After leaving the seal show, we drove to Big Sur Julia Burns State Park to see McWay waterfall. We arrived at the park and started the trail towards the waterfall overlook. Although the overlook was amazing, I really wanted to climb down to the beach, but it appeared we were unable to. There was a carving in the sand that said Elvis Swims Here so somebody was clearly down there as some point. The views were amazing. We then headed to another trail which had many California Redwood Trees. This was a preview of things we will see later in our trip. The trees were huge and we could have walked around there all day, but I had to remind everyone we still had quite a bit of travel today, so we headed north on the PCH again.

We had worked up an apetite, so we went to Big Sur Bakery. We found out that they close up between lunch and dinner, so they recommended walking down the stairs to the Big Sur TapHouse. It was a quaint little place and had decent food. The price was a bit steep, but since it is one of the only options for food for quite awhile, it is what it is. They did have a nice patio where we sat and enjoyed our luncheon. They also had nice wooden chairs to relax in after we ate, so the kids hung out there a bit too.

We then continued north on the PCH to the Bixby Creek Bridge. We made a stop there for some photos, and then finished the short drive into Carmel-by-the-sea. Heather loved the little beach town and all the cute houses. We drove through the town and saw a bakery and sweet shop so we parked the car and headed to the Carmel Bakery. Heather got some pastries. We then walked down to Carmel’s Cottage of Sweets. The kids and I loaded up on the sugar stuff there, and then we headed to Salinas where we stay tonight.

At the hotel, the lady at check-in told me the jacuzzi was a balmy 105 degrees. Since we had been experiencing the cold all day, the family decided to take a dip and warm up. We then grabbed a bite at El Pollo Loco and turned in for the evening.

Tomorrow San Francisco…