The Road to Los Angeles

Thus far, my travel dispatches have not described a very "warillever" vacation.

You know, the warilevers that set out to see Grand Rapids, but came back from Des Moines with a new car. Or the warillevers that drove accross the country with a Subaru station wagon, two boxes of cereal, and $100.

Don't you worry -- our vacation did not end at the Ritz.

As soon as the conference ended, we picked up a rental car and drove down the coast. Well, not really the coast, since the coast was on fire. And the Pacific Coast Highway was closed. So we started down the coast (to check out the 87 foot whale skeleton), then headed inland and saw this:

...for hours on end. Beautiful!

We took a little break in Soledad to stretch our legs and tour Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad. The name means "Our Lady of Solitude." The statue of Mary in black dress startled Agent 004 and led to an interesting conversation about Jesus' sacrifice.


We also stopped by the Mission San Miguel Arcangel, which is still an active parish. Ironically the 300 year old church was damaged in a recent earthquake and masses are now held in the parish hall.

After dinner in Grover Beach, we spent the night in San Luis Obispo and attended Mass at the Old mission there. We made a quick stop at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, then on to our friends' house outside Los Angeles.

We spent two low-key days catching up with the D's. Their children are now 4, 2 and 9 months, so the Agents had a splendid time riding bikes and splashing in the wading pool with them. We caught a view of the Hollywood sign from the Griffith Park Observatory,then let the children loose at Travel Town.

Our visit came to an end much too quickly, but we were very excited to set off on our desert adventure nonetheless.

And that shall be the subject of another post.