San Luis Obispo in 2023? (Santa Maria, Atascadero: real estate, home, elementary school)

[1AngryTaxPayer]

Originally Posted by MechAndy

When I was a kid you could drive dune buggies/trucks and cars Pismo Beach.
I am not sure if that is still a thing.
A few days ago I took my son Razor clam digging on a Washington beach.
He was totally shocked that we were allowed to drive on the beach.
I’ve done this a few times and have never seen one bit of litter/rubbish on the beaches.

We used to hunt ducks in South Bay. You could deer hunt in what's now Tierra Santa.

[1AngryTaxPayer]

Originally Posted by MechAndy

When I was a kid you could drive dune buggies/trucks and cars Pismo Beach.
I am not sure if that is still a thing.
A few days ago I took my son Razor clam digging on a Washington beach.
He was totally shocked that we were allowed to drive on the beach.
I’ve done this a few times and have never seen one bit of litter/rubbish on the beaches.

We can dig pismos but you'll be walking a bit to get there. The areas in the river drainage are too polluted to be safe to eat.

[2011KTM530]

I grew up in SLO county, lived there over 50 years before I had to move away. Couldn’t afford to retire in California. SLO was a good place to grow up, safe, no homeless bums like now. I remember having fun on Thursday nite cruise nite in downtown SLO in the 70’s. Go to the Grad and have an enormous Grad burger and play pool for $.25 a game. You could drive on the beach whenever you wanted, there were no pay kiosks. Avila Beach was an old Chevron oil town, not the palm tree lined SoCal style tourist trap it is now. Pismo had the dive bars, roller rink, pinball arcades, slot car track and the tacky Fun Zone. You could walk across Grand Ave in Arroyo Grande and not have to look either way. We would slide down the moss covered spillway at Lopez Dam in on the warm spring days. SLO that i described disappeared starting in the 80’s. Where we would go camping, riding motorcycles and shooting guns is now all covered with mini mansions and golf courses. And I noticed before I left, politics in SLO county has turned very bitter and angry with all the big city transplants. Sad.

[AnythingOutdoors]

Originally Posted by skyway31

It depends on where you're viewing the peak(s) from. It's all perspective. If one stands on the beach and sees a 3,000 ft peak a few miles away, that's going to be much more impressive than standing in a town square at elevation 5,500 looking at 7,500 ft peaks. The mountains are more impressive to look at in Santa Barbara than Denver or even Boulder, CO. People have a very, very difficult time accepting this because Santa Barbara is on the coast and Colorado is the Rocky Mountain state with much higher elevation numbers.(Of course, if it is conditions unique to higher elevations-like skiing or certain temperatures- you seek, then it's a different story).

Majestic and impressive are in the eye of the beholder. You like vertical difference, and that's fine. But others don't have to accept your definition, which is also fine. I like craggy steep mountains, lots of granite, etc. Some of this is a function of elevation, but also geology.

Here's a photo I took in Idaho:



The mountains in Santa Barbara aren't without their charm, and I've spent a lot of time exploring that general area. But there's simply nothing remotely like this in the California Coast Ranges.

I should point out that these peaks are only around 2000' above where I took this picture.

[NORTY FLATZ]

Originally Posted by skyway31

It depends on where you're viewing the peak(s) from. It's all perspective. If one stands on the beach and sees a 3,000 ft peak a few miles away, that's going to be much more impressive than standing in a town square at elevation 5,500 looking at 7,500 ft peaks. The mountains are more impressive to look at in Santa Barbara than Denver or even Boulder, CO. People have a very, very difficult time accepting this because Santa Barbara is on the coast and Colorado is the Rocky Mountain state with much higher elevation numbers.(Of course, if it is conditions unique to higher elevations-like skiing or certain temperatures- you seek, then it's a different story).

The term you are looking for, is "prominence."

[skyway31]

Originally Posted by NORTY FLATZ

The term you are looking for, is "prominence."

Thank ya!

[Ivory Lee Spurlock]

Originally Posted by skyway31

It depends on where you're viewing the peak(s) from. It's all perspective. If one stands on the beach and sees a 3,000 ft peak a few miles away, that's going to be much more impressive than standing in a town square at elevation 5,500 looking at 7,500 ft peaks. The mountains are more impressive to look at in Santa Barbara than Denver or even Boulder, CO. People have a very, very difficult time accepting this because Santa Barbara is on the coast and Colorado is the Rocky Mountain state with much higher elevation numbers.(Of course, if it is conditions unique to higher elevations-like skiing or certain temperatures- you seek, then it's a different story).

The Smokey Mountains in Tennessee and North Carolina look just as high to me as the Rocky Mountains I'm Colorado despite being nearly half the elevation..

[AlwaysSmiling]

I'm not sure what is going to happen to SLO county. It has a huge influx of money from seniors and college kids, but no middle class. Everything has just gone through the roof in prices. $6.00 for a bottle of salad dressing, gas is now down to $4.99 (seriously??!!) a room in someones house is being advertised for $1800. $1800 plus proving that you make 3x times that. A studio going for $2500. And don't even ask about having a pet. It isn't sustainable. Diablo (nuclear power plant) might or might not close. Salaries have not gone up and people can't afford hardly anything. Food pantry at church opens at 10 and there is a line starting at 8:30. Millions have gone to homeless issues, yet there are panhandlers at most every corner. Hiring a housekeeper is upwards of $50 to $75 an hour. Home insurance companies are not renewing because of the fire danger. It's December and suppose to start our rainy season, yet it's going to be 75 today.
People talk about the mountains being non mountains - we actually got snow on them darn hills last winter. Snow!!
I'm wrestling with staying in this beautiful area at a huge cost or move somewhere else for a lower one. But, all other areas have weather, bugs, humidity, clouds!! SLO county averages over 276 sunny days a year. Not many other areas have that.
I just don't know if it makes fiscal sense to stay. Any advice is welcomed!!

