Big Sur's wild coastline makes travelers one with the elements

Big Sur has the boldest and most compact shoreline in California. I know from having grown up in this state that much of it can feel like La-La Land, as it's sometimes called, where the balmy climate lulls one into a detached, soporific state. In Big Sur, however, you know you are amid the elements, and if nature here is grand and inspiring, it also can be fearsome.

Along this wild and ragged coast, the ocean crashes against the cliffs with a savage beauty. Traveling over the section of Highway 1 that passes through Big Sur, you may feel that one wrong turn will send you tumbling into the nearly shoreless sea below. The road itself, which was blasted into the mountainsides, is often precarious.

While I visited with a friend in December, a rock slide closed part of Highway 1 for a day, and mudslides made several roads impassable. This wasn't at all unusual, according to Frank Pinney, who is known informally as the Mayor of Big Sur and also heads its emergency relief system.

Falling debris routinely clogs the highway, and portions of it wash away several times a year, Pinney said. During one torrential downpour in 1998, Highway 1 fell into the sea at about 20 places, closing the road for three months. The only ways in or out of Big Sur were by horse or helicopter.

Locals don't seem to mind the periodic isolation.

"I love it when the road closes. It's my time for myself," said Teresa Bradford, who owns the Heartbeat gift shop.

"I finally get time to read, and be cozy with my neighbors," said Magnis Toren, who works behind the counter at the Henry Miller Memorial Library.

Clearly, it takes a certain kind of spirit to thrive here, one that enjoys adventure and doesn't mind the perils of living on what author and historian Augusta Fink described as "land with the contours of a gabled roof." For years the terrain was hardly inhabited. It could have been called Big Empty.