Whoops,yesterday I wrote that Soledad was our destination...no, it was Buellton, near Solvang. The reason for the mistake is that I had originally planned to stay there and I was thinking we were a day later than we were.
Be that as it may, we started off for Buellton, a small town on route 101 just north of Santa Barbara. The plan was simple enough not to use the satnav. We were going to head up I405 and pick up route 101 to follow that to Buellton.
From the word go the traffic was heavy. Up the I405 and on to the 101 was done smoothly. Along the 101 I took us down to Malibu State Park. There was a very good reason for this; the area of the park has been used in several films and television series. It has been used as a Welsh valley of all things in the film “How Green was My Valley” - it doesn't look very Welsh valleyish but probably the most well-known use was for 'MASH'. Looking around the park it was so easy to see that the landscape was familiar. There was even directions to the 'MASH' camp. Unfortunately we didn't have time to go there but we tried to listen for 'incoming copters'.
The weather has continued to be good; hot and sunny. It's easy to understand why the park was of with that in mind.
On the thought of television series we caught an episode of Monk. Towards the end the characters are at an amusement park on a pier. Now, Monk is set in San Francisco and the only pier amusement park is Pier 39. The one shown was not that one but it just so happened that we had seen the park the previous day, it was Santa Monica pier!
Back to today. We set off again and about 40 minutes later we pulled off the route and picked up some coffee and sandwiches. We ate them in the parking lot of the convenience store. There was a Salvation Army collection going on. There was also a lad sweeping the area around a skip. Talk about making a mountain out of a mole hill. He just took so long to do a job that need only have taken 5 minutes but he was taking 15 and still hadn't finished. A car drew up and a couple got out. They offered some goods but they appeared to have them rejected. The woman was really annoyed. Although we couldn't hear what was said her body language and the way she threw the items back into the car made it clear how she felt.
Our next stop was Santa Barbara where we went wandered around for a while. There was a bus service up and down State Street, the main drag, but is wasn't a patch on Denver's version. The one there was free and frequent and the City authorities had made 16th completely pedestrianized; State Street still had traffic and the bus service was rather flaky, however, it served it's purpose as eventually we took one down to the main beach and pier. The wind was blowing and the beach wasn't quite as good as Santa Monica/Venice. However we walked along it for a while and then went back up to 16th. I went and bought a new pair of trainers at a Payless for the equivalent of £13 which would have sold for £26-30 in the UK.
Leaving Santa Barbara was easy as the 101 was well sign posted. The drive up to Buellton was simple for the first time in over weeks the hotel was on the right hand side of the road. All the others had been on the left or a corner site.
A little later we found an Albertsons, a supermarket, and bought some dinner. Microwaveable main course but an apple pie, strawberries and cream for the dessert, with a garlic bread starter and a New Zealand white to wash it all down.
Tomorrow we go from here up the central valley to Salinas where John Steinbeck was from.
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