First, I have to say that aside from the awful wireless coverage in our room at the very end of the building, our stay at the Beachcomber Motel was all I had hoped for. This hotel is right on the beach. This was the view directly out our back glass door and then looking back toward the hotel from the foot bridge adjacent.
Awesome. Also awesome – our breakfast. I didn’t get any pictures of it because it wasn’t really that spectacular to look at and, who wants pictures of food? Ok, me, but I digress. Eggheads Cafe was quite possibly the most expensive breakfast I have ever purchased, but well worth it. I had an omelet with crab meat and cheese, some really great fried potatoes and some toast. For those of you who aren’t interested in shellfish or seafood, I’m sorry. You’re missing out. Fresh crab (caught daily in Fort Bragg) plus eggs and cheese is just great. And the orange juice – oh, the orange juice. Fresh-squeezed Valencia orange juice. My mouth is watering again. Amber’s pancakes were quite good as well and she also had orange juice.
On the agenda for today was to visit the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens. It’s a really nice place with a mixture of well-manicured gardens with plants of all types, a “natural” area which is mostly just labels on many coastal plants and an area where they grow vegetables for donation to a local food bank – they donated over 7,000 pounds last year! This time of year their fuchsia and dahlia collections are especially nice.
After this visit, we had another interesting drive along CA-1 down to Motel Inverness where we are staying tonight. This little place is in between Inverness Park and Inverness on Sir Francis Drake Blvd. It’s a clean and welcoming place with beautiful views out across Tomales Bay, upon which it sits.
One thing we stopped and saw along the way was the Point Arena Lighthouse. Here are some pics from that stop and some of the drive down. The panorama at bottom (sort of) shows how the road climbs down a valley and back out of it. This is typical on Route 1.
