Here is the model for the Frio Saloon where Benni goes to pick up her drunk brother-in-law, Wade. Though I call the town Santa Flora, it is actually based on
Santa Margarita and the saloon is called the Pozo Saloon. I've been there a couple of times and it is quite a lovely drive during the day, though very curvy and definitely out in the boonies. They serve some of the best hamburgers in the county at the Pozo Saloon. I recommend them highly! I don't know if it's quite as rowdy at night as I've portrayed the Frio in my books because I only went out there during the day. The inside is as I described it except I did take a few "artistic liberties." There really are "suicide squirrels" that you have to be careful to avoid as they dart across the narrow road to the saloon.
This is a picture of the Amtrak station in San Luis Obispo. In Dove in the Window, it is where Benni goes to pick up her cousin Emory who came out from Sugartree, Arkansas, to finally claim his date with Elvia.
Inside the mission-style building, you feel like you've gone back to the forties.
Here's a picture of
some real SLO county cattle, owned by a friend of
mine, Joy Fitzhugh. I was helping her "bring
the cattle in" here to be vaccinated and branded. Being a
visitor, I was given the easy job of sitting in the
back of a slow moving pick up truck and throwing hay out for them to
follow us back to the ranch.
