My Trip to San Luis Obispo - Journal Entry
Well, the first thing I have to say is that being sick and unemployed means that I can go to meet-ups like this without having to schedule a vacation. Life is full of trade-offs.
I woke up and brushed and fed the cat (extra in her dish) cleaned the cat-box and then fed the Cavvy (Guinea Pig) and made sure there was enough water for both. I then set up two box fans in the windows (one blowing in from the sitting room and one blowing out from the bedroom) to keep the pets from getting too hot. I then packed quickly (I'm a 30 minute packer - which means that I believe that if I pack just before I'm going on a vacation I don't obsess about it and I seem to get most everything necessary anyway (in this case everything) and what I forget can be purchased where I'm going) and jumped in the car.
I left Scummyvale at 9:30 and hit 101 South. I made good time and passed Salinas by 10:45 and then into the Salinas Valley and that long ride to Paso Robles. It got a little exciting when some idjit in a RV decided that both southbound lanes were for him. Yikes!
I hit the down-grade of Cuesta Summit around 12:30 and carromed down the mountain into SLO. I find it fascinating that you go from 1500 feet elevation to the 250 feet that San Luis Obispo resides at within a distance of three miles or so. It's quite a hill. There are three lanes going each way for the grade and the trucks are in the right lanes trying to either make the hill or come down the hill without killing the drivers. It is a mighty slow trip for them. In the middle lane are the guys like me who either have a car which doesn't go fast well or have more sense than to go fast on this monster hill. The left lanes is for the heart donors and speed-racers. I rolled into SLO at 12:40.
Check in at the motel was 2 so I had some time to kill and maybe decompress. I needed food and so I went in search. Cruising through the fascinating downtown I came across a place called Mo's Bar BQ which looked to be just up my alley (independent restaurants are always a great adventure) so I parked and went in. Great 'Q'!! I was on vacation so I decided to splurge a bit and ordered the "Combo Plate" which gave me a selection of meats. The first was chicken (really good but not "fantastic") I got a leg so I don't know how moist the breast would have been but the leg was almost falling off the bone and the hickory smoke had gotten well into the meat. Well cooked BBQ is a joy. The next meat was pulled pork butt which was too moist. It should have been drier but all-in-all quite good. The next was some pork ribs and here I pause to say a silent pray of benediction upon the man who taught Mo how to do "Q". The ribs were the 6th best I'd had in the USA and the 2nd best I'd had in California (The Best is in Hayward, CA... it's called "Carmen and Family" and is run by the family of a Creole Lady who developed the sauce). Really wonderful food. They also had Rolling Rock (pre-Anheiser-Busch-shutdown) and I ordered two (and water!) because I was dehydrated from the drive.
After lunch I needed a nice place to digest and I dragged my 27-acre body down to the mission and looked at all the pretty people while I sat in the shade and ruminated. San Luis Osbispo is probably the nicest town I've been in for quite awhile and I could live there easily. The combination of local agriculture, college-town ambiance (Let's hear it for the Cal-Poly Mustangs!!) and tourist attraction makes it really friendly and filled with wonderful young people. A man could grow old there and still stay young.
(more later)
I woke up and brushed and fed the cat (extra in her dish) cleaned the cat-box and then fed the Cavvy (Guinea Pig) and made sure there was enough water for both. I then set up two box fans in the windows (one blowing in from the sitting room and one blowing out from the bedroom) to keep the pets from getting too hot. I then packed quickly (I'm a 30 minute packer - which means that I believe that if I pack just before I'm going on a vacation I don't obsess about it and I seem to get most everything necessary anyway (in this case everything) and what I forget can be purchased where I'm going) and jumped in the car.
I left Scummyvale at 9:30 and hit 101 South. I made good time and passed Salinas by 10:45 and then into the Salinas Valley and that long ride to Paso Robles. It got a little exciting when some idjit in a RV decided that both southbound lanes were for him. Yikes!
I hit the down-grade of Cuesta Summit around 12:30 and carromed down the mountain into SLO. I find it fascinating that you go from 1500 feet elevation to the 250 feet that San Luis Obispo resides at within a distance of three miles or so. It's quite a hill. There are three lanes going each way for the grade and the trucks are in the right lanes trying to either make the hill or come down the hill without killing the drivers. It is a mighty slow trip for them. In the middle lane are the guys like me who either have a car which doesn't go fast well or have more sense than to go fast on this monster hill. The left lanes is for the heart donors and speed-racers. I rolled into SLO at 12:40.
Check in at the motel was 2 so I had some time to kill and maybe decompress. I needed food and so I went in search. Cruising through the fascinating downtown I came across a place called Mo's Bar BQ which looked to be just up my alley (independent restaurants are always a great adventure) so I parked and went in. Great 'Q'!! I was on vacation so I decided to splurge a bit and ordered the "Combo Plate" which gave me a selection of meats. The first was chicken (really good but not "fantastic") I got a leg so I don't know how moist the breast would have been but the leg was almost falling off the bone and the hickory smoke had gotten well into the meat. Well cooked BBQ is a joy. The next meat was pulled pork butt which was too moist. It should have been drier but all-in-all quite good. The next was some pork ribs and here I pause to say a silent pray of benediction upon the man who taught Mo how to do "Q". The ribs were the 6th best I'd had in the USA and the 2nd best I'd had in California (The Best is in Hayward, CA... it's called "Carmen and Family" and is run by the family of a Creole Lady who developed the sauce). Really wonderful food. They also had Rolling Rock (pre-Anheiser-Busch-shutdown) and I ordered two (and water!) because I was dehydrated from the drive.
After lunch I needed a nice place to digest and I dragged my 27-acre body down to the mission and looked at all the pretty people while I sat in the shade and ruminated. San Luis Osbispo is probably the nicest town I've been in for quite awhile and I could live there easily. The combination of local agriculture, college-town ambiance (Let's hear it for the Cal-Poly Mustangs!!) and tourist attraction makes it really friendly and filled with wonderful young people. A man could grow old there and still stay young.
(more later)
posted by S.A.M. Tanner at 10:45 AM
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