Day 11-12: Occidental

We spent a month this summer on a 7,957-mile road trip across the country, from the Washington, D.C., area to California and back. I began posting privately about the trip while we were gone. I have kept the original dates on the posts I began writing earlier, but now I’m updating with photos and making them public. Day 11 was July 13; we left San Francisco that afternoon and then drove north to the town of Occidental, where we spent the night before continuing up the coast.

Occidental is a small, charming town in the midst of steep hills and towering redwoods. We chose mostly because it was about the right distance from San Francisco; we just needed an overnight stop on our way up the coast. But we also liked the fact that we could stay in a quaint, historic place there instead of another ho-hum Marriott or Comfort Suites.

The following morning, I visited the town’s Little Free Library to leave a Jane Austen book, and we had an excellent breakfast at a local cafe before heading north toward Redwood National Park.