Do you want to visit Yosemite this Summer but don’t have a Reservation? – Here are some options.
Story and Photos (except as noted) by David A. Laws.
Beginning in late May, Yosemite National Park in California is instituting a reservation system for admission during the summer of 2022. Designed to reduce congestion while major infrastructure construction projects are underway, Yosemite spokesperson Scott Gediman estimates that the park will see about 70 percent of peak hour traffic compared to pre-pandemic levels. Depending on their success in reducing overcrowding, reservations could become a permanent factor in planning your trips to this and other popular national parks. The “Ways to Get a Reservation” section at the end of this article provides details of how, when, and where to apply for a permit. But if this summer is your one chance to visit Yosemite and you cannot secure a reservation, what are your options?
John Steinbeck’s Valley of the World Revisited: A Photo Essay
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
A ranch in “the wilder hills” from Old Stage Road
“I would like to write the story of this whole valley, of all the little towns and all the farms and the ranches in the wilder hills. I can see how I would like to do it so that it would be the valley of the world.” [Steinbeck: A Life in Letters]
In The True Adventures of John Steinbeck, Writer, Steinbeck’s biographer Jackson Benson explains that “scene and setting assume a far heavier burden of meaning in his work than in the fiction of most other novelists.” 1n 2001, I explored Monterey County’s Steinbeck Country seeking landscapes that matched quotations from his stories to photograph for a presentation at the Steinbeck Centennial Conference the following year.
Point Sur Lightstation: A Haunted Ghost Town on Prime Big Sur Real Estate
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
Towering three-hundred feet above the crashing surf of the Pacific Ocean, one of California’s most faithfully restored ghost towns occupies prime ocean-view real estate just 25 miles south of Monterey. Inhabited by chickens, a cow, and families with children until less than 50 years ago, the deserted barn, houses, and workshops of Point Sur Lightstation cling to the edge of a great, volcanic rock with spectacular views of the Big Sur coast and marble-tipped peaks of the Ventana Wilderness. Aficionados of the paranormal claim it as one of the most haunted lighthouses in the country.
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
Birdwatchers look at birds. Birders look for them” – U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Birdwatching, feeding and enjoying birds in our backyards, has long been a popular national pastime. As we seek safe, socially-distanced pastimes during the COVID-19 pandemic, the recreational sport of actively searching for them, called birding, is enjoying the fastest growth of any leisure activity in the world. Rock star birding in Big Sur and the inland mountain ranges of Central California offers many opportunities to see eagles, harriers, hawks and especially condors, as they continue to build nests, mate, and rear their young with a freedom that envious humans no longer enjoy.
Dragons, Ghosts and Witches: Every Night is Halloween in Burley
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
For most of us, dragons, ghosts, and witches raise goosebumps but once a year. For the citizens of Burley, deep in the woods of England’s New Forest National Park, every night must feel like Halloween. The hamlet of Burley is far from an undiscovered tourist gem. Quaint tearooms and souvenir stores straddling its winding, one-block main street bustle by day. But visit late on a fall afternoon, when shadows from towering beech and chestnut trees hasten early dusk, and you’ll sense the chill as spirits of the Dark Arts seek to reclaim their realm.
Steinbeck in Somerset: “The Time at Discove”
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
“Bruton is the only spot in the world I have refused to see again since John died.” (Elaine Steinbeck -1992) Elaine Steinbeck’s comment in a 1992 letter to artist Betty Guy refers to the time that she and her husband John Steinbeck spent at Discove Cottage in Somerset, England while he worked on his “reduction of Thomas Malory’s Morte d’Arthur to simple readable prose without adding or taking away anything.”
Celebrate Monterey’s 250th Birthday with a Virtual Tour
Story by David A. Laws.
Monterey, California, planned a big celebration today, June 3, 2020, of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the city in 1770. Sadly, all birthday events, from historical reenactments to block parties and patriotic parades, have been canceled or postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Instead, other-worldly masked figures haunt the streets of Old Monterey and the venerable adobes are silent and shuttered. We cannot visit them in person, so I invite you to join me on a virtual tour of some of my favorite spots.
