Lots of People

It was a day with Lots of People

There were lots of people in the room where we slept – 14 others, to be exact. People of various ages and nationalities, snored and snoozed in white metal bunk beds that lined an old church basement room of the Monterey Youth Hostel. In the morning, our 14 bunk mates joined more people from the men's dorm, and women's dorm and the family rooms in the large, bright kitchen for breakfast. Myself and a woman from Sweden, gave Thomas, a tall blond young man from Germany a tutorial on how to make American-Style pancakes with Krusteze and an electric griddle. Two young Italians sat at a table nearby spreading nutella on their dollar-size hotcakes. I followed Thomas's lead and sprinkled my pancakes lightly with sugar, followed by a gentle dollap of carefully spread strawberry jam.

There were Lots More people on the bus going to the Laguna Seca racetrack. We passed white-washed clay brick buildings, lined with ornate painted green railing. Monterey has stayed rich in its Spanish history - those fevrent, abusive, conquistadors. 

 There were EVEN MORE people – Roy says about 45 thousand, at the race track. We threaded our way through a barely organized human mass to watch agile, superhuman conquistadors of the motorcycle world zoom by at 200 miles an hour. 

We sat on metal bleachers, our necks cooled by the breeze blowing off fog on the bay and ate hotdogs in baguettes. Thank goodness Americans have started to catch on to this wonderful treat. We sipped outrageously priced mediocre beer, and cheered with the crowd as Marquez slipped passed Rossi. We cheered more when Rossi maintained a solid third. Bright yellow flags emblazoned with the number 46 from the crowd as he crossed the finish.

Finally, after we stepped off the bus that was the wrong bus, and were walking the final one and a half miles to the youth hostel, past old Monterey, past the sailboat filled harbor, it was just Roy and I, two harbor seals, and cold, clear water splashing on caramel colored rocks. And the fog and the quiet.