Market Street Musings

It’s official. The entire trip has blurred into a single great memory. Was the BBQ yesterday or 6 days ago? Who can tell? According to the pictures it was yesterday, and it was a blasty blast. I am so lucky to call these witty folks my friends: Ron (the smartest and funniest of them all), Leena, Linda, Michelle, Marcus, Harold, Jen and my new friends Brandon, Bella and Greg. I haven’t laughed that much since, well, the last time. Thanks to all for a fabulous day of feasting, boating and laughing! Thanks to Brandon & Bella for hosting the madness at their lovely Huntington Harbor home!

Captain Greg and his floating harem of hotness!

Up early this Saturday morning, the start of week two of this fun little vacation.  I know that I’m going to get to the end of it and say “what happened!?!  I need 3 more weeks!”   Maybe next year!!   With our summer pretty well planned out, I don’t think that we can squeeze in anything more than a weekend here or there.   Ashley comes to Denver for a week in late June, De Ann is going to New York for a memorial service for her grandfather in June, my parents are probably making the drive to Denver to hang out in June/July.   Then it is Puerto Vallarta at the end of July, another week visit from Ashley in August, a long weekend in Dallas to visit the Preissler clan,  Vegas in September and New York for De Ann’s family Christmas and some travels on the East Coast.    I’m sure we’ll find a way to squeeze another trip in there somehow!   But for now, we are just going to enjoy the next couple of weeks.  Check out the calendar under “HAPPENINGS” at the top to get an idea of where we will be!

So, yesterday was a day for me to meet some of De Ann’s friends (some of whom she has known since she was 4 years old.)    First, we packed up the Hybrid and said goodbye to Paradise Point.  We didn’t take advantage of the resort nearly enough, but it was a good base of operations for the SD portion of the trip.  As an aside, there are ridiculous deals everywhere on hotels/vacations right now.  By way of example, Paradise Point is one of those places that looks and feels like you have gone to Hawaii, but it is in Southern CA, just a short drive for most of you.  We found a deal there that basically put the cost at $100 a night.   Even though times are tough right now, consider “traveling” in your own back yard.   Think about the $$ that you can save on the travel costs AND with everyone giving away rooms and such these days, it really is a good time to take a break for a little R&R.   Check out www.travelzoo.com and sign up for their weekly newsletter – they are great at finding the deals!

Back to our story…  we headed up the coast to Oceanside where we visited with the Sexton family.   I’m sure that I’ll mess up some spelling, but Jen and Mike (why do all of the Jen’s find a Mike or Matt in this universe??)  and their two beautiful kids Jillian and Keagan.    They put out a big spread of fruit, bagels and cinnamon rolls and we had a great time catching up with them.   Great people and very gracious hosts.   

We jumped on the road and headed east and then North to visit with Tricia, Matthew and Andrew Holmes in Murrieta.   Tricia and De Ann lived across the street from each other on a cul-de-sac in Orange, CA for their entire childhood.  They have stayed friends and visit whenever they can.  Tricia has been married to Brian for twelve years, but he is on deployment with the Navy (Thank you for your service, sir!).   She is busily getting the family ready to meet up with Dad/Hubby in Hawaii next weekend and we wish them safe travels.

From there, we battled the 15 (yes, its “The 15” because we are from CA and that is how we say it.  It’s not “I-15”… get it right, people…) and then the 91 (joy o’ joy) before finally working our way to Orange, CA for dinner at De Ann’s favorite Chinese place, Yen Ching.   “Dinner for 2, please” is actually a menu item and the food was outstanding.   Waaaaaaay too much for us, but luckily Leena hadn’t eaten yet and enjoyed our leftover’s when we got to their house.

For those that don’t know my family, my brother Harold (15 months older than I am) lives in Irvine, CA and works for Toshiba America Information Systems.   He is dating Jen Peterson and his roommate for the last few years is Leena Shirgaokar.    We arrived at their place and spent some time catching up with Leena before Harold and Jen arrived home from a beach bonfire.   We made plans for the day and then retired for some much needed rest.  All this meeting new people / being charming all of the time can really take it out of you.     We will be in The O.C. for the next few days before heading north to Dan’s Super Subs and then on to Monterrey, CA.   From there, it is Sacramento, Portland, Victoria, B.C., Seattle, Spokane and Yellowstone National Forest.   We hope you continue on this journey with us.

Until then…

Ron is really putting me to shame with his up-to-date posts of witty banter! With the first week behind us, I can say with certainty that it’s all running together already. Soon, I won’t remember what day it is or which state I’m in (except for Denial and Disbelief, with which I’m intimately familiar).

