Califeducation #3: The Coast Starlight, San Luis Obispo, and Solvang

For July 4th weekend, which is halfway between my mom's birthday and mine, I headed down to LA, where the madre lives. She had planned a surprise trip for me on the Coast Starlight (an Amtrak line on the West Coast, notorious for its wonderful views) to San Luis Obispo – I wanted to go to Santa Barbara, but the views get real good between Santa Barbara and San LO, so we went a bit farther north to get the good stuff and it totally paid off.

This is from the train. FROM THE TRAIN.

The highlight of the trip was the train ride. It's not that the trip was bad, it's just that the train ride was that good. It was my first one, so I suppose it's kind of like how you remember your first love. I wonder if any other train ride I ever take will compare. Correction: it was my first train ride in America. Train rides in Vietnam are full of men spitting into the aisle, people yelling into their cellphones, and obnoxious music videos playing so loudly they can't be ignored.

Once my mom and I finally figured out that you have to practically beg for a seat assignment (Yelp did not clue us in on that one), we got our seats and asked just about every attendant when we could move to the observation car. Here's what every Yelp review should say (and doesn't):

"When you go to get on the train, ask for a seat assignment. If the attendant you ask says something akin to, "She can get you one over there...hopefully," don't be alarmed; you won't be the first one to have been told that. Once you finally do get your assignment, find your seat, sit your butt down, and bask in all the leg room you have compared to every flight you've ever taken. Then, as soon as the conductor guy scans your ticket and your seat assignment, book it to the observation car. From LA, you'll have to wait about 2 hours for good views, but you'll have the best seat in the house (in fact, you'll actually have a seat) for when the waves finally do come crashing in around you. And if it's Thursday - Sunday you're in even more luck: there's this awesome National Parks volunteer tour guide group that makes it an even more memorable experience. Coast Starlight? 4 stars fo' sho'."

So for the entire trip, my mom and I planted ourselves in the observation car, which looks like this:



And offers views like this:




My favorite, though, was probably the trestle that we crossed. Made me feel like Jesse James could come out with his gun at any time, you know?



We got off the train pretty high on life, eventually got our rental car from a 19-year-old boy with eyes like Frank Sinatra, and headed on over to the Apple Farm Inn, the cutest little boutique hotel this side of the Rockies. There's a bakery, restaurant, and mill right there, too, so if you don't feel going up to Pismo Beach, you can just bask in massages, ice cream, and comfort food and then roll on into bed minutes later (even if it is 7:30 PM...cough cough). But the best part about Apple Inn? When you check in, they hand every person in your party cookies (soft, chewy, delectable, melt-in-your-mouth cookies) and a glass of wine. Do I want to go back? Uhh, does the pope wear a funny hat? They even give you a souvenir apple that's waiting for you on your vanity table when you walk in. It's the little things that sell me, you know?


We decided to skip San LO, stuff ourselves silly with the aforementioned comfort food, and head to bed super early for a trip to Solvang in the morning (after we loaded up on complimentary hot cocoa and cider, of course). It's a little town entirely devoted to tourism that is in traditional Danish style, even with horses wandering the streets and women and men dressed in traditional Danish clothing wandering the sidewalks just waiting to answer your questions. There are a ton of windmills, a ton of interesting architecture, and lots and lots of pastries. In other words, it has everything good in this world – well, for at least an afternoon or so.




Solvang – check. Coast Starlight – check. The next Amtrak ride I'd love to take would be up to Seattle or Canada. Sure beats American or Southwest any day of the week, but especially Thursday - Sunday. Don will even give you a sticker-stamp for your National Parks Passport when you hit just past Santa Barbara. With my sticker-stamp, souvenir apple, free cookies, and tummy full of hot cocoa, I reunited once again with the waves. Thanks for the pastry and cocoa-induced diabetes, south-central California. Thank you, Don, for being such a gracious docent. And thank you, railway workers of yore, for letting me travel with the sea (and, you know, get watermelon in winter and stuff).

