After a good nights sleep and a few pieces of raspberry jam on toast we took a walk out to downtown San Luis Obispo. Tom and Nancy’s house is in the perfect position for walking (I know it is very shocking to think you can walk into a town in the US).

Autumnal colours in December

After visiting quite a few shops we managed to find some nice trinkets for gifts (if they survive being stuffed into panniers!). We just need some deserving people to give them to.

San Luis Obispo has one of the 21 missions the Spanish established throughout the Baja area (California and Mexico) to ensure that Spain’s influence in the area. It was in 1846 war broke out with Mexico and not until 1848 did California become a US Territory (and later still in 1850 California was admitted as a state).

The Mission Building

There were several cows around the town, all painted in bright colours (a little like the Owls in Birmingham if you remember those).

A food stop and we ate a nice picnic lunch in the park, there are still hummingbirds here as it is very mild even in December, then returned to Tom and Nancy’s where we sat with our new friend and relaxed for a while.

Lucy

Around 4.00 pm Tom took us a short walk to a lovely viewpoint where we could see the whole of San Luis Obispo.

Once back we had another lovely meal with a little wine and more chatting but an earlier night tonight as we have our next train to catch early tomorrow.