"Well, I'm back."

Eventually it happens.  We return home, we do the laundry.  The house start to run smoothly.  We stop eating cereal and bologna for dinner.  We arrived home Tuesday night, picked up Scout and Biff on Wednesday.  Did groceries and laundry.  And laundry.

 The house smelled like home and it was good and our pillows were comfy.  Thursday we did laundry.  And put away miscellanea.  Today, Friday, was Lydia's eighth birthday.  We had tuna casserole, ice cream cake and the kids played like there's no tomorrow.  Tomorrow they will play like there's no the next day.

We drank wine with friends, laughed and prayed.  Now everything is as it should be.

Thanks for coming along for the ride.  Sharing at the Clan Donaldson.

Day Twenty-three...see you soon

A few details from yesterday's journey through Radiator Springs country will deny any previously published comments about the boringness of the I-5.  Firstly, with every passing hour, the landscape got greener, regardless of elevation.  The valleys were primarily agricultural areas, we passed such produce as unidentified nut trees, acres of tomatoes, olive trees, expansive fields of sunflowers reaching the height of bloom, garlic fields, apricot orchards and hay, tall or laying cut or baled, and some hillside wineries.  

We hit the highest elevation on the I-5 at 4,310 feet.  We passed truckloads of tomatoes.  They just cart them from field to factory in open bin-like trucks. We wondered if they ever got spilled.  Then we got to see several hundred tomatoes on the side of the road and wondered no further.  

Along with the flora and fauna and the temperature, changing at the various latitudes, so does the road kill.  Porcupines, badgers, skunks and other assorted small mammalia litter the by-ways, representing diverse eco systems of the North American west coast.  We were fortunate that no Big Horn Sheep decided to cross the highway in our travels.  

It's 2:49 pm, and we have travelled 400 miles today, with about two hours to go.  Sparky is making great time, motivation is high.  

Day Twenty-two, the big push

We made it across the Oregon border today, wow!  We're staying in a pretty little town called Roseburg that we will not see anything of. Today was eventful, to say the least.  Travelling temperatures averaged 110 degrees all day.  We listened to an audio dramatization of Romeo and Juliet by Jim Weiss that was excellent AND the entire unedited Prince Caspian read by the very talented Lynn Redgrave.

I love Doctor Cornelius.  

During our travels, the boys have been collecting liscence plates from every state to see how many we could collect.  They got every single state (including Alaska and Hawaii, not once, not twice but THREE times, what the heck?) but three:  Arkansas, North Dakota and West Virgina.  I find that remarkable.  

We covered a whopping 489 miles, almost 787 kilometers today, and well, I must say, our kids are rock stars.  Did we have to bait them with burgers and ice creams at crucial points?  Well, we didn't have to.  But they got them anyway.  'Cause Sparky and me are rock stars too.  

But I do need to say this.  There are not many lunch options in Willows, CA.  

Will share some photos tomorrow when I'm not so tired.  

Day Twenty-one, all directions

Ups and downs.  We've traveled a pretty long way today.  Here is a photo of Lydia and I 340 miles ago.  

It has been inland through mountain and flatlands, hitting heights of more than 4000 feet and lows of 52 feet above sea level.  We hit 101 degrees and dove to 93 degrees at one point.  Brrr.

Peaks, valleys and oil rigs. 

Lydia, who is becoming the resident expert on our GPS system in the van, says today, "Dad!  You're off your highlighted route!  But don't worry, it's easy to get back on, just follow the yellow line!"

We are staying in Patterson, CA tonight, a literal middle of nowhere, boring as snot kinda town, the only two businesses that made it into the AAA guide were the Best Western (where we're staying) and the El Rosal Mexican restaurant (steps away from the hotel, where we ate). Nothing particularly noteworthy about the hotel, apart from that it had beds. Dude.  The Mexican restaurant, however, was worth the one minute walk for sure.  Yum.

And the sunset. WOW.  

I apologize for the monosyllabic commentary.  When I get tired my language skills become less descriptive.  

Day Twenty...northward bound

Disneyland is behind us.  I gave two talks at the SCCHE conference today and we are packing up and coming home.  It was great, I met Maureen Whittman and Cathy Duffy.  We trying to get somewhere north of where we are.  And that is all we know. I know you all miss Abel's silliness, so here's something to look forward to.  

