Wednesday, March 20th 2013
Santa Maria – Sunnyvale
Relatively early morning in Santa
Maria. It was our last day on the road and there was still stuff to
do and to get home. We were still unlucky (sort of) with the weather.
It was cloudy and grey. Oh well, it could be worse (snowing, tornado
or something else). Apparently after leaving the motel, I took the
wrong turn (instead of right I went left) and we made a small detour
to the farm country. Already many people working the fields. We got
back to town and started to drive the right way. It was a country, no
big cities anymore. On our left, there were Pismo Dunes,
unfortunately they were either too far and mainly for four wheelers.
On the beginning of the town, we turned into it and quickly got on
the beach. This one was open to cars. We parked in the parking lot
and just joked about our Utah incident (when we got into the sand and
made it hardly out). The beach was huge, there were some dunes near
by and as well some cars on the beach. It was pretty. J. found many
“monkey business” on the beach and started to collect it. So, for
her it was happy and good start of the day.
On this beach, there was a huge vehicle
driving on it to clean it or compact it. It was funny. We drove
couple minutes and entered the town and drove to the beach again. We
parked, walked on the pier and J. got all giddy and walked on the
beach collecting more shells and sand dollars. I was back in the car
having my breakfast. There were already people on the beach (about
9.22 am). The sky cleared some. We continued along the shore. On the
map, there was a lighthouse near Avila Beach. Even it was a detour,
we drove there. It was nice drive, we passed the spa. We got the
small harbor and found out, that the road ends there. The other
option, another road was blocked by the entrance to the power
company. Weird. We tried to find something on the phone, but it
looked like you could access it on Saturdays via the guided tour. We
drove back to the main road.
San Luis Obispo, that was our next
destination. We drove on highway 101 / 1, nice road with the speed
limit of 65 mph. The surroundings were very similar, it was inland, a
lot of farming and rolling hills. Very pretty and enjoyable. We did
not stop in the downtown area (kind of small and not super
interesting), it was again in that spanish mission style. We found
and stopped by the San Luis Obispo Mission. We passed several times
another missions (without visiting), so we figured out we would visit
now. There was small store, about 8 different rooms were now a
museum. We walked through, there were many artifacts, indian history
etc. We saw black wedding dress (she was a widow). We saw a great
silver saddle. We were told (there was a staff in the room) that it
was used in Rose Parade. We were looking at her silently and were
asked about Rose Parade. She was startled that we never heard about
it. (((Looking on the web, it is a new years celebration parade held
in Pasadena since 1890.))) She even asked us if we were from this
country. That was funny. We toured the rest of the museum. We saw
washing machine (old one). At the end, we went into the church –
pretty. It was really nice building. The park next to it, small but
pretty. So peaceful. It warmed up and there was sunshine. So nice. We
walked down to the creek and stayed for a minute.
This time, the road split into 101
(freeway heading to San Francisco) and road 1 (surprisingly heading
to SF as well, but along the coast). We took a detour and followed
number 1 for a while. The town of Morro Bay (apparently famous with a
Morro Rock). We drove via the harbor main street (it is some what sad
how all those place are becoming the same, store and restaurants,
same trinkets sold everywhere). We continued driving along the
harbor, enjoyed three chimneys standing there (power plant) on the
way to the Rock. It was a small half island that we could drive on.
And we did. Big parking area on the beginning, but we continued along
the side of the rock and parked there. Short walk to the area marked
“do not enter” and bunch of big boulders and a border or a wave
breaker. We stood at the end and discovered that by the ocean (not
safely accessible) there were tide pools. We could see bunch of star
fish hanging on the rocks and looking more we could see bunch of
midsize crabs crawling around there. That was cool. We walked back on
the inner beach and found hundreds of sand dollars and probably five
tiny crabs (or something like that) crawling on the beach leaving a
trail behind them. Again, really cool. I forgot to mention, there was
a big rock standing, and it was really big.
A bit more driving along the coast. We
were some what pushing the time, as we wanted to arrive before the
rush hour (J. have to work next day). The town was fine (that close
to ocean, trinket stores and some restaurants). We just drive through
to get to Moon Beach. It got nice and sunny (at the end of our trip,
really). We parked, looked around and I lost J. to the beach, where
she was looking for her monkey business. As usual. It was pretty
there, again and surprisingly. She brought some shells and was super
excited as she found an arrow head (or something like that). Life is
good.
It was about 1.26 pm when we left
Cambria. We crossed the mountains, the views were incredible. J. was
trying to talk with some recruiters but it did not work super well
with disappearing signal. Some big houses lost within the vineyards.
The life has to be hard here. In no time we were about to get on 101
and head north. We got gas and coffee (J. finished her phone call).
And about two and half hours on the road. It was not too bad. We
already drove on the part of this road, so it was not really new. And
going, going, going and going. It was boring. Finally, we made it. We
had to stop by Costco and Safeway, to get some food and shortly
before six, we were at home. It looked like rain, but nothing
happened. It was interesting and good trip, but it was good to be at
(temporary) home.
