Originally Published on American Airlines BlackAtlas.com on October 5, 2010
My husband and I took a knock-out scenic drive along the California coast last weekend. Our destination: Luxury camping at El Capitan Canyon in Santa Barbara County, a beautiful place to get your camp on. Don’t get me wrong – I love a 4 star hotel experience just as much as the next person, but for me there’s absolutely nothing like America's Great Outdoors...especially when it's infused with a little luxury. =) So please, take it from me, if you’re looking for a more earthy vacay, you should totally put El Capitan Canyon (via the California coast) on your list of things to do! I've been wanting to see what luxury camping was about for some time now and I'm so glad I went! You can see a few of my pictures on Outdoor Afro).
Luxury camping isn't cheap, but I knew that going in and I love the beauty of Santa Barbara County! The coast of California is - as you know - to die for and for folks who don't live in California, I'd still recommend making a nice little excursion out of it (kinda like you can with New England's Fall Foliage tours back east)! Fly in to SFO or OAK and then rent a car (try a convertible on a lovely day) and enjoy miles and miles (5 hours-ish) of breathtaking California coastline by car. The added bonus for me is that after the drive, I get to hang out at a campground that is by the sea with El Capitan State Beach a mere mini-hike away.
Our campground gave us free bikes to ride around on and appropriately serious warnings about wildlife. I even had a cute little encounter with a family of raccoons and a not so cute encounter with a skunk walking around with his tail raised too high for my liking. All of these wildlife creatures were angling for leftover cat food, and if you like wildlife like I do, it was kinda neat (and scary) to watch. But what puts the luxury in luxury camping is the accommodations (cedar cabins and safari tents all with personal firepits), room service (!), maid service (!) and a gourmet market & restaurant that not only carries a decent selection of wines called Happy Camper Wines (LOL) but will deliver a complete BBQ set up with your choice of tri-tip, chicken, burgers and/or hot dogs directly to your camp site, including the fixins, wood, paper plates, utensils and firestarters. The campground even offers wireless access for those who can't put down their laptops and some of the cedar cabins have amenities such as bathrooms, fireplaces, soaking bathtubs, and sleeping lofts. If you stay in a safari tent like we did, then you share a community bathroom -- the nicest, cleanest community bathroom I've ever seen. El Capitan Canyon also offers a nice heated swimming pool, a spa (yep, you can even get spa treatments), yoga, story-telling, Saturday night barbecues and concerts in the summer, stargazing, and more. There's also a beautiful two-bedroom house that they call a Safari Cabin Suite that is available for 4 people only and it's a mere $795 a night. Wow. The trees are glorious. And that's just what’s happening on the premises, although I do admit that I wish all of that luxury could get rid of the pesky gnats, but alas no. I ended up buying some organic bug juice (aka insect repellant) from the market and put it on my neck and ears and all was good in the world again.
El Capitan Canyon is less than 15-20 minutes from Santa Barbara's famous State Street and Stearns Wharf, where we visited the Ty Warner Sea Center. Land lovers can rent pedi-cabs and sea lovers can rent jet skis, small sailboats and other small watercraft. I saw a few girls on paddle boards too! The breathtaking Santa Ynez Valley has soooo many activities that it's hard to decide what you might want to do outside of Santa Barbara proper. The Santa Ynez Valley was originally Chumash Indian territory, so there's the Chumash Reservation and the Chumash Casino Resort & Spa for folks who like learning about local culture, history and, of course, gaming. And for the nature lovers, there's the nearby Cachuma Lake Recreation Area - "home to fish, deer and bobcats as well as 275 species of birds" and the Cachuma Lake Nature Center where the focus is on "local human and natural history." There are stables for horseback riding, apple & fruit farm stands along the highways, and we even followed a road sign and unexpectedly stopped by a lavendar farm in Los Olivos. It's definitely wine country, so there are some great wineries throughout the Valley, my favorite being Rideau Vineyards, a small boutique winery off of a lovely road in Solvang. The owner, Iris Rideau, has public parties on her lovely grounds pretty regularly and I've had a blast with family and friends on several occasions. I could tell you about the Rolling Hills Garden Center, the Jeep tours, and the whale watching, but I think you can see how much there is to do in this lovely area of California.
All luxury aside, what I liked most about my weekend getaway is that after a full day of however you personally define luxury (and then a nap of course), you get to gather with your friends and loved ones around a glorious campfire and enjoy each others company in America's Great Outdoors. I'm not sure it gets much better than that. Of course, that’s if you don’t count Paris.
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