My Trip Down the PCH

It’s been a few weeks since I posted a travel blog and I figured now would be as good of a time as any to write one. Over the summer when the COVID numbers were at a low point, my family and I took a trip out west to California for a week. The plan was to start the vacation in San Fransico and then rent a car and drive along the Pacific Coast Highway all the way down to Santa Monica and let me tell you, it was probably one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had. My whole family had an amazing time and while there were some minor bumps along the way, it was definitely a family vacation to remember.

The morning of our flight my family and I got up at 6 a.m. and drove to Logan Airport to board our flight to San Fran. now any normal person would be over the moon thrilled about this. Our vacation was about to start, we had a chance to settle in the terminal before boarding, and all we had to do was get on the plane and go. Well, that wasn’t exactly the case for me and my family. My cousin Mike works for JetBlue airlines and was able to snag my mom some tickets at a great discount. The only downside is that the reason that they were discounted is that they were standby tickets. For those who don’t know, when you fly standby it means that you are only guaranteed a flight if the plane wasn’t full or someone didn’t show up. And if you are doing this with only yourself, it’s a low-risk, high-reward situation. But with a family of four, the chances of us getting on these flights were very slim. The entire time we were waiting to board the first flight my mom was sitting in her seat having an anxiety attack over the fear of possibly not getting on the flight while my dad was in the seat next to me mumbling things like “we just have to go with the flow” and “whatever happens, happens.” Basically, he was Mr. Nonchalant and my mother was like the squirrel from Ice Age who can’t seem to find the nut. Except, in this case, the nut was our plane seats. After an agonizing 20 minutes, we ended up getting our seats on the plane and the next thing I knew, I was in an Uber headed to our hotel in San Fransico.

We ended up staying two nights in the Fisherman’s Wharf part of San Fran which is right by Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge. It was crazy to me how everything about this area was within walking distance of one another. The first night we got there we met up with some friends who live in the area and spent three hours in a restaurant (I’m blanking on the name) talking and catching up. We actually spent so long there that the staff had to kick us out because they had to fill our table. We then took the next few hours of daylight strolling along the pier, going into shops, and checking out any and every place possible. There was one area on the water that had these giant sea lions just laying on docks on the water. These things were probably triple my size in both height and width and were absolutely adorable yet also terrifying. They kept doing that sea lion scream and flopping into the water. It made them look so harmless but I know that if necessary, they would kill me in two seconds.

The next day in San Fran was spent doing everything that a tourist should do. In the morning we woke up and went across the street from our hotel to this little breakfast place called the Hollywood Cafe and it was honestly the most delicious breakfast I have ever eaten. There were so many options and some even named after famous actors. I got the Marilyn Monroe which was three slices of french toast with a side of fresh fruit and a mocha coffee. Not only have I been dreaming about this coffee for the past six months, but the french toast was amazing and the fresh fruit literally tasted as if they grew it in the back of their restaurant. I am very picky when it comes to my fruit and I ate everything including the sprig of mint that came on top of the bowl. If you are ever in the San Fransico wharf area you cannot miss this spot. Definitely, one of the highlighted meals from this trip for me.

After breakfast, we spent the morning walking around the city before it was time for our first activity. My mom booked us a tour around San Fransico in an original 1970’s Volkswagen bus through a company called San Fransico LOVE Tours. For those of you who don’t know, that is literally my dream car so I was on top of the world. We were taken to so many places that I would have never gone to if it wasn’t for this tour. We went to the Palace of Fine Arts, the Golden Gate Bridge, Haight Ashbury street to see houses of old celebrities like Jerry Garcia and Janis Joplin, and even drove down the crooked street. This was definitely one of the most fun tours I have ever been on and would highly recommend it if you are planning a trip! After our LOVE tour, we got some lunch at a local sourdough bakery because San Fran is known for its sourdough bread. I got a clam chowder in a bread bowl and it was delectable and then we walked over to the pier again to catch the ferry for our tour of Alcatraz prison.

I definitely did not expect to love Alcatraz as much as I did. Unlike my mom, I am not a huge history person, but abandoned places have always interested me (don’t ask me why I was a strange child) and Alcatraz hit all of those marks. The tour comes with a tiny phone that resembles a Nokia brick phone in size that guides you around the prison. The whole experience was so surreal from seeing where prisoners dug their way out with spoons to the isolation chambers that the guards would throw in prisoners who misbehaved. Every story told just put into perspective how terrine the conditions were in this prison. It was a piece of history that I am so grateful I got to learn about.

All in all, San Fransico was an amazing area. It left such a huge mark on me and it is definitely a place that I could see myself living in one day (sorry mom lol). But the next day it was time to move on to the second part of my trip. Driving the Pacific Coast Highway.

First off I feel the need to include the fact that my father was supposed to be picking up a Toyota as the rental car. We let him go off on his own to pick up the car and he chose to walk 3 miles UPHILL to get this car. In San Fran, the hills are so steep that they had cement stairs put in so that people didn’t fall down the hill. Anyways this man pulls up to our hotel in a MASERATI. His excuse was that it was only a $20 a day upgrade but really I think he just wanted to feel cool because he showed no mercy when driving. We actually coined the term “Maserati Dad” because him driving the Maserati was a completely different person than driving his pickup truck.

