It was closed the day of our visit, but it would have been nice to have stepped in and learned more about the town.
In front of the library is a statue which we were also curious about...
for it was of the Polish composer Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860-1941) whose legacy and contributions to the city of Paso Robles live on years after his death. Not only was he a composer, but he was also a concert pianist, a politician and a spokesman for Polish independence. He served as the first Prime Minister of independent Poland in 1919. Between 1916-1919 at the height of his fame, he bought land in Paso Robles and over the next few decades, planted almond trees, fruit orchards and zinfandel vines (over 2600 acres worth). In doing so, he contributed greatly to the development of Central Coast agriculture.
This video features the song, "When Paderewski Plays" by the Two Bobs:
There is even a Paderewski Festival in his honor. The upcoming Festival will be held November 6 - 9.
Although not in full bloom, the back of the library has a small memorial rose garden sponsored by the Paso Robles Woman's Club.
Just a few steps away from the rose garden is a horseshoe rink. This is just one half of it. Bert liked seeing this but it would have been cool to see people actually using it.
The park itself was pretty large, had lots of trees which provided shade and a very modern restroom area! It was one of those kinds where you didn't have to really "touch" anything. Everything was motion sensored like the soap, the water, the toilet flusher and hand dryer. Very nifty! I was not expecting such a state of the art restroom!
Not too far from the park was the candy shop I'd read about. TC always likes getting some sort of candy something wherever we travel. This place was called Powell's and it looked like an old time candy store, like the kind you would find from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. In fact, the candy shop even had a mini theatre in which customers can watch the original Willy Wonka movie (Gene Wilder before he did all those buddy flix with Richard Pryor, haha) on an endless loop! In addition to candy, the shop also sold sodas and shakes, plus ice cream and gelato by Doc Burnstein's Ice Cream Lab (we would end up visiting the main store in Arroyo Grande a few days later).
The store was pretty fun to look around. I bought a few Pez dispensers and was really happy that a place of this caliber did NOT jack up the price. Case in point, at some rip off candy joint in Pier 39 in SF, that place was selling Pez for $4.99 each! WTH man. Over here, it was $1.50 which is about the same price that Wal-Mart sells it for. Not too bad!
The park also has a covered gazebo/grandstand. There are picnic tables scattered around and on the outer edges, fields for people to play sports.
I found the "hard to find" monkey with a heart Valentine's pez. That one came out several years ago and I never even saw it in the stores. The other Pez were Randall and Sully from Monster's Inc and Kero Keroppi (the Sanrio frog).
TC bought some Jelly Bellies while Bert splurged on a fancy chocolate bar that we recently finished. We loved the burnt caramel filling. He liked the fact that it had Rogue's Ale Chocolate Stout Beer which also tastes good with ice cream as seen in one of our early beer float experiments meant to replicate the beer float we had in Portland's Pix Patisserie back in 2009. Portland is always ahead of the trends!
The park also had this mini house that a lot of little kids liked going into. It was really cute.
A Fair poster we saw at one of the neighboring businesses...
We walked around a few blocks just window shopping and enjoying our candies.
Our stay in Paso Robles was all too brief. It was time to get going and keep heading west...
We hope to visit Paso Robles again in the near future!
A recent video from March 2014 in which the town celebrated the 125th Anniversary of Paso Robles. You can see downtown, the park and the iconic Acorn Building...
Powell's Sweet Shoppe
840 11th St.
Paso Robles, CA 93447
(805) 239-1544
www.powellsss.com
Info on the downtown park:
www.prcity.com/parks
For an interesting read on the wineries of Paso Robles, please refer to mmm-yoso contributer, Ed of Yuma's post on his recent visit to the Central Coast:
Paso Robles Wine Tasting Adventure June 2014
Well, we were off once again to head all the way to the 1 from the 46.
But rather than go straight to our eventual destination of Cayucos, we took a right turn and headed up the coast to see some interesting sea creatures...
I was excited seeing these roadsigns. I remember TC getting sick near Big Sur a few years ago. We've always stopped at Ragged Point for a pitstop as well. We have many fond memories of visiting my late Ninang in Pebble Beach where she took us to Monterey Bay, Carmel and Pacific Grove...
We were really enjoying our road trip so far. Bert didn't seem to mind all the driving because of all of our little stops...
In any case, San Simeon was our next stop and no, we weren't going to see Hearst Castle either!
2 comments:
Oh man, that mini house looked so cute. I would have loved something like that when I was a kid. That candy store is so cool, too. I wonder if they people who work there hate the Willy Wonka movie now haha.
Hi Mary - it's nice seeing kids happy and playing in it.
i actually asked the girl working there if she was tired of the Willy Wonka movie and she said 'not yet'. it was actually her first week of work there! i'm sure she's sick of it now, haha!
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