Thursday, October 12

San Luis Obispo

This is a pretty funny place. A muscular shirtless guy in his 50's was in the cafe before. There was a hobo with a guitar. There's a theater producer at the table behind me. Everyone's tanned and mostly thin. (The skin cancer doctors must do good business around here.) The toilet has a wood seat. There are mountains off in the distance.
I'm heading off to Santa Barbara now.

Seeking Wifi

While getting food in Cambria yesterday, I noticed a sign for an internet cafe along the main street. So I went there this morning expecting a wireless network, but they only had two desktops and no wireless, and my cellular card didn't work there at all.
I got back on route 1 and got to San Luis Obispo, where I was going straight on the road through the town, but must have missed a sign to turn off back onto route 1, because I clearly wasn't on it anymore. So I turned onto a side street to make a u-turn, and right in front of me I see an internet cafe with free Wifi. Waddya know.

Morro Bay

Camping in San Simeon


I was going to head towards a state park some 30 miles south of San Simeon to camp, but I got to San Simeon State Park shortly before sundown, checked if I had an internet connection (I did), so I decided to camp there. I didn't have food for dinner, though, so I detoured a few miles down the road to Cambria and stocked up on rations at the general store, then came back. As I stood at the entrance shack picking up a self-registration card, I heard a man talking to his daughter in Hebrew. I asked him in Hebrew where they're from. From Modiin, in Los Angeles for a few years. Without even asking my name, he invited me to dinner. Not so much invited as simply stated matter-of-factly that I would be joining his family for dinner.
Well it turns out, after not speaking Hebrew for two years, I still remember a couple of words. And the meal turned out to be a feast. The family (parents and three kids) were on a camping trip for a week, so they had a huge cooler and portable propane stove. On the menu: hamburger on a roll with vegetables, seasoned rice, chicken, beans, two types of juice and soda. There was more but that's just what I ate, and I ate quite a bit of it, and there was plenty left after the meal for another meal. There was lively conversation and I left quite full. Pretty sweet the way that worked out.
The internet connection here turned out to be pretty weak and intermittent; it's not working now at all, so I'll go to sleep and post this in the morning.