Davis Family Adventure: The Conclusion

My parents left very early yesterday morning for their flight back to Indiana. Whew! (That's for my father, who told me I was free to blog about how "relieved" we were that they were gone.)

But seriously - whew! We did a ton with them during their two weeks home. Yesterday was spent in recovery: both Peter and I were power nappers, and Kevin pulled out the Battlestar Galactica, a sure sign that nothing of consequence will be accomplished on a well-deserved lazy Saturday.

It was nice they could spend so much time here, because they were able to see just how much Peter changes daily. And, in a few weeks, they'll get to see him again as we visit Indiana.

Until then, some memories of the last week of their trip:

Mission San Juan Bautista
The largest of California's 21 missions, and site of Hitchcock's Vertigo. It was pretty cool, if only for the crazy statue of John the Baptist outside.

Peter's Opinion: Nice, because it was mostly inside or in the shade. Plus, it was only a short car ride - always a plus! Thee out of four Pampers.

Locusts and wild honey, indeed! SJB's looking a little too much like a Calvin Klein model here.

Old Town Sacramento
It looks old, but it's full of all kinds of modern treats, like taffy and ice cream. As Kevin said, "I didn't expect it to be full of stores, but they're the kind of stores I like - candy stores and joke shops."

Peter's Opinion: Kind of a far drive, and a little sunny for me to enjoy it fully. Plus. there were too many loud trains. (This is true: the loudest Kevin and I have ever heard Peter cry, aside from those times when he received a shot, was when a train chugged past us and unexpectedly blew its whistle. It was pretty heartbreaking how upset the little dude was.) Two out of four Pampers.

The Uncle Sam Handshake Rater told me that I'm an "expert on everything." Damn straight.

Taffy, taffy everywhere...but it's all dolphin free (??).

Jelly Belly Factory
So, yeah, we've been here before, but it was on the way, the baby needed a diaper change, my father wanted to collect the "elongated coin" found inside, and Kevin and I knew that it serves Blue Bunny ice cream. And we love that Blue Bunny ice cream! This is how we came to enjoy ice cream before 11 a.m.
Peter's Opinion: Love those bathrooms! Four out of four Pampers.

For the record: Birthday cake and cotton candy ice cream goes down really easy at 10:37 a.m.
Also note: Kevin's watch is 5 minutes fast.

Egyptian Museum
Pretty interesting, even if we all were exhausted! Peter's Opinion: I was very, very quiet. Three out of four Pampers.

A probabilist's work is never done.

Mission San Juan Bautista

Jelly Belly Factory

Old Town Sacramento

Egyptian Museum

adventures

The Davis Family Adventure continues, with trips to:

Big Sur

Big Sur

11 photos

Monterey Bay Aquarium

Monterey Bay Aquarium

22 photos

Alcatraz Island

Alcatraz

26 photos

Stanford

Stanford

12 photos

My sister left this morning, but my parents will remain for another week. The non-stop momentum of their visit will wane now that my sister is gone, which is a bit of a relief since it's exhausting to be on vacation with a newborn. (Especially since Kevin's needed to work most of the past week.)

tall trees and a tiny baby

The Davis Family Adventure began in earnest today, as we trekked across the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods National Monument and Stinson Beach.

We saw some tall trees, some beautiful beaches, and dressed our baby in a truly ridiculous manner.

My mother patiently waits for us.

Did you know Peter is half reptile?

Kimberly and me.

Kevin and I decided that we'll never, ever, ever, ever try to go north of San Francisco on a summer weekend, even if there were a free festival of all-you-can-eat ice cream and cotton candy and popcorn and a dance party featuring all of our favorite bands and professional athletes. The drive is..."needlessly painful" is perhaps the most charitable way I can describe it.

Davis Family Adventure

29 photos | Edit

spoilage

Since Peter's grandparents and aunt have arrived, he's enjoyed even more than usual time-in-arms. Which makes time-in-carseat that much more unbearable, and this is unfortunate, since we would like to do more than sit around the condo staring at the baby.

Gram and Pop and Peter.