Day Sixteen and a few more

You won't be hearing from me too much, 'cause our evenings our mostly all used up with fun here in Disneyland.  Some proof:

Day Fourteen, Hollywood, Day Fifteen, a chance meeting

Yesterday we did a Hollywood/Beverly Hills tours and hit a few highlights of the rich and famous, both living and dead.  A few notable homes and businesses we gawked at were:

Johnny Depp

Nancy Reagan

Katy Perry

Ringo Starr

The Improv

House of Blues

Rosemary Clooney

Lucille Ball

Elvis Presley

Below is a picture of a famous person's home, living or dead, I'm not sure which. 

The Dolby Theatre where the Academy Awards are held.  Meaningless to our children because they've never seen the Academy Awards.  Photo op and the infamous Hollywood hillside sign.

We saw one of the handful of Frank Lloyd Wright homes here in California, the Storer House.

The Graumann Chinese theatre was an interesting place, where there are the hand and foot prints of famous persons.  

The boy's got treated to a Bugatti (a French car designed by an Italian guy) sighting, as well as a Tesla, which is a luxury electric car and very special.  I tried, but I just can't care, but I'll include a photo of said Bugatti here for your edification.

As you can see here, it is very black and very yellow.

Today was a treat!  Friends of our, John and Katherine from Seattle just so happened to be visiting their daughter who lives a half hour or so away from where we're staying and we were planning a down day, so we hung out and had breakfast and hung out some more and talked about important things.  It was  so cool!

Day Thirteen, miles and miles

Leaving Arroyo Grande this morning, we headed off to the Santa Barbara mission 100 miles south.  We are in beautiful wine country again, mountain vineyards everywhere.  The mission was amazing, Santa Barbara is s major holiday area, and the mission is immaculately kept.

We hit the In-N-Out Burger in Santa Barbara (we're hooked, Harrison), and headed south to destination L.A.  Well, Pasadena.  L.A. is too expensive.  

A Day on the Road

A day on the road looks something like this:

I wake up, like clockwork, between 6 and 6:30 every morning feeling well rested.  I do not know why.  I do some writing and checking of emails.  I search out a hot spot to get coffee.  My family wakes up and gets moving usually between about 7:30 and 8 am, showering, packing of bags, pillow fighting, playing sardines, breakfast (we always look for the breakfast included places), and then we move out in one semi-fluid motion to address the day.

We get in the car, find awesome coffee, see spectacular things, visit spectacular places.  We usually stop three or four times to see or do. We pray for our intentions for the day.   We either have lunch in the car or stop somewhere with a picnic table or grass and eat out of doors.  So far on this trip, we have had about two hours of cloudy weather.  That was this morning.

Every three or four days, I make my family eat up all the weird leftovers for dinner, which can include canned mandarin oranges, yogurt, sliced meat, tortillas, grapes, carrots and celery, corn chips, avocado mashed with aiola mayonnaise, sour cream and onion chips, Life cereal and leftover Chinese food heated up on a paper plate.  It's fun!

We roll into our next hotel usually between about 4 and 7 pm,  then we have a long swim.  Ever few days, Albert and I go for a grocery date, where we pick up supplies for the bellies.  Then we watch Chopped or Thor or Castle or Jeopardy for an hour or so and then go to bed.    Albert and I plot out the next day or two's events, have a beer or a glass of wine, write blogs, check emails, distances, book our next night's hotel, read about the towns we'll pass through and the local history here.

We all pass out and sleep like rocks.

Day Twelve, Big Sur

We lounged around Carmel this morning, 'cause it was so darn pretty.  The coastal hightway between Carmel and San Luis Obispo area is considered to be the most fabulous section of the coastal highway.  We were not to be disappointed with Big Sur and the surrounding area.  We stopped a ridiculous number of times on the highway, the views were thrillling.

I'll spare you all the two or three hundred photos I took of pristine, wild, rugged, stunning coastland of bays and headlands and twisted highway, and just share three here.

We stopped along the highway to see the McWay waterfall, fed from and underground spring, so it runs the same all year round.  It falls eighty feet to turquois water.  There is dozens of eucalyptus trees and the warm air was full of the scent of it.  Intoxicating. 

There is a stretch of elephant seals along the coast, lying around, dusting themselves with moist sand to keep cool, and making noisy claims over their particular strip of sand.

We stopped in Morro Bay, yet another little seaside town for ice cream.  There was an interesting volcanic peak in the bay, sticking our from the water, and just a short distance away an impressive nuclear power plant.

