california 2015

It makes me squirm to think of how behind I am on capturing this trip in this way. I hope to catch up on New Orleans here before we go to COSTA RICA in a couple weeks! Anyway...at least I'm doing it. I'm so thankful for this space, no matter how infrequently I go on it. It's so fun to look back on this stuff, bah!


In the spring, J and I took a road trip down part of the California cost! I'm so sad that it's taken me so long to post about it. I didn't even take that great of notes, which I'm also bummed about since I'm usually great at that! Get ready because this is a huge barf-a-rama of photos!

Our first stop was Lovers Point by Monterey. We kind of found it by accident, and it was a fun first stop. The ocean is just beautiful, pretty much no matter the context.

Our first air bnb was an adorable little home in a neighborhood by Carmel. It was a super adorable home, right smack dab in a neighborhood. We had the place to ourselves for the afternoon, but we actually just had the room rented, so when we came home later that night, the couple that owned it were there!

Of course we found our way to the ocean right away. It was a little chilly, but it's hard to complain when you're by water and sitting in soft sand.

Carmel was really, really charming. It's known as a pretty ritzy place, which is sometimes I bummer. But I just ignored that part, and was entranced by how adorable it was! Plus the toffee we found in the coffee shop above was OUT OF THIS WORLD.

For breakfast the next morning we went out for breakfast. The fried toast was raved about, but I was actually a little dissapointed by it. I would still recomend the place though! It was wonderful.

He has mastered the "look casual" for me...or maybe that's his, why is she still taking photos face...it's hard to tell.

I'm not going to lie, a lot of our trip was spent talking about the weather, looking up the weather, and then reminding ourself that it was OK, we would still have a blast...and then repeating that cycle. But all in all, it was still an awesome time, duh!

We were still able to hike, and explore. The times where the weather mattered, it pretty much showed up for us. We did Point Lobos park the first day, and that was pretty cloudy. But let's be real, all i really cared about was seeing the seals, and weather doesn't matter for that ;)

At a cranky part of our trip, where there were cars everywhere, and we had no idea where the entrance was to our destination...the most amazing, humbling thing happened. We passed Pfeiffer Park, and finally found the tiny weird road that lead down to Pfeiffer Beach. As we pulled in, there was a guy directing traffic, and he explained that the lot was finally open again, everyone else had had to walk the two miles down to the beach. Hollah! As we were driving down, we saw a couple with a huge duffle bag making the treck, so we stopped and offered them a ride down to the beach. They were SO thankful!

It was ridiculously windy here. Like knock you over windy. Blind you with sand flying windy. It was nuts. So we walked around a bit, trying not to fall over, took some photos. I could barely smile without getting a mouthful of sand. We ended up just laughing really hard and saying, welp, should we go back? And we did just that.

As the master of self timers (above), this was a huge challenge, to balance the phone on driftwood, while the wind blew furiously. Thumbs up to me ;)

As we made our way back to the car, the couple we had driven down, came up behind us.

"We don't want you to think that we were stalking you...but we were...can we get a ride back up?"
We all laughed so hard, they couldn't make it work either. Poor friends had packed a huge heavy bag with picnic supplies too! What an awesome thing that we were able to help them out though.

Nepenthe was our stop for linner (lunch/dinner-is that a thing? it is now...). Everyone recommends this place as a stop on Big Sur. I'm not a huge fan of inflated prices like this...but we were kinda cranky and ready to eat. So we bit the bullet! Somehow we lucked out and got reservations, literally right before they started turning people away. AND THEN, when they brought us to our seat, it was literally one of the best seats in the house. Sometimes things just work out how they should...I need to trust that more.

Our next stop was McWay Falls. At this point, J was a little tired of "stops", but when we finally landed her, he was super thankful, because it was awesome. And golden hour! Another plus!

We a last made a road side stop to tinkle catch a final view of the sunset.

I also made J stop at this seal sanctuary. I could have spent all day there, but I just ran around watching the seals freak out and bark and go crazy. There was probably 300ish along this stretch of beach, and it was INCREDIBLE. For some reason I'm obsessed with these creatures. Thank you for humoring me J, but I still wish we could have stayed there for the night ;)

Our next AirBnB was also really great. We stayed for a night in Morrow Bay. There wasn't much to do in this place, so I'm glad we were only there for a night. This awesome guy built a little shed house behind his place. There was a hot tub even!

Our next stop was the town of San Louis Obispo (SLO). It's a super quaint little place, college town. There was a gum alley. We ate at Big Sky Cafe, which was really good. Then went for a hike on Bishop Peak, which I really loved!

Next, we stopped in Santa Barbara. La Super-Rica Taqueria is the "go to" place to get tacos. We weren't super impressed, but we understand the appeal. It was an adorable little turquoise shack. 

There was a chalk art festival, which happened to be just blocks from our house!

We went to the Santa Barbara botanical gardens, which isn't normally something we would do, but we went with it!. It was beautiful, but i'm not really one to get amped about spending money on stuff like that. Not sure if I would do it again. But we had a good time!

We ate at Milk and Honey in downtown Santa Barbara, and it was incredible. J can sometimes talk me into pricier restaurants, and sometimes I'm happy with it. This time, I was really happy!

We were going to go somewhere trendy and expensive for breakfast, but we ended up at a diner instead. It was a GREAT decision! I would recommend Cajun Kitchen-big portions, great prices. That's my kind of breakfast!

On our way to Santa Cruz, we stopped Solvang, a little Scandinavian town.

And of course we made a stop at in and out!

Next up was Santa Cruz! We spent time laying on the beach, walking the board walk (which was closed, but still fun!) and played some games at the arcade!

Of course we are thankful for any adventure we get to have together, but both of us agreed that this was not one of our favorite trips (I guess I can be honest and just say - it was our least favorite).

One of the things we realized was that through road trips seem so fun on paper and on instagram, part of the reason we love to travel, is falling in love with a place! Finding a bar that tickles us and memorizing the walk home from the city center. On this road trip we just kept moving, we weren't able to develop a relationship with the towns or places or people. It was a really awesome time, and a really good lesson too! And there will always be the regret of, we should have took time to watch more seals ;)

Thanks Cali! We will definitely be back for more.