Archive for the 'wanderlust' Category

Coastal Drives on Thursdays

Published on January 31, 2011 in family ties and wanderlust. 1 Comment

My birthday weekend was a tough one. Lots of work. You’ll hear more about it in a little bit. But my dad and mom both came out for that weekend and it was great seeing them. Then my mom went home, and I brought my dad back to Santa Rosa with me. I took my furlough days Thursday and Friday and that is how he and I ended up going for a coastal drive on Thursday.

First of all, we couldn’t have asked for more beautiful weather… The ocean was PERFECT that day. Warm enough for sweatshirts, sunny, and just a gentle breeze. We took a few stops along the coast to get some prime photos. Somewhere along the way, we stopped at my favorite beach. I don’t know if it has a name, but it is really the only beach between Bodega and Jenner where you don’t have to descend down a big hill to get to the water.

After basking in the sun for a while, we continued our drive down through Tomales Bay and into Point Reyes. We picked up coffee and a snack then headed out to the lighthouse. I forgot how much I like driving for fun. It was great exploring with my dad. On our way out to the lighthouse we encountered some great wildlife…

We even saw a few whales spouting out in the ocean. It was pretty awesome. First time for both of us!

After the walk out to the lighthouse, we thought we would drive down to a beach to catch the sunset. Good lord! We were rushing around. Our first attempt took us to a cove where no sun could be found… and just as we abandoned the idea of catching the sun sinking below the water, the hills dipped and we caught it just in time.

These past few days with my dad have been some of the funnest I can remember. I am glad we had time by ourselves and with Eric, Lisa and Lam. Even Pebbles had a great time with him…

Now we just have to work on getting them to move out here!

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The big finalé

Published on August 12, 2008 in family ties and wanderlust. Closed

It is so sad. We’ve spent months looking forward to the wedding and now all we can do is look back. My parents and grandma leave bright and early tomorrow morning. The last of our aunts and uncles leave later in the morning. And this concludes the perfect wedding week.

My sister’s wedding was incredibly beautiful. I don’t think things could have possibly gone better. I hope that lisa and lam look back on it with great pleasure and happiness. I really glad to have gained such a great brother. I can’t wait to see what the future brings for them.

It was also great to spend time with the family out here. I wasn’t sure that any of my dad’s family would visit us up here.

All in all, it was a great time. And now I am going to go back to watching “it’s always sunny in philadelphia”.

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A Ten Pizza Night.

Published on July 20, 2008 in Country Livin' & City Life, Me and my Winemonkey and wanderlust. Closed

Our parties are always a one bottle of wine per person plus one extra type thing. But this last dinner party was a one pizza per person party! Ten different pizzas, a multitude of toppings…. it was really good. What made it even better was the company. It was the first time I spent time with people Eric knows through work outside of work-related activities. Not the hosts. The hosts and I go way back and I love them. They are a ton of fun!

The hosts had just bought an apartment in the city, right on the corner of Haight and Asbury. An apartment that is in the background of a lot of famous pictures, particularly of the Grateful Dead. (A band that one of the hosts really loves…)

Point of the story: Great night. I wish we could do it more often.

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Van Damme

Published on May 20, 2008 in Country Livin' & City Life, pug-tastic! and wanderlust. Closed

You know, I am not a fan of his movies, but I sure do like his state park….

We went camping Mendocino this past weekend. I had worked enough overtime to take Friday off, thank goodness! It was a zillion degrees here in Northern CA and we (Winemonkey, Pebz, along with Siea and Brown Bear) wanted to escape to the coast! Winemonkey, Pebz and I got there on Friday night and found one of the last few spots in Van Damme State Park. It is one of my favorite places to camp because it is always incredibly lush with ferns, berries, and stinging nettle. Well… the stinging nettle doesn’t make it all that wonderful… The other thing that makes Van Damme such a great place is that it is in a gully, so the walk to the ocean is really really easy. No mountain climbing gear necessary.

Anyway, we took a chance going out on Friday as there were no reservations available online. I typically don’t like making reservations, but I knew with the heat everyone was going to run to the coast. Even there it was abnormally hot, in the 80′s (a far cry from the inland hundreds…). Our spot was really nice, good shading, level, pretty little flowers all around and no stinging nettle. It was nestled right next to a babbling creek. The bathrooms were located right across the street from the site, but it didn’t matter much as the light didn’t both us.

We spent the weekend cooking and relaxing, going to the beach, hanging out at a local bar in Mendocino, where they let my “service dog” in. The weather was perfect the entire time. The food was amazing. Winemonkey and I had our first grilled chicken thighs and grilled zucchini of the season. This is always one of my more favorite grilled dinners. We had tri-tip on Saturday night for dinner along with Siea’s perfect fruit salad and grilled sweet potatoes. I won’t even go into the killer ‘zza apps’ that Siea brought.

All in all, this weekend was beautiful. Even Pebz had a good time.


Click the picture to see the rest of the trip!

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SUNBURNED!

Published on May 12, 2008 in pug-tastic! and wanderlust. Closed

My shins haven’t been this sunburned in a long, long time. But I have to say, the pain, stinging, and trouble walking was well worth the nap we took. We did not end up making the hot dogs wrapped in croissants… we just grilled them. Sie and Brown Bear met us for dinner on Saturday evening. It was a great surprise and inspired us to go camping with them again this weekend. Hopefully I will be able to get Friday off from work so that ew can spend more time out in the wilderness. That would be the best.

But back to this weekend. It was really cold. Hard to believe with the sunburn I am sporting… but because of the wind chill I only have burns on my shins and a patch on my chest. The rest of me was covered for warmth. Sleeping at night was an interesting experience. Pebbles did not have her own sleeping bag so she had to climb into the bottom of mine. Winemonkey and I were both a little nervous about her suffocating down there, but she emerged the next morning like a little ball of sunshine. She had somehow wiggled out of her sweater during the night. The second night we put the rain fly on and it was infinitely times warmer in the tent. Pebs spent the night blanket-free snuggling alternatively with me and Winemonkey.

All in all, Pebs was a great little camper. She is so mellow it is hard to tell if she liked or hated it. But at least she didn’t seem miserable.

If you want to see pictures from the weekend, click here.

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Camping!

Published on May 9, 2008 in wanderlust. Closed

This weekend is Pebbles first camping trip. I am pretty excited to get away. We are going to try a couple of ideas from the ljc. This includes the hot dogs and croissants on a stick and the mini snickers in marshmallows.

Just thinking about it makes me want to bolt out of this office and get on the road!

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