The Hecker Pass tour on June 8th started at 9 am at Chili’s in Seaside, where 20 Porsches and their drivers and passengers gathered for a drivers’ meeting before hitting the road for San Juan Bautista, where we would meet another 5 Porsches with their drivers and passengers at the Windmill Market.
We drove through town and then past it on the San Juan Highway to join Route 129, which took us to the Watsonville area, where we drove on Carlton Drive past Gizdich Ranch (famous for its pies!) to Route 152. This road took us through Hecker Pass, which is tree-lined and curvey, definitely a Boxster road (and other Porsches!), with the Mount Madonna Inn at the top and more curves on the way down the other side – several of the 20 mph variety that are basically switchbacks. Safely on the other side, we then headed for Chitactac-Adams County Park for a brief potty break. Then we drove past Uvas Reservoir and on to Oak Glen Ave.
Some of us took the Oak Glen Ave. turn and drove past Chesbro Reservoir. Others missed the turn and kept going until they reached Bailey Ave., where they knew they had missed the turn but kept going to get to Monterey Road and Morgan Hill.
We all met at the 3-story parking garage in Morgan Hill, where we parked and walked next door for lunch at MoHi Farm. We had a buffet with three choices: a breakfast sandwich, egg benedict, or salmon on toast. Our group sat together in an outside area of the restaurant. The food was quite good and we could have any combination of the three and as much as we wanted. Steve and Madeleine Taty met us there and had lunch with us.
After lunch, Mark led us back on Oak Glen Ave and past Chesbro Reservoir, then to the DeRose Winery and Little Uvas Vineyards joint tasting rooms. The tasting room had a few cars on display that their owners enjoyed, with a VW Thing, a 924 turbo, a 944, a VW that looked like an old MG, a beach buggy, a whale-tail 911 with a Chevy V-8 engine, and a few others. The tour ended here, with some partaking of the tasting menu before heading for home.
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