Coffee during our Central Coast Road Trip - Red Kettle Coffee House, Cayucos Coffee, Luna Coffee Bar, Scout Coffee & Lucky Llama

It's been about three weeks since our trip to the Central Coast...

we debated whether to do it or not, but wanderlust won out...

Bubblegum Alley

A gas refill somewhere in San Luis Obispo  yielded these two packs of gum...

which would be instrumental in our next stop on our road trip...

Kreuzberg Coffee Company

A few doors down from Rocket Fizz was Kreuzberg Coffee Company...

It serves as a restaurant and coffee/book lounge, as well as the only roastery in downtown SLO...

and is named after a vibrant neighborhood in Berlin.

Rocket Fizz, SLO

Gotta love the font on these signs, reminiscent of the Spanish/Mission heritage in San Luis Obispo...

The brown is kind of blah but I'm sure they chose it because it's the same color as the robes worn by the Spanish friars...

The coffee place we wanted to go to was on Higuera but I spied this kitschy soda shop first...

Day 3 - SLO Donut Company

Returning to our Summer Road trip, not to be confused with the SF Road Trip (which posts I am still trying to finish)....

It was time to say goodbye to Cayucos and the cute little place we stayed....


We would miss their beautiful garden just steps away from the beach and having our dinners out in the patio. As we took photos, we met another family also on vacation (they were from Madera, CA). Everyone we met during our stay was so kind and nice and we are hoping to make another stop here in the future...

Everything was packed and ready. Southward we would go...

Summer Road Trip Day 3 Highlights

Well, as the late Chef from South Park would say, "Well hello there childrens..."

In this case, it was goodbye to this cute little seaside town with quirky homes...

SF Road Trip - Day 8 - Mission San Luis Obispo, Cal Poly SLO & Mission Santa Barbara

[Yet another post coming out weeks later! 7/22]

The last day of our trip brought us to the lovely town of San Luis Obispo, home to the Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa (see plaque below) and also to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly SLO). Last night we saw bit of the main drag - there was a street festival going on. Lots of college students too. We didn't originally intend to visit the missions when we were planning our trip, but figured, since TC had to learn about the California Missions (in which native Americans were subjugated and coerced by the Spaniards to build these missions with their blood, sweat and tears in the name of God and glory, and dying like flies from diseases from said Spaniards in the process...), we thought it might be cool to see a few of them since they were on the way down.

Here's the head honcho of the Mission system in California, Father Junipero Serra. His bones are buried in the Mission in Carmel where we were a few nights before (well, we were actually at the Mission Ranch area, next to the mission). I think there's a statue of this guy at every mission. It's kind of hard for me to be excited about this guy. The native Americans didn't ask to be "converted" to Catholicism, much like the Filipinos in the Philippines and the native peoples in Mexico didn't ask to be colonized. Despite this, we still found it valuable to visit these places so our daughter could learn about history firsthand.
Click to enlarge - plaque about the Mission Bells...
I later saw a sign that said that photography was NOT allowed. Ooops. This was one of the altars...
OMFG - can you believe that this is a wreath made out of HUMAN HAIR? Nice hobby.
Mass was going on when we arrived. The place was jam packed.
After about an hour or so here, we headed down to Santa Barbara - talk about a beautiful city! It's gorgeous there! The mountains are close by and there are lush and rolling hills! Everything here is so pretty and scenic! This town is also home to another famed university, UCSB, and is home to yet another mission, the Mission Santa Barbara, also known as the "Queen of the Missions" but before we went to the Mission, we stopped off to have lunch at McDs! This was one of the main streets (can't remember the name).
In order to use their bathroom, you had to get a token, but only if you were a paying customer. If you came in from off the street and just wanted to do your business, they charge you a quarter. There were a lot of homeless folks IN the McD's and also hanging out on the sidewalk. Not to sound like an elitist, but the bums looked kind of incongruous in such a relatively picturesque setting.
TC's cheeseburger from her Happy Meal - which she had with apple juice, not a soda.
We let her have fries this time (purely for selfish reasons - so we could have some too!) - the other choice was apple slices with caramel dip...
Her Happy Meal box whoring out crap from the third Ice Age movie...
My plain hamburger. You know they have to make it fresh because they're used to cranking out burgers with everything on them and letting them sit there. One of my friends who used to work in McD's back in high school told me that making plain ones were a pain in the ass - no one wanted to make them as they were ordered. It was easier making their assembly line burgers and letting them sit under the heatlamp until someone bought and ingested them.
Bert's burger. I don't think this was a big Mac since those come with two patties, dont' they? WTF, whatever!
The historic looking (it probably is) Granada Theatre across from the McD's...
Just a few steps down from the Granada was this Gelato place...
We were all craving a taste of gelato...
Here's ours (me and Bert) - Hazelnut and Coffee - It was melting so fast that day!
TC's was mango sorbet with strawberry gelato. Her and her fruity flavors...
Here's a zoom of Mission Santa Barbara. You can't see them in this photo, but there was a newlywed couple posing on the steps. Awww!
We parked a ways off from the Mission. We had to cross a grass field with these gorgeous flower beds filled with roses.
Another shot of the Mission - this time you can see the young married couple posing on the steps! They looked so happy and the photographer was totally making them work it!
The Mission was built through hard labor by the native Americans (specifically the Chumash tribe of Indians). They also had an aqueduct system (more on that here since the Mission was a place where people actually lived and worked.

There were chalk drawings on the ground - Apparently they do this every year. The Italian tradition of sidewalk chalk drawing comes to Santa Barbara each Memorial Day weekend. Artists show their talent on the blacktop pavement in front of Mission Santa Barbara .
I could feel the sense of history from this Mission...the stones looked almost pink. We didn't realize just how huge this mission was until we took the tour.
Here's Bert on the mission steps...
And here is the view inside one of the gift shops before you embark on the self guided tour, should you choose to do so. It's $5 per adult and $1 for kids. The worker there was cool and didn't charge us for TC!
Once you walk through the hallway (seen above), you are in the inner courtyard. There's a really pretty garden in there. There are arrows and ropes that guide you along as well as a pamphlet (they give it to you before you walk in) that describes each major section of the mission.
Evil looking cactus!
This was in the graveyard which is on the mission grounds. TC and I found it morbidly fascinating that this site held about 4,000 bodies! Some were Spaniards but most of them were native Americans. They died quite easily back in those days - no thanks to diseases spread by the Spaniards. Many of the natives did not have immunity to those diseases.
While I found the graveyard fascinating, TC found it a little unsettling, especially after seeing some mausoleum like tombs...
Some of the graves had gates:
You can kind of see some crypts in the background...
The mission is also home to Santa Barbara's Moreton Bay Fig Tree. There's also one of these gigantor trees right by the San Diego Museum of Natural History in Balboa Park. The one in San Diego us much bigger than this one though and it has been fenced off so that the roots wouldn't get messed up.
Entrance by the side of the church. See the three skulls above the door? It indicates that you are in the cemetery...

Church interior:
Tools used to build the mission...

One of the old rooms with a kitchen...
The Lavanderia of the mission. More info on that here and here.

Here's Father Serra again.
More of the church interior. Someone asked me if I knew where confession was at. Like I know!
The Virgin of Guadalupe, a much beloved image, especially to Mexicans. One of my friends collects anything with her image on it.
Next stop! Home!