The drive down the coast from San Simeon to Oxnard is very picturesque, quiet and paved with food.

Our first stop (for a first, super healthy breakfast) was in Cayucos at the Brown Butter Cookie Company.

The most delightful little town, which looks like it’s been transported to the coast from the old West. And the bakery is probably one of the friendliest places we’ve ever set foot in. They only make one thing, brown butter cookies, but in tons of different flavors. And you get to sample all of them! We nibbled our way through a good few before deciding on brown butter cookies with honey. The guy serving us said they

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A bit further down we stretched our legs at the lovely Morro Bay. It was very windy and a bit chilly, but people were enjoying the sea nonetheless.

Next stop was at SLO Donuts in San Luis Obispo. This little donut bakery came highly recommended and I guess the photo tells you why. I think I’ve never seen such a huge variety of donuts (and this is only a selection of what’s on offer).

Thomie went for a lovely old fashioned donut with chocolate glaze (very cake like, with amazing crumbly edges)…

and I enjoyed a Red Velvet donut with cream cheese frosting and white chocolate shavings. It tasted as good as it looks!

After that it was just roads and ocean for a good couple of hours. Excellent, because that gave us space to digest our donuts.

After all, we wanted to have lunch at Patrick Stewart’s favorite taco shop in Santa Barbara.

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La Super Rica Taqueria is a small neighborhood joint with an extensive, yet simple taco menu and extraordinarily lovely staff. The little patio was packed and we waited a good 15 minutes for our food, as it was being prepared from scratch. We shared 4 small but surprisingly filling taco dishes (steak, chorizo, green chiles with queso and carnitas with cheese). Brilliant place!

A bit further on we chanced upon this little stretch of coast which was literally covered in napping elephant seals. It looked kind of cozy and snuggly.

And so beautiful Highway 1 went on and on until Oxnard, where we stayed at a slightly underwhelming chain hotel. But I won’t bore you with those pics!