A happy couple on the beach at Santa Cruz

Hilary and Matthew give Danielle a few hints on how to look through binoculars

Jilly Cooper meets

the Bald Eagle

Saturday is our “family” day. So please switch off now unless you are a fan of the Swiss Family Robinson or just like reading embarrassing home truths about other people’s families. I’ll try to make it as short as possible. The meeting place is to be Lighthouse Point overlooking the sea and an island that local pelicans use as a restroom. (Yes!!! That’s what they call loos in the US! Restful places, lavatories.)

R&D, whom we heard about earlier, lead the convoy in their 6,000-litre white Chevvy truck (“van” doesn’t quite do justice to this gas-guzzling, earth-destroying brute of a vehicle that R&D lovingly call the Bad Eagle). Hilary and Matthew, as befit their respectable stations in life, follow on less obtrusively in a scarlet hire car. HaM, as I shall call them for short – and fun – have been much concerned about the weather, bombarding R&D and us with daily texts and emails about “what to wear”. We have tried to explain that in California – of parts of it – an Arctic wind can blow at one moment, an ice-cold fog can envelop you at the next, and a Saharan heatwave will break out when you least expect it, and then there is that stuff about the cloud menace that follows you wherever you go. Mark Twain’s little joke is repeated too often: “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”

So, to say the least, we await with interest what all-weather-defying garments HaM have picked from their wardrobes. And we are not disappointed. H is sporting a waxed boilersuit guaranteed to repel wind, ice and water to great depths and heights. That is topped by a khaki corduroy cap as worn by Jilly Cooper at polo matches or Desert Rats, and by “sensible” woollen socks at the other end – in case of a sudden drop in temperature. M, in more streetwise fashion, has gone for a hoody. Grey, of course (do hoodies come in any other colour?). As a back-up he brings a red covering of indeterminate nature. In case he should be called to round up a herd of Andean llamas, perhaps? If all this is still not up to the most unexpected the weather can come up with, round their necks HaM are wearing scarves. Like you do when you are invited to watch some outdoor winter sporting event.

So surely the Californians can show us up? Yes they can! For D goes for the jaunty French boho look, her Jules et Jim cap worn at kooky angle. R, rather oddly – but perhaps this is a complicated joke to which we do not have the key – is wearing a sheepskin jacket a passing tramp gave him. He claims it is not real. But it patently is, and whenever he moves his arms bits of sheep fall off.

Jane, by the way, is perfectly dressed for the seaside in white blouse and blowy skirt. I strike a bravely daring note by just wearing a T-shirt. But we are half-way into our walk when I realise I probably won’t last till lunch and Jane has to go back to get my coat from our car. Poor show, I admit!

Well, that’s the fashion story [ AND ABOUT TIME TOO – ED. THE READERS CAN’T TELL THEIR BALMAINS FROM THEIR BALENCIAGAS. GET ON WITH IT!!!]

Er, yes, I suppose so.

Well, there’s not much else to tell. We have a picnic, R catches grapes in his mouth, D looks through the wrong end of a telescope, we look at a sea lion, see a chevron (thank you M!) of pelicans gliding over the waves, and under R’s guidance do funny walks in the car park.

That evening we light a barbecue on the wooden balcony of our mountain cottage with the tops of redwoods in front of us and the blue Pacific horizon beyond. Martin and Mary Jane, our landlords, and John and Monet (I never did ask her how she spelled her name), their friends, join us. R is the barbecue master chef. The wine flows and, amazingly, everybody gets something to eat. R&D roar off into the dark, the Bald Eagle spurting sparks and soot from the exhaust. If only I had the Bald Eagle at Bodega Bay, I think, Wendy and Big Mom would have shown me respect.

There is nowhere to sleep in our mountain shack, so HaM are invited to a treehouse a quarter of a mile down a dark track. They spend a chilly night there, in the redwood forest, and heavy blankets are put to use. One redwood holds up a little shower, another their bedroom.

Next morning we expect them for breakfast back at our shack. But they don’t turn up. I am sent to investigate. The poison oak didn’t get them, however. They are just too cold to get out of bed. They leave for Yosemite, taking Jolene with them, a move that we will regret.

But read the next jaw-dropping episode to find out why