A Wedding at the Mission

The mantra of the day was "leisurely", so we followed our usual morning rout ion--coffee and a walk with Ozzie and loaded into the car, Ozzie, Ozzie's bed, our suitcases, and some nice cheese that we hated to leave behind (but had to be sealed in a cooler due to its not -so-nice aroma). We were on our way by 9:30.

We elected to make it a really leisurely two day trip, so we headed down the 101 freeway, which eventually, but not until tomorrow, makes its way to the coast. It was almost lunchtime by the time we reached the turn-off for Mission San Juan Bautista and we decided to go in and walk around the quaint little town centered around the mission, built in 1797 .

I love the simple architecture and the pervasive feeling of peace surrounding the missions. Their goal was to convert the Native Americans living around them, and one can argue both the intent and the success of such a venture, but they also provided protection for travelers and usually were built next to military barracks. Here, Lt. Juan Bautista de Anza was sent by order of Juan Carlos III of Spain to colonize the San Francisco . He led the de Anza expedition in 1775-6, just before the mission was built. The name de Anza can still be seen on schools, parks and civic buildings around the area.

Today, when I went inside the church, a wedding had just concluded, and people waited while the wedding party posed in front of the altar for wedding pictures. I stood a respectful distance back with my camera, but still liked the beautiful interior of the church.

As we ambled our way down the windy, deserted back roads above the Salinas Valley, there was no escaping the fact that California is in the grip of a serious drought. Rolling hills, usually green and verdant at this time of year, were dry and sere. The fields designed for growing food for the many cattle ranches in the area were all fallow, and the windmills, meant to pump water were still. The weathered and tilting barns, stood out in stark relief against the yellow hills, and the cattle were gathered around bales of hay put out for them.

The final leg of our day's journey took us past the San Ardo oil fields, one of the oldest in the state. The hundreds of derricks, resembling praying mantids, have not changed at all since I passed by here as a child. OilMan says the "heavy crude" from the wells is loaded onto the freight trains on the tracks next to the highway and shipped to an asphalt plant in Oregon.

Today's trip through "Steinbeck country" was a pleasant journey back in time, and a quietly important piece of California history.