HOLIDAY, NOVEMBER 2014 (25) - MONTEREY TO SANTA CRUZ

NOVEMBER 10

Suffering slightly after giving in to that fourth course at "Cibo" the previous evening because we found the idea of the Pear Tart just too good to resist, we got up early and headed out to the "Wild Plum" once again for a far lighter breakfast than we otherwise might have had, before returning and checking out and heading in what might be regarded as the "wrong" direction for a while.

This was because we'd planned another bird-watching day as we meandered back up the coast to our next destination, and the rather lovely State Park at Point Lobos had so beguiled us on our previous visit to the area that we felt that the ten miles further south it took us - incidentally the furthest south that we would travel in the entire fortnight - was very worth it.

As we pulled up into a surprisingly busy car park, after paying a friendly Park Ranger the entrance fee so that we could put receipt on the windscreen which would have allowed us free entry to several other State Parks that day if we wished it, we couldn't help but notice how windy it was, and indeed another Park ranger did point us off in the direction of a trail which would take us away from the headland but keep us out of the wind, and we decided to spend a happy hour trundling around that, once I'd stopped taking pictures of the blue birds that I'd noticed hanging around the place.

It was a beautiful and remarkably unspoilt spot, given that you had views right across the back back towards Monterey itself and that, on a good day (as we'd found last time) there was a very good chance of seeing Sea Otters along with the usual bird life and mammals that we were still not quite getting used to seeing with such regularity.

It's obviously quite a spot for photographers, too, given that we spotted a man (with his bored looking partner) spending absolutely ages setting his camera up on a tripod which implied that he was particularly taken with one empty looking tree.

We could only imagine that he knew something that we didn't, and that something wonderful would eventually perch there.

Well, either that, or he particularly liked its bark.

After that we braved the lashing winds and headed out towards the headlands to enjoy the almost ubiquitous Pelicans, the seals, and the bracing, lashing waves, before returning to the car and setting our sights northwards with thoughts of home and the approaching end of our holiday.

But that was still several days away and we had decided to seek out another bird watching spot which had been recommended to us by both the helpful volunteer lady on the seafront at Monterey the previous day, and the gentleman who was an avid birder and employee of the Monterey Bay Aquarium who came over and chatted to us when we were looking once more at the Peregrine that had taken up residence there.

"You must try to find some time to visit Elkhorn Slough" (pronounced "sloo") they had both said, and so we set "Min" the task and she led us there, and, although we were disappointed to find the gates to what appeared to be the "official" park firmly closed, we persevered and found a rather abandoned looking car park next to a railway track and decided to pull up there.

After a certain amount of exploration, it turned out that this was indeed a genuine nature reserve and we followed the path along the side of the Slough until we reached a rather impressive bridge/boardwalk, and we might have spent several hours there with the binoculars and cameras if I hadn't suddenly remembered that we'd left the Sat-Nav and the Beloved's backpack containing her passport and wallet on full view when we'd parked the car, and those one or two lonely looking trucks that had also been in the car park when we'd pulled in suddenly seemed - in my mind at least - to have been full of sinister-looking criminal types.

Of course, having dashed back to the car we were lucky and all was well and secure, because bird watchers are, by their very nature, lovely, lovely people who would never do such a thing as steal our stuff, even in a land of opportunity such as this where providing such opportunities really are your own fault.

We got back to the car park just as a pair of Otters swam up and so we watched them play and eat for a while, and I got embroiled in a conversation with a gentleman in another truck which pulled up.

He apparently went there as often as he could to unwind when he finished work for the day, which seemed like a very good way to be living your life, if you ask me.

He also said that he'd been coming there for years and had only ever seen Otters there once before, and so it seems that, once again, we were proving to be very lucky indeed when it came to getting opportunities to see actual wildlife in the actual wild.

Yes, I know that nothing we'd seen was particularly uncommon, but nevertheless it's pretty uncommon to a couple of amateurs from Derbyshire.

So, just when we were starting to believe that we were being very lucky indeed, a Pelican landed on the jetty just in front of us and we were in the very unusual position of being just a few yards from a Pelican and a pair of Sea Otters, both of which were within a few yards of each other.

Starry-eyed and amazed at our luck, we got back into the car and set off towards Santa Cruz once again, only to pull up at the side of the road within a mile at another lovely spot where far more Egrets than we might have expected had gathered, whilst a whole host of other birds circled overhead.

Luckily we got back into the car before the distant train whistle that we'd heard whilst standing there had transmogrified into the actual (and seemingly endless) train turned up, otherwise I'd be boring myself rigid with several hundred photographs of some passing flatbed rail carriages on these long, dark, midwinter evenings.