California Coast

Jan. 26

Time flies when you’re having fun!

We have been watching sunsets, walking on the beaches and doing art galleries, hikes and a little shopping.

Spent some time in Carpentaria just south of Santa Barbara. Nightly lulled to sleep by the roaring waves hitting the beach just over the dunes from our campsite. Daily walking along this beautiful beach, observing the beautiful people and using their library.

I noticed in San Clemente that most of the streets have wide designated bike lanes and that after school there are a lot of kids – even elementary ones – riding home with their book bags. Pretty nice! Must be a really safe place

Took a tour of Santa Barbara - great walking town – really beautiful people here. Stopped in Territory Ahead – both discount store and REAL store. Lots of great eating places which we didn’t eat at but did hit Trader Joe’s.

Side trip to Solvang – a Danish styled village. A bit touristy but my heritage you know. Managed to stock up on lots of Danish pastry. It was a beautiful ride thru the hills – as was the next day’s tour to Ojia – an artsy community. Lots of avocados being grown – huge trees. We had never seen one before. Citrus too. We went buy the lake where the 1984 Olympics were held. It’s a camping area now. REMEMBER Joanie won the marathon that year. Seems like yesterday.

Went to Venice Beach – passed thru Malibu on the way - didn’t see any “stars” and Venice is weird – Lots of tattoo – and similar shops also henna and roller bladders and tourist. Barry insisted we go there. We did get a parking ticket which we didn’t notice until we were in a 2.5 hour traffic jam on one of the freeways thru LA. Luckily tit blew away. Oh well. I am sure they will find us.

The weather has been hot during the day and cool at night.