Pandemic Travel – Pathfinders

With the holiday season coming up, 2020 is proving to be an eventful year until the very end. With the pandemic still going on, and many places showing surges in cases, I wanted to look at a couple places that would be a good getaway while still being far away from civilization. Below are three of my favorite Airbnb’s that I am looking forward to trying to book (if any availability ever opened up.)

1. A Treehouse in Santa Cruz

This charming treehouse can be found in the forests in Santa Rosa. With this retreat, you’ll be near wine country, but still have enough privacy to avoid any crowds during the holidays. It might be a bit hard to find some availability, but definitely add this to your bucket list!

You can find this treehouse at this link

2. An Off-the-Path Retreat in the Desert

If the forests are not for you, how about a retreat in the middle of the desert? With activities such as rock climbing, dune buggies, and hiking, the deserts provide a great way to have some holiday fun while avoiding the crowds. Sure, you won’t be getting any snow, probably, but the amount of privacy you can get in return more than makes up for it.

This little retreat is situated on a private property roughly half a mile off of the main road, and it takes quite a bit of an adventure to get to your lodgings, as the paved road ends and you’ll be navigating across bumpy dirt roads to get there, but nothing quite beats having your own place all to yourself and enjoying your own little slice of paradise.

If you interested in booking the place I stayed at, you can book this retreat at this link

3. A Lookout Tower in the Forest

Maybe you took a look at the previous places and thought, “These are good, but I want to rough it even more”? If so, why not look into renting a fire lookout tower for your next stay? These little known places serve an important function, allowing for early detection of wildfires in our nation’s forests, but at the same time, many of these places are also available for you to rent out. There is nothing quite like waking up in the morning with overarching views of forests all around you. With perfect elevation, natural seclusion, and in the middle of nature, renting one of these lookouts can be the perfect trip if the last thing you want to do is be around relatives for another holiday party.

Fair warning though, these places are usually only open for certain times of the year, and book very quickly, so you’ll have to keep your eyes on it if you want a chance to book one of these lodgings. Also given the Covid situation in California, all of California’s lookouts are currently not bookable until further notice.

If you’re interested in one of these, you can go to recreation.gov and search lookout in the search terms to see what the current availability is like.

Recently, I took a trip to Pismo Beach to get away from the house for a bit. If you read my previous post, I recently made a wishlist of travel destinations for Californians that might still be stuck in their state due to the pandemic. Given that I’ve been working from home for over five months at this point, I decided that it was a good time to take a trip somewhere (also in the process getting my Marriott Platinum status).

The drive to Pismo Beach was relatively uneventful, with a quick three hour drive for someone living in Los Angeles. During the drive, you’ll have an opportunity to drive along the ocean side if you decide to take the 101 Freeway, as well as a scenic mountain drive as you head north towards Pismo Beach. California is known for its coast, so I decided to take the opportunity to enjoy the drive up to the beach.

Staying at the Vespera – A Review

Once we arrived to Pismo Beach, I dropped by my hotel right next to the beach. For this trip, I decided to stay at the Vespera Hotel, one of Marriott’s hotels that are part of the Autograph Collection. I chose this hotel for two reasons: the hotel is located right on the beach, and it would allow me to hit Platinum Elite for the year. Although the benefits are minor for status, for a regular traveler such as myself it is a nice badge of honor to have.

If you’re lucky, you might get a room with a balcony that has a direct view of the beach. Unfortunately, the pool needed to be reserved due to Covid-19.

Finding the hotel wasn’t easy, and I missed the street a couple of times, mainly due to most of the local streets not being marked very clearly. Surprisingly, the streets were also packed, with a lot of cars trying to make their way to the beach parking lot.

After some driving around, I finally found the hotel, modestly places on a street that also has residential houses.

The hotel is very much a luxury hotel, with a large price tag to boot. Although not the best option for travelling seeking a budget option, it is a great hotel if you are looking to splurge a bit. The hotel was quite busy, a telltale sign that most people are out and about travelling in spite of a pandemic going on.

The hotel is situated right on the beach, with direct access through the courtyard to the boardwalk, and less than a 1 minute walk to the beach.

The Room

The blue and white decor gives off a modern hotel feel while still maintaining the beach house atmosphere.

The blinds open up to a balcony that you can relax and take in the views of the beach.
Sadly, my view was angled more towards the street rather than the beach.

This is truly a modern hotel, complete with smart TV that you can stream from your favorite apps like Netflix.
It also has a Chromecast in case you want to stream directly from your device.

The bathroom is quite spacious, providing you the extra room in case you need to get into or out of your wetsuit after a day of surfing.

The shower is also very accommodating, you won’t be trying to squeeze yourself into this one.

The Town

The town of Pismo Beach was packed the weekend that I went. Even though we are still in the midst of a pandemic, every restaurant that had outdoor seating available for dining had lines out the door. Sure, part of that could be due to the social distancing guidelines set forth by the state, but there were a lot of people walking around the town, especially near the beach area. What surprised me the most was very few people were actually wearing masks (about 20%), which tells me that the people here weren’t too afraid of what was going on in the world.

Just one of many restaurants that offered outdoor dining, perhaps people just really want to go out and eat.

Another restaurant that was packed with people waiting to order. The BBQ looked great but the wait was too long.

Given the long lines pretty much everywhere, it was quite difficult to find a place that I could order from that wouldn’t take forever to get out food. I ended up choosing a place called Splash Cafe, which was known supposedly for its Clam Chowder.

The signage had a nice retro feel to it.

They only accepted phone or online orders, so I ended up waiting about 30 minutes on the line while waiting to speak with a person right on the other side of the door, then another hour of so until I finally got my food. They food was pretty tasty, but I couldn’t help but think about whether I could’ve saved time going somewhere else, or whether all the restaurants in the area had the same amount of wait time.

Conclusion

Overall, this trip was pretty fun. I was able to spend some time on the beach and take some photos, fly my drone, and to top it all off it was very cool compared to the heat wave we currently have in LA. Although I wished that there were perhaps less crowds since we are still in the middle of an emergency, I can’t fault people for wanting to spend some time outdoors and enjoy the weather and the beach. After all, if California has anything going for it, it’s the weather and the beaches.

Tag: Pandemic Travel

3 Unique Lodgings to Escape to This Holiday Season