Cruising the California Coast
The year was 1992. The season was late winter. The place: the central California coast, around Monterey Bay.
I had ventured there on business for the software development firm I was working for at the time. It was my first trip to California, and I was looking forward to exploring the coast.
No stranger to flying, I remember my flight from Baltimore to Los Angeles being long and uneventful. But the commuter flight from Los Angeles to Monterey couldn’t have been more different. Hugging the coastline the entire way, the views of the shore in the late afternoon light were absolutely thrilling.
After arriving at the Monterey airport, I rented a convertible, put the top down, and drove into town before checking into the hotel. What awaited me in Monterey completely captured me. I was immediately greeted by stunning landscapes, rugged seascapes, curious wildlife, and colorful historic cityscapes.
Of course, I packed a camera and a few lenses. This was 1992, though, and 35mm film still ruled. The camera I brought? A Canon T90, Canon’s flagship SLR at the time. The lenses I paired with it for this trip were Canon FD lenses: the 50mm f/1.4, the 35–70mm f/4, and the 70–200mm f/4.
The film I used was Kodachrome 64 and Kodachrome 200, both slide films. Years later, I scanned the slides and, more recently, processed them in Adobe Lightroom. Each image was cropped and enhanced for white balance, exposure, and contrast. A few were converted to monotone.
The images presented here are just a small selection from what I captured between Monterey and Big Sur. This sampling, I hope, offers a sense of what the California coast meant to me that winter in 1992. Images as feelings, feelings in the moment. The California coast truly is a magical place, offering unforgettable vistas and some of the most wonderful colors and light.
Enjoy!
