Hi Folks
Phileas and Fogg outside their R.V having driven from Los Angeles to Santa Margarita Lake . The R.V ( camper Van ) is 25 foot long, 10 feet wide and 12.5 feet high and it took 3 .5 hours to get out of L.A and another 3 to get to S.M.L. But we made it and at this camp site met the most wonderful and generous and kind people. Americans Brad and Suzanne and German Michael and his Finnish wife Linnear. It was just such a pleasure to be in the company of these folks after what had been quite a stressful day. Shortly after our arrival the wine flowed and we talked well into the hours of the early morning. The next day Brad lent us his Ute to go to the local town thereby preventing the need of us unplugging our RV. A beautiful camp site for a day and we were sad to leave these folks but time pressed and we set off on the ocean road to Santa Cruz travelling to the Big Sur. Over to Phileas. I might be back!!

This is cosy travelling and we have to be very organised as we have limited space for storage. But it is fun and it is so good to be able to talk to other travellers to find out how to do the technical stuff like 'dumping'. No more on that!! We were so pleased to meet up with wonderful people at our first campsite as we were both very tired and it was very late and dark. So thank you all, you know who you are! Again I must pay tribute to my fellow traveller and in this case driver, Fogg is the man. This is not easy driving and he has been awesome. So the ocean road, what a beautiful drive along a windy, narrow road that was carved out of the cliffs above the ocean. These guys are elephant seal adolescents practising for being grown ups! They were so huge that they could hardly haul themselves up the beach and after a few minutes of posturing and growling at each other had to lie down for a rest!!!
This is a good view of the road taken from one of the many view points along the way. Again it was a long drive to the campsite but we arrived in daylight and by now we were experts!! I was particularly taken by the wild flowers growing along the side of the raod and of course the wonderful natural scenery of cliffs and mountains. Now as you can see we are in San Francisco and what an amazing city it is, I love it. We are doing all the tourist things, a coach tour of the sights, a boat trip round the bay and a cable car ride. Such fun and in glorious weather too. Over to Fogg now to round this off. Best wishes from Phileas (who unfortunately has no flowers in her hair!!!!!!!!!!!!)
We had booked a hotel in S.F. thinking we could bring our RV into the city. How foolish this idea was so we have left it at an out of town RV park and we are very happily exploring this wonderful city. We are staying in Fisherman's Wharf, an exciting and vibrant area with cafes and shops to explore and enjoy. The Golden Gate Bridge is awesome. We have driven over it and been on a boat under it. Having 'done' one of the many icons of S.F. we went on another in the form of a cable car when Fogg travelled standing up on the running board. Of course Phileas was there as ever to look after me and I take this opportunity to pay tribute to her map reading skills which are as equally awesome if not more than my driving!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We loved the cable car and as I write this we are at the top of Powell- Mason Line. Looking forward to going down the hill which is past the 'Crookedest' Street in the world, allegedly. We are about half way through our Californian adventure so we will be sending another blog when we have visited Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks, where we will be back in our RV and enjoying the open road again.
So this is Fogg wishing you all well.