Big Sur, Small Budget

Had I known what discomfort awaited in the tent that night, I would have stuck it out in the bar for another few rounds.

Tents and Indians

Through the incessant rain of the morning, we head north, finding a camping store in the town of Seaside, just outside Carmel, where we buy a new tent and stove for, oh, about the price of a mid-scale hotel room in Big Sur. We lunch on flaky local sea bass at the delightful Il Fornaio restaurant in Carmel. Then, with new gear in hand and columns of sunlight finally dissolving the clouds, we roll back to Big Sur for another shot at camping.

Even on the second pass, the abrupt rise of mountains from sea (the highest of these hills tops 5,000 feet, mere miles inland from the coast) is humbling, and the inaccessibility helps explain Big Sur's rather sparse history. Indians lived here -- the Ohlone, Esselen and Salinan -- in small "tribelets" of up to 250 people, coexisting peacefully well into the 18th century, when Catholic missionaries eviscerated the Indians' culture. Next came tough-skinned homesteaders, like the Pfeiffers, Posts, Andersons and Partingtons, for whom many of Big Sur's canyons, coves and parks are named.

Some homesteaders set up guiding businesses, others thrived in the redwood logging business and, history tells us, most were no doubt happy to eke out a living in this remote coastline, where even today winter storms wash out sections of state Highway 1, effectively cutting off neighbors from each other for weeks at a time.

Construction of Highway 1 was completed in 1937, but electricity did not arrive in Big Sur until the 1950s. In 1933, California legislators began protecting parts of Big Sur and, today, the area includes nine state parks totaling 14,984 acres, plus nearly 2 million more acres of public land in Los Padres National Forest. Still, much of the coast is privately held. (Obey those "No Trespassing" signs!) But thanks to commendably farsighted development restrictions, building along the coast has been limited to mostly low-profile homes, inns and restaurants.

Deep Massage

"I've re-coded my RNA, my DNA, rewired my whole brain," Serena Willow is telling us in the lobby of Ventana's spa. "If you saw pictures of me from 10 years ago, you wouldn't recognize the face."

A large woman with radiant red hair, she is manning a thinly veiled temple of retail, with every variety of organic, aromatic, soothing, calming, reinvigorating body oil for sale, along with curative rocks and those supremely comfortable high-end clothes that make Californians look so content. Outside, a small deck cradled by wildflowers affords a king's view of the ocean 1,200 feet below.

"I can see people's energy, their chakra," Williams continues. She gives us plush cotton robes and shows us to the resort's clothing-optional swimming pool and Japanese baths. "Buying a massage gives you access to all this."

As much as I am tempted by the chai-soy-clay wrap treatment that Ventana offers -- really, I am -- I opt for an Esalen-certified massage, so named for the bellwether Esalen Institute, a few miles south (more on that shortly). My wife signs up for a "cranial sacral," essentially a feather-light head rub.

Afterward I return to the L-shaped pool, where a lone, naked German woman is swimming slow laps. Far below, on a sea so still it looks airbrushed, a gray whale breaches. It is an altogether California moment and, seeing no reason Germans and whales should have all the fun, I drop my robe and slide into the pool.

The massages run us $120 each, but knowing what the other guests are paying for their rooms -- $356 a night and up, spa treatments not included -- I can't help thinking we are still ahead. Besides, who can argue with 50 minutes of restful attention to knotty muscles, with a gentle breeze carrying the stress away through open windows, high above the Pacific Ocean?

We bank down the road a mile to Big Sur's most famous cocktail hour, on the deck at Nepenthe. My college buddy Rob, a Bay Area resident, has recommended the place and, to ensure we make the most of it, he's driven down to meet us for part of the weekend. Nepenthe is a Big Sur institution, with food and drink prices to match the soaring view. Not that we, the high-rolling tent dwellers, even blink at the bill (north of $50 for six cocktails and a basket of french fries).