Quick! Hit the Brakes!

And here we see that our plucky travelers come to a screeching halt, make a u-turn and change direction.

So, we thought we were going to the Texas Gulf Coast. It sounded so luxurious, the warm, slightly humid ocean breeze blowing in our hair and a clear Gulf sky stretching to the horizon and beyond. Still sounds good, doesn’t it? No, it sounds great! So, why the teasing lead-in to the story?

In spite of that lovely dream of staying on the road for a few more months of travel we have decided once and for all it’s time to settle down and, furthermore, we can’t leave California. Many people out there in Facebook land will be utterly aghast at this notion. As a matter of fact, some FB friends will think we’ve going stark raving bonkers and you know what? Based on all the momentum we had four months ago for moving out of state I would have thought the same thing. Did you know that a lot of people absolutely HATE California? I suppose you do and mostly for the following reasons:

CA is crowded (in certain places like cities but not all places like country places). CA is expensive (all over, yes, except for remote places like Modoc county, for housing costs and gas). CA has a lot of laws – many more than other states and I think it’s to keep our crazy, diverse population under control. Here’s an example of how CA has not been successful at keeping the diverse population under control and why some ex-pat Californians and others think CA sucks.

Yes, CA has a ton of problems but other places don’t have the ocean or our children or familiarity. We think we can have our California cake and eat it, too. See if we don’t. As Dolores Johnson’s mom always said: “You pick the relationship that has the problems you can deal with.”

We’ve looked at land in some places kind of far off the beaten track (but not too far off) and crunched the numbers and it looks like we can pay cash for the land and build a small house plus horse infrastructure and only have to get a small loan that we can easily afford.

In the meantime, we are enjoying the CA coast. It’s almost as good as the Texas Gulf Coast. It’s shirtsleeves weather here in Cayucos. The surf is up and Morro Rock at Morro Bay is just as spectacular as it always is.