Since we had spent so much time hiking along the coast, it was only natural that we developed a craving for seafood. Our evening quest was to find a seafood restaurant that also provided a good sunset view. We found just the spot in Bandon, Oregon. We pulled into Bandon at the perfect sunset photo time. While hunting for the best seafood restaurant, I discovered a small pier that presented a great setting for pictures. We then found the Wheelhouse Restaurant where we had some yummy clam chowder and dungeness crab sautee.

After a wonderful breakfast at Hotel Carter (fresh herb frittata, fresh fruit), we continued our journey up the west coast to Floras Lake, Oregon. We checked in to the Floras Lake Guest House, a beautiful property right on Floras Lake which also provided convenient access to the ocean beaches. From here, we were able to travel to a number of hiking trails leading to fantastic coastal views. Our first hike was out to Blacklock Point for an elevated view of the ocean and Oregon shoreline. The view was great, but it was difficult standing upright - the wind was tremendously strong. I think the wind is as much an attraction in this area as the scenery. The owner of the guest house also runs a kite surfing shop and training facility at the lake where you can often see a number of kite surfers in action.

If you make it to this area, I would highly recommend staying at this guest house. The rooms are spacious and homey, the breakfasts are tasty and healthy (except for the sticky buns and french toast), and the hosts are gracious and fun to talk to. The grounds of the guest house are beautifully landscaped (check out the pictures on Flickr) and the view of the lake is spectacular.

We reached our final destination for the day – Eureka – around 6pm and checked into the beautiful, Victorian-styled Hotel Carter. After a quick tour of the hotel, we dropped off our bags, made a dinner reservation for 8:30pm and started a walking tour of Eureka. 20 minutes later, we were back at the hotel – not much to see in Eureka once you’ve found the 6 restored Victorian homes and the old town shops that close at 5pm. Fortunately, we were able to move our dinner reservation up an hour. With dinner at Hotel Carter, we experienced the most pleasant surprise of the entire trip. The restaurant at this hotel is worth the trip to Eureka even though there isn’t much else to see. We took advantage of the chef’s tasting menu and wine pairing, which treated us to the best meal of the whole trip (so far). Since I know you’re going to ask, here’s the menu:

• Truffled Veloute of Summer White Corn with Avocado and Cilantro


• Sonoma Valley Foie Gras with Fruit Gelee, Toasted Brioche and Saba


• Country-Style Pork and Veal Pate - A Terrine of Pork, Veal, Pistachios, and Cognac with a Pickled Vegetable Relish


• Grouper with Israeli Melon Salsa (not on the menu, so the description isn't as frou-frou as the other entries ).


• Pickled Ginger and Scallop Mousse Stuffed Dover Sole with Yukon Gold Potato Cake, Baby Bok Choy and Lime, Ginger Beurre Blanc


• Brioche Ravioli with Dark Chocolate Filling and Brandy Mint Creme Sauce

While enjoying this delightful feast, we discovered that the owner of the hotel – Mark Carter – was dining with a friend at the table next to us. We heard a gasp of surprise from his friend and realized that Mr. Carter had brought out a 1966 Chateau Latour Pauillac (which goes for about $750 a bottle right now). We couldn’t help but watch the poor waiter (who works for Mr. Carter, of course) make a valiant effort to coax the cork out of this venerable bottle of wine. Even the finest sommelier would have been nervous with this task. Mr. Carter was very gracious in providing advice to the waiter and after a few tense minutes, the bottle was open and decanted. After we finished our dessert, Mr. Carter’s friend asked the waiter to pour a taste of the LaTour for us!! He said that since we had witnessed the fanfare of the uncorking, we ought to have a taste. Quite a generous treat and it lived up to all expectations. I have a feeling that we won’t be topping this experience during the rest of the vacation.

Now that we were stocked up on wine and champagne, it was time to head up to Eureka. On the way, we detoured off of US 101 to take the scenic Avenue of the Giants. This stretch of road took us through a beautiful section of old redwood forest. We rolled down the windows to take in the wonderful smell of the redwoods with the occasional scent of nearby eucalyptus. We stopped a few times to take some pictures and quickly learned that a wider angle lens would have come in handy – the trees were just too tall to take in with a measly 38mm lens. It was also amazing how quiet the forest was just a few feet away from the highway. We will definitely want to spend more time in the redwoods on a future visit.

Today we are traveling from Little River to Eureka by way of the Anderson Valley wine country. Our first stop is the Roederer Estate which is the California extension of the Champagne Louis Roederer. They didn’t seem too willing to let us taste Cristal, but they had some very nice champagnes and a surprisingly good Pinot Noir. Apparently, champagne and sparkling wine producers are starting to produce still wines since they make their sparkling wines from Chardonnay and Pinot Noir grapes. It was a nice surprise, so of course we had to buy some.

