2017.11.24 ~ 26We arrived Pismo Beach in the afternoon. Inn at The Pier had been remodeled and reopened not long ago. We got the room with the ocean view. Our balcony overlooked the beach and the pier was right in front of us. There is a parking lot between the hotel and the beach, so we didn’t get the feeling of next to the beach. Nevertheless, it’s a nice room and the sunset was gorgeous!

Most people come here for the beach, there are not a lot of restaurants, Splash Café is one the best of them. The nice thing is that it is just around the corner, we could order the food and eat at our balcony.

The next day, we did some shopping at the outlets nearby in the morning and had our lunch at Cracked Crab. It’s a very popular restaurant with quality seafood and reasonable price. Good we came early, people started lining up outside while we were eating.

In the afternoon, we drove to San Luis Obispo, which is only 15 miles north. We did some hiking at the Bishop Peak. It took much longer time than we expected on the road leading to the parking lot, unfortunately, we didn’t reach the top.

After we checked out of the hotel on the third day morning, we first stopped at the Butterfly Grove very next to the highway 1. There are several Eucalyptus trees where up to 25,000 Monarch Butterflies spent winter there. Monarchs here have a life span of six months so the butterflies come the next year have never been to these trees. It’s amazing how Monarchs remember their routes across multi-generation migration.

Oceano Sand Dunes is another popular site near the Pismo Beach. One option is to park the car at the end of the Grand Avenue, but you have to walk 3 miles to get to the dunes. Somehow through a back road we found a small ranch to park our car. From there we only walked 15 minutes through the bushes to reach the dunes. The area is big enough to spend one or two hours wandering around the huge dunes. It’s a good exercise.