The GeekHiker

The girl came California.  And now she’s gone away, back to Australia.

I don’t think I’ve ever had three and a half weeks pass by so quickly.

I have no idea, at the moment, what to say about any of it.  Completely speechless.

So, I’ll regale you with pictures of some of the places I took her, in my attempt to woo her on my native state using California’s impressive scenic charms.

* * *

Australia, being older geologically, lacks high mountain peaks, so one of the first places I took her was up to the High Sierra Nevada and Lake Tahoe, where we drove around and played a bit in the snow. Needless to say, I would also love to bring her up on a warm weekend in summer!

On days that I’d be looking for work, we would take time out to do local stuff, such as bike riding or, below, hitting the local disc golf course.

Since I’m currently in the Sacramento area, we went downtown for a day, exploring Old Sac and the waterfront along the river.  This is Tower Bridge, crossing the river and painted, appropriately enough for a state that had a bona-fide gold rush, gold:

One of the places 1Cent really wanted to visit was San Francisco, and we managed to get down on two days: one cold and drizzly day, where we walked around the city and stopped at places like Telegraph Hill and the Golden Gate Bridge, and this day, where we hiked in the Marin Headlands before meeting friends in The City for dinner. (If you look at the full size picture from the Marin Headlands below, you can see Sutro Tower in the far distance.)

Due to my busyness, there wasn’t much in the way of multi-day travel, but we did manage to get to one of my favorite spots: the central coast and San Luis Obispo. We camped, hiked, ate seafood on the waterfront, watched otters in the kelp beds, and dined on BBQ at the amazing San Luis Obispo Farmers Market.  The fog would come in thickly around our campsite at night, but usually burn back just to the shoreline during the day, as it does here just touching Morro Rock:

…and to top it all off, the weather was clear enough along the Big Sur coast to make the drive, one of the best in the world, worthwhile.  Below, the famous Bixby Bridge along the Big Sur coast:

Although we only made it for the day, I did manage to get us to Yosemite (which she quickly declared her “favorite place”, a feeling I very much understand) on the way to Los Angeles.  El Capitan on a gorgeous spring day:

There was also a couple of days in L.A., where she got to meet my friends and see a bit of the city. One of the last places we went was the Secret Spot, the significance of which long-time readers will be fully aware of.

Funnily enough, one of the things 1Cent liked most about California might just be:

She eats a bit healthier than I do, and the availability (and relative in-expense of) organic veggies here was definitely one of the highlights of the trip for her, methinks.

Then, in what now feels like the blink of an eye after she arrived, she was gone.

Yes, before anybody asks, I miss the hell out of her.

And we’ll leave it at that for now.