Califeducation #2: Half Moon Bay

A few days ago, Aaron and I decided that the beach beckoned at sunset. The thing about NorCal beaches (do people call them that?) is that they're just so much emptier than SoCal beaches, which, in my mind, makes them so much better. Sure, they don't have milkshakes at the end of their non-existent piers, but it's a give and take. The closest one is Half Moon Bay:

Califeducation #1: Donner Pass, Plumas-Eureka, and Empire Mine

Last weekend, Plumas-Eureka State Park and Empire Mine were the destinations my "adopted daughters" and I set out to explore. This is the first time I've been camping since I was about 8 and all I remember about that experience was the porta-potties. Needless to say, camping has been upgraded since 1996. Nowadays, instead of just a tent and a couple of forks, the backs of vans look like this:


We stopped in Auburn at Bootlegger's for some lunch, and it was there that this turkey-panini connoisseur had the best turkey panini she's ever experienced. Apparently Greg dropped half of it on the floor though, so he gave me free cheesecake (in addition to a new sandwich), but I like to think he was just flirting with me. The cheesecake was drool-worthy, too. So far? The trip gets 5 stars.

Soon enough we pull into Donner Memorial State Park and Emigrant Trail Museum. The entrance greets you with a giant statue, where I immediately tell the girls that there's no way there was 20 feet of snow the winter of 1846 and there's no way the statue commemorates where the snow once was...

Apparently my wintry Iowa upbringing just wasn't harsh enough.

After the girls somehow accept that California history isn't a thing that's taught in every state (freakin' Californians), we move onto the Emigrant Trail, where 18-year-old boys once built cabins by themselves and where 18-year-old girls now trod on their iPhones and take photos for Instagram.


All jests aside, it really was beautiful. I can't imagine coming to this land after crossing the Midwest. It must've been breathtaking – in the good way – not the oh-god-I-just-ate-my-sister way. After a few moments reflecting on how painfully simply our struggles are and a very informative documentary at the visitor's center, we load back up into the van and make our way to Plumas Eureka.

Not too much later, the tent gets pitched with ease (surprisingly), we set up for the night, ward off the bears, and settle in for hours of s'mores and Chloe's guitar skills. The trip is still at 5 stars, if you're counting.


Whereas my version of camping, again, is a sleeping bag, a loaf of white bread, a jar of peanut butter, and the printed out version of my masterpiece How to Defecate in a Cup, Haley had other plans for the morning. Those plans included pancakes and bacon. Not once did I complain.

Bacon on left; pancakes on right.

Having loaded up on Americana, we start our hike to the nearest lake. This is the one bit of the trip that wasn't practically perfect: it's like whoever made the trail to the lake went to a rock dealership and said, "Hmm. What size rocks can I use on my trail that would be too small to hop between and too big to crumble underneath the weight of a human? I require a solid 15% sprained-ankle rate. Do you have anything like that?" Turns out that rock dealership did have exactly that size of rock and gave that person a deal because they bought in bulk. After a mile or two of hating our lives, we emerge to this:

Worth it. Hundreds of bright blue dragonflies everywhere, too. With a ham and cheese sandwich in this spot, nothing in life can be that wrong.

Returned, showered and ready to go, we hit the road for Grass Valley's "Gold Rush Days" and Empire Mine (you should visit the website to watch their 10-pixel donkey walk back and forth in their header). The girls promised me I would get to pan for gold, but a hoard of 6-year-olds kept me from living the dream. Though I didn't get to make the grill I wanted to make, I did get to realize that A) at least I'm not a miner for a living and B) California's history really is fascinating. I envy children who grew up here and the wealth of knowledge at their feet. The mine was a great look into history and the work men are capable of, even in such terrible conditions.

One of the major mine shafts once used on left; the repair shop on right.

I still haven't made it to Yellowstone...or to Capitola, or Carmel, or Santa Barbara – but next week is Solvang, which means it's Danish time, in both the carbophile sense and in the Europhile sense. Let's sign off with a view of where the Bourn family lived, on the grounds of the mine. Their backyard, the mine, is where the two halves of society once met, if you will.



No. Wait a second. That's a terrible idea. On second thought, it's July 4th, so let's not end this post about the widening economic gap between America's wealthy and impoverished. Instead, let's do it the right way:


There it is.