California Dreamin'

We had a wonderful time exploring the California coast. We began our journey June 10th in San Francisco and arguably had the best Italian meal of our life at a restaurant in the Mission District that was recommended to us called, Flour + Water. If you ever head there, we highly pass along the recommendation. Andrew had pork belly that he said was out of this world, and I had a pasta dish (of course) with spinach and sausage and a delicious salad to start. We worked off our meal later on those SF hills!

There is no way I would be able to walk those streets in my heels like I do here, it would most definitely turn into a disaster (but a good story I'm sure!). We spent a lot of time walking around and exploring the city.
We headed to Healdsburg next for the wedding festivities, which was about an hour and a half north of SF. It was a very pleasant and easy drive. We imagined if we lived in SF that we would have a 'country house' in Healdsburg for a quick and relaxing weekend getaway. Andrew absolutely loved Healdsburg. It's a very quaint town with a handful of wineries nearby and some very good restaurants. We ate at a place Friday evening called, Zin that was very good. Again, Andrew, had 'one of the best meals ever' which was a rack of lamb with mint chutney and potatoes. He said it was the best combination of food he's ever had. So, 2 days in a row with superb meals is not to bad! The Baskin wedding was a hit on Saturday and the reception was at a beautiful country club, just a perfect California setting. My dress was very comfortable for the most part until I ate the dinner and my stomach grew slightly.

The boning in the dress was digging into my stomach and all I wanted to do was take off the dress! I guess that is why a lot of people buy maternity dresses. Oh well, I can wear the dress again after the baby comes. :) Sunday morning, the 13th we headed back to San Francisco for another night and walked around a bit more. We headed to some landmarks like crooked street and the fisherman's wharf which were cool to see. We woke up early Monday morning to get our rental car and hit the road to Monterey. This was a very long, but pretty drive. The coast is just breathtaking with the ocean to our right as we headed down south on the Pacific Highway. We made a handful of stops to take in the view and to stretch our legs. It was a bit scary at times driving so close to the cliffs but once we got a hang of the twists and turns, it got a bit easier. We switched on and off driving so that both of us could take in the view. You definitely can't fully enjoy the view while you are driving, unfortunately that would probably result in a car accident. We could not believe how many RVs and mobile homes were traveling on Hwy 1 as well. We were thankful we had our little convertible :) After a couple of hours driving, we ended up in Monterey. This town was known for canning sardines back in the 50's and 60's. Our hotel was on "Cannery Row" and we had a partial ocean view from our hotel window which was nice. It was very cool here, and it didn't get to be more than 65 degrees. Needless to say, when we went on our whale watching tour we were thankful we had brought and bought some extra layers to keep us warm. We were out at sea for about 2 and a half hours and it was freezing and very 'bumpy' as the captain referred to the water conditions. I would call it very big swells with a lot of bumps along the way. I felt like I was on a roller coaster and at one point thought I might have to let go of my breakfast over the railing! Thankfully, I held it together but was very excited to reach land again :) We ended up seeing some dolphins (they were too quick for my camera) and 2 whales! We were happy for the experience to see the whales, but agreed that we probably wouldn't do it again. Pebble Beach and Carmel were 2 towns that were close to Monterey. We ended up not going to Pebble Beach because the US Open was going on, so we headed to Carmel instead one evening. We were really glad that we went because it is a very cute, sophisticated beach town. We saw some surfers attack the waves there and grabbed a bite to eat.
On the 16th we headed back on the road to our next destination, Santa Barbara. We drove through Big Sur and saw more beautiful landscape along the way. We stopped for lunch at a place that sat on the side of a mountain and overlooked the ocean. I thoroughly enjoyed my $13 cheeseburger and bathroom break. We stopped at one point and saw hundreds of seals. These specific seals were called Elephant seals and were large and in charge. They were quite amusing to watch, whether they were making their way into the water or flopping their blubbery bodies onto a buddy. This stretch of drive took us about 7 hours to reach Santa Barbara. The drive was so windy that it took about 30 minutes to go just 5 miles. We would NOT want to take on this journey in the dark! Thankfully we reached SB around 5pm, just enough time to take a walk along the beach and grab a bite to eat on State Street. We ate breakfast on the beach the following day before heading to Sonoma for some wine tasting.
The drive to the wineries was beautiful and as we drove further inland the temperature rose about 15 degrees (which made me happy). We started off our wine tasting tour in Solvang and ended w/ our 5th in Los Olivos. Although Andrew did all of the tasting (I had a couple sips of his favorites) we had a wonderful day exploring Sonoma and learning more about wine.
The final leg of our trip was to San Diego. We decided to take the less scenic route this time in fear that we would not return our rental car on time. The drive was still nice and we stopped in Laguna Beach for lunch. We loved the fact that the highways in this part of California near San Diego have 6 lanes (NY/NJ need to catch onto this idea). My good friend from high school, Niki and her husband Joe picked us up after we dropped off our car. They have a nice place in San Diego and were kind enough to let us crash there for a couple of nights. We had a great time catching up since it has been about 5 years since we had seen each other. We had brunch in La Jolla Saturday morning which was really pretty. We noticed there were a lot of people in scuba gear. Apparently there are some great places to scuba dive there (so, keep that in mind if you ever visit). Joe had one of his friends take us to an authentic Mexican 'restaurant' in the 'ghetto' which was interesting to say the least. The food was great, the experience getting there was another story (for another time!) :) Andrew and I both thought the food was amazing, and I would have gone back for seconds if it wasn't closing time.
Overall, the trip was fantastic and we were really glad we took the time to do it. We both agreed that having a little one with us on this trip would not be the way to go, so I guess it was a good thing we did it now!
If you would like to see more pictures of our vacation please click here.