Welcome to CP one oh one. How today trip. We love Slow with all of our hearts, but we need to get away every once in a while. Luckily, our little town is driving distance from some pretty cool spots.
We're going to get into quite a few amazing places today which are solving big Sir Santa Barbara, Monterey and even Herst Castle. Hop in your car and buckle up as we take you on a tour of the best day trip spots near Slow. Cal Poly is in session. Students swarm through campus and file in and out of classes. You're thinking about the chapter reading they have tonight, their next class, their new dorm, their senior project, how to get to the gym, what's for dinner tonight? Where's in
yours bathroom? Kate and I know things can get a bit chaotic as a student navigating the inns and outs of college life.
At cal Poly, we focus on learning by doing, but sometimes you don't know what to do.
Well.
Emma and I are here to answer your who, what, when, where, why, and how's here? On CP one oh one Learned by Listening, presented by KCPR ninety one point three.
Him sang, I'm Emma Hughes a third year English student.
And I'm Kate Lopenski, a third year journalism student here at cal Poly, and we're here to share or tell all guide on how to survive and thrive at cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
So grab a notebook. You may want to write this down.
Okay, so before you take off on your adventure, there are some things that you might want to check off of your to do list. So spontaneous day trips are amazing. But if you like to go buy the book, We've got your back.
So some of the things you definitely want to consider for your trip is how long you're going to be there, how long it takes to get there, how you're getting there. All these things are something you need to know. You have to have those figured out, especially if you don't have a car or a vehicle. So there are other alternatives like zip car, ubering, depending on location, train all these are available, but today we're going to focus primarily on those with vehicles at their disposal.
You could also join a club which will get you from place to place. And we actually have a very special guest today who's going to talk about cal Poly Vanlife Club.
My name is Kenneth Bevans.
I'm the vice president of Vanlife Club, but we're kind of all trip leaders, and then I also run their social media and I plan trips for Hiking Club too.
So first, can you just tell us a bit about Vanlife Club and what y'all do.
Yeah, So, Van Life Club is a we like to think of it as a resource for students to get out an adventure. So every once a week we plan an adventure for students and you.
Don't even need a vehicle to join. It's all free.
We don't have any fees except for splitting the cost of the trip, whether it's through gas or for food. But yeah, it's just weekly adventures and we go all over Central California. Just a way for people to out there a very wholesome, nice, adventurous community.
I love it how many people typically go on these adventures.
Yeah.
So for our last point Ray's trip, which was over President's Day weekend, we had twenty seven people, which was pretty good turnout.
We all got along super well.
I even brought my fourteen year old sister from Sacramento and she stayed with us on the trip.
It was awesome.
Yeah, can you tell us a bit about the planning and the work that goes into each of those trips.
Yeah, so we kind of split up. We're changing the model for next year. But how it worked for the point rays trip is every person that's going we divide up the work into segments kind of, so one person might spearhead budget and one person spearheads like researching trip locations. I for my role, I kind of stayed out of the budget and mostly planned the trip by itinerary. So we went to Bhutano State Park to kiss some banana slugs.
We explored an abandoned shipwreck in in Vernaz, California. And yeah, even like planning the campsite in China Camp State Park, I.
Need to join this. Yeah this sounds so cool.
Have you done the banana slug challenge where you put it on like your eyebrowser your nose for like seven bananas flug seconds?
What's the difference between a banana slug second and a regular second?
One bananas lug, two bananas l It's that I did it in sixth grade. It was like one of our little trips where it's like you have to wear a banana slug on your face.
People wore banana slugs. Okay, for sure, I got some photos of that.
It's so fun. Love that.
So where you kind of mentioned some of the places already, but can you deep dive into maybe like your favorite trip that you've gone.
On, favorite van life club trip. I loved Corrizo Planes during the super bloom. We went last year when it was really poppin' and we.
Got to see the poppies.
But we Corrizo Planes, for those that don't know, is a national monument and I believe it's run by the Bureau of Land Management. So there are a lot of camp sites out there where you can camp for completely free, from up to fourteen days, and there's one Acchorizo Planes.
It's first come, first serve. But we went out there early enough.
That we got to do that during the super bloom, and so we camped out there for one night and explored the salt lake that's out there and the poppy trails and saw all the social media influencers. But we kind of did our own thing. It was really fun.
Okay. Yeah, So our episode today is about how today trip, And so I was wondering if you maybe have any tips for cal Poly students who are looking just to explore the area a little bit more and might have a harder time wrapping their minds around how to do this all.
Yeah.
