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We did an overnight stay in Solvang, the famous Danish town in America, earlier this week. It's our first Solvang visit for this year.

Ever since we moved to San Luis Obispo (SLO) County, we've visited Solvang at least twice a year. It's less than an hour drive from our house as we live on the southern part of SLO County. What I've noticed from years of visiting here is there's always a crowd during the day and then the evenings are very quiet in the entire Solvang Village area.

Here's a picture that I took in the evening below. We were the only ones walking for blocks. I really appreciated the quieter walk so that I could get a better look of all the Danish buildings.

Hotel Corque

For this trip, we decided to stay at Hotel Corque. It had the best reviews and ratings online and since we were staying on a Tuesday night, the hotel rate was significantly cheaper than the other days of the week, even in July! They have a nice pool with a few cabanas you can use. Towels were provided by the pool and parking was free for hotel guests. Here are some pictures that I took of Hotel Corque during our trip.

Many tourists and visitors stop in Solvang for brunch and then continue their exploration throughout Santa Barbara County. Solvang, CA is part of Santa Barbara County so you'll notice a lot of cars driving in and around the streets during the way from visitors coming to visit all over Santa Barbara area. 

As I noted before, there were less people in the evening and at night I really enjoyed seeing the lights on the trees in the middle of July in Solvang (see picture below).

There is a lot of bakeries and brunch places in Solvang. You can choose from so many delicious places to eat during the day. See a list of places with brunch in Solvang that I've personally visited via another Solvang family-friendly blog entry. However, there's a significantly less amount of places that are open for dinner, especially on a Monday and Tuesday night so you'll have to do some research on where to eat for dinner if that is your plan.

Vaquero Bar

We kind of winged it for dinner and ended up walking a few blocks before we found a place that was open past 8PM. It was a bar named Vaquero Bar. The food was very good. My husband ordered the Roast Beef Sandwich (left picture below) and I ordered the Ricotta Cavatelli (right picture below). They were really pricey but the taste was great and we really didn't have a lot of options. I was just happy we've found a place that's open late on a Tuesday night. Don't let the bar name defer you. There were other tables with kids like us that night and it was not a rowdy crowd when we came. The kids shared a plate of fries and it was the only thing they would eat. My kids' palates are not adventurous yet. 


Read about our older Solvang visit in the middle of February.

Some of my most favorite gifts from my husband are experiences, like a local hotel stay in a nice boutique hotel or a nice stress-free cruise. Read more blog entries to read about my local adventures.