WHERE IT BEGAN

“We had no set plan, and no set destination. Just three weeks, two surfboards, a mop of hair, and a collection of maps I picked up the day before.”

Desperately needing a break from the normalized monotony that is university, my pal and I packed in my ‘98 Jetta and drove south. The destination was LA. Or was it the Baja? San Francisco would be a good stop, no?

We had no set plan, and no set destination. Just three weeks, two surfboards, a mop of hair, and a collection of maps I picked up the day before.

Well.. we never made it to the Baja. We barely made it to LA. somehow, while driving down highway 101, we managed to lose a wheel. Yes, you read that right. lose a wheel. My poor Jetta.

After spending a day walking around seaside California in the baking heat, rethinking our every decision and lack of preparedness, we decided to continue the trip, although it wouldn’t be quite as planned. Our car needed a handful of new parts that would take a week to repair. Luckily, the VW dealership had a rental car we could borrow. Not just any rental car, though. A fiat. A fiat 500. No roof racks, and two surfboards packed into one of the smallest vehicles on the planet. We couldn’t help but scream with laughter at our predicament.

We were told not to leave the sleepy, desolate town of seaside.. but we were not willing to give up on our trip just yet. After sparking a conversation with one of the mechanics, we heard of a place called Big Sur. This goes to show how little research we did for this trip - neither of us had even heard of Big Sur before. We arrived after dusk to find all the campgrounds overfilled with tourists and surf bums like us. Shit. Where were we going to sleep?

After a few hours of searching, and several ‘full occupancy’ signs later, we stumbled upon a clifftop campground with the most remarkable view over the ocean. We were stopped by the campground operator, who laughed at our predicament and offered us a patch of grass behind her RV. We shared a few swigs of whiskey around a fire before laying our heads down. We ended up staying for several days. The rest of the trip followed a similar tune.

One for the books.

California, USA

Summer 2016

Canon AE-1