Monterey, and the Carmel Shortcut From Hell

By Douglas V. Gibbs

We pulled into Monterey during the early evening hours. After a quick trip up the pier next to Fisherman's Wharf, we headed over to Cannery Row. After quickly walking down Cannery Row, we spent some time at San Carlos Beach Park. The walkway's railing was rusting near the bottom, revealing that at high tide sometimes the water reached the back of the small beach area. Large rocks sat between the sidewalk and the sand, and the foot of the walkway to the sand led under the sand, as if the beach had risen, or the walkway had sunk into the beach.

Once on the sand, to my left was a large concrete square, a wall slightly taller than me, with four sides, but empty inside. Closer to the water a smaller square, a hollow pillar if you may, extended upward. In the sand was chunks of concrete and steel.

The canneries used to build as close to the water as possible for access to the boats. Pipes, hoses and conveyor belts reached out over the water to receive the fish. The concrete on the beach was surely once a part of such an operation. A cannery once sat where the park was, with only a few concrete walls left as evidence.

We returned to the Fisherman's Wharf, noticing that the majority of the businesses along the walk were restaurants. We were still full from our lunch in San Francisco, so a restaurant was the last thing we wanted.

When we got to the end of the wharf, an Italian restaurant greeted us. We stepped past the entrance and up to the roof of the establishment - a view area open to the public. The ocean settled in for a long night sleep as the crowds on the tourist trap lessened with each darkening phase of the sky. The temperature was cooling quickly, and we knew we had a long drive still ahead of us.

Once on the road, Virginia pointed out on a map that instead of back-tracking to Highway 68, we could take the Pacific Coast Highway to a county road, G-16. She figured it would be a quicker line to Highway 101.

As a truck driver, I was leery of the county road. Those kinds of roads tend to be narrow, snaking through the countryside with an extra helping of S-Curves. Those kinds of shortcuts usually aren't so short. And sometimes, those roads have obstacles that don't permit full passage.

"The map says it goes through, and on the map it looks pretty straight."

She was depending on the map, and I was supporting my argument with instinct. Nonetheless, I gave in, and we headed for Carmel Valley Road, a.k.a. G-16.

For the first few miles, while the sky became darker, the county road seemed reasonable enough. One lane each way with a bright dividing line. We came upon a couple gas stations and a small town a few miles in. The gas price was $4.35 a gallon, a little more steep than I wished to pay. My tank was just below half.

"Do you have enough gas to get to the 101?" she asked.

"Yes," I replied. But I knew there was not enough for a return trip if something happened along the way.

We stopped at one of the stations for a bathroom break, a soda, and some trail mix. Then, off we went, into the dark, into the hills, and into the unknown curves, rises and falls of county highway G-16.

A few more miles into the great unknown and the bright yellow line in the middle of the road faded into a dotted hit and miss, and eventually vanished altogether. The night darkened and I turned on my brights. The road rose up into the hills, higher and steeper than I thought it could. The S-Curves got sharper, and the road narrowed, sometimes to a point where if another car had been coming in the opposite direction, we would not be able to pass each other.

At the crest, the road became more violently curved, the asphalt became loose and covered with gravel, and the occasional lights from homes stopped. We were completely alone, and one car break-down from being in a very bad situation. I looked at my phone, and the signal was dead. Then the phone beeped, and went dark. The battery was dead, too, just like the night air.

"I wonder how the tankers get gas out to those gas stations," I said. "Surely, from the Highway 1 side, because there is no way I would ever drive a rig on this God-forsaken road. The trailer would never make these sharp turns."

Virginia seemed indifferent, not responding to my attempt to make conversation. She was second guessing her idea of a short-cut. An ocean of stars flowed above us. Few places reveals the truth about how many balls of fire can be seen by our small planet. A couple shooting stars reassured me this was not some angry nightmare, but still real, and in living color.

The road began to descend. Darkness and fallen rocks on the road greeted us. A sign advised us that rock slides were a possibility. Dark wooded areas made me wonder if a deer, or a bear, was going to rush out into the roadway in front of me. I down shifted, keeping the speed slow so as to not misjudge any of the sharpening curves.

"Will this road ever end?" I asked.

Virginia did not answer.

My tank was below a quarter. I was beyond the point of no return. There was no turning back. We did not have enough gas to return to those expensive gas stations an hour or two behind us.

