Day 2: Monterey/Carmel/Big Sur

8:30 am: Since our room included breakfast, we enjoyed a second meal at the Duck Club. My egg's benedict were tasty and I enjoyed the protein, but I was totally jealous of Adam's fragrant waffle with strawberries. The view of the water was amazing in daylight and breakfast was a good start to day 2. Note: Don't order the hash browns at the Duck Club, they're possibly the worst I've had in recent memory. They were pale while shredded potatoes with little wisps of crispy browness. I had to laugh, it's like they didn't even try to brown them, they were literally white.

10:00 am: We drove the 10 minutes from Monterey to Carmel where we took a walking tour of the town Clint Eastwood was once mayor. I realized while on the tour that I'm an impatient tour participant. I have no tolerance for the other people who might dwaddle or earnestly comment, "that's wonderful" every two seconds. I especially don't enjoy tour guides that don't give me a snappy laundry list of facts and fun stories. I'm here to learn lots of trivia darn it, I want my money's worth. I contemplated abandoning the tour and going shopping, but made a decision to mellow out and relax and just go with it especially after I saw how Adam was admirably doing just so even though we both agreed we were bored out of our minds. The tour picked up toward the end and we did get to see two wine cellers that were cool and we got pretty good recommendation for lunch.

1:30 pm: We left Carmel for the Pebble Beach area for the "17 mile drive." It's a driving route around this residential/resort area with unbelievable coastal views and pretty golf courses. Just like the people I couldn't tolerate just two hours earlier, we earnestly commented, "the view is wonderful," "so pretty," "wow," every two seconds. Our last stop was the Pebble Beach lodge where we admired the view from the 18th hole. "Wonderful!" Hankering for a snack, we stopped by the market and bought an Its It oatmeal cookie ice cream sandwich covered with chocolate.

4:00 pm: We left Carmel and civilization behind and started toward Big Sur on windy roads along scary cliffs and [surprise surprise] unbelievable views. On the way, we stopped by to check out the view from Nepenthe. It was once a house owned by Orson Wells and Rita Hayworth, but is now a restaurant. We finally found our hotel for the night, Deetjen's Big Sur Lodge. It's this super cute rustic place to stay with little cabins built by "Grandpa Deetjen" back in the day. Fortunately, the cabin appeared more rustic than it actually was. The room had a nice bed with a fluffy down comforter, electric heat and even a wood burning stove. I've never been so warm. Restaurants are hard to come by in Big Sur so we ate at Deetjen's restaurant. Adam had the New Zealand lamb and I enjoyed an organic filet mignon. For dessert, cheesecake and fancy chocolate pudding. With our bellies full, we walked back to our cabin on the dirt path with a flashlight in hand just in case. Very nice!