(My family and me at the beach at Monterey Bay)

Below isone of my blog transplants from AKO.  I had a series of posts there describing the various places to live and the various communities in the Monterey Peninsual area (which is where DLI is located).  I want to make sure I add it here because I think it provides some baseline information for anyone living in the area, whether you are there for DLI or NPS or just assigned to the post (lucky!).  However, before I continue, I want to add a link to a blog post by MAJ Matt Brown entitled Foreign Area Officers: How we're trainined and what we do.  It is a great general overview of being a FAO, training and assignment possibilties.

Moving to and living in Monterey:

Monterey has its own airport.  It’s not super big, but it is pretty busy and has regular connections through most of the major California airports.  If you don’t want to fly on a commuter jet into Monterey, the next closest major airport is in San Jose.  It is a little over an hour from Monterey.  My family and I were previously stationed at Ft. Lewis, WA, so we drove to DLI.  It was a nice drive, but we did it all in one, 18 hour shot.  I do not recommend 18 straight hours with two babies.

     There are three places you can stay as you wait to move into your permanent place.  There is the Army Lodge, located on the Presidio.  Follow this link:

http://www.pomlodging.com/map.htm

     The Army Lodge is a typical, old style Army lodging.  I am pretty sure it is renovated Army barracks.  You can also stay in either the Navy Lodge, located near the La Mesa housing development or you can stay at the Del Monte Hotel.  The Del Monte is located on the Naval Post Graduate School grounds.  Follow this link:

http://www.nps.edu/Visitors/guest_lodging.html

     We stayed at the Army Lodge.  It is sufficient for short term stays.  I recommend the Navy Lodge or the Del Monte if you can get a reservation.  the Navy Lodge is new and the Del Monte has a lot of newly renovated rooms.  However, any of the hotels will meet your short term needs.

There are several different housing options while you live in Monterey.  Housing on the Presidio is reserved to permanent party members only.  No exceptions, no matter how much you beg, plead or bribe.  Government housing is managed by a private contractor called Pinnacle.  Here is their website:

https://monterey.pinnaclefamilyhousing.com/

     They manage two different housing developments.  One is called La Mesa, located near NPS.  The other is the Ord Military Community located on the grounds of the old Ft. Ord.  Both developments have both new and old houses.  In order to put your name on the housing list, you have to go into the housing office in person with a copy of your orders.  No exceptions to this rule either.  There are a very limited number of new houses.  There is no way to guarantee that you will get one of the new houses.  But there are a couple of things you can do to maximize your chances.  First, you need to arrive far enough in advance of your class date to wait for the house.  My family and I arrived a month before class started and waited about three weeks for our house.  I have friends that arrived only a day or two before their class date and just didn’t have the time to wait for a house.  They needed to get their family settled and took whatever house was available.  Also, make sure you physically go to both the office at La Mesa and the office at Ord.  The two offices do not share the same database, I have no idea why, but they don’t.  Put your name on the list at both offices. 

     Of course, you can always rent a house or apartment as well.  The Pinnacle website has a link to the BAH calculator.  Rent is high in the Monterey area, but the BAH covers most places.  Unfortunately, we have a dog and were not able to find any house owners that would take her.

     We have a house on Ord, and we have been pretty happy with it.  Ord is about a 15 minute commute from the Presidio.  La Mesa is probably ten minutes or less, but there weren’t any houses available for us there.

Communities on the peninsula:

Generally speaking, most of the places around the Presidio are pretty nice.  Some of them are nicer than others.  There are pros and cons to each:

     Monterey - The biggest of the surrounding towns and probably the most well rounded in terms of things to do and places to live.  The Presidio also sits on top of the hill, right in the middle of town.  Consequently, you will have the shortest commute time to work from Monterey.  In fact, I had a friend who could literally walk to work in about five minutes.  Prices in houses vary, depending on size, view of the bay, etc.  It is not super hard to find places within BAH.  There is a huge variety of shopping and places to eat.  Although, there are not a lot chain restaurants, but in my book that is generally a good thing.

     Pacific Grove - Or "PG" as the locals like to call it, sits to the west of the Presidio.  It is much smaller than Monterey and has more of a quiet, older town feel.  It has a nice little downtown and some nice restaurants.  Pacific Grove is a little more expensive for houses and food.  It is also a little further away from work, but still pretty close.  You can probably be to the Presidio in ten minutes or less from most places in Pacific Grove.  For both Pacific Grove and Monterey, you don't have to worry about taking the major roads in the area to work, so rush hour traffic really won't impact your travel time too much.

     Carmel (and Pebble Beach) - Small, beautiful and prohibitively expensive.  Well, I should clarify.  It was too expensive to live in these places on the BAH of an O3.  My wife and I did not spend too much time looking around for places to live in these locations.  Maybe they are within the BAH for O5s and O6s, but I am not sure.  They are beautiful locations though and well worth the visit for shopping, restaurants or a trip to the beach.

     Seaside - Probably the "least nice" of the Monterey Penninsula towns.  But, I think that is mostly just relative to how nice most places on the Penninsula are.  I live on the Ord Military Community, as I mentioned earlier, and Ord is located within Seaside.  Therefore, I am pretty familiar with Seaside proper.  The houses in Seaside tend to be much older and a little less nice than some of the other places.  Almost all of the houses have some kind of view of the ocean though.  Rent is much more reasonable here.  The shopping options aren't huge, but there is still quite a variety of restaurants.  It takes me 15 minutes to get to work when there is no traffic.  When there is traffic it takes from 20 - 25 minutes.  I imagine most places in Seaside are a similar commute.

     Marina - A little further to the east of Seaside.  I honestly do not know too much about Marina.  Maybe someone who lives there will read this and be able to speak a little more intelligently about the town.  I have some friends that live there, however, and they seem to be happy.  The commute is maybe a few minutes longer than that of Seaside.

     Salinas - Salinas is not actually on the Monterey Penninsula, it is a little further inland.  There are good places and bad places in Salinas.  It has a very nice downtown and some good shopping on the north side of town.  If you or someone in your family is looking for an actual, indoor shopping mall, Salinas is the only place in the area.  It is actually the only place with a Toys R Us as well.  Salinas is the only town I would describe as having a problem with crime.  The crime problem is generally restricted to certain parts of town, but it does exist.  I have several friends that live in Salinas and really like it.  Rent is very reasonable, well under most BAHs.  The commute is a little longer, probaby about 30 minutes on an average day.  Oh, one other point about Salinas.  It is outside the mountainous shell of the Monterey Penninsula and therefore tends to have much sunnier weather and higher temperatures than the other towns I have discussed.

     I am going to post a couple of maps that I found online.  They have pretty good detail, but you may have to download them and look at them in your picture viewer to see them better.  One is a really good one of the area.  I can't claim credit for the routes to the Presidio's gates on it.  Strangely, they were already there.  The other is a map of some of the attractions in the area.  Critical info if you and your spouse are anything like Julie and me.