Marina to Big Sur

40.5 miles, 2550 feet of climbing, NO ROAD KILL

We have a theory on the lack of road kill - it is simple, actually. If you've already killed all of the animals, well, there isn't much left to kill.

With that thought in mind, we started out with a real treat - a ride on a bike path for the first 10 miles of our journey. The Monterey Coastal Bike Path is a beautiful right-of-way for bicyclists, joggers, etc. and winds from a little north of Marina at least to Monterey (where we turned off). Sometimes you ride right along the beach - a little bit of blacktop just a few hundred feet from the breaking waves.

After our treat, it was time for some penance, and that happened after a bit of town riding dropped us onto Highway 1. We kept hoping that traffic would drop off as we passed through Carmel, the turnoff for Carmel Valley and finally Carmel Highlands. Arn was still in a grumpy mood (because of the traffic) as we passed the Highlands Inn (where we got married).
Fortunately, the traffic did abate somewhat as we got further south and we hope that tomorrow will be even less as many go to Big Sur for the day and return to the Monterey Peninsula in the evening. The views along the coast were nothing short of stunning and the 1930s era arched bridges over many of the canyons were awe inspiring - especially when some dope passed us with a desire to test Newton's law of gravity on their own. Fortunately, for everyone, that test didn't happen.
We also have a real treat for where we are staying. If you go to Big Sur, check out the Glen Oaks Motel. It is a very recently remodeled mid-century motel and the rooms are really quite impressively done. In fact, we'd like to get their designer to redo our place in Seattle! All of the reviews on Yelp were over-the-top fabulous and deservedly so. Only about $1000 a night less expensive than Post Rach Inn. Really.

Sadly, our plans fell through for Cambria so we aren't sure what our next two days look like. 110 miles to San Luis Obispo - we'll be there Thursday unless we have some mechanical issues and we need to walk there - in that case, we are expecting to arrive sometime before Halloween. We may or may not have internet access tomorrow so blogging may wait a day...