After Roederer, we stopped at Goldeneye – a winery started by Duckhorn vineyards devoted entirely to Pinot Noir. Before we tried any of their wines, the woman at the tasting room mentioned that we would be welcome to bring our own lunch to their patio to enjoy with the wines. She suggested a few places down the road to pick up some sandwiches or salads. So, we visited the Boonville Market, grabbed a couple of delightful, overstuffed sandwiches and returned to Goldeneye to start the tasting. Even if the wines sucked, it was a great place to have lunch. The patio was nicely shaded with a beautiful view of the vineyard. Fortunately (or maybe unfortunately budgetwise), Goldeneye’s Pinots were quite nice. We picked up a case as a souvenir.

After our hike, we decided to head into Mendocino for lunch and to check out the shops and galleries that we heard so much about. (Does it sound like I'm setting things up to describe another disappointment?) We did have a nice lunch featuring fresh dungeness crab - after walking around forever looking for a restaurant. Maybe we were looking in the wrong place? After lunch we strolled around looking for galleries. I guess Mendocino just isn't our style since we didn't find much to our liking. It also seemed more crowded and touristy than we we like. Rather than hanging around (with nothing to do) until dinner, we decide to find some wine and cheese to enjoy back at the inn while relaxing on our balcony. We found Wine Shop of Mendocino, a nice little wine shop with a good selection of interesting wines. The woman running the shop not only helped us with recommendations for wine, she also suggested wineries to visit on our way to Eureka and pointed us to a little organic grocery store to pick up some wonderful cheeses. So, we bought some wine, stopped at the grocery store for cheese and crackers, and returned to the inn for a quite evening watching the sunset. Even the disappointing Pygmy Forest didn't seem so bad anymore.

Today’s big adventure was a hike through Fern Canyon, along the Old Logging Road Trail to see the Pygmy Forest. We’ve been told that the Pygmy Forest is quite interesting – a natural growth of miniature, bonsai-like trees. The Fern Canyon trail was very nice – cool, quiet, and green with a small creek running along one side. The same could not be said for the Old Logging Road Trail. Of course, one shouldn’t expect an old logging road to be very scenic, but we figured it would be worth it to see the Pygmy Forest. Wrong again. While some may have seen fascinating natural bonsai trees, we saw shrubs – rhodendrons, azaleas and a few unfamiliar, scraggly things that sorta looked like small trees. At least we didn’t pay for it. Well, that’s not entirely true. The 1.5 miles of the Old Logging Road Trail was all uphill at a roughly 5 degree grade.

After smelling the cows … I mean … viewing the historic ranches on the way back to Point Reyes Station, we continued our way up the coast to the Little River Inn located in – surprisingly – Little River, California. If you ever make your way out to this area, I would highly recommend this inn. The grounds are beautifully landscaped and, even though it is on the east side of US 101, it’s located on a hill that blocks the view of the highway. Instead, you get a beautiful view of the ocean and Van Damme State Park beach. Our room had a deck with a couple of Adirondack chairs so we could sit outside watching the surf. The inn also has a nice restaurant with fresh seafood dishes and a decent wine list. Not a bad way to end the day.
Don't forget to check out all of our vacation pictures on Flickr!

From the Marin side of the bridge, we began the first of a series of slow winding drives back to the coast ending up in Point Reyes around lunch time. Maybe we weren’t prepared enough for our visit or didn’t give ourselves enough time, but it was a challenge finding a place for lunch. We finally found a funky pseudo-Mexican place in an old converted warehouse that had an unusual (but good) chicken Caesar salad and a shredded pork quesadilla. Then, we traveled the 20 mile access road out to the Point Reyes Lighthouse. It turns out that we really did allow enough time to visit the area. Aside from all of the ranches (translation – smelly cows), the lighthouse was closed on Tuesdays and even the steps to the observation deck were closed due to the wind. So, we dug in to keep from being blown into the ocean and took some pictures of the beautiful seashore. Around the south side of the peninsula we caught a glimpse of some sea lions hanging out on the rocks and making quite a lot of noise.

Time to head north. Today, we drove through San Francisco to Point Reyes. To save time, we decided to skip the scenic route of the Pacific Coast Highway. Instead, we came up US 101, and then cut over to the coast at Daly City to avoid city traffic on 19th Ave. This gave us a chance to drive along the edge of Golden Gate Park and the Presidio, ending up right at the south end of the Golden Gate Bridge. This turned out to be the best opportunity of the trip to get a photo of the bridge. We tried to get to a prime spot for bridge photos across the bridge in Marin, but the haze prevented any decent shots.