The drive to California was pretty uneventful, although we managed a Chinese Fire Drill on an offramp in San Bernadino County. Sadly, I missed the photo opportunity that presented…

No doubt you’re reading each word of Ron’s four mile long posts, so I won’t bore you with a repetitive account of each breakfast meeting, lunch meeting where we make our friends by their own damn sandwiches, dinner meetings, happy hours and after happy hour events since we arrived.

Sea World was great – not too crowded and not too many bratty kids. There was an older girl, maybe 10, having a melt down and being dragged off by her arm not 20 minutes after the park opened! Take it from me, kid, save the melt down until the end of the day. Other than that episode, wide open park of happy smiling people, many of whom fell for the sales & marketing pitch that the Shamu show has become. For the briefest second I considered becoming an animal trainer so I could snag a $0.47 whale tail necklace, too.

Paradise Point is a beautiful place to stay. Very quiet and peaceful, too, with a great gift shop & boutique. Sad to see it in the rearview, but happily moving toward the next of many destinations ahead of us. Until I type again, D.

It’s my Birthday!!  WOooooooo Hoooooooo!!   De Ann took great care of me on my birthday, just like she does every day!    A new Tommy Bahamas shirt, perfect for vacation lounging, and a “Life’s Good” hat with a picture of a pint glass that is partial filled and the words “Half Full”.. Perfect for my optimistic outlook on life, to be sure.    Another early morning meeting (why oh why do we do this) with our friend Bill Attinger.   We met at a place that De Ann and I referred to as the “Meat Palace”..   Tip Top Meats in Carlsbad is a European deli and butcher shop, that also serves breakfast.   Take a look at the menu, which we did when Bill booked the place, and you’ll notice one of the meals includes “all you can eat breakfast meats”….  Shockingly, we passed on that selection and opted for some traditional eggs, bacon and potatoes.   Food was great, another 14 cups of coffee morning, and two hours of chatting the morning away was a great way to start the day.

Then we headed over to a Starbucks to take care of some work and meet up with our friend Pat Keran.   Pat and his wife Tina are expecting a second child to complement the great son they have in Cooper.  It was great to catch up with Pat, but thankfully we didn’t have to eat anything.  I think Pat was looking forward to a free lunch, but alas, he had to buy his own pre-packaged $6 sandwich.   Suck it up Pat, you still have a job, right!?!    Leaving Pat in the rear-view mirror, we took the M3 back to the hotel where we lounged in the sun and caught up on the day’s calls and emails….

Headed back over to Oggi’s to meet up with Tom and drop off the car, before heading to Escondido to hang with Jason Hooper and his girlfriend Andrea.   Friends of De Ann’s from her previously life at Elan here in San Diego, it was great to meet them and catch up on life.   We headed over to the Elephant Bar for a little Seared Ahi Tuna dinner.     We were both exhausted from the day, so we called it an early night and retired back to Paradise.    All in all, a great birthday and a wonderful way to spend a Friday in beautiful San Diego.

Thanks again everyone for the calls, texts, emails and facebook posts!   Catch up with you tomorrow.    We’ll be checking out of San Diego and heading to OC, by way of Oceanside and Murrietta, so we’ll find you tomorrow!!

Until then…

Morning came WAY too quickly on Thursday, May21st.   Whose bright idea was it to schedule a breakfast meeting at 7:30a the day after we arrive, when we are technically on vacation.  That is bullsh*t, I tell you…   wait a second, I think it was me.  Dammit.   We actually made it to breakfast early, though one of our guests decided that sleeping in was more important than seeing his friends (great job, Ross!!)   It was great to catch up with Mike and Ross and find out what’s been going in San Diego.  We had a LOOOOOOOOONG meal at Coco’s, due to the impeccable service that we received!   14 cups of coffee later, we headed back to our room to change and head over to Sea World.

I love Sea World.  It s a great place to people-watch and going before summer gets here means that we didn’t have to fight too many crowds or kids.   But I gotta tell ya, the shows were pretty disappointing.  Moreso than I remember them to be, anyways.   For example, the Shamu show is now themed “BELIEVE” and it centers around this Marketing Department-inspired B.S. story about this boy who carves a whale-tail out of wood and wears it as a necklace.  He paddles his kayak into the ocean and he is created by Shamu, who swims around him, jumps over the kayak and otherwise frolics with him in the water.  Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure that if there was a killer whale swimming around me and I was in a kayak, there would be quite a mess to clean up in and around my shorts…  and I’m fairly certain that the kayak would look like a seal from under the water and Shamu would gobble it up without giving it a second thought… but I digress.    So, they create this story and then they build this whole “if you believe, you too can be one with the animals” message that culminates with a ridiculous number of vendors walking up and down the aisles during the show selling….wait for it….. yes, selling WHALE TAIL necklaces.   I don’t know a parent out there that wasn’t bombarded by “can I have it daddy PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE” from their kids.     It was ridiculous.

