Our Trip Across America-Part 8

A Slice of Life

  Bill Lites

Now we headed North, up the beautiful California coast on California Hiway #1. We stopped to tour the famous Hearst Castle in San Simeon, which is one of the largest private residences ever built in the United States. It was built by the newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst, and is absolutely amazingly beautiful.

We were told it was started in 1919 and work continued until around 1947.  At some point during the construction Hearst named the project “La Cuesta Encantada” but it is now commonly called Hearst’s Castle.  Most of the elaborate furnishings were collected by Hearst during his many Worldwide tours, stored for years, and were then painstakingly incorporated into the design of this huge construction project.

We continued up the California Coast Hiway to Monterey Bay, CA and visited the Monterey Sea Aquarium.  What an unusual and informative place that is.  The tide pools are home to many sea creatures who come and go with the high and low tides.  The Kelp Forest Feedings of the multi-variety of fish was most interesting and we all loved the show.

Then it was on up North to San Francisco where we ate seafood at the famous Fisherman’s Wharf, took a tour of Alcatraz Island, and DiVoran’s favorite visit, the Ghirardelli Chocolate Square.

Our next stop was to visit with DiVoran’s folks in Fort Bragg, CA about halfway to the Oregon border from San Francisco.  That visit was what I considered an epicurean delight.   Her father, Ivan, showed us how to pick the kind of wild mushrooms that we could eat with our charcoal grilled steaks..yum!  We also ate fresh salmon caught by Ivan (the master fisherman) during an ocean-fishing trip on his commercial salmon fishing boat. Then there were the driftwood and Jade rock hunts on the beach, lead by DiVoran’s mother Dora.  To top it off, we were treated to fabulous 4^th of July fireworks display.  What great fun, and a wonderful visit.

         —–To Be Continued—–

Related articles

• 3 Hearst kin recall growing up at Castle (sfgate.com)
• Hearst Castle “An American Palace” (stephangcalizona.wordpress.com)

Tags: Alcatraz Island, Father's point of view, Ghirardellie, Hearst Castle, William Randolph Hearst