TT: Heads in the clouds

Having grown up in one of the flattest parts of America, I now spend as much time as I can gazing at oceans and mountains. Accordingly, Mrs. T and I passed Sunday and Monday in close proximity to both, staying at Ragged Point Inn , a rustic retreat perched on a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and dining at Nepenthe , a similarly situated Big Sur restaurant. Ragged Point Inn and Nepenthe were designed by architects who, like us, favored the style of Frank Lloyd Wright and so took infinite care to ensure that both places were in perfect harmony with the spectacular sites upon which they were built.

Though Ragged Point Inn is beautiful in and of itself, you stay there in order to look at that which surrounds you. Fog rolls in each morning and rolls out by midday, meaning that you can walk through the clouds to breakfast, then retreat to your terrace and spend as much time as you want reveling in the view.

As for our dinner at Nepenthe, which we ate on the outdoor deck, it was as good as it could possibly have been, not just because of the food (which was superb) but because of the setting. To eat a simple but well-prepared meal under such gorgeous circumstances is a profoundly pleasurable experience, and it was further enhanced--for once--by the background music played by the management. Midway through the meal, I realized that we were listening to a track from Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy .

I gleefully nudged Mrs. T. "Hear that?" I said. "It's a definite omen."

"Maybe," she replied. "Maybe it is."

We smiled happily at one another and went back to our meal, knowing that we'd remember this day for a long time to come.