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by Karen E. Steen, Laura Davick & Meriam Braselle "It’s
hard now to recall what Orange County looked like then, when its rolling
hills held little besides yellow pastures and orange groves. A drive
down Pacific Coast Highway today reveals housing developments, shopping
malls, condo time shares, and golf courses. And yet, remarkably, Crystal
Cove—a small settlement of weathered cottages tucked into an otherwise
undeveloped stretch of beach—remains frozen in time. The turn-off
from Pacific Coast Highway quickly drops down to a potholed road snaking
under towering eucalyptus trees and through embankments overgrown with
morning glory. The zzzp zzzp of highway traffic becomes the slow rhythmic
build and crash of waves. The smell of Old California reaches up from
the past: the wine-like ferment of warm ice plant, the velvety dust
of crumbling road, and the tang of drying seaweed—all wrapped
in a fine mesh of ocean salt. The cottages, too, look much as they ever
have, an appealingly haphazard collection of architectural odds and
ends nestled in so cozily that they seemed to have grown here, among
the bougainvillea and nasturtiums. A clock permanently set to cocktail
hour (4 p.m.) hangs outside the old store..."
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