| California, the State. San Francisco, the city. Monterey, | | | | canning companies would, by dint of financial muscle, |
| the town. John Steinbeck, the author. For this | | | | bully their way into ownership or control of all of the |
| Steinbeck fan, San Francisco is quite close to heaven. | | | | agricultural land in the area. Steinbeck was right to be |
| From San Francisco it is an easy drive down the | | | | worried. For that is what has come to pass.Sad also |
| peninsula to Santa Cruz and into Steinbeck territory.I fly | | | | to realize that the year 'Cannery Row' was published, |
| into San Francisco airport late in the afternoon. The | | | | 1945, was the year the sardine fishing industry of |
| signs are immediate America. 'No Ped Xing', 'Squeeze | | | | Monterey died. As Steinbeck said at a later time: 'They |
| right', 'Occupation by more than 132 persons unlawful'. | | | | are fishing for tourists now.' In the heyday of Monterey |
| From Rent-a-Wreck I collect a Chevrolet in two tones | | | | there were eighteen canneries, 100-odd fishing boats, |
| -- cat-sick green and vile yellow. A veritable | | | | 4,000 workers, three gaudy brothels and a terrible |
| pimpmobile. And was it not in a car like this I drove into | | | | smell of dead fish. Now, nearly all are gone.(It used to |
| San Francisco for the 1967 Summer of Love, to follow | | | | be that Monterey, and nearby Salinas where he was |
| Timothy Leary's instructions to 'turn on, tune in, and | | | | born, was angry and ashamed of John Steinbeck. In |
| drop out'? | | | | 1944, after the success of 'The Grapes of Wrath' |
| It was. And was it not in very much the same | | | | Steinbeck bought a house in Monterey; no one would |
| automobile I parked outside the City Lights Bookstore | | | | rent him an office for writing. He was harassed when |
| and went in and listened to Ginsberg recite 'Howl' and | | | | trying to get fuel and wood from a local wartime |
| got Jack Kerouac to sign my copy of 'The Dharma | | | | rations board. He wrote that his old friends did not |
| Bums'? It was. This antediluvian American monster is | | | | want him, partly because of his works and partly |
| the car of my youth. Be damned to the characterless | | | | because he was so successful: 'This isn't my country |
| compacts of today. (It is a sad reflection on progress | | | | anymore. And it won't be until I am dead. It makes me |
| that the Rent-a-Wreck franchise now rents modern | | | | very sad.' He late wrote: 'After I had written "The |
| compacts.)Now I drive across Highway 92 and its | | | | Grapes of Wrath" . . . the librarians at the Salinas Public |
| beguiling signs leading to San Jose along the Camino | | | | Library, who had known my folks remarked that is |
| Real -- the Royal Road. (Yes, I know the way to San | | | | was lucky my parents were dead so that they did not |
| Jose and a sterile, dreary city it is.)Swing on to | | | | have to suffer this shame.'In truth, the whole American |
| Highway 1, America's very own Pacific Highway, which | | | | literary establishment should fry in hell for their |
| takes me down the peninsula and along the coast, the | | | | treatment of this author. When Steinbeck won the |
| rugged, rocky coast on the right, the remains of | | | | Nobel Prize for literature in 1962 he was damned in |
| cypress forests on my left - and goes through Santa | | | | newspapers with faint praise. 'The New York Times' in |
| Cruz to Monterey. Coming back, I will use Highway 9 | | | | particular should hang its head in shame.)Now there is |
| which is a backroad, in spite of the grandiose title, and | | | | a National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, about 25 km |
| follow the San Lorenzo river up, up into the Santa | | | | inland from Monterey. It is not for me. I am not of the |
| Cruz mountains and then through the magnificence of | | | | school who thinks these things can be packaged, |
| California redwoods in the Henry Cowell Redwoods | | | | tarted up, represented. Of itself the center says: |
| State Park.If I have enough time, on the way back I will | | | | 'Discover Steinbeck's works and philosophy through |
| stop at Felton on Highway 9 and ride on a steam train | | | | interactive, multisensory exhibits for all ages and |
| for an hour of nostalgia on the wondrously named | | | | backgrounds, priceless artifacts, entertaining displays, |
| Roaring Camp and Big Trees narrow-gauge railway | | | | educational programs and research archives. Seven |
