The California Road Trip or Better Known as Joy Luck Club 3

View California Road Trip - San Diego to San Francisco in a larger map

Somehow we’ve branded our annual get-together trips with the Joy Luck Club moniker. It started with JLC 2, which took place last summer in Vancouver and Victoria. Although the numbering may throw you off, it’s actually the first JLC trip (our trips being the sequels.) This year we hit the road with JLC 3 on Highway 1 from San Diego to San Francisco. What better way to honor our Asian heritage than to revisit the cities that were built by our ancestors. Quite fitting, don’t you think?

The weather gods seemed to be on our side. We had the good fortune of experiencing the lovely California sun most of the time on our road trip except the last couple of days in San Francisco. I’d like to think of it as the weather gods helping us transition back to reality. The nice sunny California weather got us quite tan. So tan in fact that I was mistaken for being Filipino—twice. Now that’s a first!

Ang and I got up before the birds to catch an early flight out of Seattle to meet up with Merles and Sclee in San Diego. When we met up with them in SD, they were way too peppy for the little sleep they claimed they had to catch an early flight. That didn’t stop Sclee from waking up at 4am the next morning all showered and ready to go hit the streets of San Diego. Unfortunately she realized too late that she woke up at the right time, but in the wrong time zone.

We saw all of what we wanted to see in San Diego in two days. It’s not as nice as I imagined it to be, but about an hour drive north to La Jolla and it’s just perfect. The beaches, the view, the little shops, the weather… everything. Santa Barbara is also another beautiful place where worries don’t exist. If I were homeless, I’d live here on the beach and be the happiest person on earth.

We “camped” in the wilderness for a night in Santa Barbara at the lovely el Capitan Canyon resort. Ang found her “Mr. Rugged”, who escorted us to our furnished tent, and fantasized about working and living at the resort.

It’s a fact that anyone who lives in Laguna Beach is just spoiled by the good weather, sand and incredible views of the ocean. They really have no reason to leave or to complain. Maybe just some of the really steep hills can be a bit scary, but how else are those nice houses going to get such a lovely view from high up? I guess the same goes for houses in Big Sur. Residents there have a way of living on the edge, quite literally. The guidebook informed us that there was no need to do anything in Big Sur except to enjoy the “weepingly beautiful” vistas. We did just that and shed a few tears along the way.

By the time we reached San Francisco, we had logged a little under 900 miles by car. Besides spending a day outside the city in Napa to tour the Domaine Carneros Chateau, we spent most of our time on foot throughout the City by the Bay. I revisited many of the sites I’d been to five years ago like the Golden Gate Bridge, but this time in better weather and less foggy conditions. Also, I had more time to stroll through the special exhibits of Georgia O’Keefe, Ansel Adams and Richard Avedon at the SFMOMA—one of the best museums for modern art on this side of the coast.

What a trip! We had ten fabulous days exploring the coast of California together. I can’t think of any better way to end the summer. The JLC tradition will live on. More photos are linked here and a video will come later.