Wow! The awful drive thru LA was well worth the final destination at Crystal Cove State Park (between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach). We were thankful that Monday was a holiday (not to say that there wasn't plenty of traffic). It didn't take us as long to get here as we'd thought, so we had time to kill before our 3:00 checkin. We got off the freeway at Seal Beach and drove down PCH (Pacific Coast Hwy) to Huntington Beach. We found a huge parkinglot south of town and thought we'd stop for an hour or two and walk along the beach to kill time. Turned out to be a little more complicated than we thought. Because we didn't want to stay for the full day, the only way we could pay for our parking was to set up an online account and pay our hourly parking by credit card. Then, we needed multiple parking spaces to accommodate our RV and tow car (which was a no/no but we did it anyway because the parkinglot was near empty and no one was checking). We went for a walk along the bike/jogging trail for about an hour and then continued south to the state park. We got there a little after 2:00 and they told us we couldn't have our site until 3:00 (even though there wasn't anyone in it and it was ready) We were asked to disconnect the car and go back outside the entrance until 3:00 (silly government rules???). We took our time disconnecting and before we moved anywhere, they told us to wait another 15 minutes and then we could go to our site. We're sitting on a bluff above Hwy 1 with unobstructed views of the ocean. We'll be be here til Thursday. The weather is supposed to be in the mid to upper 60s, but could see some rain Tuesday (boo). Wednesday on should be better, with Thursday getting close to 70 (yeah). We're not going very far on Friday...Oceanside.
Day 11, Tuesday January 19
Tuesday was a visiting with family day. We went to Lake Elsinor to visit Dave's mother. His brother and sister-in-law came out too, so we got a good visit with some of the family. We drove over a road they call the Ortega Highway. It connects San Juan Capistrano and Lake Elsinor. It's a narrow, switchback, 2-lane road that the locals drive very fast and pass where there is no passing permitted!! It's the major route for commuters who live on the east side of the mountain and work on the west. It's never our favorite route, but the quickest way to get to Lake Elsinor from where we are. We made it over and back in one piece (hurray).
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