Big Sur Tales

By Robert Cross

Big Sur's scenic grandeur and formidable landscapes have inspired countless artists and writers to capture the essence of Big Sur's magic. Early pioneers struggled to carve out their meager farms and ranchos, a few ships plied the treacherous rocky coastline, some losing their precious cargos at night to vicious storms, gold miners worked the ghost town of Manchester, while loggers stripped tanbark, giant redwoods were harvested, and ranchers exported grizzly bears by boats, and more recently thousands of hippies tried out their culture on the fragile environment. Those who survived it all inspired this book of tales.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jan 7, 2011
• ISBN: 9781456711481

Robert Cross

Robert Cross lived along Big Sur's rugged 90 mile coastline  since 1960, when he struggled up Partington Ridge's dirt track to meet the reclusive artist-writer Henry Miller, who became the subject of ths first book, "HENRY MILLER: The Paris Years".  He moved in permanently in 1973, first behind Nepenthe into an old cabin which he rebuilt, and 17 years later into the Coastlands, where he served as its president for 20 years.  He was president of the Big Sur Historical Society, a founding docent of Pt. Sur Historic Lighthouse State Park, a director of Big Sur Natural History Assn, and  served as the resident Realtor , driving nearly all the back roads and hiking streams, canyons and rugged mountains where he met most of the people whose tales he tells.  He served also as the resident land use planner for those who sought to build under the very stringent guidlines of more than 30 overlapping governmental agencies which fought with the residents over control of this wild and scenic coast.  He was also a member of the "boatless" Big Sur Yacht Club.

Book preview

WHERE IS BIG SUR?

        Ride past those final, fleeting hints of man

        beyond his habitations and his hungers

                        —and then walk…

        Walk until silence becomes the canvas

        the principle rather than the exception

        Where even to think, even to desire

                would be to shatter that silence

                        and render it absurd

                        —and then sit…

        Sit and breathe and know the aloneness

                                the At-One-ness

                until it almost consumes you

                        and then you might

                                —you might—

                                See BIG SUR

                                                Copyright 1993

                                                E.J.Childress

                                                Big Sur, CA

It takes poets like Emmet to make our world go round.

UP OR DOWN?

Ask any local if Big Sur is vertical or horizontal…and you are liable to be told it is flat on a calm day at Pfeiffer Beach, vertical when scaling its jagged cliffs, and surreal for the rest of the time…a state of mind in a time of life, or so I learned under a blanket of stars in the Esalen Baths.

Strange, isn’t it: Anthropologists tell us that the Eselen indians who collected abalone along the rugged coastline had never fashioned a canoe, or seen a ship until Gaspar de Portola tried to find a safe harbor and failed. (Just like our Coastal Commission).

But then, they had never seen a wagon wheel until our Mexican ancestors came overland.

And so it can be said that while the European ships created North-South traffic, the indians never thought about it. However, in 1941 or thereabouts, the local ranchers found flint arrowheads from tribes East of the San Joaquin valley along the Little Sur riverbed—likewise abalone shells near Kings Canyon in the Sierras…proving they at least knew how to trade East to West to East. Trading was simpler then…even without the internet.

But it took the locals nearly a century after the first post office was established at Post Ranch, (at the end of what was then the Monterey Coastal trail) to transform Slades Hot Springs into the New Age mecca for the human potential movement, now Esalen Institute.

So…if you smoked any of the local weed at Esalen…all this convoluted musing will make perfect sense to you. It did to me at the time.

LOCAL LORE

Overheard at the Fernwood Bar:

What’s bright orange and sleeps four?

The CalTrans dump truck, Dummy!

(Local joke)

Off work, while standing next to that same truck:

Hey, whaddya do that for?

Do what??

Ya just crunched that big snail with yer work boot!

"Oh…him…he’s been followin’ me around since I

started my shift…"

(told by Pat Chamberlain, resident CHP)

FOX N’ HOUNDS ON HIGHWAY ONE

It was a lovely Fall morning in the Big Sur valley…the river meandering along in my direction…while impatiently

I trolled my Porsche Turbo behind the California Highway Patrol’s oldest patrol car, a Ford wagon of truly uncertain

odometric calibration. The only red light was mounted in the driver’s windshield pillar and hand operated. And Officer Ken Wright was trailing Gilbert’s Volvo of equal

vintage.

Now Kenny was a creature of habit, and so when it came time for his morning coffee, he turned off and headed uphill to Captain Cooper School where a fresh pot always brewed at the reception desk.

Gilbert was also a creature of habit, and—with the Highway Patrol now safely off Route One—he promptly proceeded to roll and light his midmorning weed of choice…keeping a steady slow speed until the Big Sur River turned west to the sea at Andrew Molera park, while we bent right on Hwy 1…passing the 55 mph speed limit sign beginning a three mile straight two-lane run known locally as Lighthouse Flats…

And I— whose nature was to run watcha brung —floored it…passing Point Sur Light in less time than it took Gilbert to inhale…and a puff later I had snaked through the sand dune, across Little Sur’s bent bridge, shooting up through the hairpins past Hurricane Point, down across Bixby Bridge and clearing Palo Colorado’s entry road…all before Ken had swallowed his first sip of coffee…or so I thought …until I saw this tiny red iris of light speeding down from Hurricane, passing the Brasil Ranch driveway like he had an expectant mother for a passenger.

Now, on a narrow country highway, my choices were limited: backup quickly into Palo Colorado Canyon and hide out in one of the redwood lined sanctuaries that the the loggers had cut down in 1912…turn abruptly left downhill into the Rocky Point Restaurant’s employee parking lot and hang with the employees until Officer Ken came in, full to his furrowed eyebrows with my antics…or outrun him (too easy) into the Carmel Highlands where every cop West of Salinas could play cat and mouse with me until they slammed the cell door behind me.

Naturally, I did the Honorable Thing…pulled over in front of the Morris mansion around the next curve…and stopped ..and waited…watched the fog roll in over the crashing surf…through the cypress grove and waft across the road…nearly covering me completely…waited some more…and finally, the tired Ford pulls swiftly in behind me, its red searchlight having found its mark.

By this time I’ve killed the engine…gotten out and paced around my silver bullet (locals named it) a few times …and finally leaned against the rear fender.

Officer Wright was, by now, furious, having pushed the old wagon to over 97—within an inch of its life span—he leaps out of the car, nearly clearing the door with pent up energy: MR. CROSS, he barks, I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT THIS POLICE CAR…AND THIS DOOR SIGN (he slams it and it nearly unhinges) DO NOT MEAN A GODDAMN THING TO YOU!!"