After visiting our friend Jim's workplace, we headed over to Frans Lanting's gallery. In case you've never heard of Frans Lanting, he is a fantastic nature photographer who has shot for National Geographic (among many other things). His photos captures gorgeous scenes with tremendous artistry. He seems to have a special knack for capturing expressiveness and character in wild animals. He uses his art to build awareness of the earth and its natural history. His latest book - Life: A Journey Through Time - chronicles in photographs the evolution of the earth. Along with the release of this book, he presented a multimedia exhibition of the photographs, accompanied by new music composed by Philip Glass. This work premiered at the Cabrillo Music Festival, but luckily for us, will be performed at the Strathmore in Feburary.

After a quick detour to Chefworks, a gigantuan gourmet kitchen store in Santa Cruz, it was time for a quick lunch at Rosie McCann's Irish Pub for a good old fashioned corn beef sandwich.

Finally, we closed out our last full day in Santa Cruz with dinner at Cafe Rio. If you've never had calamari steak before, I highly recommend it! You know how after a big meal you joke about walking home? Well, we actually walked to and from Cafe Rio along Seacliff Beach. It wasn't quite far enough to walk off dinner, but it gave me the opportunity to take a few more pictures like the one shown above. Check out more on Flickr.

Today's adventure started off at The Mystery Spot. Back in 1939, someone buying this land in Santa Cruz County, California discovered some odd properties. Many aspects of gravity and perspective don't quite work the way you would expect. Is it real or is it a hoax? Many have analyzed it, but no one has proven exactly what is going on. The working theory is that a UFO crash landed on the site and the power plant is buried beneath the ground. To me, it doesn't matter. It was fun! Check out more pictures on Flickr. (Be sure to look at the descriptions of the photos. A number of them need to be viewed in a specific 'before and after' order to see the effects of the Mystery Spot.)

After this adventure, we went to our friend Jim's office to see just exactly what it is he does. The company provides machines used to prepare a substrate for use in making chips and circuit boards. One of Jim's coworkers gave us a demo of how the machines work. They basically create a huge vacuum (close to what you find in deep space) to remove all of the impurities before laying down the material that forms the substrate. It's all controlled by a Windows XP PC hooked into various process control components. let's hope it doesn' blue screen!

Of course, Mexican food in California. Darn good stuff too. We opted for El Palomar in Santa Cruz for pitchers of margaritas and maybe some food to go with that. The margaritas were quite tasty and so was the burrito de camerones (shrimp burrito). Now all I need to do is walk back to Aptos.

So I had to pick up a USB cable for my mp3 player and get some snacks to take with when hiking. It still feels like vacation. First stop was Santa Cruz Electronics to get the cable. You don't find many electronics stores like this any more. Aside from the huge selection of parts, this store boasts (believe it or not) knowledgeable salespeople! Wow. The only problem was I didn't have time to browse - it would have taken me hours and I don't think anyone wanted to wait for me.

Next stop, Trader Joe's. If you've been to Trader Joe's on the east coast, never, ever go to one in California. You'll never want to go home! The one in Capitola is at least three times the size of the biggest Maryland store. And they sell wine - good, cheap wine!

Brunch at Shadowbrook was as good as the menu looked. I ended up having the Seafood Benedict - eggs benedict with dungeness crab instead of ham. Yum. The bloody mary's didn't hurt either. See more pictures from the beautiful surroundings at Shadowbrook on my Flickr page.

Better late then never. With all of the extra time available due to the flight change, we managed to make sure we didn't forget anything and packed more than we really needed. So, we unpacked some. Talk about having too much time on your hands!

The flight to San Francisco was actually pretty nice. United's Economy Plus give much more legroom than before. (I think they are worried about JetBlue!) They've started a new thing with charging for food. I've always thought it would be better if they charged a reasonable fee (probably more than they used to spend on food) and get better food. Well, it looks like they are figuring it out. For $5, you can get a snack assortment that included organic whole wheat crackers, Bumblebee lemon pepper seasoned tuna, hummus, Stacy's pita chips, some Gouda, raisins, and a small Toblerone bar. Not too bad!

After barely navigating our way out of the San Francisco Airport car rental area, we made our way down to Aptos. Too bad it was too late to go to Manny's (a great Mexican restaurant with excellent margaritas!). There's always tomorrow. Today, we're planning on brunch at Shadowbrook. Then we will be fasting for a while!

Stay tuned for pictures from Shadowbrook - a beautiful garden setting.

Well, our summer vacation is off to a great start. Our flight was cancelled and we were booked on a flight 5 hours later. At least we found at before we left for the airport. So at least we don't have to rush!

I guess there is no point in trying to have a nice late afternoon walk on Seacliff Beach today.