San Luis Obispo

San Luis Obispo (SLO) is a county located in central California. There are many beaches and wineries nearby that can make for an extremely relaxing vacation.

We visited Pismo Beach, Paso Robles and Morro Bay all in one weekend to get the full experience!

Getting There

The drive to SLO from Los Angeles was a pretty smooth and calming drive. It took us about 4 hours. We were able to see the coast a little and I was able to take some cool photos with Brea’s new camera.

Brea was also able to take her car this time haha. It doesn’t get driven much.

Things To Do

We’ve never really visited central California before – we usually just drive through it. But since we were looking for something to do and everything else was closed (due to COVID-19), we thought why not? You could basically stay anywhere in SLO and drive around to do different activities from hiking to water sports to wineries. Here were the places that we visited while in SLO.

Pismo Beach

We booked a hotel at Pismo Beach that had a really nice private beach.

There are also a couple of hiking places near by like the Avila Sea Caves. If we had more time, we would have done this hike since it was close by and didn’t seem that intense.

We were also planning to ATV on the dunes but unfortunately, they were closed due to COVID.

Paso Robles

Paso Robles is known for their wineries and distilleries and we managed to visit 2 of them: Calwise and Re: FIND! If you have time, you can take a tour that goes to all of the distilleries.

Calwise Spirits Co.

You don’t need reservations to visit this distillery but you should pay attention to their shortened hours. They are only open from 12PM to 5PM on Friday through Sunday.

At Calwise, you can do a spirits tasting for $12. You’ll get to pick 6 of their spirits and can even buy cocktails-to-go for $25. They don’t really have a food menu. On the day that we visited, they were selling $1 corndogs. Luckily, the place next door had some food so we bought some from there to go with our tasting.

Re: Find

At Re: Find, you do need a reservation and they are for 1 hour and 15 minutes. The times they offer are: 11AM, 12:30PM, 2:45PM, and 4:15PM. You’ll get seated in a nice outdoor area. Face masks are required.

The tastings include both a wine flight and a spirit flight. They are also required to serve a lunch size meal and allow sharing. Since we were a group of 5 we purchased 2 tastings for $35 each ($15 is for the lunch which was a salad). You can split the wine tasting part to someone who likes wine for example and save the spirit tasting for the other person.

We also wanted to visit the Field of Light at Sensorio but they were sold out on the night that we could go.

Morro Bay

Some other activities you can add to your list (if you enjoy water sports) include paddle-boarding, kayak-ing or renting an electric pontoon boat.

Morro Strand Trail

We have visited Morro Bay once before to see Morro Rock. This time we decided to do the Morro Strand Trail hike to see Morro Rock from the beach-side. This is more like a stroll/walk than a hike haha.

Where to Stay

Of course you should only stay at a hotel or Airbnb if you feel safe and comfortable. We decided to stay at Pismo Beach and the hotel we picked was safe and clean. All of the staff wore masks and everything was properly sanitized.

Inn at the Cove

Our hotel had a private beach! We watched the sunset here one night.

The rooms were spacious and had a nice view too!

They also have complimentary breakfast but because of these times, it was a to-go bag.

If you are looking for a relaxing weekend trip, you should definitely pay a visit to SLO. There is something here for everyone – even if you just want to stay at the hotel and relax by the pool.

Check out our post here for a free itinerary!