Strawberry Fields Forever

Posted on September 8, 2013 by Amelia M.

[Day 2: The Day that starts with Strawberry Fields and ends with a Failed Quest for Mustard]

The day starts with all of us in an unintentional braiding chain (everything from french to fishtail) to combat convertible wind effects. We then discover that the reason it felt like we drove to the middle of nowhere is because the road to our beach house is in fact surrounded by strawberry fields. Rows and rows of red little strawberries peeking out of the green, stretching out into the horizon. They greet us every time we go in and out of Watsonville.

We start the morning at this breakfast place called Gayle’s Bakery in Capitola. There we are treated to a cashier who shares her life experience from New York, the best organized breakfast rush I’ve ever seen, a giant bedazzled statue of a raspberry tart adorning the top of the fire place, and some really yummy food.

Modest appearance, but excellent taste. And, yeah, when I’m on vacation I spring for the Pelligrino.

From there we take in the beach. My friends explore the colored condos further up while I hang back and sketch the scenery a little.

The beach was foggy, but it was a nice way to start the day. This, of course, is not the sketch, but the subject there of.

I loved this lone, little, purple flower.

After that it’s on to our next stop: the Santa Cruz boardwalk.

The fog cleared up and we had a beautiful day in Santa Cruz.

We definitely had fun taking in the board walk and all the rides it had to offer. My favorite ride was probably the roller coaster (so. much. fun.). Somehow my friends also got me on the sky glider ride (I am not really a fan of heights at all and for some reason these little sky rides scare me more than any roller coaster could, haha).

We also decided to swim even though the water was juuust a little bit chilly.

After the boardwalk we went to one of my favorite beaches on the trip – Shark Tooth Beach in Davenport.

This beach was a little hidden. You had to pull over on the side of the road, walk down a hill, and then climb down a rocky path to the beach (quite the feat when you are wearing flimsy little beach shoes).

We explored a little cave on the side of the beach.

We grabbed a bite at the Surfrider Cafe (which had amazing garlic-parm fries that I intend to replicate), and then headed over to the Mystery Spot (Just watch if you haven’t heard of this place, now you’ll see their bumper stickers evvverywhere).

The Mystery Spot is a “gravitational anomaly” in the redwoods. They have a little house where things roll backwards and everyone feels like they are leaning when they should be standing up. There are potentially many things to blame for this: holes in the ozone layer, mysterious fault lines, etc. But I really think it’s best to go with aliens. It was a fun (if dizzy) little detour on our beach tours.

The tilt of the place made walking around interesting… haha. It also made sliding down the rail fun.

We ended the day at the Natural Bridges state park. I wish I could end every day with a view like this.

Courtney Imagining.

Afterwards we loaded up on groceries for our picnic plans the next day. But we were so tired we really were little zombie shoppers (leading us to forget the mustard, which somehow became the most important and talked about ingredient of them all – until you know, we went to the store the next day, and got some mustard).

I promise the final post is coming soon: Day 3: [The Day where we Drive, Drive, Drive]

Currently: watching Portlandia and making Kale chips (I still need to perfect this a little).

Winging Our Way to the Coast

Posted on September 2, 2013 by Amelia M.

[Day 1: The Day where we make our way to the California Coast]

[Better known as The Day we became Four Gurrrrls One Convertible]

Our California adventure starts in the unlikeliest of places: Provo, Utah. We are sitting in the tiny airport waiting area. There is no McDonalds, no news shop full of overpriced magazines and beef jerky, no security line snaking around the corner, stretching into oblivion. There is the most relaxed version of TSA I’ve ever seen, a person who walks you through every step of the automated parking payment machine, and paperback novels [including Goosebumps] for $5 each.

I accidentally paid for seat selection on the way there so I had the very front seat with all the leg room on the way there.

The plane on the runway. Not pictured: I ended up in the front row (the Allegiant version of first class) with alll the leg room and sat across from the classiest woman I have ever beheld. She actually fluffed her hair with an air of dignity and sophistication [Note to self: Master this].

We don’t bring big bags [That costs extra], sit together [That’s extra too], or nibble at complimentary airline pretzels and soft drinks [Take out the complimentary part], but before we know it we find ourselves landing in the Oakland airport.

Our ride for the rest of vacation! We attempted to name her Beep-y, which ended up Bebe, which ended with us actually not being cute at all and just calling it “the car” most of the trip.

