Road Trip: California or Bust

After 3 nights in the Utah desert, it was time to pack up & head west. It was kind of sad. We knew we would miss our primo camping spot, but then again Cali was just five hours away & we needed to get out of the 105 degree heat.

We camped our first night at El Capitan State Beach just north of Santa Barbara. We set up camp soon after scoring the last camping spot available & then headed in to Buellton & Solvang. We went to Andersen's Pea Soup Restaurant got dinner & a glass of wine. We both had a bowl of pea soup & it was so good I forgot what we actually had for dinner after the soup. The billboards up & down the highway don't lie. The pea soup was great & the atmosphere was strange. I think it was the restaurant that time forgot. We love little eccentricies like that.

So after dinner we drove down the road to Solvang, the mock Danish village.

What we didn't know was the town closes at five o'clock...SHARP. (look at the time on the clock in the photo....D'OH!)



We managed to find a market open that sold wine so we got a few bottles & headed back to the campsite.

We took a bottle of 2004 Santa Barbara Winery Pinot Noir down to the beach to watch the sunset while dolphins played off shore right in front of us. Our first night rocked. If it had been a fairy tale it wouldn't have been any better.



The wine was good...not knock your sox off good, but...well, let's just say the wine only got better.



La enjoying our first sunset over the Pacific.