We stopped in an adorable city called Carmel with a bunch of different stores and restaurants. My mom got a sweatshirt and we even stopped in a tiny barkery to get pastries for the remainder of the drive. I had a chocolate chip biscotti that was super tasty and we were off to 17 Mile Drive which is exactly what it sounds like. For each mile drive, there was a different sight to see such as The Lone Cypress, Seal Rock, and a Gingerbread House.

As for the drive to the hotel, do you know in the Disney movie Inside Out there are Core Memories that the main character has? This day was a Core Memory for me. We spent nine hours driving along a highway that was on the side of a mountain. The only way I can describe it is that if my dad drove off the road by one foot, we were plummeting to our death into the ocean. There were multiple times where I forced him to stop along the side of the highway so that I could get out and stand on the edge of a cliff to take pictures and look at the water. We drove through Monterey and Big Sur stopping at places such as Mcway falls, and Bixby Bridge. The views were breathtaking and watching the sunset over the mountain was insane.

I will say that if you are like my brother, Brady, and are afraid of heights, it would probably be best if you took a nap during this portion of the drive. While the views were amazing, the idea of falling was terrifying. Another thing that was scary was that after the sunset, we were driving on a narrow street on the side of a mountain in the dark. This is where my dad put his UPS driver skills to the test. Finally, after what felt like forever, we got to our Inn at 9 p.m. (for reference, we started our drive at 11 a.m. that day). The best part was that when we got to the hotel, we hadn’t had any dinner and everything in the area was closed. My parents drove around the tiny town and found the only convenience store open and got us chips and queso for dinner which was delectable.

The Inn we stayed at was called the Sand Pebble Inn and was right on Moonstone Beach in a tiny town called Cambria. It was the cutest little Inn and woke up to the sound of the ocean waves which was super calming. Because my mother is a kleptomaniac, she stole two towels from the lobby and they are still in our bathroom we only stayed in Cambria for one night because the next day it was time to head down to Santa Monica.

The drive to Santa Monica was honestly nothing crazy like the day before but once we got there, we were able to walk right down to the pier and check every out in the area. Before I start this section I will say that out of everything, Santa Monica was probably my least favorite place we went on this trip it was extremely crowded, and driving anywhere was an absolute nightmare. With that being said, I still had a great time! The first day we spent the day on the pier, and then later drove to the Griffith Observatory to look at the view of Los Angelos and see the Hollywood sign. Watching the sunset over the city was so so beautiful and the observatory itself was breathtaking. This day mom decided to take the Maserati for a spin and ended up doing 90 mph on the highway “by accident.” Safe to say I feared for my life.

The next day we woke up early because Brady and I had a surfing lesson on Venice Beach. And let me just tell you if you have no surfing experience, I’m not sure starting at Venice beach is a good idea. I went into this lesson so extremely overconfident and was humbled within the first 15 minutes of the lesson. The waves on the beach were so extremely strong that I was being knocked over with every single hit. I did manage to get up on the board a few different times but not without some pretty insane wipeouts and a sore body the next day.

Later that night my mom decided to book a “Celebrity Homes” tour in downtown LA. when I tell you this was the absolute WORST tour I have ever been on, I am not joking. Our tour guide Rob took us all around LA, showing us homes that celebrities USED to live in. As for the homes that celebrities do live in, we would get the same response over and over again which was “if you look across the valley about 3,000 miles to the left you’ll see a house with a tiny sliver of an orange roof. That is the home of Bruno Mars.” it was pretty much a huge letdown. Not to mention that Rob almost killed us by getting into several near-miss accidents and slamming on the breaks so hard that Brady’s face continued to slam into the head of the seat in front of him. Our day did turn around however when later that night we found a tiny hole-in-the-wall Italian restaurant called North Italia and had a great meal with our waiter, Eddie, who gave us arguably the best service I have ever had. He gave my parents free scotch, brought us free dessert, and at the end of the night sat with us for half an hour just laughing and telling us stories about the area. I will give this place amazing reviews until the day I die, that is how good the experience was for us.

Our final day in California was spent going on the Warner Brothers Studio tour. I got to see the sets of Big Bang Theory, Ellen, Friends, and so many more. I got to see how the CGI works from Harry Potter and even saw the original Batmobile which was sick (EDIT: According to Dwight Flewelling aka Batman Enthusiast, while I did see A version of the Batmobile, I did not see THE original Batmobile sorry Dwight, my bad). I felt so official driving around the set in a golf cart and got to see literally everything. We ended the night with a delicious dinner at Del Frisco’s in Santa Monica and the next day we were on a plane back to Massachusetts.

I love writing posts like these because throughout writing them I get to relive all of these amazing experiences. I absolutely loved everything about this trip and am so so grateful for the memories I was able to make. If you ever have a chance to take a trip like this to the west coast do it. Without a question do it. This was such a long post and if you read the whole thing just know I appreciate you.

I hope you all have a lovely week!

- Meg

P.s. LOTS of photos here! the first group of pictures is from the PCH drive, the second group is from San Fran, and the third is from Santa Monica. Not everything I mentioned is photographed because I was trying to live in the moment but there is some amazing shots here! Enjoy!