The Pacific Coast Highway does not disappoint. It is a continuous stretch of beautiful oceanfront coastline with views as far as the eyes can see.  Due to campsite availability, we headed back up to coast from Big Sur to Monterey and Carmel after our night in the clouds.  By the end of this trip we will know this part of coast extremely well after driving it three times!

The city of Monterey is a cute little town that offers adventures along the water, a fisherman’s wharf, historic old town and a cute cannery row of tourist stops.  We walked ourselves around historic old town to find some breakfast, headed down to fisherman’s wharf to check out the shops and then headed down to Cannery row to find the coolest Antique Mall and tourist shops.

Once we had walked our way through everything, we hopped back in the car to hunt down this Antique/Vintage Market that was being held at the local college.  We walked the rows of dealers and was lucky enough to pick up a great old Kodak camera to add to our collection.

We headed onwards toward Carmel which was where our next campsite was booked for at Saddle Ranch.  This place was a little more expensive but the amenities made up for it.  After setting up the tent, we made the solid choice to head down to the pool to soak in the sun and relax after what seemed like an awfully long day of driving down from the Prewitt Ridge Campground that was up on the hill overlooking the coastline.  Sadly we were relaxing so much that we forgot to take some pooltime pictures, just image us on loungers with the hot sun increasing our tan lines and a cold one in hand.

It was a relaxing evening, much warmer than the nights before hand.  We enjoyed a taco dinner, before settling in with our books and of course crossfit videos as the sun went down.

Today we made the decision to get out early, hit a couple of tourist beach spots along the way and then continue down the coast.  We found ourselves at Pfeiffer Beach, watched a few surfers, found this crazy Cairn field and found the notable rock with the hole in the middle for our #handsdownthecoast photo.

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Next on the list was Mcway Falls. Sadly there is only a trail along the top, and no way to access the beach (unless by boat), because it was a beautiful cove with its own waterfall that would have been cool to explore up close.

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Later on in the day when it looked like finding a campsite was no go (everything in Santa Barbara, and Malibu was at least $50 for a night – we have gotten used to paying no more than $20 for an amazing campsite in the state parks).  So we made our way through the crazy LA freeways and have now landed in Carson, California.  A day earlier than expected, this gives us the chance to check out day one of the competition that involves the new teen category and the masters level.  Rod is extremely excited about the upcoming days and I’m sure the next few posts will be nothing but photos of crossfit, the people and the gear that we intend to purchase through out the next 6 days!

It looks like a free stay in a Walmart parking lot will be this evenings accommodations, we made the judgement call that skipping an expensive campground tonight will get us an extra souvenir at the games!

Until Next Time!

– Tracy