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Santa Cruz
Dec. 4th, 2007 12:16 amThis weekend Bree and I made the trek up to Santa Cruz for a very compressed but entertaining visit. On Friday afternoon it was pouring rain in southern California for the first time in a very long while; city streets were snarled and I can only imagine the freeways were a disaster, so we left bright and early on Saturday. 5:30 AM!
We breakfasted at the Cold Spring Tavern on the San Marcos Pass (CA-154), which I had recently read about in the Los Angeles Times. It was #2 on their "15 places to visit to see the real California" published a few weeks ago, and in good company with other items on that list. The place is terribly atmospheric--you could probably plunk someone doen from the late 19th century and they wouldn't immediately notice the new century, except perhaps for a slight excess of "flair" on the walls. At 8 AM the air was crisp and chilly inside the restaurant, not yet warmed by the woodfire. We dined on country-fried steak and biscuits and gravy in the dim glow of a kerosene lantern. We overheard another party ordering beer and whiskey to complement their morning meal.
We made it to Santa Cruz just barely in time for the fermentation workshop that was our stated purpose for visiting. I particularly enjoyed the presentation on Tempeh production by Manfred Warmuth. That man is awesome, and a true tempeh/fermentation enthusiast. And a professor of computer science. He gives his contact information as simply "google manfred". Despite having such a common (German) first name, he is the fourth search result on (American) google. If he had a fan club, I'd join it. Meanwhile, workshop participants stochastically interjected anti-capitalist slogans. Ah, Santa Cruz.
Our host for the evening was Alex at the Twelve Tribes Co-op, an eight-person Jewish-themed house, where we found an uncommonly high density of very friendly folks. My interest in train hopping was made known, and Alex showed us videos from his hitchhiking trip from Ukiah to Bolivia. It turns out that the train-hopping portion occurred on none other than the Copper Canyon Railroad, the same route on which![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
four and I were once paying travelers on the passenger train. Alex actually rode on the roof of a boxcar on a freight train. It looked totally terrifying, albeit with awesome views! No couchsurfing trip would be complete without running into another physics student, and in this case we were quickly rewarded by meeting Zack, a first-year physics grad student at UCSC. The four of us enjoyed an intermission from the 12-tribes party in which we acquired delicious donuts at Ferrell's.
On Sunday we woke somewhat late (but still all-too-early) and Alex offered us delicious coffee. I do not know why, but coffee in the Bay Area just tastes better than most other places (e.g. southern California). (Is it the water? Or the coffee? Or the preparation?)
We wandered theUCSC campus briefly. Most of the university grounds consist of a huge forest, and we hiked up a fire road into this forest in search of "tree number nine," a redwood we were told was climbable and offered an excellent view. We found thousands of other trees, but not number nine. The forest is a patchwork of different kinds of forests. There are patches of redwood forest and patches of oak forest and interesting patches of moss-covered manzanita that make you feel that you're in a fantasy novel.
I have heard that students build elaborate treehouses in the forest, and live in them. I asked about these treehouses and was told, "oh, the woodsies live in them." I asked where I could find these "woodsies" and was told that they could not be found. I was told that they moved their treehouses every three weeks, via zip-line. Others told me that the University routinely removes treehouses from the forest. One person I asked about treehouses launched into a diatribe concerning the military-industrial complex. Another gave specific directions.
On our journey home we were accompanied by Sav and Oliver, who had replied to my craigslist advertisement offering a ride to Los Angeles from Santa Cruz, the first leg of their own Grand Hitchhiking Adventure, from Zami co-op in Santa Cruz to LA to Joshua Tree to Austin to New Orleans to New York to Europe. We stopped in San Luis Obispo for burritos. Sav explained that she changed her name for every trip and that she was mulling over "Tobin" for future use.
Our passengers deposited at their friend's house in Echo Park, we arrived home again at about 1 AM.
[spoonless: sorry we didn't manage to meet up! next time!]
We breakfasted at the Cold Spring Tavern on the San Marcos Pass (CA-154), which I had recently read about in the Los Angeles Times. It was #2 on their "15 places to visit to see the real California" published a few weeks ago, and in good company with other items on that list. The place is terribly atmospheric--you could probably plunk someone doen from the late 19th century and they wouldn't immediately notice the new century, except perhaps for a slight excess of "flair" on the walls. At 8 AM the air was crisp and chilly inside the restaurant, not yet warmed by the woodfire. We dined on country-fried steak and biscuits and gravy in the dim glow of a kerosene lantern. We overheard another party ordering beer and whiskey to complement their morning meal.
We made it to Santa Cruz just barely in time for the fermentation workshop that was our stated purpose for visiting. I particularly enjoyed the presentation on Tempeh production by Manfred Warmuth. That man is awesome, and a true tempeh/fermentation enthusiast. And a professor of computer science. He gives his contact information as simply "google manfred". Despite having such a common (German) first name, he is the fourth search result on (American) google. If he had a fan club, I'd join it. Meanwhile, workshop participants stochastically interjected anti-capitalist slogans. Ah, Santa Cruz.
Our host for the evening was Alex at the Twelve Tribes Co-op, an eight-person Jewish-themed house, where we found an uncommonly high density of very friendly folks. My interest in train hopping was made known, and Alex showed us videos from his hitchhiking trip from Ukiah to Bolivia. It turns out that the train-hopping portion occurred on none other than the Copper Canyon Railroad, the same route on which
four and I were once paying travelers on the passenger train. Alex actually rode on the roof of a boxcar on a freight train. It looked totally terrifying, albeit with awesome views! No couchsurfing trip would be complete without running into another physics student, and in this case we were quickly rewarded by meeting Zack, a first-year physics grad student at UCSC. The four of us enjoyed an intermission from the 12-tribes party in which we acquired delicious donuts at Ferrell's.On Sunday we woke somewhat late (but still all-too-early) and Alex offered us delicious coffee. I do not know why, but coffee in the Bay Area just tastes better than most other places (e.g. southern California). (Is it the water? Or the coffee? Or the preparation?)
We wandered the
I have heard that students build elaborate treehouses in the forest, and live in them. I asked about these treehouses and was told, "oh, the woodsies live in them." I asked where I could find these "woodsies" and was told that they could not be found. I was told that they moved their treehouses every three weeks, via zip-line. Others told me that the University routinely removes treehouses from the forest. One person I asked about treehouses launched into a diatribe concerning the military-industrial complex. Another gave specific directions.
On our journey home we were accompanied by Sav and Oliver, who had replied to my craigslist advertisement offering a ride to Los Angeles from Santa Cruz, the first leg of their own Grand Hitchhiking Adventure, from Zami co-op in Santa Cruz to LA to Joshua Tree to Austin to New Orleans to New York to Europe. We stopped in San Luis Obispo for burritos. Sav explained that she changed her name for every trip and that she was mulling over "Tobin" for future use.
Our passengers deposited at their friend's house in Echo Park, we arrived home again at about 1 AM.
[
spoonless: sorry we didn't manage to meet up! next time!]
