california dreaming: travel means beauty, peace and the sacred in hidden places
the romance of travel, for us, is constant discovery.
take hwy. 101, between canada and mexico: we’ve traveled this entire route at least six times in the past 11 years.
we’ve worked as photojournalists all along this route; we’ve vacationed at different spots, from washington to california; and we’ve lived in cities along, or close to, its path: vancouver, b.c.; portland, oregon; san francisco.
yet every time we traverse this road, we discover something new. or something new about a place we’ve visited before.
this chapel is one of those discoveries.
we encountered it, entirely by accident, on a california coast vacation in the ’90s.
traveling north and south on hwy. 101 since then, we looked and looked for the chapel — and missed it several times.
(we didn’t bing or google or mapquest it; the chapel was such a private discovery, we wanted to rediscover it the same way we found it, during our first major, pre-marriage trip together.)
so, on an autumn trip south on hwy. 101 for work, we searched for the place again — and found it, just as we had the first time.
by happenstance.
it’s such a spiritual place, we still don’t want to divulge its exact location. (bing it if you must.)
it’s in a clearing, at the end of an unmarked road, with no sign.
it’s in one of the most exclusive coastal communities of California.
yet it’s free and open to everyone.
out-of-the-way sign at chapel entrance
there’s more outdoor art, a fountain, and resting places amid the pines than we recall from earlier visits:
the chapel was dedicated in 1985, by two californians in honor of their son, “a navy aviator, artist and zoologist, who believed that art is the intermediary between the physical and the spiritual.”
Enter these doors, and find sanctuary
TOMORROW: chapel history, art, and its spiritual quiet, for people of any faith
