No road in the whole country is more famous than Monterey's seventeen-mile drive; one could never become weary of its glorious bits of coast—wide vistas of summer seas and gnarled old cypresses, found nowhere else in the New World. It is still called the seventeen-mile drive, though it has been added to until there are forty miles of macadam boulevard on the peninsula. Leaving Monterey we passed the presidio, where a regiment of United States regulars is permanently stationed—being mostly troops enroute to, or returning from, the Philippines. Near the entrance is a marble statue of the patron saint of Monterey, Father Serra, commemorating his landing in 1770. It shows the good priest stepping from the boat, Bible in hand, to begin work in the new field. This monument was the gift of Mrs. Leland Stanford, to whose munificence California is so greatly indebted. A cross just outside the entrance, standing in the place of the ancient oak whose dead trunk we saw at San Carlos Church, is supposed to mark the exact landing-spot of both Serra and Viscaino. There is also the Sloat monument, reared of stones from every county in the state, which commemorates the raising of the American flag by the admiral in 1846. The roads in the presidio are open to motors and one may witness the daily military exercises from a comfortable seat in his car.
EVENING NEAR MONTEREY
From Original Painting by Sydney J. Yard
Beyond the presidio is Pacific Grove, a resort town nearly as large as Monterey—just why "Pacific Grove" is not clear, for there are not many trees in the town. It was founded in 1869 as a camp-meeting ground and is still famous as a headquarters for religious societies. From here one may take a glass-bottomed boat to view the "marine gardens," which are said to surpass those at Avalon.
Beyond Pacific Grove we passed through a dense pine forest—this is the Pacific Grove, perhaps—and coming into the open, we followed white sand dunes for some distance along the sea. A sign, "Moss Beach," called for an immediate halt and the ladies found treasures untold in the strange, brilliantly colored bits of moss and sea-weed washed ashore here in unlimited quantities. It is a wild, boulder-strewn bit of beach, damp with spray and resonant with the swish of the waves among the rocks. Beyond here the road continues through dunes, brilliant in places with pink and yellow sand-flowers. We passed Point Joe, Restless Sea—where two opposing currents wrestle in an eternal maelstrom—Bird Rocks, and Seal Rocks—the latter the home of the largest sea-lion colony on the coast. The sea was glorious beyond description; perhaps the same is true of any sunny day at Monterey, and nearly all days at Monterey are sunny. It showed all tones of blue, from solid indigo to pale sapphire, with a strip of light emerald near the shore, edged by the long, white breakers chafing on the beach. Here and there, at some distance from the shore, the deep-blue expanse was broken by patches of royal purple—an effect produced by the floating kelp. A clear azure sky bent down to the wide circle of the horizon, with an occasional white sail or steamer to break the sweep of one's vision over the waste of shining water. It is not strange that Stevenson, who had seen and written so much of the sea, should say of such a scene, "No other coast have I enjoyed so much in all weather—such a spectacle of ocean's greatness, such beauty of changing color, and so much thunder in the sound—as at Monterey."
The climax of the seventeen-mile drive is Cypress Point, with its weird old trees. Description and picture are weak to give any true conception of these fantastic, wind-blown monsters. It is, indeed, as Stevenson wrote—and who was able to judge of such things better than he?—"No words can give any idea of the contortions of their growth; they might figure without a change in the nether hell as Dante pictured it." And yet, with all their suggestion of the infernal regions, there is much of beauty and charm in their very deformity. There is about them a certain strength and ruggedness, born of their age-long defiance to the wild northwestern winds, that is alike an admonition and an inspiration to the beholder. If you would get my idea, select one of these strange trees standing by itself in solemn majesty on some rocky headland—as shown in Mr. Moran's splendid picture—and note how its very form and attitude breathe defiance to the forces that would beat it down and destroy it. Or take another which lies almost prone on the brown earth, its monstrous arms writhing in a thousand contortions, yet its expanse of moss-green foliage rising but little higher than your head, and note how it has stooped to conquer these same adverse elements.
OLD CYPRESSES ON THE SEVENTEEN-MILE DRIVE, MONTEREY
From Photograph by Pillsbury