In October our nephew had a "destination wedding" in Pismo Beach, so we drove the T42 down to stay in for the pre/post wedding festivity days, and then to take an additional week exploring some of the other sites down there on our way home.
Oceano Dunes Campground served as our home base for the wedding days. It's one of two state park campgrounds in the Oceano / Pismo Beach area, and the only one with water/power hookups (ironically, the dump station is by the other campground). Sites in the middle of the RV area are unshaded, while a lot of the ones on the edges have some. We were grateful for both the shade and the power hookups (which we normally don't bother with) since an uncharacteristic October heatwave passed through for a couple of days while we were there.
A short walk from the campground brings you to a beach that several of the other wedding guests who came out described as "being like Mad Max" because it's practically the only beach in California that allows vehicles onto it, so you sort of have to dodge the stream of trucks (some pulling some pretty large, heavy looking fifth-wheel trailers) and SUVs going by.
We passed by this little wetland area, which was a hangout for gulls and pelicans. As a passing airplane startled them and they all took flight at once, it occurred to us that "directly underneath a flock of startled birds" was not necessarily the safest place to be from a "clean laundry" perspective. 😉
About a mile down the beach was our intended destination: the Oceano Dunes Nature Preserve - an area that's actually off limits to vehicles, but which you have to walk the Mad Max area to get to, and borders a popular OHV area (you can see the OHV staging area in the upper right corner of this first photo from the the Dunes).
If you hike in a little ways, though, you can leave the sounds of the OHVs behind , and pretend that you're lost somewhere in the Sahara (or at least Death Valley).
It's a little hard to see, but this video shows how the strong winds sculpt the dunes.
The wedding itself was at a Dolphin Bay Resort - a perfect setting for a beautiful ceremony and fun reception. Here are a couple of rare photos of the family "all dressed up".
The morning after the wedding there was a breakfast gathering at Dinosaur Caves Park: an ocean-front, bluff-top park with a number of sea caves beneath it.
On our way north to our next destination, we stopped at Avila Beach.
Tom's sister had spotted whales there a couple of days prior, but the day we were there was largely cloudy and overcast and all we saw was a few pods of dolphins in the far far far distance.
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