Having driven on California’s Highway 101 between Ventura and Santa Barbara many many times in my past, I was familiar with the RV campers that lined a section of the beach there.
But that’s as far as my knowledge went. It was our friends, Ray and Pam Santana that put a name to it: Rincon Parkway – one of their go-to vacation spots when they lived in California.
So we contacted them when planning our Pacific coast trip and they gave us the lowdown on the best spots to book. Which we did months ago.
So we knew to arrive in the right direction, and we knew that the spaces were barely long enough for both our rigs. But with two spots we could share space. It was a little stressful to get the two rigs wedged in, but boy were we happy once we got settled. It was gorgeous!
The weather was ideal and it doesn’t get much better than having the shoreline just yards away from your front door.
Our two weeks flew by and the weather was near perfect the entire time. There were walks on the beach nearly every day. Hel-lo, it was right in our front yard! And we had an awesome front-row view of the sunsets.
We also had lots of great day trips. We rode our electric bikes from Ventura all the way into Carpenteria. The bike trails along the 101 were great and had ramps down to the beaches in some spots.
We enjoyed some local breweries before riding back.
Another day we rode our bikes in the other direction to downtown Ventura and after enjoying the beach, had drinks overlooking the pier.
It’s fun to make lots of stops while biking and we found this swing on a beach and had to stop and play. Tom’s “catching” the sun and Patsi is showing us her moves jumping off the swing.
One evening we drove into downtown Ventura, again enjoying a local brewery and some great food.
We took a drive up to Ojai and back around Lake Casitas – which I never even knew about.
Did I mention the weather was practically perfect?
In Santa Barbara, about thirty minutes north, they were having a downtown art hop, so we went and started with free wine at the Amazon headquarters. We saw some great art and even got to watch an artist at work.
And Tom made friends with all the local statues.
They even had bands downtown. It was all great fun.
I’ve always loved beautiful downtown Santa Barbara. We drove back a second time to check out Stearns Warf.
I mentioned the weather was nearly perfect, right?
We did a lot of beach combing and Patsi made some artwork from her finds. I took advantage of the beautiful backdrop and took a lot of pictures of my mermaid dolls. Plus I made friends with a seagull that wouldn’t leave until we gave him a closeup.
We played in the rocks, enjoyed the changing tides, and watched the dolphins swim by. Along with someone who had a drone (can you see that dot in the picture?)
We had fun happy hours and great game nights and none of us were ready to leave! But two weeks is about our limit for dry camping (no water or electric hookups) not to mention the campground had a 14 day limit. Now it is time to hit our next reservations up the coast. We are heading to the Elk’s Lodge in Santa Maria – also recommended by the Santanas.
Happy Travels!
