The ribbon of highway that traces the rugged coastline south from San Francisco toward Monterey, California offers the traveler some of the most beautiful scenery in North America.  You can close your eyes, put your hands behind your back, hold the camera and snap, and you will still get a photo worthy of any landscape picture calendar.  The Pacific is breathtakingly blue, punctuated by white foam around the rocks that break its surface near the coast.  The contrast of the pastoral countryside and soaring ridges against the seemingly endless watery horizon is dramatic.  If you need to be reminded how small you are, this is a good place to start.  This is one of those places that, for lack of better expression, speaks to my soul — moves me.  I can’t imagine ever getting tired of seeing it.