| line. No railway line of my youth ever swooped through | | | | themed theaters showcase "East of Eden", "Cannery |
| stands of redwoods; it is true that only God could have | | | | Row", "Of Mice and Men", "The Grapes of Wrath" and |
| made these trees, one of which is within spit of being | | | | much more.' That is not my scene.Yet we can still see |
| a hundred meters tall.No train in the darkness of the | | | | the old Cannery Row if we look with care.This morning |
| Rhondda Valley in Wales puffed like the 'Little Red | | | | I go to Foam Street, where the true Cannery Row |
| Engine' -- I think I can, I think I can -- up one of the | | | | starts. I stand silently on the stone pilings of the |
| steepest railway gradients in the world to Bear | | | | deserted loading dock. A pleasant melancholy. It would |
| Mountain.But that is on the morrow. Today is for | | | | have been better if I had delayed my visit by a couple |
| blessed Monterey. Robert Louis Stevenson in | | | | of months. For this is the end of summer and the |
| travel-book mode wrote of Monterey in a fish-hook | | | | weather is still too warm, too pleasant for my mood. |
| simile as being 'cosily ensconced beside the barb'. (At | | | | Cannery Row needs a touch of cold damp in the air |
| the time Stevenson was skulking around Monterey, | | | | for true dismal authenticity. And it is wrong that I should |
| waiting for the divorce of the light of his life, Fanny | | | | be here on a Saturday. Thursday, Sweet Thursday, is |
| Osbourne.) Much earlier than Stevenson, Gaspar de | | | | surely the only day to visit Monterey. But how can we |
| Portola and the intrepid explorer for God, Father | | | | change a business itinerary for literary |
| Junipero Serra, claimed Monterey for Spain and the | | | | requirements?Much in Monterey remains the same, |
| Holy Catholic Church by establishing a fort and a | | | | much has changed. La Ida Cafe of blessed memory is |
| mission in 1777. Now I claim it, yet again, for myself.The | | | | now Kalisa's, down from my hotel at 851 Cannery |
| sea as I drive down the coast road is white with rage | | | | Row. Wing Chong Market, at 835, has been |
| and foam. A hurricane has been creating havoc at | | | | transmogrified into the Old General Store and the |
| sea and in Mexico. This is the dying fringe of the storm. | | | | building that once held Doc Rickett's Marine Lab still |
| Waves slam against the rocky coast and burst in | | | | stands at 800 Cannery Row. Last time I was here it |
| white flags to mark the route ahead. I see no sea lions | | | | was a private club and I managed to smooth-talk my |
| or seals as I did last year. Perhaps the sea is too | | | | way in. This morning it seems sadly deserted and I am |
| rough. Perhaps they have a shelter where they hide | | | | told it is owned by the city of Monterey and the public |
| from the big waves. Perhaps.I am staying at the | | | | is not welcome.Do not confuse this, the genuine article, |
| Monterey Bay Inn simply because of its address, 242 | | | | with Doc Rickett's Lab, which is a restaurant at 180 E |
| Cannery Row. From here, last night, I walked past the | | | | Franklin Street, and is not the sort of place Doc Rickett |
| appalling tourist mockery that is Fisherman's Wharf -- | | | | would have dined at, but didn't.When I have finished |
| what sins are committed for the tourist dollar -- and on | | | | writing, I will stroll down to Sancho Panza for lunch. This |
| to the Municipal Wharf at the end of Figuero Street. | | | | restaurant is in an adobe building built in 1841 in Calle |
| This is where the real fishing fleet is moored; where | | | | Principal -- Main Street. There, in the crowded, |
| the buildings are designed for work, not tourist, and the | | | | low-ceilinged room, I will drink Mexican Corona beer |
| pelicans stalk the fish-smelling docks and landings. Pure | | | | with slices of lime and eat chile con carne con frijoles |
| Steinbeck.Last night I dreamed I was Doc Rickett and | | | | and remember John Steinbeck, the writer who gave |
| that I still worked in my laboratory among the | | | | me the smell, the feel, the reality of Monterey when I |
| wonderful desperates of 'Cannery Row'. This morning, | | | | was a small boy in Wales.Gareth Powell runs, among |
| over breakfast, I consider sadly the strong moral | | | | other sites, Travel Hopefully - - and has been a travel |
| purpose that ran through all of John Steinbeck's | | | | writer and editor for far too long. |
| 'Cannery Row' novels. He was worried the major | | | | |