A painful drive home from San Francisco.

El Corte de Madera Creek OSP, redux

Editor's note: Kevin has pointed out that I'm supposed to be the optimistic one in this relationship, but this post was surprisingly negative. So, to clarify: when I say "diminished our ability to enjoy this hike," I mean "reduced" or "lessened," and not "eliminated" or "removed all enjoyment from." The fact is, though, it was buggier and hotter than when we first visited, suggesting that it's more of an early-spring park than an early-summer park.

Peter and I investigate some redwood stumps.

We revisited ECdMC this weekend, after realizing that the drive to our first choice (Purisima Creek Redwoods OSP) was a bit long and winding for some stomachs to handle. (Plus, we'd thought about a seven-mile hike, which would have been really interesting. And not in a good way.)

You may remember the crazy family, and the tafoni sandstone formation, from previous posts.

We chose this alternate trip after remembering the trail as easy, although as we started Kevin had a change of heart:

Kevin: I thought you had trouble on this trail. Toward the end you were struggling.
Amy: Kevin. (Pause.) I was seven months pregnant. And having contractions.
Kevin: Oh, yeah.

The hike was nice, but two things diminished our ability to enjoy it:
- the hot weather;
- the bugs, including, but not limited to, mosquitoes.

Really, if this is what a Bay Area summer is like, why not move back to NC? Oh, yeah...the humidity.

El Corte de Madera Creek OSP

17 photos

Monte Bello Open Space Preserve

It's like the Bjorn was made for mountain lion attacks!

We returned to the trekking life today, after our recent success with the Bjorn. Our destination? Monte Bello Open Space Preserve, chosen because of its proximity and its promise of some shade.

Well, we could have used more shade, and it is close - though, it requires driving on a queasily-curvy road to get there.

But, a hike we did take! It was a relatively easy 3-mile loop, with just a few hundred feet of elevation gain, but probably exactly what we needed. Let's just say that Peter might be the most in shape of all of us.

In a patch of shade, and very happy to be outside again.

Monte Bello Open Space Preserve

16 photos

Half Moon Bay

Yesterday, we took my mother and our baby to Half Moon Bay.

Fish was eaten by some; fun was had by all.

Half Moon Bay

Big Sur

Although it's a few weeks early, KJ and I celebrated our third anniversary by taking a trip to Big Sur. We'd been to the area during our trip to California in 2005, but we were excited to return.

See how excited we are to be in Big Sur!

We were excited. Then we started our trip, which was pockmarked with luck both very very good and very very bad.

Bad Luck #1: Destruction of Jetta on CA-85
Not 15 miles from home, we ran over some road debris on one of my least favorite highways. I wasn't exactly paying attention, but Kevin seems to think it was a "clay pot" or "some glass;" it apparently was about the size of a rugby ball, though, and it crashed underneath the car with a mighty boom.

We were able to pull off the road at the next exit with a sickening grinding sensation under the floorboards. When we pulled into a neighborhood to check out the damage, we saw a random piece of plastic hanging down, dragging along the ground. Groovy!

Bad Luck #2: Attempt to Discern Amount of Destruction to Jetta
We'd actually pulled off the highway at the perfect time; any later and we'd been in a much more rural area. As it was, we were in a fairly industrial area populated by many, many, many mechanics.

Alas, it was Sunday.

And so I don't exaggerate when I say that we drove past over a dozen car repair shops - not to mention service stations - before we'd given up hope of finding something by pure luck. But perhaps luck was on our side, since on the corner where Kevin had decided to turn around stood a Shell station with open garage doors. Hallelujah! And while they weren't open, some suggestive pregnant-belly petting and pathetic looks from yours truly garnered us some time with a mechanic, who informed us:
(1) we have an oil leak (which we knew about);
(2) we were OK to drive.

Snap! Back on the road.

Good Luck #1: Free bassinet
Just moments after we'd received the good news, and as we were looking for the highway on-ramp, we received a call from friends offering us their not-really-ever-used bassinet. Excellent! Perhaps we can free up an extra six inches or so in the bedroom.