[AnythingOutdoors]

Originally Posted by AlwaysSmiling

I'm not sure what is going to happen to SLO county. It has a huge influx of money from seniors and college kids, but no middle class. Everything has just gone through the roof in prices. $6.00 for a bottle of salad dressing, gas is now down to $4.99 (seriously??!!) a room in someones house is being advertised for $1800. $1800 plus proving that you make 3x times that. A studio going for $2500. And don't even ask about having a pet. It isn't sustainable. Diablo (nuclear power plant) might or might not close. Salaries have not gone up and people can't afford hardly anything. Food pantry at church opens at 10 and there is a line starting at 8:30. Millions have gone to homeless issues, yet there are panhandlers at most every corner. Hiring a housekeeper is upwards of $50 to $75 an hour. Home insurance companies are not renewing because of the fire danger. It's December and suppose to start our rainy season, yet it's going to be 75 today.
People talk about the mountains being non mountains - we actually got snow on them darn hills last winter. Snow!!
I'm wrestling with staying in this beautiful area at a huge cost or move somewhere else for a lower one. But, all other areas have weather, bugs, humidity, clouds!! SLO county averages over 276 sunny days a year. Not many other areas have that.
I just don't know if it makes fiscal sense to stay. Any advice is welcomed!!

If you limit yourself to a very specific climate only found along a narrow slice of the CA coast then I suppose you'll have to accept that you'll be paying an exorbitant amount to live there.

Californian's are a funny bunch when it comes to climate (and I say this as an ex-Californian). What's considered "ideal" is a social construct, mostly a relic from mid-twentieth century pop culture (beach/surfer life and all that). I mean, it's okay, but it's not the be all end all. Yet Californian's act like it's a huge problem if it gets above 100 or below freezing. Dressing for the weather (esp. cold) is not a big deal.

What opened my eyes was living and working in Europe for a year. Europe's weather is basically the same as what we get in the Midwest: hot humid summers with lots of rain, and cold overcast winters. Most Californians would say it's terrible. And yet we had a wonder experience there. I learned that what makes a place great are the people, culture, architecture, parks, and so on. I learned not to be bothered by a little rain or snow or cold. This opened up a whole world of opportunity beyond my soft cocoon of comfort in CA.

As for bugs... We have far fewer bugs here in Boise than when we lived on California coast. Sure, you can find buggier places, such as the Southeast. But most of the semi-arid West isn't very buggy.

SLO also has weather. I betcha you don't go outside much when it's cold and rainy there. During winter you spend more time inside. Trails get muddy during winter, which makes hiking and mountain biking a bad idea (messy and bad for the trails). Here in Boise we also spend more time inside during winter, but we also do a lot of skiing (just 30 minutes away), and we get less precipitation than SLO, which means I can more easily do stuff outside most days. We get very little snow in the city, but cold overnight lows freeze the trails which means I can mountain biking here year round.

So my advice: Travel, see the world and other parts of the US. experience living in other areas. You may find that SLO is your ideal place, nothing wrong with that. You just need to hustle to make it work. But you may also find that weather isn't nearly as important as you thought, and that other areas have a better quality of life (for you) and at a lower cost.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by AlwaysSmiling

I'm not sure what is going to happen to SLO county. It has a huge influx of money from seniors and college kids, but no middle class. Everything has just gone through the roof in prices. $6.00 for a bottle of salad dressing, gas is now down to $4.99 (seriously??!!) a room in someones house is being advertised for $1800. $1800 plus proving that you make 3x times that. A studio going for $2500. And don't even ask about having a pet. It isn't sustainable. Diablo (nuclear power plant) might or might not close. Salaries have not gone up and people can't afford hardly anything. Food pantry at church opens at 10 and there is a line starting at 8:30. Millions have gone to homeless issues, yet there are panhandlers at most every corner. Hiring a housekeeper is upwards of $50 to $75 an hour. Home insurance companies are not renewing because of the fire danger. It's December and suppose to start our rainy season, yet it's going to be 75 today.
People talk about the mountains being non mountains - we actually got snow on them darn hills last winter. Snow!!
I'm wrestling with staying in this beautiful area at a huge cost or move somewhere else for a lower one. But, all other areas have weather, bugs, humidity, clouds!! SLO county averages over 276 sunny days a year. Not many other areas have that.
I just don't know if it makes fiscal sense to stay. Any advice is welcomed!!

A friend of mine who used to post here said, that when she was growing up in Paso Robles, there would be a very light snowfall in December every 5 years. That was my experience in Berkeley, CA as well, in the hills. A few years ago, it snowed hard enough in Berkeley, that people were skiing in the big regional park in the hills! Elevation really makes a difference.


And thanks for the update on SLO. It wasn't so bad the last time someone posted about it. What you're describing is probably post-Covid prices. That's crazy! That's not a healthy economy: students and retirees but no middle class, hardly. Where do the retail workers and restaurant staff live?