Remembering Crystal Cove’s Magic

For over 55 years, the Carter cottage at Crystal Cove has played a large and wonderful part in my life (“Crystal Cove Residents Try to Turn the Tide--Again,” Dec. 29).

During my teen years, there were some serious experiences of “passage” that took place there, and through the years some memorable parties and even a wedding.

It is a marvelous, magical place, is Crystal Cove. Perhaps not Camelot, but definitely a kind of Shangri-La.

Even today, if I walk down that rickety boardwalk, my nostrils seem to be 16 years old again; my eyes, now coated with contact lenses, seem to sharpen when I see the familiar cliff and the beach; my body becomes taller and slimmer; the surf invites me, and my smile is broader and brighter.

But now the houses must become vacant. The state of California, in its infinite wisdom, has decreed the change. And knowing the state as we do, here is a prediction:

A year or more will pass before the state bureaucrats ever begin to do anything.

During that time, the cottages and houses will slowly decay beneath the onslaught of termites and transients, of vermin and vandals. The once charming and well-kept “places” will become sad little shacks, with broken windows and doors, with peeling paint, and overgrown with weeds.

And save for our precious memories, our Shangri-La will be no more.

Ultimately, there will arise in its place a large resort hotel, open to the public . . . or that portion able to afford $400 a night.

DEANE BOTTORF

Corona del Mar