“Live in the sunshine. Swim the sea. Drink the wild air.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Monday-Wednesday (6/10-12) – Jamul, CA
We try not to drive more than 300 miles a day, but we made an exception this time to beat the heat. We drove 380 miles from Mesa, AZ to Jamul, CA, which is 25 minutes east of San Diego. We had arranged to camp at a Thousand Trails campground called Pio Pico, and it was not a favorite, especially after the gorgeous regional campground we had left in Mesa! If we weren’t Thousand Trails members, this campground would have been $70 a night, due to its proximity to San Diego.
We skirted the Mexican border for most of the drive from Mesa, and we saw sections of the existing border wall/fence. We also saw a number of Border Patrol SUVs parked in various places, and we were required to go through a checkpoint on Route 94 about 15 miles east of Pio Pico. The Border Patrol agent asked us if we had anyone in the trailer!
On Tuesday we went into old town San Diego to have dinner with my cousin Danny, and the next day I met my friend Gwenn for lunch at Brigantine in La Mesa. Afterward we wandered through the multitude of thrift stores downtown La Mesa. In both cases, it felt like little time had passed, although I hadn’t seen either Danny or Gwenn since we were in California for our daughter Kayt’s grad school graduation 6 years earlier.
Thursday (6/13) – San Clemente, CA
Before heading to San Clemente, we spent the morning at a Starbucks in Jamul so we could use the WiFi. However, no public WiFi has been as good as the Panera in Mesa, AZ, so no blog publishing was possible.
The campground at San Clemente State Beach was full, and there were tons of kids running around. It was a fun and lively place, and it was only a 10-minute walk (albeit quite steep) to the beach. I found it interesting that there is a train track that runs right along the beach, and several commuter trains went by while we were there.
We stayed in site 52 ($60 per night; full hookups) next to John and Karen, a nice couple from Irvine whom we ended up chatting with that evening for several hours. As we were talking, a small skunk ran under our trailer. They said that when they had camped there the previous summer, a skunk got their dog full in the face. Yuck! I was a little worried when we went back to our trailer that the skunk would still be there, but it was long gone. In spite of the odiferous wildlife, we were sorry we couldn’t stay another night.
Friday-Sunday (6/14-16) – Simi Valley, CA
We had wanted to visit our friends Sheron & James, as well as our nephew Robert, in LA, so we camped at Oak Park, which is a Ventura County Park ($37 per night, water & electric only; site Lower 9). It was the steepest site we have ever camped in, requiring extra support for the jack. Our site backed up to a hill that proved to be home to a colony of little ground squirrels. They were a hoot to watch.
We had a restful afternoon when we arrived, and the next day we drove to the Hollywood area to visit Robert. We couldn’t find parking near his apartment, so we picked him up and drove to a parking garage in the central Hollywood area. What an amazing sea of humanity! It reminded me of Times Square, only on a smaller scale. After lunch at the California Pizza Kitchen, we wandered around. We saw the stars on the sidewalk, including Donald Trump’s (apparently it’s always being messed with in some way; I saw recently in the news that someone had built a little wall around it), as well as many people dressed in costume, like Spiderman or Darth Vader (presumably for paid photo ops). There was also a group of people marching with signs and bullhorns demanding that all listeners “accept Jesus.” I certainly wasn’t bored!
Our friends we had intended to visit were in Europe (we didn’t plan that very well!), so we slept in on Sunday and then drove to Malibu up the Pacific Coast Highway. We visited beautiful Malibu Bluffs Park and walked the path along the ocean.
As we continued up the coast, we saw signs for Channel Islands National Park and decided to go. There was a great visitor’s center, including the best movie we have seen in a national park, narrated by Kevin Costner. In order to visit the actual islands, you need to arrange a boat tour and we were too late for that. But we saw the islands from the deck of the visitor’s center, and learned a lot about them. Given how delicate they are ecologically, I’m okay with not visiting.
It was a lovely way to end the coastal portion of our trip, as we are about to head inland to the national parks.