Fun Fall Itinerary

Of course, kukku­la is the most impor­tant stop, so I’ll start with that, includ­ing direc­tions from var­i­ous points.

If you’re in Paso, dri­ve 13 miles west on 24^th Street, which will become Nacimien­to Lake Road, then becomes Chim­ney Rock. Do NOT turn toward Nacimien­to Lake at the turnoff. Five miles from the Naci turnoff, turn left into the dri­ve­way at kukku­la.

If you are on the 101 head­ing south (com­ing from Salinas/​Bay Area), turn right on San Mar­cos Road (about a mile south of San Miguel), Fol­low San Mar­cos until the T at Nacimien­to Lake Road, and turn right. Con­tin­ue straight (approx­i­mate­ly 6 miles) to kukku­la, turn left into the driveway.

If you are com­ing from the south: Exit the North­bound 101 at Vine­yard Dri­ve, turn left. Con­tin­ue on Vine­yard tak­ing the sec­ond exit at the round­about (going straight). Fol­low Vine­yard 9 miles until it ends in a T at Ade­lai­da. Turn left at Ade­lai­da. Fol­low Ade­lai­da until it ends at Chim­ney Rock and turn right. The dri­ve­way is ³⁄₄ mile on your right. Alter­na­tive­ly, if you or some­one else in your car gets car sick, take the 101 into Paso and get off at 24^th St./46 East exit and turn left. Then fol­low the instruc­tions for com­ing from Paso. In the Jus­si­la house­hold we refer to this as ​“the less gag­gy route.”

kukku­la

Kukku­la was a wal­nut orchard before we pur­chased the prop­er­ty in 2004, and we still have many acres of wal­nuts. Although we don’t har­vest them, our 100 year old dry-farmed trees are still pro­duc­ing and you are wel­come to pick up and take a bag or three home with you. Check in at the tast­ing room for where to pick, and a bag if you haven’t brought your own. Wal­nut sea­son varies from year to year, but you can usu­al­ly count on Octo­ber and Novem­ber and some­times Sep­tem­ber and Decem­ber as well. If it has recent­ly rained, the fall­en nuts get water­logged and the clay soil will adhere to, and ruin your shoes, so no har­vest­ing after rain storms.

9535 Chim­ney Rock Rd.

Paso Rob­les, CA 93446

805−227−0111

kukku​law​ine​.com

Reg­u­lar tast­ing room hours: 10 – 4 Thursday-Monday

Deep Dive ​“reserve” tast­ings avail­able dai­ly (must be reserved in advance)

Pic­nic tables can also be reserved in advance

Gate clos­es at 4:00

Rocky’s Favorite Walk

If you’d like to check out Rocky’s Favorite Walk (ours too) direc­tions are below. This is all on paved roads, but with few if any cars, and much of it is shad­ed. It can still get pret­ty hot, so I would rec­om­mend doing this walk ear­ly or late in the day if it’s a warm day. We park on the road or just off of it on a dirt shoul­der. If you are walk­ing with a dog, I sug­gest keep­ing your dog on a leash, as there are many crit­ter dis­trac­tions in the area, not to men­tion poi­son oak. 

• Make a left out of the dri­ve­way onto Chim­ney Rock Rd.
• Con­tin­ue on Chim­ney Rock for approx­i­mate­ly 3.8 miles, turn left onto Cypress Moun­tain Dr.
• Fol­low Cypress Moun­tain approx­i­mate­ly a mile and look for a good place to to park on the shoulder.
• and con­tin­ue walk­ing along the road. Much of the road will be along Tablas Creek. When you’ve gone half as far as you’d like, turn around.

When you return to your car, you may:

• Con­tin­ue on Cypress Moun­tain approx­i­mate­ly 2.3 miles at which point it will turn into Klau Mine Road (tech­ni­cal­ly you are turn­ing left onto Klau Mine here, but real­ly you’re just going straight). 
• Con­tin­ue anoth­er 2.2 miles on Klau Mine until you reach Ade­lai­da Rd. (4.5 miles total)

Chese­brough Farm

Call me jad­ed, but I can’t stand places that truck in a bunch of pump­kins, arrange them in a field, and call it a ​“pump­kin patch”. Chese­brough Farm is the real deal! They grow and har­vest a breath­tak­ing vari­ety of squash and gourds and have them beau­ti­ful­ly dis­played at their farm­stand in Tem­ple­ton, They are only open dur­ing the month of Octo­ber, and not to be missed if you are vis­it­ing then.

Chese­brough Farm

790 Moss Lane

Tem­ple­ton, CA 93465

(661)510‑3165

Open 10 – 6 every day in October

Cam­bria Scare­crow Festival

The town of Cam­bria is a great place to vis­it in the Fall months, espe­cial­ly because of the annu­al scare­crow fes­ti­val. You will enjoy see­ing scare­crows singing, ped­al­ing, danc­ing, swash­buck­ling, and fly­ing through­out Cam­bria and San Sime­on. Cre­ators of these whim­si­cal char­ac­ters include local artists, busi­ness own­ers, stu­dents, and vol­un­teers who don’t think they’re artists but real­ly are. Head to Cam­bria to enjoy the show along the streets of the upper and low­er Main Street busi­ness dis­trict — offi­cial­ly dur­ing the month of Octo­ber, but you’ll see some in late Sep­tem­ber and into Novem­ber as well. For more infor­ma­tion check out cam​bri​as​care​crows​.com.

Tem­ple­ton Farmer’s Market

If you are vis­it­ing on a Sat­ur­day at any time of year, check out the Farmer’s Mar­ket in Tem­ple­ton on Sat­ur­day morn­ings. It’s not as big as the Thurs­day evening Farmer’s Mar­ket in SLO, but has a great home­town vibe and the sec­ond most ven­dors of all the Cen­tral Coast Farmer’s Mar­kets. It is locat­ed in the park in the mid­dle of town bor­dered by 5^th Street, 6^th Street, Crock­er and Old Coun­ty Road.

If you’re look­ing for a great break­fast near­by, check out kitch­enette or Joe’s—both locat­ed on Main Street and with­in walk­ing dis­tance of the Farmer’s Market.