So one thing that I love about San Luis Obispo and what attracted me to the area is there is there's so many different subjects of adventure to tackle. So if you want to go to Kyukis, there's an abandoned shipwreck there. If you want to go east of cal Poly, there's the Santa Margarita Lake and an old abandoned mercury mine. Or you could go to montagnade Ora State Park and see a giant sand dune or explore the super bloom
like conditions there in the springtime. So kind of section it off into what like quadrant of San Luis Bo County you want to explore and then see what's around there, because no matter what area you pick, there's going to be something and you can do it for pretty low budget.
So how do you go about choosing your location and then planning the itinerary?
Yeah, so for the location we for Van Life Club, we all get together at the start of the quarter and say like, well, what kinds of activities do we want to do? We haven't done any snow related activities yet. That'll probably be for the future Van Life Club leadership to tackle next year. But we yeah, sparse it out to like, oh, maybe we want to hit the central coast or you know, smoot some banana slugs, and so we figure out where we could do that activity and
then we kind of base it around that. So we kind of our Van Life Club leadership team is only about eight people, and so we split up all those activities like budgeting, location picking, and so we each give input into like what we would want to do for our dream event, then we plan around that.
That's really cool. How you pick what you want to do before you pick the location. That's actually a really smart approach.
Yeah, this is an area where that's possible. Not all areas have that.
Yeah, for students who are looking to get involved, how should they go about doing that? Yeah?
So for Van Life Club, we have the Van Life Club Instagram and the Van Life Club Slack channel, which Slack is, from what I've seen, the main form of community app other than Instagram the club's use and we post both of our events to both areas. But if people really want to get involved, join the Slack community, and there's a link to it in our Instagram bio. Some people post trips outside of the normal Van Life club things and it really fosters that community.
I was going to ask how many people are in the club, and then how many typically go on the trips.
Unlike most clubs, we don't really have a number of who's in the club because we have a rotating cast and crew. Like those twenty seven people that were on the Point Ray's trip, probably only.
Ten of them.
Had been to like a significant number in air quotes of Van Life events, so it kind of rotates.
We get in a lot of new people every time.
What made you want to join the club? Initially part of it was.
Our club president, honestly, Nick Tansky. He is one of the nicest people I've met at Count Paul really good friend of mine. But I myself wanted to get into van life at some point. I didn't know to what extent necessarily, but it's a great resource for figuring out how to go about that.
So how many of you have vans and how how does the travel look like?
Yeah, that's a good question. So I most of the leadership team this year.
Has a vehicle of some kind.
So I got my car this year after summer too super stoked about that.
Congratulations.
I named him Travis for traveling.
So it's the vibe.
Yeah.
Then our president Nick Tansky has a van, and over the tours of the past couple of years, people have picked up some rags like Niko Stallone now has a van and Ethan Jeram has a converted Forerunner. I believe that he took up to Canada and back. For me, this is one really cool idea I had back in twenty twenty one, and I think more people should start to do it, which is I make a Google Earth
map of all the places I've visited across California. So the reason why I use Google Earth is because you can make a map and have just an icon of the type of activity you do there, whether it's skiing, you did a little ski icon and it looks all really clean and you can name it to whatever you want. So I have a Google Earth map for all the places I had ventured in twenty twenty one across California
and then twenty twenty two, three and four. So how I plan my own personal day trips when I'm outside of Van Life Club or hiking club is I look to see what area of the map is still unexplored, so that way, by the time I leave college, I'll have all of California map out.
Oh wow, that's really smart.
Yeah, it's completely free.
It's completely free and just updated at the end of every month or two. Just go back through your photos and see the places you've been, add a little note to them, but build it up.
That's a great tip for all of our passionate day trippers. Yeah.
How often are you day tripping? You said, every week?
Yeah.
So I'm a photography miner and whether I'm out on shoots or well, the type of photography I shoot is outdoor adventure port traits. So I shoot I document the van life club trips and the hiking and backpacking club trips, and those usually involve like a fifteen mile backpacking experience with my camera on my backpack. It's pretty intense, but I try to get out there as much as possible.
Because I lost a year to COVID two my freshman year, I wasn't on campus, so you know, only three years is a really short amount of time for being in such a valuable space. Just like the wholesome people you can encounter and the types of opportunities there are. I try to make most of it, and so I get out there pretty much every weekend.
That's honestly so inspiring. That's really cool.
Also one of the things, like for the budget for the Point Rais.
Trip, including gas and campsite and like all the permits we needed and all food, the whole trip costs with seventy bucks. That's for three full days of adventuring. Like people went to Pinnacles National Park. We went four state parks, got Costco pizza for everybody one night and Costco muffins another.
So it was pretty affordable, I would say for something that ambitious.
Yeah, definitely. And like, do you guys do an end of the year, Like do you plan a big trip for the end of the year or anything like that.
Okay, so we don't really plan like a massive trip for the end of the year. However, lately this year we've been working with UCSB Excursion Club, which is a lot bigger than we are. They're about a five hundred person regular showing up club and they do like three adventures every weekend. But we've kind of we've done a couple like Rain dances on mountaintops with them, and we're planning a skydiving trip. Oh wow for Spring quarter in Lompoc, California.
I think I saw on your instagram you guys have done that.
Yeah, we did that.
In the past, this time with UCSB Excursion Club. The amount of people we have, that's the thing too. If you whether it's day trips or kind of more organized events, the more people you have, the more of a discount you can give to everybody, because you split the trip costs up more. So we're going to approach the stydiving airfield and basically say we have these sixty people that want to go skydiving, which is probably four times more
than their regular day rate. We'll put one random day in a week and then we could get a pretty big discount and take over the whole airfield for a day and just go sty diving.
Should we go?
Okay?
Should we hop on? Like? That sounds amazing considering it, I would do it. Oh okay, CV one, oh one.
Okay, Kenny, do you might be hearing from us?
Yeah, and anyone else who wants to join.
It's fantastic way to end the year. End the year screaming I love joy, screaming joy.
But I mean working without rivals.
That's true. We are working with us.
We're talking about Santa Barb in the pod today, So we can't give them too much shade.
They're really cool people, they are. Yeah, they're awesome.
Yeah. So what's the difference between like doing a van trip versus a biking or hiking trip.
Yeah, So for hiking and Backpacking Club, it's a lot more like outdoorsy. What's the right like not work, but like getting out their physical activity focused. So for hiking and Backpacking Club, we've done two Yosemite trips that comes around one of the holidays in November, and last year we did oh yes, two years ago we did Yosemite Falls and then which is you know, a pretty that's a seven mile round trip hike, I believe, and there's
a lot of elevation. And then this past year we did Cloud's Rest which is even higher than Half Dome and we started from the valley floor. That was about a yeah, twenty mile backpacking trip. Or so with Van Life Club it's a lot more car camping. We'll do the occasional hike, but it's nothing strenuous. And so for Hiking and Backpacking Club. When you do the trip planning for that, you have to add in the sign up form,
like what are your physical capabilities? Because you don't want to have someone who only does like four mile hikes do a twenty mile backpacking trip because at that point, like there's a certain amount of responsibility when planning trips for clubs because you don't want to like endanger them, right if you went out with and you don't want to have the experience not like ruined for other people, but you don't want that one person who's not prepared to hike that much to feel bad, you know, if
they get caught with a sickness, that's another thing.
But yeah, it's different.
And then for Van Life Club, it's a lot more kind of like not it's like nature tourist y, like remote touristy, so we don't go to tourist heavy places, but we like car camp, hang around the vehicles, that kind of stuff.
That's great that there's something for everybody, no matter what your physical capabilities are. Thank you so much for coming in and telling us more about your club, And honestly, I feel like we're inspired to tag along on your next trip.
Yeah, definitely should. We're open to all.
Yeah, and the cow Polyvanlife Club Instagram is at cpvan Life. You could find the cal Polyvanlife Slack channel in the Instagram bio and yeah, keep a let out her future events.
So thank you Kenneth so much for that amazing interview. So let's get into the first spot of the day, Santa Barbara.
Okay, so I wanted to talk a bit about this one because I went a couple weeks ago. My best friend goes to UCSB, so we had been talking about planning a little trip for a while. She's super busy, I'm super busy, So we planned it all out so that our schedule syncd up, and I just took a weekend and just went down there and I had the best time. So my favorite spots that we went to were obviously State Street. There's a ton of shopping down there, good food, it's just really nice to walk around. Just
a great area. My favorite store down there is the Italian Pottery Store. Oh, absolutely gorgeous. I wanted to buy everything in there, yeah, but I didn't because it's expensive. And then they also have really cute coffee shops. Since we're both students. We obviously had to carve a little bit of time out to do some work, so that was super great, just mixing it up because I go to my same coffee shops here all the time.
Yeah, so that was a nice I'm impressed that you were able to find time to do homework. If I'm doing a day trip, I'm like schools on the back burner for me.
