Highway 1 from Carmel to San Simeon

From Salinas we drove west to the California coast—Carmel by the Sea—and followed Highway 1 down to San Simeon. This stretch of highway is beautiful and well known. We gave ourselves 4 hours so we could stop and take in the views along the way.

It was so breathtaking, I cried. It always feels like scenes like these were created just for me. Though, I'm sure everyone else feels the same.

Some friendly foreigners took our photo.

 And for them...I took video of a choreographed dance to music in front of the view.

I hope it turned out alright. The music went on so long that I started to shiver, I tried to hold the camera steady but I'm sure the video had a slight jiggly quality toward the end.

As we went further south, the fog hadn't burned off. And so, a lot of the drive looked like this. Sadly, this was through Big Sur too. We could hear the ocean but the long shoreline wasn't visible.

Down in San Simeon there's a part of the beach where sea lions sun bathe.

We also saw a line of cars pulled over on the wrong side of the road—the land side. So we pulled over too and saw a herd of elk with a majestic bull accompanying them.

As we drove back home, we decided to try that stretch of highway again, hoping the fog had burned off. And it had!

Unfortunately, there were a couple of vistas we could't pull into because of a "photoshoot" going on. (Obviously for something like Instagram.) Picture this: barefoot boho girl sits on a rock, wild hair blowing in the wind, pretending to strum a guitar while a photographer takes entirely too many photos while another man keeps everyone else from parking.) Grrr.

We also witnessed a quintessential California hangout scene, perpetuating the image of how all Californians spend their free time: VW van, a group of young adults dressed like hippies, sitting on a tribal patterned blanket on the roof while getting high and taking in the view. Thanks for that.

I particularly liked this scene below: horses on a hill with the wide ocean as background. It's not something you normally see in person. It felt like it belonged in a movie scene. 

Someday I hope to drive more of Highway 1 from Monterey up toward Oregon with plenty of time for stops along the way. Aaaand plenty of Dramamine too.