I 5, between Los Angeles and Davis, was very very long, very full of trucks, and for the most part very boring - or depressing, every time I passed a "Trump/Vance will make Gas and Food Affordable Again" sign, or one reading "Democrats: Highest Inflation for 50 Years." I stopped at Bravoland (where? you might well ask) where there was a life-sized model stagecoach - and a good enough connection for me to tether my computer to my cellphone and attend a graduate student Work in Progress session. And then for lunch ... I'd long ago determined I'd experience the complete ridiculousness of Andersen's, in Santa Nella, having driven past its windmill in the past. Such an interesting story ... the original one was in Buellton and opened in 1924, though apparently closed this summer, just before its 100th birthday. The Santa Nella establishments only dates from 1976.
As you can see, it's marked by a windmill (suggesting Dutch pea soup) - but the interior was like a Bavarian bar. Weirdly, the founder was Danish, and his wife Juliette, who created the soup recipe, was from eastern France. The soup was, indeed, great. The grilled cheese sandwich - fairly horrible. The coffee - really horrible. But I went, because I still love the weirdness of roadside America.
And eventually, eventually, I arrived in Davis - the traffic was so much at a standstill around Stockton that even my car's GPS rolled its eyes and took me off the interstate and round a tour of the back streets.
So far as first impressions go, Davis is a really nice small leafy college town, with a bookstore, an excellent icecream shop (honey, ginger and turmeric counts as a health food, no?) and various little art galleries - one of which has this huge, glorious cat outside. Its illuminated whiskers change colors in slow but regular succession ...
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