Malibu

We made it to Malibu Monday, after a difficult drive out of Santa Ynez to Santa Barbara. There a two ways out of Santa Ynez, where the coach was parked. One way is US 101 south right to PCH to Malibu. The other direction was through the mountain pass, which is no problem in a car; the coach is another story. The pass is 29 miles long, many 4 to 7 mile stretches of 6 to 8%, very twisty descents. We have taken the pass many times in the car, we were not about to do it with the coach. We said goodbyes to Carolyn and George and headed out towards the 101. We soon passed a sign that we thought said ‘101 closed ahead’, can’t be! Sure enough, they were directing traffic off the freeway and towards the ‘pass’. Now we have no choice, there is no other way to Santa Barbara. I decided it would probably be better to unhook the Suzuki and drive through the pass separately. The coach handles much better on descents when there is not 4,000 extra pounds pushing on the rear end. So we disconnected and headed out. Lucky for us, everyone else was forced in that direction, its one lane in most places, so the pace was slow. Laura was behind me the whole way; she said she only smelled burning brakes once! It was on a very steep sharp turn, as I came around the corner, traffic was completely stopped. I got on the brakes pretty hard, nothing dangerous, but it takes a lot to stop 10 tons!

So, a trip that should have taken about 30 minutes was well over an hour. The remainder of the drive was pretty easy as it was mid day and the freeway was virtually empty (by Cali standards, of course). To make up for lost time, we decided to just finish off the drive separately, instead of hooking the Suzuki back up (about 120 miles). The drive along the PCH to Malibu Beach RV Park was spectacular!

The campground is cut into the hillside along the ocean, just above the PCH. Here is the view out of windshield from where we are parked in the campground.



Here another pic of the view looking back from our site at the sunset. You can see the PCH and just how high we are above it, the views are just spectacular!



We are here for the week. Yesterday, Tuesday, we ran errands and walked around Santa Monica. We stopped by Laura’s aunt Connie and uncle Terry’s to say hi. We plan on hitting the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market with them on Wednesday (We will get to see Carolyn and George again; they’ll be selling olive oil). On Thursday Connie and Terry want to come by and check out our home on wheels and we’ll probably do lunch. Friday, we’ll load up and head towards Palm Spring for a week stay.

More later,

Rich