Day 6 Solvang to Merced

California Land Form Diversity Solvang to Merced

The Reputation
 California to the rest of the world is something of a mythology. In the mind of those who have not traveled to and through California, it is a place of Hollywood Stars on every corner. It is busy, it is urban and pretty noisy. To those who have taken some time to travel within its borders, California is full of contrasts both physically in the land forms and emotionally in the form of quiet out of the way places that allow one to recharge their batteries and get a grip of the life as well as those .

Contrasts in the Scenery
Our last day of vacation was full of both of these contrasts. The land forms around Solvang are simply beautiful. Its farmland that would approach the quiet surrender that one finds around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania in the East. Today we also traveled to a part of California that not even a scrap of vegetation volunteers to grow, yet provides California with a huge jolt of economic power. I am bit intrigued by writing such verses.

Solvang and its surrounds is quiet. My local Starbucks barista told me that her parents go there to get a way from a frenetic lifestyle in Ventura. It is easy to sit on the many provided benches and enjoy the quietness of the day. The town has a definite laid  back style and its easy to get caught up in it. Sue loves to pause and see what is seasonally available at the old fashion hardware store near the end of the main street. Many residents meet and carry on social conversations as they meet their neighbors who stop to pick up a pony pack of annuals for their gardens or talk to their friends about an upcoming gathering. Life rolls on in this town on a Monday morning. The residents in the hardware store get a resident discount on all that they buy. In the other stores it is amazing to see that the ubiquitous UPC labels that are read by point of sale computers are not present. The young retail clerks in one souvenir gift shop, the middle aged lady that took my money for some cards at Rassmusens and the retired and back to work owner clerk at the on sale costume jewlery store all carefully wrote down on a receipt book what was purchased, added up the total with a calculator and  entered the price paid at the bottom of the list. It has been along time since I have seen that happen in a retail store.

Solvang Charms
The clerks were happy to talk about their lives as they completed their sales. Sue talked to an older guy that owned a costume jewelry out let that told her all about running two bakeries before "retiring to sell jewelry 3 for 5 dollars. Sue found a handful that she could not walk away from for the price. While Sue was looking at the scarves at another boutique, I talked to a Las Vegas escapee that was running a souvenir shop. She had quite a tale about working in the casinos for 32 years before coming to Solvang to run this little shop beside the bakery. Sue found a couple of treasures and again she dutifully wrote them down and took my money.

I let Sue pick the choices for the bakery to go box. She picked me out some choices that I would probably not pick but were fabulous. She chose for herself a napoleon and a cream puff. For me she picked out a couple of macaroons. She knows I have a weakness for coconut.  They were fabulous but I probably would have picked a danish sweet roll if given a choice. But the macaroons were the best I have ever tasted and they showcased their coconut magnificently.

Solvang is set up for a wine tasting. This was not something that I cared to do with the 5 hour driving trip ahead but it is one of those things that people do since the popularity that the wines of the Santa Ynez valley received in the Oscar winning movie, Sideways. About 35 wineries have set up tasting rooms in Solvang. On a Monday morning they were all pretty empty as we walked by.

Solvang is set up for the tourist buses. There are major parking lots next to the city parks in the middle of the town with massive restroom facilities provided by the city so as to lure in the highway 101 travelers on the crawl. We had done the shops and were on the road to Paso Robles by 11:00. Paso Robles is the spot on 101 that we veer off and take the inland route to get to the Central Valley.

Back on the Road up the Coast

As we were trucking up the road I got a call from my sister and her husband that suggested that we find a place in Solvang to meet up and have some lunch together. At that time we were in San Luis Obispo about 70 miles north. It was a great idea.. but we were pretty intent upon moving up the road and getting home soon.

The road up the coast takes an inland jog as land on the coast is reserved for Vandenburg Air Force Base. It is the place on the west coast that the military launches missiles. When ever there is a UFO "sighting" it usually is not a UFO at all but rather a missile has been launched and lights up the evening sky. The launches are from this spot on the California coast.

Highway 101 rejoins the coast at Santa Maria and San Luis Obispo where on this day the breezes coming in from the ocean were about 30 knots. The road follows up a canyon where there are exits for the Cal Poly campus. Eventually it reaches exits for Pismo Beach, Avilla Beach and Shell Beach. Paseo Robles is further inland and is the home of the mid valley fair and rodeo each year. All the big stars in country music make this fair for a stop on their road trip. There are also many winery tasting rooms in this area too.

We made the turn at Peso Robles and at first the road is pretty scenic as it rolls through the rolling vinyards. Then another junction and suddenly we are in a ghost like land form. There are many layers of sandstone that drop off into other layers of sandstone as we travel through the oil rich California region known as Lost Hills. Not a house in sight for miles and miles. Not a stick of a tree or a wild grass of any kind lives in this area. It is desolate. I make the choice to angle a little North as we come through the area that the legendary movie star, James Dean lost his young life in the late 50's. It is also the area that a coffee drinking retired teacher friend of mine got nailed for traveling 7 miles over the speed limit and had to pay 350 dollar fine and attend a traffic school. You can bet that I was watching my speed as we headed for Buttonwillow a wide spot on interstate 5.  We stopped there and found and IN and Out burger joint and were ready to head north.

My navigation program has a time estimate feature. We could save 25 minutes by angling North on highway 41 from Buttonwillow. It would leave us in Fresno which is about 59 miles away from Merced. We took that direction even though our usual way would be to head up interstate at 70miles per hour and scoot over at Mercy Hot Springs road to the road that would take us through the valley past Dos Palos and into Merced.

The Buttonwillow Road to Fresno was a great road. It followed a couple of canals and rolled us through Lemore, a naval air base in the middle of the valley. suddenly out of seemingly nowhere, a freeway overpass appeared and we were trucking through Lemore. As we got near Fresno the highway became separated and there were a couple of traffic light the two lanes became four lanes Sure to its estimate we were in Fresno and headed home right on schedule.

The cats were very happy to see us and were were happy to see them.

 A Great Vacation was had by all!