Day Eleven, A Small Geographical Area

We did some way fun stuff today.  We went to Vision Quest/Monterey Zoo, a training area for wild animals where you get to see them up close and personal.  Abel felt quite at home.

In N Out Burgers, recommended by our dear friend Deacon Harrison was a fabulous lunch spot.  Squeaky clean burger guys delivering up old fashioned, fast real food.  Three main items on the menu, hamburger, cheeseburger, double cheesburger, along with real potatoes (I saw them being peeled) fried up in baskets in a red and white kitchen.  Cute and yummy.

After an exciting afternoon of seeing real animals and eating some too, we headed down the 17 mile highway that takes you past Pebble Beach and it's famous golf course.  The drive around this peninsula is spectacular.

We wandered about the golf course at Albert's behest.  It was fabulously beautiful, and, more importantly, famous.  Pictured below is Albert in front of the 18th hole.  

After this lovely loop of many vista points, we came out at Carmel, and went to the Mission there, San Carlos Borromeo, where Bl. Junipero Serra is buried.  We attended a 5:30 pm Mass and took in the meticulously cared for mission.  Tonight we are staying in Carmel, and will head through Big Sur and the Mission of San Luis Obispo.  

Day Ten, Somewhere Near Salinas

Well it's time to move on from the architecturally stunning den of iniquity.  Isaac and Albert liked Pier 39, I liked the architecture.  Lydia's favourite part of San Francisco was our hotel room.  We stopped at a couple of different state parks on our way down to Somewhere Near Salinas, beautiful rugged coastline.

Lunched at the Pescadaro State Park where there were some ubercool sand formations, cliffs and wildflowers, mostly hardy looking varieties clinging desperately to the cliffsides.       

                                                                                                                                         

We stopped at Santa Cruz, aka Surf City where there is a boardwalk and a very windy beach, reminiscent of a beachside town with a boardwalk and surfers and sand.  There was a very fun market on the edge of a farming area with fresh fruit, avacadoes for 2$ a bagful.  Some photo ops, too.

                                                                                                                                              

We blew through Castroville, artichoke capital of the world, unfortunately missed the artichoke-fest.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

I guess we're just not lucky.  We stay somewhere near Salinas tonight and tomorrow, we'll slip away somewhere near San Luis Obispo.  That just never gets old for me.  

Day Nine: Much San Francisco

We went to Mass today at the Mission Dolores, at the Church of St. Francis.  It was a beautiful church, and the original mission church beside it was lovely, too.  Apparently it's the oldest building in San Francisco.

We took Dad for fancy coffee and treats at Four Barrels coffee, just near the church in the mission district.

  Not only did we drive down Lombard Street, but we took in a walking tour of Chinatown, with a great guide who share so much historical information about the Chinese immigration to the San Francisco area, and the political scene of the Chinese, immigrants and politics of their mother country.  A really interesting guy.  While in Chinatown, we found out the fortune cookies were actually invented by a Japanese family, right here in San Francisco.  Not that long ago, like in 1962 or something, and we got to tour the teeny factory where they make the cookies. Grandma was folding cookies like nobody's business and putting them into her fortune baker. 

There was a street *here we say SHTREET festival in North Beach, San Francisco's "little Italy," and lunched in a cafe overlooking all the shenanigans and various performing artists, some hired, some volunteers from the relatively wild crowd.

An evening tour took us around downtown and across the spectacular Oakland Bay bridge, a double decker bridge.

I get pretty wiggy about the spectacular architecture here, a few shots...

Day Eight, dis iss SAFRASISCO

We headed into downtown San Francisco this morning and made a day of it here; including but not limited to, Golden Gate Bridge, Haight Ashbury, Fisherman's Wharf, the Saturday market at the Ferry Building where we ate gourmet hot dogs, oxymoronic as that may sound and took in a few buskers.

There are five Landry's in this photo.  Can you spot all of them?

Here's an interesting snippet from a bus tour guide pointing out some people tenting in the park.

  

"They juss let you do anytheen you wahn hee.  Are you kideen? You coot stan nakit on nat shtreet corna.  Dis iss Safrasisco."

Apparently, tour buses carry signs with simplistic grammar to aid the foreign tourists in the acquisition of the English language.  Well, I think we can assume this approach is ineffective, since we've tried it for three or four decades of schoolchildren with less than desirable results.  Let's move on.

We'll stay in San Francisco tonight.

Our room is on the 22nd floor, spectacular views.  Here's the skyline from the pool deck a few floors down.