Hooray, hooray, hooray! I finally made it to Santa Barbara and brought back a ton of impressions. GPS is like a holiday in itself, it knows everything, it’s so smart that I almost feel embarrassed being next to it. What calms me down is the fact that I’m driving it, and it’s guiding me. In love, the dream of a fool. As I wrote earlier, I wanted to leave yesterday, but I ended up being lazy the entire day, and I must admit, that laziness actually helped me relax. Sometimes, it’s okay to be lazy.
Today, I also got plenty of sleep, called my dad, found out that he was doing fine, then watched a movie, washed the dishes, took a shower, did my nails, got dressed, and left. It’s funny, I really enjoy doing my eyes up, for me it’s like a little artistic episode every day. I sit there like an artist, painting them. Unfortunately, I can’t go all out, otherwise, people would misunderstand. But I do everything very carefully. Foundation with SPF, Tanya’s Chanel powder, and then comes the eyes – different shadows, eyeliner, mascara. I realized today that it’s time to replace my mascara.
The sun hit my left eye, and it started to tear up a little, and the mascara started to smudge in it. So, it was crying the whole way, especially when I arrived in Santa Barbara, it cried so much that I had to wash it with water, otherwise, it wouldn’t calm down. It looked very funny because one eye was fully made up, and the other one was completely bare. I had to “wash” the second eye too.
The road to Santa Barbara is beautiful. You can take the 101 highway, which is faster, but you don’t get much of a view of the ocean from it. On the other hand, the 1 highway offers a stunning view of the ocean, though it’s slower. Of course, I took the 1 highway. The further I got from Malibu and closer to Santa Barbara, the more beautiful it became. It’s simply beautiful to drive there, especially in the evening when the sun hangs right over the ocean, and the entire ocean sparkles like a cracked mirror, reflecting millions of tiny suns into your eyes. Across from Santa Barbara, in the ocean, there are the islands of San Miguel, Santa Rosa, and Santa Cruz. They look incredibly beautiful from the shore! I don’t have photos, though I did bring a camera. I was so overwhelmed with the sheer bliss I was experiencing that taking pictures seemed too mundane.
As soon as I got back to the coast near San Buenaventura, I was greeted by an unforgettable sight that could compete with some of the most beautiful paintings I’ve seen in my dreams… Soft green mountains of the Los Padres National Forest, a sunlit coast, the endless sparkling ocean, islands in a lilac haze, an unreal turquoise-blue sky crisscrossed by delicate white streaks of clouds, and the farthest mountain from me – a shade of blue. This is something you don’t see in real life, but it all happened to me. From this otherworldly view, I immediately relaxed so much that I almost regretted that I was driving. My soul rested today with all these beauties.
Unfortunately, I left quite late, but, well, why regret it? Yes, I didn’t see much of the city, but what I did see will be enough for at least a week. And besides, I spent the whole day without rushing or stress, and that was very important too. When I got to Santa Barbara, I drove around the bay and the harbor a bit, then GPS found my favorite Australian restaurant, Outback, and guided me to it, where I had dinner: a piece of tilapia with crab-mushroom ragout and a Chablis sauce. After that, I went to downtown to see the night view of Santa Barbara.
All along the way, I was accompanied by an increasingly strong mix of ocean, flowers, and eucalyptus scents. The smell was so strong that I could feel it even at 70 mph when driving back home on the 101. I really liked downtown Santa Barbara, and it reminded me a bit of West Palm Beach and Palo Alto. It’s a decent, clean, neat, quiet, expensive, yet simple, lovely coastal city.