And not that I don’t appreciate the splash zone, we sat in it.   But didn’t it used to be that the splashing was done as part of the tricks that the animals were performing?  Now they have, in both the shamu and dolphin shows, dedicated “SPLASH TIME” where they have trained the animals to douse the crowd with water using their tails.  Not really part of the show, just “here, have some water kids!”   Oh, towels are available for purchase for just $17.

All in all, pretty minor annoyances, considering we had a GREAT time.  We pet all of the animals, fish and creatures that they would let us pet (Sea Stars, Bat Rays, etc.)   We saw most of the exhibits and were able to see all the shows that we wanted to see.  It was a breezy day and not too warm, so we didn’t wind up riding the shipwreck rapids or the other water ride.    We had a great time and were back to the hotel by 4:30 to rest up before dinner.

For dinner, we went to Costa Brava , a Spanish tapas restaurant with a great wine selection and some delicious food.  We were joined by our friends Scott and Pelin Thorogood, and it was great to catch up with them and hear all about what is happening in their world.    After dinner, Scott & Pelin had to get home to relieve Grandma of babysitting duties, but De Ann and I stuck around to partake in another drink or two before catching a cab back to the room.    A great day all around – we are fortunate to have such good friends and the opportunity to vacation like this.   Life is good!

I’ve had hundreds of calls and letters wondering where the daily fix of the travel blog was, I apologize to each of you.   As can often happen on a vacation, we selfishly were spending time enjoying ourselves and neglecting the huddled masses, yearning to be free and whose only source of enjoyment and escape is to live vicariously through us.   Your complaints have been duly noted and we will rectify that situation ASAP.

As you might have guessed, Day 5 was fairly uneventful.  We had 521 miles to cover between the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, and our hotel in San Diego.  The drive on the I-40 was long and boring, with not much to look at except 18 wheelers and other vacationing families.   We did stop at the Flintstone Campground (hopefully De Ann will post those pictures as the official photographer), but otherwise it was pretty uneventful.

We stopped at Oggi’s Pizza on the way into town to see Tom Coyle.   In typical fashion, by the time we stopped rambling on, getting caught up like two old ladies (no offense to any old ladies out there), we had been there for 2 hours and were dangerously close to missing our dinner reservations.   Tom was gracious enough to loan us his BMW M3 Convertible for the couple of days that we would be in San Diego, so that has proven to be good fun, all around.

Our sweet ride for the duration of our stay in SD

We headed to the hotel – Paradise Point Resort in Mission Bay, where we essentially collapsed into a ball of exhaustion.   We scrapped our plans to enjoy steaks at Donovan’s, instead taking a walk over to the Barefoot Bar & Grill in the Resort for some good grub and a drink or two.   Completely relaxed, we passed out in no time flat!!

After spending some time at De Ann’s parent’s house, getting their wireless network up and running and assuring them that we are not, in fact, going to be destitute as we start our consulting and infrastructure firm, we were free to head off into the AZ heat towards the Grand Canyon.  The drive itself was only 3 hours, so not a  long day of driving (thankfully).

If you haven’t been to the Grand Canyon South Rim, you should go.  The views are amazing and there is a ton of history and things to see.   By the time that we got through the Visitor’s Center and headed to the Canyon for a bit of a hike, there wasn’t too much time for the hiking, unfortunately.  We did take one of the most popular routes, the  “Bright Angel Trail” that is actually about 9 miles down into the Canyon.   The first 1.5 miles drops you about 1100 feet in elevation.   With my fear of heights, I figured that I would get to about the railing and decide “enough” and go find a bar.   But alas, I was able to start the trek down and progressively, things got easier.  The very first part of the trail is the narrowest and the steepest (why do they DO that?!), but things even out a bit from there.   We hiked down for 30 minutes or so and then made the executive decision that since we couldn’t go all the way down, we’d probably seen enough of the trail and the rocks, and headed back up.  

