Often when we travel, if there are a few of us, we’ll hire a car to get about. The flexibility it gives us is well worth the money and allows us to see things that are a little off the beaten track. It also means that if we see something interesting, we can just pull over and investigate – on a bus or a train that’s much harder to do!
This weeks post is dedicated to some of those little pit stops, sights and experiences we’ve had that were unplanned but added to our adventure.
Sea Lions on the Big Sur
Driving down the stunning coastline of the Big Sur, we spotted a group of sea lions hanging out on the beach. We pulled over for about half an hour, watching them from a safe distance.
Ghost Town Near Vegas
Much of the surrounding area of Vegas is rock, dust and highway. To break up our long and dry drive, we followed a road sign to a small ghost town – an abandoned town rising out of the dust. It was one of the smaller towns and I’d love to go back and check out one of the larger ones at some point.
Model Town Near Zion
Stopping for a much-needed loo break, we pulled into a store which had a large scale model town outside. It was certainly pulling in the visitors and the inside of the store was also really cool, with lots of interesting trinkets.
Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara was one of our best finds. We needed somewhere to pull in to take a rest on a long trip from San Francisco to LA and Santa Barbara was it. It was beautiful and I could have stayed for so much longer. You can read more out our stop in Santa Barbara here.
Boulder
Boulder was an interesting stop over. After a long day driving, we stopped at a hotel in Boulder before continuing our route the next day. With not much around, the stand out feature of Boulder was the sunset – although the Shining-esque hotel corridors were a big talking point – we spent the night listening out for echos of ‘Redrum’!!
Cliffs Overlooking San Francisco
This was one of the most beautiful pit stops I remember. Heading out of San Francisco, the winding roads stretching out before us, we pulled over to the side of the road to check out the views.
The cliff edges floated out into misty nothingness and it felt like we were standing above the clouds. We could hear the water below and glimpses of the stunning drops peaked through the clouds.
Where has been your best unscheduled pit stop?
Peeling ourselves off the hot fountain edge, we wandered through the streets, stopping to marvel at statues, shops and tiled walkways. It felt like an art-lover’s paradise, with expression and passion everywhere you looked. The life-like statues (something that would usually creep me out) perfectly fit the activity on the streets and added to the bohemian atmosphere.
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