It's a big drive most of the day: Santa Maria to near Yosemite
National Park. I sleep much, so it's not the most memorable of
affairs for me. A highlight's driving a section of the scenic,
twisting Coastal Highway 1. It's made a bit mellow because I'm in a
minivan, but I still drive aggressively enough to get complaints from
my passengers. With what may be narcolepsy, I've had enough after
about an hour.
Enjoyable evidence of different travel preferences occurs for Pebble
Beach's 17-Mile Drive. I have no desire to do anything involving
golf, especially ride in a car around a course when I've been cooped
up in a vehicle all day. I crack at some scenic point, called Bird
Island or something equivalently descriptive and boring. "That
island's near the short. Pull into this parking lot: I'm gonna swim
to it." The bird-infested and heavily poop-colored island isn't far,
but I have to pass through a veritable seaweed forest. It also
doesn't help that the water's surprisingly cold: it really sucks my
energy right out. Regardless, I make it the few hundred yards there
and back without incident, even sharing the rock with a seal.
According to my buddies shoreside, I attract an audience. "Psycho,"
"he should be a Navy seal: they get paid for stuff like this," "are
those (sea foam chunks floating near me) ice cubes?" and "hold on,
honey: he's almost back to shore" are some of my favorites. I'll
consider this evidence that I'm more exciting than a hold of gold in
the suburbs. Unfortunately, I might not be too smart: it's only as I
begin to return from the island that I realize my tattoo, fresh from
its bandage and immersed for the first time, is probably bleeding at
least a bit and just maybe attracting sharks. For everybody around
but me, that'd certainly be a better show than the PGA tour.