Northern California - Dave's Midwestern Ohio Memories

Series of Guest Blogs by an out-of-state Fish Report reader originally from this area about fond memories of growing up in Midwestern Ohio during the 50’s & 60’s

Northern California

My last two blogposts touched on the internet and my involvement in it’s development from 1984-94 while on the Stanford University Technical Advisory Board. After those twice yearly Board meetings each spring and fall, my family and I would spend some time touring the sites of northern California, most of which are shown on the map above. But first, in light of the election fallout, my reference in last week’s blogpost about the social dilemma of the internet manipulating our minds, the hyper link included in the blogpost was blacklisted by Google and would not open for most readers. Google considered my post to be inappropriate, or not in their best interest, probably because the blog was critical of their CEO, so they blocked me. Now I know how every right wing politician running for office felt this year!

The rest of this blog is non-controversial so should hopefully be readable just fine!

Since we honeymooned in San Francisco, many fond memories of the Bay Area and northern California fill our hearts, so when asked to join the Stanford Board, I readily accepted, knowing we could spend more time revisiting some familiar sites and seeing new ones. And we sure were not disappointed. After meticulously planned our adventures each spring and fall, we found that time of year to be perfect for touring northern California. The weather was perfect and the crowds were down. I don’t recall it raining once during our trips there and the temps were always in the 70’s and sunny. Probably ditto for our honeymoon in October, 1972, but we weren’t paying much attention to the weather.

One of the first areas we spend some time after the Board meeting was nearby Monterey Peninsula the site of Pebble Beach golf course, Carmel and a majestic seashore. No, I didn’t play Pebble Beach, which to this day remains on my Bucket List (a subject for a future blog), but we did walk the famous 17th and 18th holes. That alone was a thrill. And we enjoyed the quant little village of Carmel-by-the-Sea with all it’s shops and restaurants. Clint Eastwood was the Mayor at the time!

The next trip entailed visiting Napa wine region, which we had missed during our honeymoon - at the time, our taste in wine was slightly different as indicated above!

This particular trip coincided with a milestone anniversary, so to celebrate, we took a balloon ride over wine country early one morning. Breathtaking! And the winery tours via the Wine Train were fantastic. But a not-so-memorable aspect of that trip was our hotel room was burglarized - while we were sleeping! The thief took an over night bag with some valuables including our plane tickets. We survived but it was traumatizing to say the least.

Yosemite and Lake Tahoe were next on our places to visit and definitely did not disappoint. Our son joined us for that trip and the water and mountains were spectacular, with Lake Tahoe so blue and Yosemite so majestic. I can recall hiking together up Yosemite Falls Trail to catch a glimpse of the falls up.

Heading north along the Pacific Coast highway was our next adventure, crossing the Golden Gate bridge to Mendocino, a touristy town right on the Pacific, then drove on to see the giant redwood Sequoia forest.

During our next trip to the Bay area, after the Board meeting, we headed south down the Pacific Coast Highway, probably the most beautiful stretch of road in the entire country. Our first stop was Big Sur. I had heard about a Clint Eastwood’s golf club under construction in Big Sur called Tehama, but had no luck trying to check it out. We were told a story at the time that the wife of one of the prospective Club members had complained directly to Clint about some detail of the Clubhouse under construction, and the next day, the prospective member received a letter telling him he was not approved for membership. Within a year, the prospective member was reinstated when Clint found out he got a divorce! I did manage to get a Tehama golf cap, which I still have, that has the inscription on the back, “Fac Diem Meam," or "Make My Day" in Latin.

Heading further south on the Pacific Coast Highway, we drove to San Simeon, the mansion of legendary newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst. What a place! The pool pictured here was something to behold. Plus there was an indoor pool as well. A decade or so before our visit, Patty Hearst, akin at the time to today’s heiress Paris Hilton, was supposedly kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army, but was really a co-conspirator with the SLA, so was convicted and sentenced to 35 years in prison. But she was eventually pardoned by Bill Clinton after only serving 22 months. Helps to have relatives who know people in high places.

Next stop was Santa Barbara, but on the way, we happened to drive through the Paso Robles wine region in central California. Needless to say, we stopped for a tour and tasting at a local winery and were told this region was going to be the next Napa, Indeed some 30 years later, the Paso Robles region is now well know for excellent wines priced much below Napa wines, but just as good in my view. A friend of mine stores his Corvette in our garage over the winter when we are in Florida and at the end of the season, he always gives us a case of Paso Robles wines where his daughter now lives. Perfect!

Continuing our drive south, we finally arrived in Santa Barbara, which is such an amazing small city along the Pacific coast between San Francisco and Los Angeles. A friend from Michigan who was in the printing business and had the contract with the diocese to print all the weekly bulletins for every parish made enough money over the years to buy a vacation home in Santa Barbara. During our visit, we were able to have dinner at his ocean front club, overlooking the Pacific Ocean at sunset enjoying a memorable meal.

Needless to say, over the course of our bi-annual visits to northern California from 1984-1994, we also spent a lot of time in the Bay area, seeing the San Francisco sites we enjoyed during our honeymoon and sharing them with our son. For example, we had lunch at a Sausalito restaurant call Spinnakers that we visited during our honeymoon. The bayside spot has great food and a fantastic view of the City and Golden Gate Bridge from across the bay. We of course rode the cable cars all over the place, toured Alcatraz Island, walked Fisherman’s Wharf and drove down the curvy Lombardo street, all of which we appreciated immensely.

But probably the highlight of that trip was attending the 4th and final game of the 1990 World Series in Oakland to witness the Reds rally in the 8th to sweep the A’s and win the series. As a lifelong Reds fan, that was quite an experience.

We’ll be forever grateful to have had the opportunity to spend such quality time in northern California over that memorable decade. It’s a shame how San Francisco's problems have eroded its attractiveness. Here’s what one local official recently wrote about the City:

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