south to north. Um and I think that that's actually the proper way to do it. Some people asked, like here we go north to South. I always say south to North, because I think that the North End has, like, the more pretty stuff to see.

spk_1:   1:2:32
Yeah, there's not as many stops like you notice, like we spent a long time on the section between L. A and SF, and then the section north of that was we talked about less stops. But it's not any less beautiful. No, in fact, it's actually

spk_0:   1:2:45
yeah, it's just it's pretty. And in fact, it's probably less people. I would say, Yeah,

spk_1:   1:2:49
because not a lot of people do the route north because there's there's kind of, like no major destination, right? Like when you drive between L. A and SF, you can fly out of one of them if you're coming from out of town. But if you drive north from S F, you have to fly out of, like, Eureka, which is like a very small little town, and

spk_0:   1:3:06
it only flies out of L. A San Francisco in Denver. Yeah, um,

spk_1:   1:3:09
also, we talk about how, like Eureka is the weirdest like thing for a state. Tohave is its motto. Like the Kentucky one is united. We stand divided, we fall on. I feel like that's like, really inspiring. And then California is just Eureka, and I feel like that's super weird. Yeah,

spk_0:   1:3:23
it means I've found it because they found gold there. You're welcome. It's

spk_1:   1:3:26
not such a Freelander they stole. Not as

spk_0:   1:3:28
weird as New York's. New York is Excelsior.

spk_1:   1:3:31
Okay, I know you're right. It's like the worst one. That's worse.

spk_0:   1:3:34
Um, so if you want to dio with road trip, I've I think that we mentioned Eureka. I think that the easiest ways to actually like logistically do it is to go south to north and then fly from Eureka to a connecting flight. Or you can actually take, like, a short cut back down to L. A. By using the five, which is just really ugly. Super not pretty. But it's like, are like, really? It's like our fast highway basically, so you can come back really quickly. I

spk_1:   1:3:59
feel like that was the traces happens long.

spk_0:   1:4:01
How dare you gonna have that song of second.

spk_1:   1:4:04
So you know, the one to the one on one and then

spk_0:   1:4:06
you guys away.

spk_1:   1:4:07
Oh, my God. I was making a different job.

spk_0:   1:4:10
Well, that sucks. Now that we're, like, in quarantine for the next who knows how long I've been really trying to think of what we can do when we when it opens up, and we're probably not gonna travel outside of the state. So now you're really excited about taking this road trip?

spk_1:   1:4:25
Yeah, we can have, like our own little car bubble and safely look at things from inside.

spk_0:   1:4:30
Do you think they make in 95 cars?

spk_1:   1:4:33
Mm, Maybe

spk_0:   1:4:34
maybe after this little beer,

spk_1:   1:4:36
Tesla's, which is in the Bay Area anyway, I am definitely missing. Taking a road trip. I always say that Jeremy and I like fell in love on road trips down. How a one, Because that's just what California romance is made out of. And I don't know. I was always really worried when we took our first road trip together that like, we wouldn't have anything to talk about. But that's when I realized that we have way too much to talk about, and we never stop talking to each other. It's been like, what, eight years now? I don't know.

spk_0:   1:5:00
Yeah, we really should have taken that road trip because now we're like, stupid in love.

spk_1:   1:5:03
Yeah, it's really great, but I love taking. I never get sick of it. We do it all the time. It's a perfect weekend. Get away thing that we dio and it's it's one of those once in a lifetime bucket list experiences. If you do get the chance to do it whether you're coming from SF for L A. And you're just doing it for a weekend or if you're coming from further away, I would say do it up to, like, take a two week long trip toe drive the entire coast and got really familiar with it is so beautiful.

spk_0:   1:5:26
Yeah, it would probably take a full two weeks if you're gonna be, like stopping at every place and taking a lot of pictures. I think the minimum to see the whole thing is probably 10 days.

spk_1:   1:5:34
Yeah, we're so spoiled to live here like we really I know iCloud on you with your California thing a lot, but at this point, it's been a decade, and I guess I am kind of a Californian, too. So we really do have, like, the California privilege. So, Brother Ho Oh, they're I e. Now regret saying everything I just said.

spk_0:   1:5:51
Hopefully, this is inspired you to take your own California road trip safe when it's safe again. We have links in the show notes for special guides on the stops that we talked about today. Describe to ours newsletter like us on the tweets and the Graham,

spk_1:   1:6:06
huh? That's so embarrassing.

spk_0:   1:6:08
And the book?

spk_1:   1:6:10
Oh, my God! We're done. We'll see you all next time. Stay safe. Treated our Facebook. Stop it! Oh, my God! Good bye bye.