Thank You, Morro Bay; We'll Miss You

Upcoming plans change; Checking in on Rachel Carson

I will miss this remarkable town.

Morro Bay has played a central anchor to our last four trips. This is for many reasons, but mainly because it retains a small-town charm when that’s hard to find in many of our nation’s more scenic communities in the post-pandemic, work-from-home era. There is a quaintness, an ease here. Chain stores exist, but not in the charming downtown. That’s reserved for small businesses and unique motels and restaurants.

We may be halfway between LA and San Francisco, but Morro Bay resembles the old fishing villages along the New England coastline. It’s a step back in time. I love that you can still get saltwater taffy here, as well as t-shirts, postcards, and other tourist trinkets. I love that sea lions bark throughout the night, and we can hear their lullaby from half a mile away in this rustic cottage with its rattling windows. I love that fishing boats share the waterfront with sea otters, and they all bob in unison with the ebb and flow. Of course, there is the great rock and the friendly townspeople. But mostly, I love that it feels like one of the few places we’ve visited that feels like home, and I could imagine us living here.

There are hiking trails and a two-mile stretch of beach where dogs can roam, run, and romp freely. That’s where we’ve met many good souls, whether they have four legs or two, be they locals or visitors like us. We’ve always felt welcome.

No town feels quite right to me without a bookstore, and Morro Bay has Coalesce, which not only sells the latest published books but also has stacks of used paperbacks. And like many of the better indie bookshops, the card collection is phenomenal. The shop has been here for more than 50 years.

Morro Bay is also vegan-friendly, which is important to me. There is a cafe, and next to it, a small grocery store where heart-healthy meals and foods are available for those of us who have damaged our bodies right up to the edge of death.

Last week, I stopped in for greeting cards at Coalesce and bought the latest study of Rachel Carson’s life. It focuses on the love that gave her courage and voice to write Silent Spring, which warned us what chemicals and pollution were doing to our precious world.

How fitting it is out now since the EPA has rolled back all science-based protections in a sickening move. It is sickening in that it will contribute to poor human health, and kill off plants and birds, fishes and animals, and much of what we treasure in the world we live in. Goodbye clean air, so long clean water. (Article here.)

Rachel Carson inspired Kennedy, Johnson, and even Nixon to clean up America’s dirty environmental act. (Book here.)

She would weep if she saw how far back our protections are going due to the new administration. According to them, climate change does not exist—no matter what science proves.

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“It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist; the threat is rather to life itself.”
~ Rachel Carson

“Today, a little more land may belong to the sea, tomorrow a little less. Always, the edge of the sea remains an elusive and indefinable boundary.” ~ Rachel Carson

And after Rachel Carson dried her tears, she’d fight for what’s right and just and for all living souls and Mother Earth.

But I did not come here to write about Rachel Carson, who has recently become a major heroine of mine.

My purpose was to thank Morro Bay for so many good visits. Alas, while it breaks my heart, I imagine this will be our last.

You all know we’ve been hunted and haunted here. It began last year when a “zealous” reader (trying to be kind here) began tracing some of our stops from her Seattle home. This year, she also followed us to Tucson, which had us changing our visit there.

We’ve encountered her, or her waiting car, at our few favorite spots—one utterly quiet and out of the way—in eight of the last eleven days.

As I told a friend yesterday, you don’t know how difficult that is. That’s beyond coincidence. Back home in tiny Jackson, we don’t see anyone with that kind of regularity besides Keith and Mike at the post office.

Hell, I’m lucky to see most folks around town once or twice a month at most—never mind eight out of eleven days.