My wife's phone began to beep. The screen blinked, and then the phone died from a dead battery, too. We had both forgotten to plug in our phones the night before, and unlike our truck, the car's cigarette lighter plug-in did not work.

If we became stranded, we would have no way to contact the outside world.

Then the darkness exploded with light. Flashing lights. Red and blue, bright, and filling the night air with a sign that an emergency was somewhere up ahead. On the right sat a parked vehicle, with the lights off. A woman sat behind the wheel. Her daughter bounced around in the back seat. The road curved sharp left, and cones blocked the roadway. Ahead, alone, about fifty yards up, sat the Highway Patrol.

I parked up against the cones, leaving my lights on, hoping the cop would walk towards me to tell me what was going on. He never came, and my gas gauge was drifting closer to empty.

I turned off the car, and shut down the lights. I had no choice. My battery, and gas tank, was what would get me to the 101 freeway, and I needed to conserve both.

"What are you doing?"

"Remember, Virginia, when I said sometimes these roads get stopped-up? We can't afford that. I don't have enough gas to go back. We have to go forward. I need to find out what is going on."

I hoped it wasn't something like a washed out road.

I walked the hundred and fifty feet, or so. The CHP's window was down, and a young Highway Patrol officer greeted me with a smile.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Big rig tried to take this road, and the trailer didn't make the turn. A tow truck just showed up. Hopefully, we are looking at about another hour. It's nine now."

"How close are we to the 101?"

"15 or 20 miles."

I looked down to the curve. A long trailer sat on the edge of a precipice, four wheels on the last two axles on the right side were hanging over the edge of the road. The tractor was turned to the left, and a larger than normal tow truck sat in front of it.

"It has vintage cars in the trailer," said the cop. "One of them is worth half a million dollars. The driver is sweating bullets."

"Well, I don't have enough gas to go back the other way. I am going to have to wait this out. I suppose I can take a nap. When you pick up the cones, if you don't mind, hit the lights. I would appreciate the wake-up call."

"Sure thing. No problem. An hour, max."

A couple of towels from the trunk served as pillows, and I slept about fifteen minutes at a time. Virginia never slept, waking me up often to voice her frustrations, or ask me to ask the cop how long. I talked to the Highway Patrol officer a couple times, and each time he had no new news, until the last talk, when he told me another tow truck was coming. A larger one. Every time the current truck tried to pull the rig to safety, the trailer would start to slip off the road, and drag the tow truck with it. This was a job for something bigger, especially when one considered how far the drop threatening to swallow up the big rig's trailer was.

Four and a half hours after our arrival, the larger tow truck arrived. After heading down, it backed up and had to find a way to turn around and back down to the rig. A half hour later the long tow truck returned, going backwards, beeping all the way down to the truck in peril.

After a series of screeching tires and near misses, the truck was finally pulled to safety. The CHP backed his car to me, pulled up the cones, and said, "I want you to go now, before he tries to make this turn again. It's narrow between the rig and the side of the road, but your little car should make it."

The car that had been waiting with me, at some time during my naps, had given up and turned around to head back the other way. Virginia and I was alone, driving past the rig, and a truck on the other side, off into the darkness, to continue down G-16.

After a half hour the end of the road still alluded us, and suddenly the sign on the side of the road said "G-17." Somewhere, we had missed a turn. Later, we discovered that G-17 ran further north, a longer path to the 101, and away from the gas stations.

When lights finally appeared on the horizon my fuel needle settled on the "E". Knowing my car, I had slightly less than an hour of fuel remaining, and I had no idea how long it would be before we reached the main highway.

Forty-five minutes later the freeway entrance appeared, and we got on the freeway going south. Ten more minutes down the road a gas station appeared on the right. We pulled off and up to the pumps, well knowing that we could be running out of fuel at any time. The station was closed, and everything was dark. We had been using cash. We don't have credit cards, and we keep only a little in our checking account. The pumps were on, but only credit cards were acceptable.

"We've got about eighty bucks in the checking account," she said. "Use our check card."

I filled the tank, and got back on the 101 South.

"Hey," she said. "I've been looking at the map. There's a state highway that cuts across from the 101 to I-5. Once we are on the five it'll be a straight shot home. And on the map this state highway looks straight enough. I think it will work well as a short-cut."

"I'm driving," I said. "We are staying on the 101."

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary