We arrived at the entrance gates of Pepperdine University around 10a. We parked and headed up to the Admission bullding and received a self-guided tour map along with a series of brochures. One that surprised me was titled, Pepperdine – A Faith University. We walked around the campus for an hour or so and then bought the kids some shirts at the bookstore. Trevor really liked the size of the campus. The enrollment is around 4,000. It appears Trevor is leaning towards a smaller school at this point, but that could change over the next year. Right now he put Pepperdine in the Elon and High Point category, with HPU leading by a large margin.

From Pepperdine we headed down the PCH to Malibu. We drove past the Malibu Colony where the flyover from Two & a Half Men was filmed. The actual show was on a Warner Bros lot, but the flyover IS real. Since the skies were still hazy, we changed our mind about having lunch in Malibu and headed up towards Santa Barbara

Just north of Malibu, we saw a huge sand hill/mountain which reminded us of Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado. We decided to stop and everyone headed up the hill. I stayed behind to take some pics. The climb looked exhausting, so I believe I made the right decision. After they all climbed down, I saw a bunch of rocks on the other side of the road near the ocean and then got a great pic of the kids. We got back in the car and continued north

We arrived into Santa Barbara and had a nice Italian luncheon at California Pasta. Heather and Tay shopped a bit while the rest of us walked around the town. In the early afternoon we headed further north to San Luis Obispo. San Luis Obispo is were my dad’s family lived and my cousins Dave & the late, Larry. I can remember visiting McCracken Tire 25+ years ago and visiting with my Uncle Carl and my cousins. McCracken Tire was really the only shop in San Luis Obispo and was really a great business until Uncle Carl passed

In San Luis Obispo, we went to the quite disgusting BubbleGum Alley. This has been around for 30+ years and is an alley where people stick their chewing gum. Yeh, kinda gross, but it is a long standing tourist attraction. We then went down to the previous location of McCracken Tire, which is now named The Tire Store. There was a worker leaving and I asked him how long he worked there and he said 20-25 years. I asked him if he knew the name of the previous business, and he said McCracken Tire. I clearly had the right place. We then headed to Morro Bay and Morro Rock. Morro Rock is a 600 ft volcanic plug in the Pacific Ocean. The views weren’t the best as the it was still hazy, but it was still a pretty cool stop.

On the way back, I wanted to stop by The California Men’s Colony where my late cousin Larry worked for 25+ years. We arrived and parked in the back parking lot to not draw attention. Heather took a few pics of me looking in remembrance at the facility. As I started to get back in the vehicle, I noticed two patrol vehicles approaching us from both sides. I waited to get in the vehicle to see if they wanted to see me, and they did. The one driver got out and asked what we were doing. I asked him if he knew Larry McCracken and he did. I explained that I was his cousin, and just wanted to come by and see where he worked all those years. He completely understood and just said he wished we would have come all the way up and they would have given us a tour It turned out he was a good friend of Larry’s, and even said he should have known as I resemble Larry. I offered to delete the pics Heather took and he was fine. In retrospect, it does make sense. How many people pull in the prison and just take photos. I had a reason, and he understood and said that he missed Larry as well.

We headed back and turned in for the evening.