We got an early start for a drive up to San Marcos Pass Road to the Cold Spring Tavern, which serves a pretty good breakfast.

But it’s the old-fashioned ambiance of the place that makes it perfect. Well, that and hanging out with these two.

Late fall or early winter is a great time to visit Santa Barbara. Many of the summer visitors are gone, as is the morning fog that hangs on at times well into the day during the summer months.

Here we are at 288 Placer Drive, where it intersects with Cathedral Oaks Road. On my right (out of sight) is the house my great-aunt and uncle bought in the late 1960s. Like with all of our brief weekend visits, we were typically gone by around mid-day as we had an 8-hour drive ahead of us. That’s if we don’t make any stops.

But of course, we could never just drive home, especially on such a beautiful day during low tide.

Yep, I said low tide, meaning exposed tide pools.

Sea life at the shore or in the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which we visited just last month, is all perfect.

In the rave community, this is known as a cuddle-puddle.

There’s no ignoring the sun that will set today, and as we likely don’t want to get home after midnight, we’ll have to say goodbye.

Right after we take this selfie, proving it was us here once again at the ocean.

Standard disclaimer that this post was not written on or near the date it shows up on my blog. This particular sequence of days wasn’t written about until September 2022 as I was trying to better catalog our travel images on this site.