Scenery was amazing. . . .
We took the Oakland Bay Bridge over to SF and then headed south on The Peninsula from The City.
Leaving "Oaktown" on the newer single-tower eastern span out to Yerba Buena Island I saw an interesting bunch of towers:
The single tower on the Oakland side of Yerba Buena Island:
"So how's Yer BaBuena?" he asked. . .
"Passable." she replied. . . .
Now how many towers are there on the Oakland Bay Bridge?
GG is looking purty nice today, too. . .
As is "the pyramid". . .
20 miles or so south of the SF city line we come upon the seaside resort of Pacifica. . .
And make our way thru it (in a long line of cars on the Pacific Coast Highway, Rte 1), till we turn off it just before the north end of the newly-built tunnel. An amazing engineering feat, with a tall bridge leading up to it at its north end.
The view of the bridge and tunnel from the parking lot at north end of Devil's Slide Trail:
Just a friendly suggestion. Horse-pies are not appreciated on this paved trail.
A nice trail. . .
1.3 miles long to the south end of the tunnel, but along the coastline that has slipped and slid down into the ocean many times in the past. . .
Here we come!
They used to have a much shorter tunnel, closer to the coastline it seems:
The trail was not too steep at first. . .
The rock strata was interesting at the north end of the trail. . .
Bit of an uphill jaunt to the first overlook. . . "C'mon you guys," it seems TJ is hinting.
Nice view. Too bad the telescope was out of order and I forgot to bring my binoculars.
Dis place is faw da boyds. . . .
Nice place to nest. . . .
Uhhhh, yeah. . . . I see why they call it Devil's Slide. . .
Downhill side. . .
But we are still climbing uphill. . .
We stopped in the shade of this tree to have our lunch. Sammitches provided by James and Jessica. (Not many shaded spots along the way.)
Part of the retaining wall. . . on the ocean side of the trail. By this time, Barbara and I were in charge of the boys as we continued south on the trail. James and Jessica agreed to go get the car, drive thru the tunnel and meet Barb and me and the boys at the parking lot near the south end of the tunnel. We had come down a steep bit of trail and figured it'd be better to continue walking downward instead of turning around and going back (9% grade signs were at a couple of points along the trail).
Two little Dutch boys think they can plug up the dike and hold back the ocean.
"Nah. Let's go, Teddy!"
The retaining wall along a section of the 'mountain' side of the trail reminded me of the 'anchors' in NY's World Trade Center 'Tub'. . .
Explaining just why this one particular section of (what once was) the road was so prone to landslides. . .
Now we are using those holes as portholes to peep thru. . .
Interesting tree atop that outcrop. . .
A bit of a mesh. . . .
Trail got darned close to the edge at points. . .
We did see some pelicans, California condors and hawks, as well as some small songbirds with unusual twitters. . .
A World War II "Pillbox" was at the top of one cliff. . .
Looking back towards where we'd come from, to the north, from the Scenic Viewpoint near the "pillbox" outcrop. . . .
Looking southward and uphill from about the same vantage point as above. . . Looks like a staircase was built into the side of the outcrop to reach the pillbox.
Newer fencing was installed, obviously because the stone wall that was part of the onetime road is so very short.
Another pillbox? Not sure what it is!
You can see the old stone wall behind the fence.
Nice flowers.
Near a steep cliff.
Fenced in!
Looking south. . .
A cormorant, condor, or turkey vulture? Dunno, but it was huge.
Nearer to the south end. . .
Fault line? Nah. Least I don't think so.
Jess spotted it. It spouted several times, but didn't breech. If you look very closely you can see the spray at about 2 o'clock of center. We'll have to go back and do some whale-watching when they say migration season is in full swing.
Cliff-diving prohibited.
More about the birds. . .
So, for many many years the local folks resisted bypassing the coastline and 'installing' a tunnel to do so. Then some years back after a landslide cut off a lot of folks "from the outside world" they finally agreed to the mile-long tunnel and conversion of what had been the coastal highway road to this beautiful trail. Glad they did so!
At the south end of the trail, looking back. . .
The south parking lot. Our chariot awaits!
Uhhhh, keep the kids away from this. . .
Dunno if that's another pillbox (but I doubt it) on top of that outcrop a bit farther south of the parking lot at this end. . .
Looks a bit unstable even here. . .
We wanna go left, and thru the new tunnel, back towards Pacifica and then The Pretty City again. . .
Two tubes. . .
Light at the end. . .
As Gloria Estefan once sang, "coming out of the dark". . .
On the way back towards Pacifica. . . "From the Eucalyptus Tree forest, to the Gulfstream waters, this land was made for you and me."
Coming back into Pacifica, but from the south this time. . .
Getting closer to SF, James started singing "Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same."
The Pretty City beckons us again. . .
In there, between that tall building and the clock-tower is where we wanna be. . .
Nice Labor Day on The Bay, as seen from Oakland Bay Bridge. . .
West side of ''the Island Nation" of Alameda as seen from same. This flat part of Alameda is where Jamie and Adam of "Mythbusters" used to blow things up, as I understand it.
Our one-of-a-kind tower on the Oaktown side of Yerba Buena island again. . .
The old span still is being demolished. I heard in the news just this week that there've been suggestions to just get it over with and implode the remainder of it.
The rest of the above "bridge to nowhere". . .
And we are ba-ack. . . .
It was a very good day!
