This morning we started with a continental breakfast (being Danishes, muffins and toast with grape jelly) in the gazebo near the pool. Very nice place but breakfast was way too much sugar for us.
We headed out early to Los Olivos and arrived before anyone was moving and anything was open. No problem for us we walked the streets (about 6 in total in town) and admired the buildings and cuteness of it all. Including the post office.
Again this is on Camino Real so has a bell to mark the historic area. Stage coaches also came through here from 1880 onward.
Main street was pretty quiet - just the local traffic that you would expect in a small farming community. Yep, tractor and pick up truck.
We really liked this "Addams family" house in Los Olivos.
A local "garden ornaments" yard was open and full of fun colourful stuff including metal goats, roosters, fish hanging from trees and this guy... Pigs can fly.
The general store on the Main Street corner was not yet open but we were trying out their furniture anyway.
Our next stop took after Los Olivis was Los Alamos on the other side of Solvang and Buellton. On the way, we passed this winery made famous by Sideways.
We took a back road, Drum Canyon Road, which turned out to be a rough windy hairpin bend road through a canyon. Fantastic. The rough surface might as well have been dirt because it was so patched and rough but Di was driving so no problem! Yeah, righto. So, she thinks...
Los Alamos is even smaller than Los Olivos and our main reason for going was to see this place. It is the retail outlet for Casa Dumetz wines which are produced by Emilio Estevez and his fiancée Sonja Magdevski. Well, much more Sonja than Emilio it appears. Unfortunately, we saw neither of them today.
Emilio and Sonja's Casa Dumetz website is casadumetzwines.com if anybody would like to check it out further.
This is Sonja, a Jill of all trades in a vineyard, and a pose that has become a trademark for Casa Dumetz.
Lovely shop with an eclectic interior, and a lovely girl working there, who was only too happy to chat to and answer questions from a couple of Australians with silly questions.
We loved this help yourself to wine in a glass or a bottle, but bring your own bottle. Nice.
The shop has some good karma notes on the wall as you can see in the next photo and we were frantically looking for an Australian $5 note among our stuff, but could only find a A$20 note as our lowest denomination. The girl thought that was crazy and refused to accept it as a gift.
Note to self, bring some stuffed kangaroos and koalas in the backpack when we go out for the day. What good are they when they are still in the big bag in the motel room!
After Los Alamos, we went back to Buellton and to Pea Soup Andersens for lunch, their "world famous" pea soup. They have served it since 1924 continuously and between their 2 Californian restaurants they say they serve 2 million bowls each year.
We both ordered bottomless pea soup (as you do). Hans managed 3 portions, Di 1 and a 1/2 portion. The pea soup was supplemented with bread and ice tea. Ohhhh....very yummy - well worth the visit - but Hans over indulged. I feel sick.... And so did the stomach for the rest of the afternoon.... OK, too much information.
The menu...
After lunch, we checked out old Windmill Inn, where the Sideways boys stayed in the movie.
Yes, it looks exactly as in the movie and a bit old and tacky.
We decided to spend the rest of the afternoon in Solvang (sunny field or meadow in Danish). An extremely cute "Danish" town. Probably very busy here in peak season, but pretty quiet on a Friday in January, although it may get busier over the weekend as Monday is Martin Luther King day and a public holiday in the US. The town people have quite a strong danish ancestry and decided to build homes since the 1930's in the traditional danish style.
The below means Merry Christmas and Christmas House.
We saw this bloke out and about in his Segway, waiting for traffic to clear at the intersection.
Stay... Stay... Good dog!
A self portrait in the middle of... American Denmark.
Some of the shops used the proper Danish words...
After wandering around in Solvang for a while, we decided to call it quits. Really, how much Danish can you take in a day?
After the previous night's extravagant dinner at The Hitching Post, we decided for a low key evening utilizing the microwave in the motel room. A few drinks on the balcony but otherwise not much more to report for today, good night.
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