I think they might have been a little shocked by our willingness to take it off their hands, though.

Joe: You can take a look at the pictures and see if you like it; it might not be your style.
Kevin: I can't imagine what it would have to look like for us not to want it.

Bad Luck #3: A chilling realization...
We'd assembled our new mansion-tent and had started filling it with the dozens of pillows I'd brought when I realized I had forgotten to pack the sleeping bags.

Kevin's smiling on the outside, but shivering on the inside

Good Luck #2: We have a down blanket in the car
For emergencies. Like early-morning basketball ticket distributions.

Good Luck #3: The restaurant in the park where we're camping sells Blue Bunny ice cream - cotton candy flavored, to boot!

Bad Luck #4: When we go to get ice cream, after waiting so patiently, the store is closed due to "lack of staff."
Amy, defeated: I'm not sure what lesson I'm supposed to learn from this.

From here, though, it was smooth sailing. We saw tons of wildlife: turkeys, harbor seals, sea otters, lots of tidepool creatures, and many birds that we can never identify.

McWay Waterfall at Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park

Hauled-out seals at Point Lobos State Preserve


Sea bird eating a starfish at Point Lobos State Preserve

Tidepools at Asilomar State Beach

Pacific coastline at Asilomar State Beach

Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park

Point Lobos State Preserve

Asilomar State Beach

Point Reyes National Seashore

Kevin and I avoided the weekend crowds (and managed to get some unseasonably clear weather) by heading to Point Reyes National Seashore Thursday and Friday nights.

Perhaps most interesting about this trip was how delightful our weather was - for the "foggiest and windiest place on the Pacific Ocean," Point Reyes was clear and sunny all day Thursday and Friday. Only Saturday did we get a taste of the fog and wind, which promptly sent us running home.

We'd ostensibly gone to the park to do some whale watching, but it turns out that neither of us have the attention span required to spot a whale in the vast ocean. Whales were there, to be sure - before we'd arrived at the spotting station, they'd seen several dozen - but our capacity to stare at the vast blue expanse was not.

Kevin attempts to spot a gray whale

(This sets me straight on something I'd been wondering, which is whether I'd dig bird watching. As I suspected, I don't have the patience. I like looking at birds, but only when they're right in front of me.)

We did see a ton of wildlife, including:

White deer. Are these just albino deer? It's not clear, but it seems obvious why they would need protection.
Elk. There was an elk ahead of us on our trail Friday morning, which was pretty cool. Saturday morning, we were awoken by several elk making a noise that sounded a lot like some punk teenagers making "spooky ghost noises."
Seals. I'm pretty sure they're harbor seals, all hauled out in this cove.
Elephant seals. (Kevin: After Ano Nuevo, I don't need to go take a look.) We saw them from a few hundred feet away, which was good enough for us.

Jellyfish, starfish, and sea anemones. We hit a tidepool, about an hour too late.
Sea lions. Again, they were all hauled out.
Quail. Did you know that quail sound like they're laughing at you?

Brownish banana slugs. I couldn't resist poking them.
Also: Tons of water fowl, tons of birds of prey, some jack rabbits, and some horses.

Friday night at the campsite, we heard what later were identified as raccoons. Apparently there's a massive problem with aggressive raccoons at our camp, and we were given permission to throw pebbles at them, should they appear. Alas, we didn't see any.

I also should add that our tent is broken. Someone had a problem with his zipper at Crater Lake, and it was only exacerbated by this trip, to the extent that his door could not close. I was convinced that one of these aggressive raccoons would enter the tent in the middle of the night. Could you imagine anything more horrific? I could seriously handle many other creatures - spiders, insects, even birds or field mice. But a raccoon? Yikes!

Technically, this was a backpacking trip, but really we just had a 3-mile hike-in to our campsite. BDR and I were fine on the backpacking portion of the hikes, and during the other 10 miles we logged, but the same could not be said for our sleeping experience. Next weekend's trip to the Redwoods will come with many, many more pillows.

Point Reyes National Seashore

78 photos