So I know June is almost over, but for Memorial Day weekend. . .back in MAY. . .Zack and I took a day trip up to San Luis Obispo.
We hit the road around 7am and arrived around 10am at our first stop for the day: Pirate’s Cove to check out Smugglers Cave as well as a nearby sea arch. There’s a dirt parking lot, and the trail to the cave is only 0.25 miles. (If your facing the ocean the trail to the cave is towards the bottom left side of the parking lot.) It’s a wide trail BUT the brush on the sides was full of poison oak so be cautious of that.
As you make your way down the trail, you’ll come to a split in the trail with a sign directing you to the beach on your left or the cave to your right. The beach is actually a nude beach so do keep that in mind when you’re visiting. We continued to the cave and were rewarded with a beautiful ocean view. You can walk through the cave or even climb above it (which is definitely a little trickier so use your own judgement on this one).
Back at the parking lot, there is another trail on the right side of the parking lot that is supposed to lead to a sea arch; however, it was VERY overgrown and we could see a lot of poison oak. Zack is highly allergic, so unfortunately we had to skip this trail during our visit.
From there, we made our way into Downtown SLO. First stop: coffee (and as usual. . .tea for me!)
We stopped in at Scout Coffee Co and Zack had an iced latte with their housemade raw sugar and whiskey syrup while I had an iced chai with their sunshine syrup (tangerine and cinnamon). It was a great combo with the chai!
We spent the next hour or so wandering around downtown before stopping for lunch at High Bar (a rooftop bar and restaurant at Hotel San Luis Obispo.
The hotel was so cute – I wish we could’ve stayed the night! And the rooftop bar/restaurant was delicious. First up: cocktails. Zack ordered the Black Manhattan and I had an Italian Mule. (Basically a Moscow Mule + Aperol and it’s honestly my new favorite. I’ve made them several times at home now!) For food we shared some shrimp ceviche to start – so refreshing – then shared a mushroom pizza (mushrooms, white sauce, thyme, goat cheese, and truffle oil – YUM).
After lunch we decided to start making our way back to LA, BUT since it wasn’t too late we made little pit stop at Ostrichland USA. Yes, Ostrichland. And it’s exactly what it sounds like. It’s right off the freeway and you can see and feed ostriches and emus up close. It’s was so silly and fun – we were laughing like little kids.
And that’s a wrap. It was a really fun way to kick off our long weekend. And it’s a really easy day trip from LA. You could easily stay longer as well as there are tons of nearby wineries and beaches in the area. Be sure to check out our SLO vlog over on youtube as well, and follow along to see where we go next!
– Courtney
hardys on holiday 
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