Heya Everyone!

Here's a quick page I've put together so you all can see what Monterey and the surrounding area look like.  I'm very happy to have had the opportunity to live in this spectacularly beautiful region of California over the past two years and I will truly miss it once I graduate and pursue my career goals elsewhere.  Who knows, perhaps I shall return some day...

This site contains some 130 images of Monterey, the Monterey Bay Aquarium, Pacific Grove, Point Lobos State Reserve and Garrapata State Beach, so if all the pictures don't load properly at first, just click on the refresh button in your browser.  Also, what lacks in terms of information describing the pictures (I'm coming up to the final two weeks of my master degree program and don't have a lot of time to be making web pages!) is made up in the sheer beauty and color of the region.  Enjoy your tour!

Above: a truly gorgeous shot of deep red ice plant in bloom atop colorful hillsides and kissed by the waters of the seductively blue Pacific.  This is my favorite beach to just sit on and do homework as the California sun drifts lazily across the sky above.

Garrapata State Park

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=579

The park has two miles of beach front, with coastal hiking and a 50-foot climb to a beautiful view of the Pacific. With 2,879 acres, the park offers diverse coastal vegetation with trails running from ocean beaches into dense redwood groves. The park also features outstanding coastal headlands at Soberanes Point. Sea lions, harbor seals and sea otters frequent the coastal waters and California gray whales pass close by during their yearly migration

Me looking a little perplexed and stuffy.  Could it be my allergies and all those flowers behind me?!?

Above: moss covered rocks dripping with water that percolates out of the hillsides down onto the white sands below.

A nice overview of the history of Monterey can be found at: http://www.monterey.org/museum/history.html

Come step into the past on the "Monterey Walking Path of History."  Stand on the site where Father Junipero Serra and Captain Gaspar de Portola founded this city in 1770.  Trading ships and Boston whalers anchored here often.  You can still stroll on a whalebone sidewalk and explore the same streets walked by Robert Louis Stevenson, General William T. Sherman, and Richard Henry Dana, author of Two Years Before the Mast.  Century-old adobes with find furnishings and secluded gardens await you.

Above: Thomas Cole House (description found on a local sign)

Thomas Cole, an English sawyer, built this home for his family in 1856.  Used over time as a dwelling house, it became headquarters for the local Nationalist Chinese Political Party in the early 1940s.

Originally built for the storage of US military supplies in 1847, this adobe building has seen many uses.  It has been a hotel, housed county offices, law offices, a church, a ballroom, a newspaper and several other activities.  Today it functions as a history museum featuring the various historical periods in California's past.

This unique building was built in the 1840s by Jack Swan, an English sailor who decided to stay in Monterey.  Swan constructed the building as a saloon with adjoining apartments.  There were four two-room apartments, each with outside east and west doors and a back room fireplace.  The apartments were separated by partitions which could be raised or lowered as needed.  Swan allowed soldiers from the New York Volunteers, assigned to Monterey, to put on plays in the building, hence the name.

Site of the California Constitutional Convention in 1849.  Forty-eight delegates from all parts of California met here to write the Constitution of California.  This fine structure had been recently constructed under the direction of the Reverend Walter Colton, a chaplain in the United States Navy and Monterey's first American Alcalde. 

Above: the Monterey Institute library.  I usually take up shop on the second floor in front of the large arched window which has a nice view of the trees just across the street.

A National Trust Building run by the State of California, Cooper-Molera tells the story of the Cooper family through three generations.  Constructed from 1827 to 1900, today the adobe is the site of a historic garden, carriage display and visitor center.

Above: there are deer all around the area so you should always drive with at least one eye looking around for deer!

Above: presumably Pacific Grove gets its name from the fact that there are groves of trees everywhere and because it lies along the Pacific?

Above: Entrance to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  Opened in 1986 and nearly doubled in size in 1996, the aquarium exhibits approximately 550 species of sea life and receives over 1.8 million visitors a year.

Above: one of many types of jelly fish on view at the aquarium which features the largest scale jellies exhibits anywhere in the world.

Above and below: fascinating jellyfish, one with spectacular shades of purple and blue, and others that swim upside down with their tentacles ready to catch anything that swims by.

Above: crazy little jellies with oscillating ridges that reflect ambient light mimicking bioluminescence.

http://www.mbayaq.org/

Penguins: http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/efc_fo/fo_peng_cam.asp

Otters: http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/efc_fo/fo_ottr_cam.asp

Kelp tank: http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/efc_hp/hp_kelp_cam.asp

Sharks: http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/efc_smm/smm_cam.asp?bhcp=1

Outer Bay: http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/efc_hp/hp_obw_cam.asp

Monterey Bay: http://www.mbayaq.org/vi/vi_aquarium/vi_monterey_cam.asp?bhcp=1

The Outer Bay exhibit which contains marine life found in open ocean waters of the temperate Eastern Pacific.  This tank holds more than a million gallons of seawater and is viewed through one of the largest windows in the world at 54 feet long and 15 feet tall.  In the tank you can find schools of giant bluefin tuna, bonito, California barracuda, sea turtles and hammerhead sharks.

Above: quite possibly the most charming gas station I've ever seen.  These California gas prices, however, leave little to be adored.

Detailed information can be found at: http://pt-lobos.parks.state.ca.us/

Above: the park is easily accessible by car although it will cost you $9 to enter.  The good thing is though that once you pay to get into the park, you may also visit any of the other park reserves in the area without having to pay again.

Above and below: I love the way local forests of pine and cypress fade into grass which then crumbles into the sea.

Above: script and symbols from an alien race impressed upon the exposed rock face, or just the mud from the underside of a tourist's shoe?  You decide!

"Greetings from the central Californian coast!  Time to race back to school and get some work done so I can graduate with my master degree next month.  Woo hoo!"

This is a non-profit educational website. Any supplementary information or imagery is used purely for educational purposes.

Except where noted, all text and images: copyright 2005, danielschereck.com