So of course we hop into our rental car and speed into the sunset. Or rather we would have. Had we been able to get the top down without pushing every button four times and figure out the mysterious beep that kept going off every 30 seconds, without holding up the entire rental line and backing the car back up to the booth. But the booth holds a convertible guru who in addition to curing our rental car woes warns us that the nearby food smell is actually a well designed trap we should never follow and recommends a dinner place in Japan Town instead.

Courtney steers us beneath bridges and over the San Fran hills directly to Pier 39. While my friends are mostly fixated on the “Rock” of Alcatraz looming in the background…

Courtney looking out at Alacatraz

I can’t help but focus a little closer to shore on the cute [Debatable I realize] sight in front of us: the sea lions. Somehow they bobbed and barked their way right into my heart.

Just chillin on the pier.

Sun bathing.

Sea Lions… In Love?

Ok, I did get some pictures of some things non-sea lion. This gives the illusion that we were able to master the wind blown hair effect <Cue long laugh>.

Out of all the San Francisco food options we ended up eating... French Crepes? Haha we we're going to do seafood, but were on a timeline and the crepe place seemed faster and equally yummy.

The Pier! Ideal for picking up drive worthy knock off sunglasses and French crepes. Yeah, somehow we ended up eating that, haha. There was seafood consumption later. I promise!

We wander around the pier, grab a bite to eat, and then set sail around the bay.

It was a great ride, but it did get a little choppy around the bridge. I was definitely glad I had a jacket for this part of the trip. The Texas part of me always rebels against the idea of toting around outwear in August, so I almost didn’t bring anything warm.

The boat! We did the Blue and Gold Fleet Bay Adventure. It was easy to get tickets and they got you a pretty good view of everything. If you want to actually go on an Alcatraz tour you have to book a few weeks out and we didn’t think far enough ahead.

All of these wind surfers (What do you call this?) were zooming around beside us.

All of these wind surfers [Is that what you call them?] were zooming around beside us. This seems like a hobby that would not end well for me. I seriously don’t know how someone didn’t smack right into the side of the boat; all they needed was one well placed gust of wind.

Somewhere between the dramatic opening music and the third translation of the tour’s intro speech we realized the recording is too garbled and lost under the sound of the water and wind, so we find other ways to entertain ourselves. Mainly this includes attempting to master the elusive art of a boat with famous landmark in the background selfie and pantomiming an overly dramatic silent movie for Emily to film on her Brownie video camera.

Livin’ the boat life.

The movie may have gone better had I realize I’d been cast as the escaped Alcatraz convict/villian on the hunt and not scared tourist girl #3 as I’d originally thought [I kept wondering why my “scared” faces weren’t satisfactory].

Alcatraz! Er, um, I mean my view after escaping.

Some close ups of the “Rock”

After the boat docks, we stroll through the Palace of Fine Arts, croon “What ever happened to predictability, the milk man, the paper boy, eeeevening TV,” in front of the painted ladies, gaze longingly at the Bi-Rite Creamery…

The Palace of Fine Arts.. also one of the rare examples of the miracle that is free parking in San Francisco.

The Palace of Fine Arts… One of the rare examples of the miracle that is free parking in San Francisco.

Always look up!

The Full House House [Or something that closely resembles it at least].

Then it’s Goodbye San Francisco, Hello… Watsonville?

Yes, Watsonville.

It’s a little bit of a drive from the city, but Watsonville was our beach home for the next two days. By this point it’s pitch dark, so in true millennial fashion we utilize this long drive time by taking to the interwebs to document the sites so far [I fully admit to excessive Twitter and Vine activity]. We even go as far as designating a trip hashtag. My suggestion of #4girls1convertible with the optional spelling of girls as gurls or gurrrrrls to make it a little more Internet friendly and all over hilarious was rejected in favor of #CAbyconvertible.

By the time we make it to the beach house [Which seems to be in the middle of nowhere] we are that special kind of cramped legs, icky hair, road trip tired, but that doesn’t stop us from running out full speed to the edge of the ocean.

A glimpse of our beach during the day. Imagine us running like madmen out to the ocean.

A glimpse of our beach condo during the day. The front side of the building has walkways criss-crossing over dunes in between the buildings.

Our beach condo. The front side of the building has walkways criss-crossing over dunes in between the buildings.

Misty dunes

Even though it’s the middle of the night and the water is freezing we can’t resist dipping our toes in. We fall asleep sandy and happy with the Pacific humming in our ears.