I wish that the camera hadn’t taken the header off of the 225 million years of history (see yesterday’s blog), as we have been having problems with it ever since.   Essentially, the automatic lens wont open all the way, so all the photos will have blurred images where the lens is covered by the un-opened cover.   We’ve found a work-around – if you zoom, you can get the full picture… but that means we have to zoom every picture.   So, no more self portraits, it seems.     Well, why is this important at this point in the story?   Well, there was a ground squirrel on the path that was…well… aggressive.   I mean, this squirrel had some serious balls.  (as a side note, the squirrel actually did have a seriously oversized set of squirrel nuts… as he scampered away, they were dragging on the ground.  I guess that would make me a little ornery too… but I digress).  In any case, De Ann was trying to get a picture of this squirrel on a rock near the edge (eating a nacho cheese chip from some tourist), so I walked over to get in the picture and the squirrel turned towards me.  How cute, right?  Then he stood up and leaned over near me.  Then, he started coming down the rock towards my feet… I took a step back, not wanting the squirrel to scale my leg and search for nuts… he kept coming, and I kept backing up.   Finally, he turned and headed back, pretty sure that if I had any food for him, he would have already bullied it out of me.    That’s when I saw the nuts…

Ain’t nature grand?

So, our free spirited visit to the Grand Canyon without much planning meant that we didn’t have any reservations for a camp site.   Disappointment over our lack of camping at the Grand Canyon was soon drowned in the beers, wine and chicken wings that we had at The Grand Hotel saloon and restaurant, before retiring in our comfy bed.   I guess that does beat sleeping on the ground in a tent… so we can’t be too upset.

Morning came early and we were back in the car around 8am, heading the 521 miles to San Diego.    But that’s for the Day 5 blog, just don’t forget to remind me to tell you about the Flintstone campground.  Maybe, if you are extra good, De Ann will upload a picture or two for you.  Very special, I know. 

Until then…

This morning we left Glendale, AZ, for a trip to the biggest hole in the Earth – the Grand Canyon. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it. It’s a complete trip seeing and hiking in something so amazing, so old and so incredibly huge. After a beautiful (and slight unnerving) hike down a bit into the canyon, we hiked along the south edge before setting up camp at the Grand Hotel. We tried, I swear, but all of the campgrounds were full. Who knew this place was so popular?!

Ron & De Ann at the Grand Canyon

As you can see from De Ann’s post, not much for me to add to the excursion of the day. We were in the car for somewhere around 9 hours today, so De Ann and I got some quality time together. People have said to us “How are you going to deal with that much ‘together time’?” Simple answer: “Happily!” Anyone that has ever met us can attest to the fact that neither of us has ever been at a loss for words. We find things to talk about. For instance, Day 1 we started keeping track of all of the different state license plates that we saw. We have quite the list going – I think that CT is the furthest away so far. If it’s not that game, then we make fun of road signs (“High winds may exist” – really, I’m pretty sure they do, I’ve felt them!), moron drivers and their antics or catch each other up on the latest FaceBook happenings. With wireless Internet in the car, we seem to keep ourselves, and each other, busy!

So, more thoughts for today. The Petrified Forest was pretty cool… we both enjoyed the sites, though we didn’t spend hours hiking or studying the books in the gift shops either. I’d hardly call 5 petrified trees a “Rainbow Forest”, but hey, they are trying to attract tourists, so who am I to comment? I did get this great idea to set the camera on a fallen tree to take a picture of us (using the timer), but the wind grabbed hold before the picture took and the camera bounced down 225 million years of history before landing in the soft dirt. Camera survived, though we never did get that picture.

Tonight, we arrived at the home of Barbara and Mike, De Ann’s folks in Glendale, AZ. They graced us with a wonderful dinner and great hospitality. Nice comfy bed will feel good, knowing that tomorrow night it is a tent and sleeping bags for us. Barb mentioned that it might rain… good thing I have that big ol’ car to sleep in if that is the case! Speaking of the big ol’ car, did you happen to catch Barbara’s post regarding the picture of the new Tahoe? Nice, really nice… Pimpin’ aint easy, Barb…

Gots to run for the night. Still work to be done! Be good, and if you can’t be good, be safe! Chat soon.

Until then…

Day 3 was slightly less eventful, if only because we were back in the car, driving from Peralta, NM to Glendale, AZ. We stopped at the Petrified Forest National Park (the Painted Desert), and drove though Holbrook, AZ in the historic Route 66. Lots of gorgeous scenery, and a desert thunderstorm that brought the ambient temperature down to just 86 degrees, temporarily.

De Ann in the Rainbow Forest

Tomorrow takes us back north to the Grand Canyon for a night of board games in the tent!