I was actually there for a weekend, so I had to use my time wisely fair enough. Yeah, But my favorite thing that we did there was tide polling. I'm obsessed with everything under the sea. I told my best friend, I said, Kara, if there's one thing that I'm doing today, I need to pen an octopus. And she said, okay, we're gonna make that happen for you. So we went
on our little octopus hunt. We went around to all the different tide pools, and the biodiversity there is so amazing, Like they're like little tiny communities in every single tide pool. I wish that I could be a marine biologist so that I can learn more about this. But we found a little octopus and I put my finger like right by him, and he grabbed it and he tried to pull me under, but he was so tiny that it
didn't really make a difference. But what color, I don't He was kind of a brown, brownish color because they blend in with their environments. So yeah, he was a little brown. But I named him Marcellus after the octopus from the book Remarkably Bright Creatures. I love Octopi because of that book, So dreams Come True. What's your take on not UCSB on Santa Barbara.
I love Santa Barbara. I have gone a few times. I've done a weekend trip, and I've done day trips and I've done night trips. I've kind of done it all. My first trip to Santa Barbara was actually my freshman year. Very fortunate enough that my older sister went to cal Poly and she was like, I got tickets to see glass animals. Like, let's go, Like holf in the car. We're going. It's at the Santa Barbara Bowl. We're just
going after class. So we left it like four in the afternoon, got to the venue right on time, saw the opener, saw the band, and it was just Santa Barbara is gorgeous.
And it really is.
Yeah, it is so pretty and the Santa Barbara Bowl, like as a venue is like on a little hill, so you're overlooking a majority of the city and you get a seat like it's the sunset right as like the band came on stage and it was amazing. So definitely would recommend checking out concerts because also that venue, since it's so close to the residential area, you like, they have to shut down their concerts by like eleven PM. So we were able to drive back that same night
and we got in pretty early. So I would definitely recommend checking out Santa Barbara Bols specifically. But also I've done cute little day trips with friends where we just drive down for the day and we go shopping. There's a lot of good thrift stores and just it's like you said, so fun to.
Walk the I can attest to the thrifting for sure. Yeah.
Yeah, there's so many cool spaces and you just walk in. You can find clothes, shoes, little trinkets, you know, anything fun. So I definitely would recommend that. We also walked to the campus and just hung out at like a new beach like I feel like slow. I love exploring all the different beaches here. But also it's fun to go somewhere else and see like different college students and'd be like, wait,
I don't know every single one of you. So yeah, I would definitely say Santa Barbara is one of like my best day trip experiences.
Before we get into our next place, wanted to quickly mention the KCPR content team who covers a lot of the things that go on in Slow, different events that are happening, and they write stories and everything is just absolutely fabulous. So check out the website at KCPR dot org to read those stories and check them out.
Yeah, find something fun to do here and slow.
Okay, So our next spot is big, sir. I have always wanted to go here. It just seems so beautiful. There's opportunities for hiking and camping and I don't know, I mean, I have heard nothing but great things about it.
Yeah. Same. I have also never been, and it's just something that like, I feel like everyone goes, they always do it, and I'm like, when's it gonna be me?
I heard that the driving is a little bit tricky though at some parts. Yeah, I've had friends that have gone in the past and they've gotten to some sticky situations. So if you are planning on going here, make sure that your car, your car is good to go and
that you have the right tires and everything. How far away is Big sur So usually it takes about four hours to get to Big Surf from Slow However, due to the storms, the roads are unfortunately harder to navigate and you can't go the straight way, so that's going to definitely add some time. So maybe stick it out a little bit before you go there.
So yeah, bigser is great for seeing harbor seals. There's lots of places to sleep in your car, so very just again gorgeous landscape. Go have fun day trip, weekend trip, hang out with friends. But one word of caution, be so careful if you're deciding to drive back at night, because, like Keate said, the roads can be dangerous and it
can just be really scary. So with all of these trips, but especially Big sur take every precaution and be so careful in your planning that you know, hey, I want to leave at this time, so it's not too dark outside. Check the weather. No, off, it's going to rain. Now, the road's going to be the conditions in which your trip is going to be, So take every precaution in the world with these trips. Guys.
Yeah, stay smart people, all right. So, Emma, I've never been to Solving before. This is so sad. It's so pathetic of me to say. So, I need you to tell me all about it, and then you have to promise to take me with you.
