As we travel into central California, the temperature is cooler (too cool for shorts) and spring is now happening.  The landscape is a lush green and the morning fog off the warm ocean covers several miles in-land before it clears around noon.

Splash Cafe-Pismo Beach

We were driving on PCH through Pismo Beach which took us right along the beach.  The main street down to the wharf looked pretty cool so we turned around, parked and walked the street.  It was about 1:30 and there was a line of people waiting to enter the Splash Cafe.  The line was moving fast and we decided that we needed to try this place.  It’s specialty; clam chowder in a bread bowl and that is what I had.  It was Outstanding!

History

In 1991, Joanne and Ross Currie purchased Splash Café in Pismo Beach just before the annual Clam Festival in October. That incredibly busy beginning was just the start of a 20+ year journey that has seen the Curries improve the clam chowder recipe that is now award-winning and world-famous, expand to a second location in San Luis Obispo, ship the chowder fresh and frozen nationally, distribute in Costco stores and other restaurants and start a gourmet catering division. It’s Splash Café’s customer loyalty and their insistence on using the highest quality ingredients that has caused chowder sales to grow from 5000 gallons a year in 1991 to 30,000 gallons a year today between the two restaurants.

Monarch Butterfly Grove-Pismo Beach

I was happily driving looking towards ocean stuff when Denise said that I just passed a butterfly grove. We did a U’ey, parked and walked in to a free Monarch Butterfly Grove.

Info:

Every year when is starts getting cold, the Pismo Beach butterfly grove begins to welcome the monarch butterflies on their annual 2,500 mile migration South. While there are a couple places to see them, the monarch grove in Pismo Beach is the largest on the West coast and right now they estimate there are around 30,000 butterflies to see!

I didn’t know what to expect. I was half expecting the butterflies to be flying around me.  While there are some flying, most are just sleeping on the trees. This makes it so hard to see them, at first it doesn’t look like much but as you get closer you can literally see butterflies clinging to a small branch.  A great unexpected find.

Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal Rookery-San Simeon

A rookery is a colony of breeding animals.

Fact

Females of all ages and juvenile males spend ten months of the year at sea while the older males spend eight months at sea.  That time at sea is in marked contrast to the time on land.  On land they are very social during the molt (new fir) and haul-out, often clumping together; at sea they are solitary, likely never seeing another elephant seal.  On land they are fasting, while at sea they devote their time to the search for food.  The muscle groups used on land and sea are quite different, and while they are experts at relaxing when on the beach, they are intensely active at sea.

Twenty-four hours a day, both traveling and foraging, they dive.  Usually between 1000 and 3000 ft. and for periods averaging 25 minutes, with 2 to 3 minutes at the surface between dives.

Their eyes are specially adapted to their lifestyle; ten times as sensitive as ours, able to see clearly in air and water able to adapted from sunlight at the surface to darkness at the limits of their vision in a very few minutes.

Males grow to as much as 5000 lbs and 16 ft. long. Females grow as much as 1800 lbs and 12 ft. long. She will spend seven to eight months at sea before returning to land to give birth; the longest uninterrupted time at sea of any of the elephant seals. Pups weigh 60-80 lbs at birth and are 3-4 ft long. When weaned at 28 days, they weigh between 250-350 lbs. At 3 months, they can dive deeper and stay down longer than adult sea lions and harbor seals. At 3.5 months, one by one they travel north, some as far as the gulf of Alaska.

This is definitely the best thing we encountered on this part of the PCH.

 

Photo Gallery

We are stay at:

San Luis Obispo Elks Lodge 322.  We have 30amp electrical, water and free wifi. The site is next to highway 101 and has much traffic noise. Wifi is terrible.  We would not stay here again.  We donated $25/night for the site.

San Luis Obispo is the best town and area that we have encountered in California.  We like this area.