![]() Authentic Santa Maria-style tri-tip and Rancho Gordo baked beans with produce from Cuyama Homegrown This is the type of travel I live for-the kind that feels integrated and non-extractive, and most importantly fun. There are community builders at Cuyama Beverage Co., a social enterprise whose delightfully dry sparkling mead proceeds go to creating rural resilience through their Blue Sky Center. There are incredible winemakers and eco-activists at Condor’s Hope who are using age-old dry farming techniques to work in harmony with the increasingly dry but incredibly beautiful natural habitat, holding community harvests with fellow permaculture activists that are standing up to the looming presence of big ag in the area. Even as a visitor, you can’t help but get wrapped up in this high desert community. ![]() At its heart, it’s an ag town, and one that’s facing a series of struggles, many of which have to do with water rights. Here in Cuyama, the enterprising, can-do attitude of the Old West still exists. The Buckhorn Bar at Cuyama Buckhorn in Central California’s high desert ![]() Which is all by way of saying: This is a stop for true road trippers who prefer stargazing over bar hopping, and would pick a round of cornhole over 18 holes any day of the week. In the immediate vicinity, there’s a convenience store where you’ll find every flavor of Takis imaginable, a gas station, a community center, and a tiny (but very cute!) vintage shop. When I first pulled in, I was admittedly shocked by how the motel was quite literally the town. But Cuyama Buckhorn still has that rural connection that gives it a feeling of connection to the past.Ĭuyama itself is a dusty agriculture town that boasts a whopping population of 562, but this is just the type of Western retreat for a traveler who’s into quiet and wide open spaces. It’s a far cry from the first bare-bones motels, which were more glorified rest stops along desolate highways in post-war America. Stylish rooms at Cuyama Buckhorn have modern amenities with an old-West twistīuilt in 1952 when Cuyama was a booming oil town, the property has recently been restored to capture the nostalgia of the West, but with modern upgrades like Brooklinen bedding, Bluetooth radios, Further bath products, and walk-in showers. And I found a great one in Cuyama Buckhorn, located in the high desert of the Central Valley. Either way, mom-and-pop motels beckon a bygone era of backroads and byways that light my West Coast wanderlust right up. Or perhaps it’s the fact that I’m a sucker for a portmanteau the world “motel” is a mash-up of “motor” and “hotel,” after all. (The first of record, Milestone Mo-Tel, opened in San Luis Obispo in 1925.) It could also be an affinity for car culture-the advent of the automobile and the freedom that the open road brings is what catapulted motor courts to their popularity at the turn of the century. The concept of a motel was actually born here in California, just like me, so perhaps it’s a little bit of local pride that makes me hold these motels so dear. I’m talking about true motor lodges located in remote destinations designed to accommodate dyed-in-the-wool road warriors. No, I’m not talking about the slapdash urban motel revamps smack dab in the middle of city centers that have taken over the hive mind of interior design. And in my opinion, there’s no better way to do so than visiting some of California’s classic motor inns. To truly understand the West, you have to get on the road.
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