Okay, I for sure will. So Solving is like straight out of a Hallmark movie. I kid you not like I. When I went there for the first time, I was like, literally where am I? I was put into a Disney movie, a Hallmark movie. It's insane. It's very It's a Danish style architecture place, and like everything there is Danish, and it's all just very cool in picturesque, very cute, sy and it's just a very small, quaint little town. So
I I never have spent the night there. Very much something you can get done in a day, but you kind of just walk through like little cobblestone roads and go into all these different shops and sit down and get the full Danish experience. There's lots of clogs, lots of clog places, clog shops, clogs, clogs. There's dogs, a giant like I love that word dog. Clog there's a giant clog statue outside of a clog store, so like it's just it's very much like they're on brand, like
they get matching clogs. Yes, yes, And they also have a what you see on TV shop that's just like that's fun. Any infomercial that you've seen, any gadget from that, they have it. So it's it's definitely an odd little place, but I love it. It's so fun to just go, like you said, do a coffee shop, get a nice little walk in. I've also heard that it's a great
place for like wine tasting and doing things like that. Lovely, and it's like literally ten minutes down the road from Ostridge Land, Like they are literally right on the same road, so you can see some ostriches and then go have your little Hallmark moment.
I literally I don't even know. I feel like I should have done a burpy every time you said cutzie, and I would have seen a little worked out cute and clog those are the words to de scrog solving. Yeah, that sounds fun and I am now definitely going to make an effort to do that.
Yeah, And it's like an hour hour and a half away, so It's very much quick, easy day trip, just to get out and explore a new town and just walk.
Okay, So our next destination is about two two and a half hours from Slow. This one's very near and dear to my heart. It's Monterey. I grew up going here. I'm from San Jose, so it was never really a far drive. They just have the best food. Such it's so picture picturesque over there. Wo a beautiful ward. I just used there. I know that people like. The main thing that people do there is visit the aquarium. I can safely say this aquarium is not overrated.
It is a blast.
I love going. It's like I said, I love my marine wildlife, so it's just amazing. My favorite thing to do in Monterey, though, is kayaking. There is just this cute little kayak rental and bike shop that's right off the coast. They do kayak tours, paddle boarding tours, bike tours. So I did the kayak tour for my senior trip in high school, and then I brought my parents back and did it again and it was so much fun.
The tour guides are always excellent, and one time they brought us by I think were they Seals over by the side there. They were like barking and it was crazy. They were jumping and they seemed super aggressive, so I was freaking out a little bit. But it's really cool. Oh and then the seat as well. They'll pop up every so often.
I used to go a lot as a kid, but I haven't been back in years, so I definitely want to go. And I see a lot of people are like going and just hang out at the aquarium and like doing fun things, so I need to go back.
Yeah, I mean, it's definitely a fun place. My favorite place to eat is all To Bakery and Cafe. They have really really good coffee and excellent pastries. Kid you not. I would do anything to have one of their chocolate croissants right now. It's a really really fun place to go. I love going with my friends and with my parents, and I actually have a friend visiting me over spring break,
so I'm going to take her to Monterey. It's just my spot that I show everyone, And like I said, it's not too far from slow so you can do it in a day.
Okay, So our last place to visit is the one and only Hers Castle, So I have been once.
Have you Kate, I've never been. I need to go. My mom and I my mom has been holding out for me. She's like, we're gonna go together. Oh okay, So I've been waiting to go. We haven't fished, I mean not quite yet. Technically.
I went and I wasn't even a student here, like I went with my family when we were just visiting. So but it is like insane, like it's it's a literal castle and it's what like forty five minutes away, and they have like you sign up for a tour and they shuttle you in. The place has like animals like zebras, bison, elk, deer, sheep. It's just like a very eccentric palace like castle vibes and I love it so much.
I need to go see me some zebras. That sounds so fun. They just roam like the lawn as they should, and it's like free the zebras, and I.
Think they have a lot of like fruit trees that line like the driveway and things like that. And you just walk through all the different rooms and you see like all these different artworks and statues and things like that. And they have like a giant pool and it's so gorgeous and it's perfect for like photos, like if you just go get dressed up and then be like, I'm a princess for the day, staying at like my newcastle.
Also fun fact the owner of Herst Castle, like back in the day was a newspaper owner, so very near and dear to our little journalistic hearts.
So so fun, We'll definitely have to make an effort to make it there. Another one just a little honorable mention more obey, not a ton to do there, That's why we didn't really talk about it as much. But they also have coffee shops, thrifting places to walk around. Yeah, that's also fun. Anyways, that's all the time we have for today. One last piece of advice.
Don't be afraid to get out and touch grass, but seriously go out and ex flor San Luis, Obispo and beyond and have fun while doing it.
Anyways, we'll be back with more tips and tricks next time on CP one oh one learn by listening. You can find us on any preferred streaming platform for the next episode.
And to keep up to date with CP one on one and all KCPR podcasts, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Spotify, TikTok, or Facebook at KCPR nine one three or.
Check us out on kcpr dot org slash Podcast signing off, I'm Kate Lopensk.
And I'm Emma Hughes. Thanks for keeping up with all things cale poly