I returned from my vision quest early Friday evening. I'm actually wishing I'd posted about it sooner, because then I'd be able to relate the experiences in a manner that was entertaining to read, as opposed to something that simply sounds like a grocery list. Particularly considering that there are other things to post about as well.

At any rate, I left Shane and Erika's house in San Luis Obispo at about noon on Thursday and drove north on the 101, which takes you through mostly rural, agricultural regions...of course, that's pretty much all there is along the Central Coast to begin with. The region is peppered with small, one horse towns that make San Luis look like a thriving metropolis. Of particular note was the "city" of San Lucas, about 70 miles to the north of SLO. San Lucas has a population of 472, and there was one restuarant on the only road in the town. I thought about eating at this restaurant, but then thought better of it and continued driving along the frontage road until I reached King City. I stopped in King City and ate lunch at the Wild Horse Cafe at the truck stop there. It was the kind of restaurant that caters solely to truckers and other denizens of the lonely highway such as myself. The food left quite a bit to be desired, but I ate all of it anyway.

I continued driving northward after leaving King City. I didn't really have any particular destination in mind, so I just drove. I knew that at some point I wanted to end up at Big Sur. When I reached Salinas, I decided to head west, so I got off the 101 and took the 68 toward Monterey. At this point, it was getting kind of late so I opted not to go into Monterey, but instead drove south on the Pacific Coast Highway. I drove through Carmel but didn't stop there either because I was eager to get to Big Sur, as it was now about 5:00. (Incidentally, my parents were married in Carmel on September 11, 1965.)

I arrived in Big Sur at about 5:45 and went to the Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. I paid the nice ranger $12 for the camp ground and then went to my isolated spot. Because it was both off-season and a Thursday, there was almost nobody else there in the park. There were maybe one or two other occupied camping spots but, for the most part, it was a veritable ghost town. I set up the "tent" (which amounted to little more than a glorified sleeping bag with a door on it) that I had borrowed from Shane Ross, and then went for a short hike. I hiked along this trail, and crossed a log that served as a makeshift bridge for a small river. On the other side of the river, I followed the trail until the moment when my vision quest came to fruition. The redwoods gave way to a wide open meadow. I walked into the meadow and, about halfway across, suddenly found myself in the midst of about eight deer. I stopped where I was because I didn't want to disturb them. I slowly moved forward to see how close I could get and came within ten feet of one of them. I stood there for quite a while, and all the deer were grazing all around me. I knew that my totem was the deer and, from that day forward, I would be known as Walks With Deer.

I noticed that it was getting dark, so I turned and left the deer to their grazing and hiked back to my campsite. I went to sleep at about 10 o'clock and woke up Friday morning around 6 am. I packed up and began the drive home.

The Central Coast, along PCH, is quite spectacular in the early morning, with all the fog banks rolling in and out from the Pacific. At several points I stopped at turnouts and took some pictures of the scenery. At one vista point, I saw what would have been the absolute perfect picture, so I got my camera ready, and then decided that it might look better from a different angle. In the time that it took me to move from one point to another (probably about five seconds) a fog bank rolled in and the picture was ruined.

At any rate, I arrived back in Los Angeles at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon and spent Friday evening not doing much at all. My roommate had a few of his friends over, so I hung out with them. Not too exciting.

Yesterday was a pretty busy day. At about 11, I left the house and went to the bank in Pasadena to get some money and some traveller's cheques. I was informed by the teller, however, that since I had an American Express gold card (he saw it when I showed him my license) I should go to the American Express office where I could get the cheques free of charge. I'm sure Henry Wells was turning over in his grave knowing that a teller was referring business elsewhere.

After my business was taken care of, I drove to Rosemead to meet Katie for lunch, since she was there setting up her classroom. After lunch, I ended up getting suckered in to helping her set some stuff up, and also broke the sink in her room in the process.

Last night, I went out to dinner with some friends from the Shoah Foundation in honor of Christine Czismadia's birthday. Actually, her birthday was on September 8, but the celebration was postponed until last night for some reason. We ate at Caffe Luna on Melrose in Hollywood. The food was good, but I think that we had perhaps the most incompetent waiter who has ever waited tables anywhere.

Well, seeing as I am leaving the country tomorrow, there are loads of things I should be doing- starting primarily with laundry. So, I'm going to go get those things done. Or maybe I'll watch TV.