Saturday August 9 (Muriel)
We had breakfast with an old friend, Jeff Finkle, the president of IEDC (International Economic Development Council), the organization for which Allan spent Thursday and Friday teaching a course on principles of real estate. After catching up with Jeff, we packed up our stuff, loaded up our car, and began the vacation stage of the Kotin Big Trip.
On this much sunnier day in Monterey than the rest of our stay there, we set off up the coast to Elkhorn Slough. Although we had visited the slough before, we took a docent led tour with two English couples on vacation and a family of three adults from India who live in the Bay Area. We saw a number of egrets and other expected birds, including a few sandpipers, probably recently returned from their nesting grounds in the far north. We learned much about the water and history of the slough. `
View of Elkhorn Slough
Leaving our tour around 3:00, we drove to our motel in Palo Alto. After freshening up, we walked to a Doctor Seuss for President rally at the Peabody Gallery a few blocks away. We weren’t quite certain what sort of event my Palo Alto cousins Gordon Lewin and his wife Hilary Rowen were sending us to. It was a fun opening of an exhibit of art by Theodore Geisel who wrote and drew the Doctor Seuss books. There was a competing campaign for Daffy Duck since the gallery also featuredthe work of Chuck Jones, the animator for that cartoon.
Platform of Daffy Duck for President
We were joined there by my cousins and their son David Lewin, a senior at American University in Washington, DC. David had just arrived in Palo Alto too, he on a summer vacation trip home. We moved on from the “political” event to dinner at the sidewalk tables of a restaurant a bit up the block.
It was a treat to catch up with Gordon, Hilary and David! It had been a few years since our last visit.
Follow the Kotins around North America 
This is a grand blog, Muriel! I wish we had done this last summer in Kandersteg. I read it all with pleasure and almost felt like I was beside you watching those bill-wrestling cormorants in Monterey!
Speaking of Kandersteg, we are here right now with some friends, and Eleri – weather is ho-hum but we had have spectacular moments when we rush out and hike for a few hours, then get chased back in by thunderstorms.
Safe and happy tripping! I look forward to reading lots more of the Kotin Perimeter ambles and prandials
Glad to see you and Allen have finally escape southern California. See is believing! I’ve heard rumors of people leaving the southland, and now your blog proves it is true: people can get out and there’s life on the outside! Really, your blog is a lot of fun. Hope you can keep the narrative going while you travel supplemented with plenty of photos. I’m already living vicariously. After seeing the photo of you and Allen enjoying a sumptuous meal, the next meal I had tasted extra good…
Daffy’s campaign platform is very compelling. I daresay The Cat in the Hat could make as convincing a case for change.