Day two in Carmel

Sept 16^th

Well, another day… another dollar. With the water heater not keeping the water hot I called Gleason Mobile RV Repair, explained the problem and he said he’d be out shortly after noon. He got here just before 12:30 and spent an hour trying to trace down the problem. He finally replaced two parts, a sensor and another electrical part. By now it’s after 2:00PM and he’s doing a final check. Everything seems to be working so we wrote him a check for $290 and thanked him for coming out.

Surfer at Carmel City Beach

With that out of the way the sun came out and we decided to drive to Carmel and pick up the shore road (Scenic Dr), a one way street with really nice houses on one side and a really nice beach on the other. We made a stop at the beach to watch the surfers trying to catch some of the waves. The water is pretty cold and everybody is in a wetsuit.

Carmel River Wetlands Reserve

With the wind blowing it was still pretty chilly on the beach so we walked back to the car and continues our drive. Three miles later we ended up at the Carmel River Wetlands Nature preserve which was closed off to public access. So I took a few photos and we continued our drive back towards Hwy 1.

Inside the Mission

Coming up over the hill from the beach Tina spotted the mission, actually the Basilica of Mission San Carlos Borromeo del Rio Carmelo, commonly known as the Carmel Mission. So we stopped to take the tour. Originally established in Monterey in 1770, the Mission was subsequently moved to the Carmel River in 1771 to be closer to a good water source. 

A great fountain for a public square in Freeland!

Surprisingly the mission only survived as a working mission for 60 years and by 1836 was falling into ruin. In the 1880’s a period of restoration occurred but it wasn’t until the 1930’s that serious restoration of the buildings took place. In1961 the mission was designated a minor basilica by Pope John XXIII and in 1987 the Carmel Mission was visited by the Pope during his world tour. 

Two beauties in the garden

We really enjoyed the gardens and simple beauty of the church which is still a working parish and school for locals and visitors alike. About 5:00 PM we left the mission and headed home for dinner.

To see all our photos go to:

http://picasaweb.google.com/mjdolanski