Vacation Travels

I just came back from a vacation trip to California last week. It was a nice break from the snowy and cold weather of the East coast, although I did see a lot of snow from the plane, as we travelled to the West coast. The views of all the mountain ranges were quite spectacular!

We landed at the San Francisco airport in the midst of a rainy day. California has been having an unusually wet season, with flooding in various parts of the state. It was also a bad year for fires! Fortunately, most of the trip was dry and relatively warm.

We did the touristy things that tourists do---wine tasting in Sonoma, driving down Lombard Street, eating at the piers, checking out the seal lions, and visiting Monterey and Pebble Beach.

We enjoyed a visit to Cline Vineyards, where we saw a large flock of sheep cleaning up the weeds around the grapevines. After a delicious tasting of a wide variety of wines, we ended up buying four bottles each. That led to a mad scramble to figure out how to get the wines home safely. After buying bubble wrap sleeves for each bottle, they travelled back home without incident in our slightly heavier suitcases.

The seal lions were hanging out in their usual spot at Pier 39 in San Francisco. Lots of barking and flopping around as they interacted with each other in the usual manner of their community.

  Cool juxtaposition of old and new architecture, taken from a window in the SF Museum of Modern Art.

A creepy sculpture of giant spiders

Had to stop at Ghirardelli Chocolate Shop.

Calla Lilies in Monterey

 Plenty of scuba divers in Monterey Bay

Gulls hanging out, with the famous PebbleBeach Golf Course in the distance

The iconic "Lone Cypress"

Another California Gull posing for the camera

These are some of the highlights of my trip. Won't include any photos of relentless traffic that one encounters everywhere. Getting in and out of SF is often a slow ride. I took the commuter train one day, and even though they pack you in like sardines, it was still better than getting stuck in traffic.

I love to travel, but am always happy to be home again!

California Travels

While I was away from home, and not posting on my blog, I was traveling around parts of California with eight of my college friends. We've known each other at least 35 years, and we began holding summer reunions four years ago. Thanks to Facebook, we resumed our friendships. Now that the youngest of our children are 18 years old, we planned a big trip to California, to meet up with the two who have settled there. Two of us still live in New England, the others are in Maryland, Virginia, and Connecticut. The landscapes and the temperatures in the areas we visited are quite varied, and I'll share some of the pictures from my trip.

 Brunch in Santa Barbara

                                           The Art Fair along the beach in Santa Barbara

 Pacific Coast Highway

Elephant Seals

 Stopped for pie at Linn's in Cambria

 San Francisco Trolley Cars

 They say this is the pub where the first Irish Coffee originated. Good place to warm up as it was very cool and windy in the city

 The Golden Gate Bridge

 The "Painted Ladies" (fans of the Full House television show will recognize these)

 The view of San Francisco from Sausalito

 Muir Woods National Park featuring the giant Redwood trees

 Taking a break on the trail

 Napa Valley

 Rutherford Hills Winery   Beautiful flowers everywhere!

 Wine casks in Castello di Amorosa (nice and cool down there as it was a warm day outside)

 Lake Tahoe beach

 Heading down in the tram at Squaw Mountain

 View from the tram of windswept rock

Emerald Bay in South Tahoe


Now that I'm home again, I need to get back to creating some new artworks. I think my California vacation will be the inspiration for my next block print. Choosing from so many great images will be the biggest difficulty.