Local Serendipitous Discovery: "Hey you...hey you... in that bizarre truck with trees & flowers growing out of it... your boss, Wendy, sent us to see a bit of history...are we in the right place?"
The "occupants" refused to answer, but for that reason, you will just have to not only visit this Steller place & Old Town Orcutt, but learn a bit about the history of this charming area.
Wendy S., who happens to wear many hats & juggles it all quite well, also runs a cute furnishings/furniture/antique shop a few blocks away. She is a long time local, who up to recently, did a marvelous job of running the only grocery in town, for quite a few years. That other store was a topic of all kinds of local angst, news, & gossip, that even involved the dreaded Weed / "Reefer Madness" of all things...including the dreaded "Money Monster" of modern day real estate & Reefer stocks. It is ironic that vegetation & gold [e.g. Sugar Beets/Cane, Celery] initially drove railway development, then came "Black Gold", & now in a strange twist of fate, now a form of "gold-priced" vegetation, which no longer needs the rails, may help erase some vestigial remains. In fact, almost all of the rails, locomotives, & such have been recycled decades or even a century ago. Some old rails still sleep under some roads & may someday, be the subject of some archeological find by either future man, or if extinct, an alien race [e.g. see A.I.].
In any case, Wendy's D.V.A. Mall is literally a page out of history in this quaint old town, which now has an influx of millennial tourists & newcomers, who generally care little about what came before. Of course, it is an antique mall, but one look around the grounds & the interior "bones" of this structure, and using the "way back machine" [ref.: The R&B show], you can imagine when this place used to store things from the then extant original narrow rail/gauge [3 feet from rail to rail] Pacific Coast Railroad.
The PCR was to help deal with the landlocked Central Coast and most equipment had to come here via Steamship, from SF to Hanford Pier, in Avila Beach. At least, the initial runs were built by early Chinese immigrants organized by Ah Louis [see the Ah Louis historic building in SLO]. Later, the very same incredibly hard working people, somehow blasted & hammered their way thru the mountains at Cuesta Pass [aka Grade], and then established the competing wider rail [gauge] Union Pacific railroad [on which our modern day Amtrack still runs [which BTW needs Infrastructure $].
In any case, Orcutt, Nipomo, Betteravia [now a modern day company ghost town], were some of the towns established by the PCR. In fact the original "Right of Way" historical plaque nearby, is one of the few other locations that remind us of this history. The very name of the town was taken from a then famous oil man who also discovered the fossils in the L.A. Tar Pits.
In any case, Wendy's DVA Mall is quite an interesting place, and I especially loved both the outside areas filled with all kinds of tastefully arranged treasures & flowers, as well as, the cool interesting huge interior of the Mall. The individual vendors have all kinds of things on display, both inside & outside, & even on the "porch".
Even if you are not particularly into antiques and just want to look around, that is quite fine with the friendly local people here. That being said, even my wife, who is not much into antiques, spied a painting that caught her eye for our next visit.
We originally had no idea of the charms of this area, until we randomly drove here after first checking out the tiny cute Orcutt Farmers Market, that they have on Tuesdays, not too far away, in relatively "newer" Orcutt.
The other attractions in Old Town Orcutt are new breweries, wine tasting, & even some good eats. It is now a blend of both old & new, with even some lesser known hiking trails nearby. Some things are tasteful, some are gauche, & some are cookie cutter rampant metastatic over-development. It would be wise to explore this area before even more falls victim, like the "Iron Horse", to "progress", or we become extinct, due to near infinite greed & stupidity [which ever comes first]!
Please remember that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.
Some history is still remembered & treasured.
Thanks Wendy! read more