Exploration was the task for today and we were delighted, especially after doing some miserable but necessary maintenance yesterday. We had some great home-cooked versions of Egg McMuffins for breakfast and I can unequivocally state that ours are better than Mickey Dee’s. Ours had the benefit of non-transparent ham steak pieces, bacon, an egg with the proper amount of yolk, Tillamook extra sharp cheddar and pan-fried English Muffins. I’m quite sure they were bad for me but tasty nonetheless.
After chow, we piled into Charlotte and drove the 5 miles back to CA-154 and headed south up to San Marcos Pass. There we turned east Camino Cielo, which turned out to be a very curvy and quite steep series of roads bordered on both sides with absolutely stunning scenery. Peggy was the original driver but she elected to turn the driving chores over to me once she had driven up the road a bit. Peggy ain’t real skookum on driving on narrow, serpentine roads with dropoffs alongside that would surely mean death if the driver were to accidentally veer from the straight-and-narrow. The road has very sharp curves and sightlines around the corners are so short that almost a complete stop is required before creeping slowly around the bends. Almost unfortunately, we did encounter a couple small cars coming too fast the other way and got to enjoy their horror-filled faces as they realized they were going to run into the grill of a 3/4 ton pickup without terrifying correction alongside the tops of very unforgiving cliffs. Nobody wrecked but I’ll wager they got to clean out their trousers when they got home.
Camino Cielo does have a redeeming feature, however. The road runs directly on top or right next to the ridge separating Santa Barbara and the coast from the inland Santa Ynez Valley. Views to each side are magnificent. On the south side, the cities of Santa Barbara, Goleta and Isla Vista border the Pacific and right offshore the Channel Islands are plainly evident. On the north side, the entire Santa Ynez Valley and surrounding mountains are the treat. In the distance, looking east, we could see some snow-capped peaks that appeared to be about 25 or 30 miles distant. Our campground is at an elevation a bit below 1000 feet but by the time we were driving on the ridge we were approaching 4000 foot elevation. The skies were clear. We probably could not have selected a better day for this little spin.
At the far end of the ridge, we descended into Summerland after stopping by the house my grandparents lived in on Hot Springs Road in Montecito. We returned back to our temporary home via US-101 and CA-154 to Rancho Oso.
Two pictures are available if you click here