In Carmel the trucks in which garbage is collected are adorned with baskets of flowers. The street signs bear carved and painted decorations—a pine cone, a squirrel, a ship under full sail, or something else associated with the region. The shops are small but legion, many of them hidden away in courts and arcades which the non-resident is likely to pass unwittingly. Their stocks are fabulous—and not all of it expensive, either.
In between are quaint places to lodge, to lunch, to dine or take tea after the English manner. Of course there are conventional establishments, too, but somehow everything in Carmel seems to have just a little different flavor.
The town stands on an oak-and-pine-clad slope with a magnificent beach fronting on Carmel Bay at its foot. Along the shore is a lovely drive, on which are homes beyond the dreams of most folk. Back among the trees are others. The comfortable domiciles built by the original artist colony still exist, but they are a minority; Carmel has become a place to which the wealthy, as well as the well-to-do and the merely comfortable, come to spend their later years.
Carmel has an outdoor theater, a Bach Festival and an art gallery maintained by an artists’ co-operative. Its Church of the Wayfarer has a garden containing, it is said, every tree, shrub, herb and flower mentioned in the Bible. Other gardens, formal and informal, are everywhere. Once a year a number of the finest are thrown open for public inspection.
And then there is the Mission San Carlos de Borromeo, where Father Serra held sway. The present church is not the one he knew; it was not begun until nine years after his death in 1784. But under its sanctuary floor he, Padre Crespi, Padre Lasuen and another lie buried. The structure has many features distinctive from the usual mission architecture, among them its massive south tower, with outside staircase and Saracenic dome, and a star window. It is of sandstone and has a vaulted roof as it did originally but in restoration the roof angle was made less sharp. Some of the original decoration may be seen in a small chapel to the left of the entrance. In a side chapel is a magnificent sarcophagus in marble and bronze, the work of Jo Mora.
A few miles south of the old mission is one of Nature’s wonderlands—Point Lobos Reserve State Park. Here stands the second native grove of Monterey Cypress, and here the ocean batters ceaselessly against spectacular rocky points which rise precipitously to make fjord-like coves. In these deep, sharp, inlets the blue water boils into furious bursts of white foam and spray, forming always-changing pictures of incomparable beauty.
Lush Valleys of the Salinas and Pajaro Rivers Rich in Pastoral Charm, Even Richer in Their Vast Yields of Lettuce, Apples, Berries, Livestock
Lettuce, famed “green gold” of the Salinas region, stretches in row after row for miles along the highways through the valley.