Fort Ord National Monument: From Military Mayhem to Coastal Gem
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
Beach Range, Engineer Canyon, Machine Gun Flats: These are not typical landscape features you’d expect to find on maps of a California “coastal gem” and “hiker’s paradise.” Their roles in decades of service under military ownership are now largely forgotten, replaced by the delights of wildflowers, bird calls and jingling mountain-bike bells. Explosions, gunfire and the mayhem of army maneuvers no longer echo across the rugged back-country and ocean-front dunes of Fort Ord National Monument, set between Salinas and Monterey in the heart of Steinbeck Country.
Winston Churchill, RLS, and the Literary Chines of Bournemouth
Story by David A. Laws.
“To plunge or not to plunge, that was the question!” – Winston Churchill. Dashing onto a rustic footbridge traversing the steep-sided, wooded ravine of Alum Chine, the youth climbed up onto the handrail and jumped towards an overhanging fir branch. His younger brother Jack and a cousin watched in horror as the bough snapped. Eighteen-year old Winston Churchill plunged 30 feet to the ground. For three days in 1892 the prolific author (43 book-length works in 72 volumes) and future prime minister of Great Britain lay in a coma followed by three months of bed rest to recover from a ruptured kidney and broken thigh. Modern visitors to this site in the resort town of Bournemouth on southern England’s Dorset coast ponder how close this prank came to changing the course of history.
Exploring Silicon Valley’s High-Tech Heritage Trail
Story and photos by David A. Laws.
In an earlier article, “Silicon Valley High Tech Tourism: Selfies and Swag,” I reported a lighthearted survey of tech-related tourist magnets in deepest Nerdistan. This second article responds to requests for more information on the places where engineers and scientists finally accomplished the feat that eluded alchemists for centuries – how to turn sand (silicon) into gold (computer chips). The following itinerary covers a distance of about 30 miles from Stanford University to the former IBM disk-drive campus in south San Jose. With a stop to ponder the implications of events that took place at each site and a break at the Computer History Museum, where many related artifacts are on display, this trip can occupy a full day.
Point Sur Naval Facility Tour Reveals Cold War Secrets
Story and photos by David A. Laws.
John le Carré dismissed Cold War spy heroes as “A squalid procession of vain fools” in his 1963 espionage novel The Spy Who Came from the Cold. Volunteer historian Carol O’Neil at the former U.S. Naval Facility on Point Sur State Historic Park, 25-miles south of Monterey, would beg to differ. “We had heroes in the Cold War,” O’Neil insisted in a recent interview on KAZU, public radio for the Monterey Bay area. “It’s important for the cold warriors to know that they are valued and their stories are out there.” Eager to hear their stories, I joined a line of vehicles awaiting access to this former top-secret naval operation. Jim, a state park volunteer in a bright yellow safety vest bearing an embroidered NAVFAC logo patch, unlocked the security gate. An intimidating “U.S. Property No Trespassing” sign discourages intruders, now called Point Sur Naval Facility. After warnings of the dangers of ticks, rattlesnakes, and crumbling asbestos-laden structures, he directed us to the administration center. Here we joined a dozen so other visitors curious to learn the secrets hidden in this former submarine detection facility.
A Blizzard of Sanderlings: Watching Wildlife on Morro Bay
Story and photos by David A. Laws – except as noted. (Feature image courtesy Danna Dykstra-Coy.)
Our kayak slid effortlessly over the glassy-smooth water of the estuary. From the shore, an eruption of sanderlings burst into the sky. Swooping and diving in choreographed formation, a wheeling blur of birds enveloped us in a blizzard of beating white wings. Within seconds, they returned to the pickleweed marsh, cheeping and feeding as if nothing had happened. For us, this spectacular avian welcome to two days of watching wildlife on Morro Bay was a memory we will treasure.
Silicon Valley High Tech Tourism: Selfies and Swag
Story by David A. Laws.
Personal digital devices and online social platforms are enabling a new kind of Silicon Valley tourism. Previously only of interest to heads of state hoping to replicate the economic miracle back home, business people pursuing a deal, and a trickle of history buffs exploring where it all began, today the high-tech mecca is increasingly crowded with denizens of the always-connected world. Selfie-stick wielding pilgrims hustle to score swag and Instagram winning moments at the temples of Apple, Facebook, Google, and more. Silicon Valley high tech tourism abounds.
Inside Alaska’s Inside Passage
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
More than two million visitors a year traverse the great marine highway of Alaska’s Inside Passage in the warmth and comfort of vast floating resorts. A bus ride to a glacier or a quick helicopter flight through a fjord is as close as many travelers get to the silence and solitude of “The Last Frontier.” For those seeking a closer look at the inside of the Inside Passage, several operators offer small-ship cruises that combine wilderness excursions with rich cultural experiences in smaller communities.
