Los Padres National Forest

 

I embarked for my travels on 8/18/09 around 10:30am. First stop? Irvine. I met with my old engineering professor and adviser, DDR, for lunch. It was good to catch up with him and talk about the environment, engineering, education, and the interrelationship of the 3. I was excited to hear that DDR was now the chair for Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at UCI, a very big deal. I also met with Jansen for one last pint at the Pub, Sunny, Steven, and ran into Marissa on my way to get coffee for the road.

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Once I did that, it was off on the open road! Nothing in the world to hold me back.....except for traffic on the 405....and the 101. But when I finally hit the 33, the fun began. I took the 33 because I had read somewhere that along the 33 was a cool small little town. The problem was I forgot to check what the town was called before I left and it was written down in my laptop, not on the paper I had with me up front. I later found that the town was Ojai which I skipped completely. The drive was not a loss though. The 33 was a beautiful drive, a somewhat hidden gem of southern California. The weather was nice and skies were clear which lended itself to beautiful views across the Los Padres National Forest (I was told later there are some natural hot springs along the 33 that you can get to only by foot that are supposed to be very nice).

The last 1/3 of the 33 was freshly paved which made for easy driving. As I began to descend from the mountains on the freshly paved straightaway coming down from the mountains, I started to smile, everything started to sink in, the trip had began. I wish I would of had more time to stop and take photos but I was racing day light (and the check in time at the HI in SLO). There are a lot of farms, abandoned buildings and equipment, and nice views along the 33 that I would have enjoyed stopping to see more of.  

 

I Hopped on the 166 as the sun was setting so it was a pretty dark drive. I had Kanye West on shuffle on the iPod and 15 seconds into Flashing Lights, I came up over a hill to see all the lights of Santa Maria break through the darkness. I found the Hostel and checked in with about an hour to spare. Not a bad place for $23/night.