......With the morning antics in San Luis Opisbo behind us we were driving the Big Sur, sun shining, wind in our hair, the most amazing scenery on earth and probably the most scary drive with all the windy roads and sharp corners, but what a rush. We stopped a third of the way at Hearst Castle, described as the most expensive and ellaborate home ever built ( or by local folks the most distasteful home ever built). We watched the film of how it came to be built first and that was so interesting we were more excited about the tour. Then to top it off, whether the fast food guy fancied us or we looked poor as we were counting our change to pay for a bottle of water, he gave it to us our drink for free. I like to think the former as we don't quite look homeless yet. The tourguide for the castle was a wicked, older lady who knew her stuff, and did you know, this Hearst Bloke who is a bit of a legend in America, resided in Wales for most of his time at St Donats, how cool are us Welsh! Anyway, the house was huge and ellaborate and expensive looking, it had entertained the greats in its time, actors, presidents etc so you can imagine its grandeur. However, as you all know I am quite minamilistic in my tastes so even though I could appreciate the oppulence, to me, it was like walking into a nightmare, granted a very expensive nightmare. After the tour we were off again into the sunshine and onto the windy road for the remainder of the big sur ( stopping at Ragged Point for lunch where we encountered our 3rd 1 legged bird) onto Monterey our next stop.

Day 11 ( Monday 25th) just in case I've lost any of you coz I know I'm way behind on the updating. We stayed in a Hostel in Monterey which is best known for its aquarium ( thats Monterey not the Hostel - I think the hostel will be best known for the highest bunk bed in the world, got a few bruises getting in and out of that) After a goodnight sleep as we were in bed at 10pm ( what party animals we are). Next day we went to the Aquarium. ( I don't think any of you expected us not to). The Aquarium was well like an aquarium, there were fish, big ones little ones and all the ones inbetween. Sharks (which could come under the category of big fish but I have to allaborate on the aquarium some how) stingrays, jellyfish, penguins and otters ( the otters were cute). Then we spent 2 hrs looking for an internet cafe, (as again the one at the hostel was from the ark) with no joy.  You may find a bit of a theme of not finding a internet place running through my journal until the grand canyon, this is my defence at why I am so behind with my updates, ( that and the fact that I'm having to much of a good time to be sat at a computar - but love and miss you all). As the internet hunt failed miserabley we spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach, which would have been fine if a guy hadn't come up to us as we were lying in our bikinis and asked what we were doing, whilst he was wrapped up in his thermals. Kate answered 'sunbathing its sub-tropical to us', so we persevered as long as we could then went back to the Hostel ( still in Monterey)where we were greeted by a room full of middle aged hippie types having a sing along ( just mine and Kates thing ).  As the chill out room was occupied and we had managed to thwart any advances on us to join in with the hippies, we spent a long night in Fed Ex Kinkos updating our journals Yeah!

Next day we drove 45mins north to Santa Cruz, hoping that the weather would be nice so we could laze on the beach again, as we couldn't check into hostel until 5pm. Well no such look, it was bloody freezing, so much for 2 welsh girls chasing the sun, we could have been in the artic for all we knew, so what the were we going to do?  If I describe Santa Cruz to you, you will understand our dilemma, Skegness at winter time. So we parked our bums at a cafe for 2hrs writing postcards and only moved because we had to move the car, as it was in a metered space. Then we had a brain wave, it was a fully formed town, it had running water and electricity we thought! so its bound to have a cinema. And yes, low and behold we wandered up the high street and parked our arses yet again, but this time in the cinema for the rest of the afternoon. The film was 'The Last Kiss' (we recommend when it comes out with you). Finally it was gone 5pm and we could go and get our bed for the evening. We were all ready a bit perturbed by this overnighter as the hostel had a curfew of 11pm, ( granted we haven't been the party animals you know and love but we liked the option at least). So after wasting the afternoon we had the dilemma of figuring out what to do with the whole 5 hrs we had left before we were to be tucked up in our beds. Food was the first priority, we knew we couldn't possibley go see a second film however tempting, so we would think of the evenings entertainment during dinner. Pizza and Pasta on the main drag then a wander to see what was about, nothing to do but I need to mention the crazy people. 'Slow Bob' or the 'Umbrella man' one in the same person ( we discovered his name when we were in San Francisco), I hadn't mentioned we had seen him earlier on in the day, and there he was still, dressed in a pink dress with a pink fluffy scarf, floral pink cardi and leg warmers, umbrella and hat which were also pink and his face painted like a clown, walking if not shuffling extremely slowly up and down the high street. ( we found out later that it started off as a protest to slow down the fast pace of the world, many years ago when he was relatively normal, I stress relatively, and had proceeded to what we saw today) Have a look at him yourselves under Santa Cruz highlights at wickapedia.com. Also, just incase he wasn't enough there was a man dressed all in black with a long leather coat and pale makeup, with a cat chained around his neck. ( We decided to name him The Cat with a man on a chain). Other than that we walked past Good Charlotte ( its a band mum, in case you were wondering) and admitted defeat and went back to the hostel - it was 8:30. Then to our dismay our 1 roomate was already in bed snoring so we couldn't even stay up and talk, there was no common room, so to bed it was, with our books and lights off at 11pm. Then just in case we thought our day couldn't get anymore comical, at 1am our roomate ( who stank) got up and had a shower very noisely and then went back to bed. Then at 7:30 she got up again and went for another noisey shower. At this point we admitted defeat and got up, just in case the crazy lady decided she would want another shower within the next hour. We left the hostel at 9am, never to darken the doors of Santa Cruz again and headed to San Francisco.

San Francisco will have to wait til next time, but keep reading plenty more stories to come..........