Stay tuned for Day 2: [The Day that starts with Strawberry Fields and ends with a Failed Quest for Mustard]

Currently: Missing the family already [The visits are never long enough!] and happy I finally saw Austenland this week after missing it at Sundance.

Please note: If you have been over saturated with tales of people’s vacations check back next week. I’ll be done with my trilogy [Yes I’m doing a three part vacation post. Get over it.] and back to normal blog life.

More Summer Please

Posted on August 18, 2013 by Amelia M.

So much summer, so little time. In the last two weeks or so every time my friends and I try to swim the storm clouds roll in or some other anti-swim disaster strikes. But, honestly, those have just been tiny bumps in the road. I’m really just sad to see the signs that summer will be gone soon (It’s probably my favorite season). There’s something wonderful about the summer life.Good thing I’m ending on a high with a little getaway with my friends soon.

In the meantime, here are some of the reasons I’ll miss summer:

Baseball Games

Don’t laugh. Yes, I’m not the sportiest girl around, but there’s something so pleasant about watching a game with blue skies overhead and a hot dog in your hand. Just don’t make me tell you what’s going on.

I went to a Bees game with my ward and had a great time. We all sat on the grassy open section. This picnic blanket really is getting a lot of use this summer.

Frozen Treats

Summer foods are the best! In addition to ice cream, sorbet, popsicles, and the like, I love grabbing a cool drink. Whether it’s a McDonalds diet coke (the best deal around) or a Sonic Cherry Limeade Slush a good drink can make a summer evening just right.

Um, who could resist a sprinkle edged delight like this? Thanks Meg!

Have we talked about this Lick’d popsicle yet? The flavor is Avocado Pistachio! Not something I’d do everytime, but it was a summer adventure I truly enjoyed.

Visits from Friends

I love it when I get to benefit from other people’s summer vacations :D My friend Kimberly came into town this year and it was great to see her and her girls!

A police officer came by our picnic table and gave us a ton of temporary tattoos with the SLPD logo so we “deputized” the kids (and ourselves) haha.

I’m a sneaky photographer, hehe. I took them to liberty park, which was really fun EXCEPT for a crazy concert going on (definitely not aimed at children).

Farmers Market

The Farmers market is a summer must! Yummy food, great produce, and interesting craft booths. Always a good time!

These raspberries were crazy good. You can’t tell from this picture, but some of them are even purple.

Outdoor Movies

Salt Lake has these in ample supply. Most recently I caught American Graffiti at Big Cottonwood Park. I really, really, really loved the film noir series at the Gallivan. They also show movies at Capitol Hill and in Park City. One of the most unique outdoor movie experiences I had this summer was getting to watch Sandlot at the actual Sandlot. The movie was filmed in Salt Lake and for the 20th anniversary they showed the film and brought in the director and a lot of the cast.

The Sandlot!

There were a lot of people there! The autograph line was so long the cast was signing things all the way through the movie and they still didn’t finish! They seemed really grateful and down to earth though (from the Q&A portion; I chose not to wait in that crazy line!).

The Cast! It was fun to hear their memories. They let the audience ask questions and a surprising amount were about Wendy Peffercorn, haha.

Wedding Bells

A summer wedding is pretty much guaranteed and I couldn’t resist the opportunity to post something about my good friend Teal’s wedding. This girl has been a great friend to me since the day I was born and she had a beautiful wedding (Such a happy, crazy in love couple!).

The beautiful couple, flower bouquet, and Karen and Meg!

The beautiful couple, one of the bouquets, and Karen & Meg!

Me with some of the other bridesmaids :)

Here's a peek of what they're reception was like.

Here’s a peek of what their reception was like.

It was a great day and a fun party!

This cutie also enjoyed the wedding!

Oh yeah, and somehow this happened to their car? ;)

While we are talking wedding, let’s sneak in a picture from the bridal shower! Love these girls!

So this doesn’t even begin to cover all the wonderfulness of summer (Maybe a part two is in order? At the very least I need to chronicle my garden/plant journey this year), but it’s a good start.

Currently: watching celebrity wife swap?! Yeah, that’s happening. But after that I’m going to finish rearranging my room (I dragged everything out of place after I got an impulse to switch things up. Some things still need a new home).

Bedelia

The less literal and fictional Amelia

Strawberry Fields Forever

Winging Our Way to the Coast

More Summer Please