We left the Redwoods on Thursday 9^th October with 2 days to get us down the coast to San Francisco where we had booked a campsite. We don’t normally book ahead but when it is in cities we always reckon it’s best not to risk it.

By the time we had finished up checking out the big trees and taken a quick walk through the drive through tree at Leggett the sun was setting.  We’d decided we wanted to take the coast road down to San Fran as we go no faster on the big highways as we do on the little roads what with us being on the large side… Also it is far less nerve wracking being on 2 lane highways than 4 lanes in each direction.

So we set off from Leggett at the start of the Pacific Coast Highway towards the next town heading south with a campsite and more importantly a restaurant. Only 27 miles so we thought we’d be there by 7-7.30pm.  Ha Ha Ha. The sat nav said it was going to take 2 hours. Rubbish we thought and off we went. Well she was right (as always!!). It was the most narrow and windy road we had seen so far. We barely got out of 2^nd gear most of the way up or down again. John and William were up front and Charlie and I were clinging onto each other in the back.

So it was that at 9pm we arrived starving and totally strung out into the tiny town of Westport. The ‘restaurant’ was a deli at the front of a motel and when I walked through the door there was only a very old man being helped up out of his armchair by a lady who asked me what the time was and then told me that they were no longer serving food. It looked as if they hadn’t been serving food in about 10 years!!  The campsite seemed ok, what we could see of it in the dark and was certainly near the sea as we could hear it. So it was one of those nights when cheese on toast is all the supper we can rustle up.

We woke the next day to clouds, which meant we had to dig to the bottom of our wardrobes for jeans. (Like the use of the word ‘wardrobe’ there? Anyone who has seen in Frankie will understand that what I actually meant was the bottom of 3 plastic crates of crumpled up clothing that is accessed only by puling out all the other boxes first and then attempting to shove them back in with the lids bursting off. It is one of my favourite things about living in Frankie – truly!!!).  We didn’t exactly make use of the facilities here other than a quick wander down to the beach. Back onto highway 1 and progress was slow. Although absolutely stunning in terms of the views from the road, the road is very narrow, very windy and has so many switchbacks it made what we had driven so far seem mild.

By lunch time we had only made it 25 miles further south down to the lovely town of Mendocino. Or ‘Spendocino’ as it is affectionately dubbed by the folks round these parts! It is a very cutesy little harbour town, which has been used for the location of lots of TV shows including Murder She Wrote – it was instantly recognisable. We had a nice lunch, some overpriced organic coffee and ice cream and spent a fortune in their book store then got back on the road.

More nail biting miles as Frankie barely made it round some of the tight switchbacks and we were so close to the edge of the road and cliff that it was almost a relief when the fog rolled in as the afternoon wore on. At least then it felt as if we were driving through the middle of clouds rather than balancing in a 28’ van with 8’ trailer on the edge of some very high cliffs about the sea! In fact Charlie very accurately described the scene was “as if the clouds had collapsed” – spot on I’d say!

We got to Salt Point State Park just before sunset and spurned a site with full hook up etc. in favour of their over flow carpark. Sounds strange but we have sort of seen enough of lovely forested campsites with fire pits and pine needles everywhere. What we were interested in was the view over the cliffs. We watched the sun go down out our window and more excitedly watched the fog literally roll in towards us like a huge tidal wave.

Saturday 11^th we woke to clear blue skies which made us feel slightly more confidant about the last 70 or miles we had to go to get to San Francisco. We had a very blustery walk along the cliff and were well rewarded with spotting seals, turkey vultures and American eagles right there in front of us.

We headed to the town of Jenner for breakfast (thought of you Sally!!). We were now very much into the stretch of coast just above San Fran and it felt like this where they might come for the weekend. Each little town had trendy coffee shops and restaurants with valet parking, which seemed a bit excessive in a little beachside seafood restaurant!! Jenner was definitely one of those towns and we had to squeeze Frankie into a layby half way up a cliff as there wasn’t a single parking space in town. Never the best of feelings to leave our ‘home’ on a steep slope next to the waters edge.. Worth it though for the yummy coffees and blueberry scones we had sat by the waters edge watching the paddle boarders going out with a man strumming his guitar outside the café. Highlight of the day was that we finally got to spot a hummingbird up close. Just buzzing around the flowers outside the café – the kids were delighted.

Our progress didn’t exactly speed up and we took most of the day growing only slightly weary of the dramatic Pacific Coast Highway.

One last stop in Point Reyes and we picked up a pizza –  had to take a photo of Will as he looked so grown up and this seemed a scary glimpse into the future!!.

We were however only too pleased to finally glimpse the Golden Gate Bridge early evening on Saturday – San Francisco at last.