Pretty much the only "ugly" part, if you can even call it that, is the stretch of road through what passes for "downtown" Malibu. Now Malibu itself is beautiful, but from that section of PCH, all you can see is the light retail and residential on the inland side and an unbroken line of houses and fences on the seaward side. The latter houses with their fences block any sight of the beach or the sand, which is exactly how the owners want it to be.
Because the beach is public land in California, the owners of beachfront property have come up with a novel idea to keep people out: simply deny access through the private land between the road and the beach. It's highly effective, but it's not foolproof, especially since many property owners have agreed to provide easements on their land in exchange for making improvements on their property etc. We found the first such easement that had been opened in Malibu, the appropriately named "Zonker Harris Access Way."
For those who don't know and didn't click on the link above, Zonker Harris is the ne'er do well hippie/surfer/champion tanner from the Doonesbury comic strip. Notice how the sign is hidden off the sidewalk? It's only visible from one direction, so if you're northbound from LA, you'd probably never see it or notice the narrow alley that leads to the beach (although some internet guides call it "well marked" or something like that...it isn't that well marked). We missed the Geffen access point that apparently opened last year after Geffen gave up his three year suit against establishing the right of way that he'd originally granted in 1983...
So we went down Zonker Way and were greeted by some nice open beach, which I'd show a picture of except that blogger decided to stop taking my photos here in midpost...:
Perhaps later.
Anyway, until then I leave you with the words that should ring in everyone's ears concerning Malibu:
"Keep your ugly fuckin' goldbrickin' ass out of my beach community."
3 comments:
I see that up on Cape Cod as well, Cuff. They have an expression they use up there. Since you have to cross the Sagamore Bridge to get onto the Cape, the saying goes along the lines of "shut down the bridge." Nice mindset, huh? I see many roads marked "private, no access," but I drive down them anyway. The worst I saw was where citizens had put up posts and a chain across a State road. I actually called the authorities on that one.
I always thought that people from California were nice. Huh.
Nice Lebowski reference.
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