A Pilgrimage to Wales: Or how I learned about the American invasions of Britain
Story by David A. Laws.
That one nation’s hero is another nation’s terrorist is seldom addressed in parochial school history books. Most children learn of the villainous redcoats in the American war of independence. Few texts tell of the American invasions of Britain. Or that one of these incursions led to the printing of the first one-pound note. These were unexpected connections I uncovered as I pursued a pilgrimage to Wales (Cymru in the Welsh language) to discover the place of my grandfather’s birth in the coastal county of Pembrokeshire (Sir Benfro).
Carrizo Plain Gold – Sunrise to Super Bloom
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
I pulled my jacket close against the chill stirring of an early breeze. A heavy silence enveloped the world in the final darkest minutes before dawn. To the east, a gray sliver of pending morning peeked from beneath a band of straggling clouds to silhouette the rugged crest of the Temblor Range. Planning a day exploring the Carrizo Plain, I had risen early to drive 200 miles from my home in Pacific Grove to watch the sunrise and a promised floral Carrizo Plain Gold super bloom from this elevated spot at the northern entrance to the National Monument that has been called “California’s Serengeti.”
The Magical Masterpiece Mystery Tour
Story by David A. Laws.
D.S. Jones: “This village is weird, sir” – D.C.I. Barnaby: “Jones, they’re all weird.” (From: Midsomer Murders: The Made-to-Measure Murders.) The south-west counties of England are rich in compelling authors, magical characters, and scenic settings from popular PBS television drama and mystery programs. I planned a recent trip to visit friends in the area around a tour of locations associated with three of our Masterpiece favorites – Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby’s blood-soaked Midsomer County, Jane Austin’s Winchester, and Ross Poldark’s brooding Cornish moorlands: a personal Masterpiece mystery tour.
Selfieville is the New Family Friendly Fantasy Experience in Monterey
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
If you feel nostalgic for those psychedelic lightshow/rock concerts of the 1960s, Selfieville a new attraction in downtown Monterey offers a chance to relive your youth. But this time in a family friendly setting without those funny smelling cigarettes! If you’re not old enough to know what I am talking about, imagine a journey through a fantasy world created with a phalanx of high-tech 3D projectors that transform a theater’s static walls into a magical experience.
Monterey Peninsula: A Movie Star for the Ages
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
Location. Location. Location. The real estate promoter’s mantra applies equally to the magicians of the silver screen. Many Hollywood faces long faded from public consciousness appeared in dramas that continue to resonate today because of their memorable scenic settings. Monterey County has been a favorite of movie directors for the variety and accessibility of its scenery since Edison’s cameraman shot Surf at Monterey in 1897. Pounding surf, brooding forest, rugged wilderness, and verdant valleys have featured in hundreds of movies and countless TV shows and commercials. It has also doubled for the coasts of New England, old England, France, Norway, Russia and beyond. Being a dedicated film buff, I grabbed a front row seat, sans popcorm. for a matinee showing of Monterey Peninsula, a movie star for the ages.
Monterey’s Mosaic Mural Memorializes Missions, Marauding Mariners & More
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
With more Mexican-era adobe buildings preserved and restored in downtown Monterey than anywhere else in the state, the city is proud of its heritage as the early capital of California. In late 2018, I revisited two public projects that have been recently updated and enhanced to present in novel and interesting ways the dramatic events that have shaped the history of the city.
Story and Photos by David A. Laws.
Byron, Keats, Wordsworth – for a few brief months in 1820, when his first book of verse topped the English best seller list, John Clare, who worked as a farm laborer near Peterborough 80 miles north of London, outsold them all. Hailed as the “Peasant Poet” by London society for his vivid descriptions of landscapes and English rural life, fickle popular taste rejected his more accomplished later works. Much of his work was inspired by the natural landscape of what is now known as John Clare Country.
John Steinbeck: “Something to do in Salinas”
Story and photos by David Laws. “There was always something to do in Salinas. For pure culture we had The World of Art, with slides in a big tent with wooden benches” but, as Nobel Prize-winning writer John Steinbeck quipped in a 1955 memoir of his hometown, “the town preferred to hear Joe Conner sing Irish songs.” (Always 59)
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