San Francisco/ Lake Tahoe trip May-June 2009!
FROM Friday May 22 to Tuesday June 02, 2009
Tyler and I have been talking about going to San Francisco for months and months! Finally, we were both able to follow through with it. We left friday morning around 8am driving Tyler's car with a cooler full of sandwich making materials and, in my case, more clothes than I needed. (this tuned out to be a good thing upon discovering how much colder SF is than Utah. I almost didn't bring my colder weather clothes but now I'm so glad that I did. For once over packing paid off.)
The trip is normally a 14 or so hour trip. We got there by just a little after 7pm. WOO! Ty and I've decided that we're good road trippers.
Here is a recap of each day with pictures to accompany each:
Day 01:
Drove to SF, arrived at Will and Megan's place. Will is an old friend from college. He and his lovely girlfriend Meg have a way cool apartment in just the nicest part of SF right by Golden Gate park not a mile from the ocean! Went out to eat with them at a place called "Q" and met some of their friends (they have awesome friends!). Got settled in, played some Nintendo Wee and crashed.
On the way there! woo!
The Salt Flats on the way
Outside Will & Meg's place
Day 02:
Went with Will and Meg to the rainbow grocery store ( rainbowgrocery.org). As it turns out SF has the way coolest grocery stores ever with everything I'd ever be able to eat with all my dumb eating restrictions! You could buy stuff in bulk and bring your own jar for it or buy one of theirs. I got some peanut butter and I swear it was the yummiest peanut butter I've ever had. I'd move to SF just to be able to shop at their grocery stores. Anyway, we took the bus downtown after that and did touristy stuff. Saw Lumbard St. Scoped out Trolleys and those huge hills. Saw the ocean from the top of the hills and this huge super awesome ship! We then went parrot hunting on Telegraph hill!!!! Parrot hunting was by far my favorite part of the day. Learn about SF's wild parrots here: (wildparrotsfilm.com). I couldn't believe we found them!!! With a little patience we got a few good photos! Then we went and explored Chinatown. Nuff said. Ty took me to some famous skate spots and then, exhausted, we headed back toward Will's house and met him and more friends for sushi at a place called Drunken Sushi. The sushi was AWESOME. They had this roll that was a CA roll but with melted american cheese on top- sounds nasty right? wrong. It was delicious!
ALCATRAZ!
T & me on Lumbard St.
Lumbard St. The curviest street in the world.
Tellegraph Hill from afar
The Parrots!
China Town!
Mmmm Sushi with our hosts Will & Meg and our new friend Mike
Day 03:
Today we went shopping in Berkley all day! They have a ton of fun thrift stores. I bought three pairs of earrings, and 4 pairs of pants!!!! haha. Tyler bought this sweet old school cycling jersey and a cowboy button-up. All super good sales. I love that my boyfriend set aside an entire day for shopping in our vacation. I even got to see where he got his lip pierced when he was younger. Later we walked around the the campus there and I saw my first fo-real redwood tree!!! We had a lot of fun in Berkley.
Thrift Store
dood's fishing for change
Day 04:
Today I took an early morning run down to the ocean. Holy crap! Why don't the people who live here spend every morning running to this beach?! Then we all went to this Indian restaurant with an all you can eat lunch buffet for only 10 bucks!!! Will had the day off of work and he treated us all! THANKS WILL! Later we ventured across the golden gate bridge out of the fog and into the warm and sunny Muir Woods National Park. Muir woods makes you feel like either a dinosaur is going to jump out from somewhere and eat you any minute or maybe you accidently got lost in Star Wars. Once you get above the forrest the fog in this place is unreal. It moves SO fast and just whites out the view then just dissapeers! We hiked there for hours and got only moderately lost. We found out way back via goat path and then crossed the bridge back into the city. When we got back we chilled with Meg, Will, and friends at a beach BBQ! It was freezing on the beach but we grilled hotdogs on skewers over the fire anyway! haha.
view from the beach on my run (taken later haha)
Redwoods in Muir woods! See me at the bottom right?
The fog rolls in SO FAST!
Tyler at the fog cut-off
click it to see a larger photo. Check out the tiny ppl at the bottom
Day 05:
The first thing we did today was go to lunch at LMI (the visual effects branch of George Lucas's whole opperation) That was lovely! Will works there and he gave us a tour of his whole building! We weren't alowed to take photos so all we did was get some of the outside campus. What a pleasure to get a personal tour of LMI!
After that we went to Pleasenton. Ty lived in Pleasenton for his high school and early college years. We walked around downtown Pleasenton and he showed me his high school (which was the most epic high school i had ever seen. Everything opens to the out doors and it's like exactly what you'd dream of if you were 14 and about to go to high school in California!) We then got a chance to go to his old neighborhood and he showed me the house he lived in and a ton of other things. We got out and took some photos around the beautiful club house his neighborhood has. I was most excited to see his church. When we got there we found out that the door was open so as we were walking in an old friend of Ty's named Josh was walking out!!!!! He was the old high school music minister when Ty was in high school! Josh invited us out to dinner with his wife Carrie! We met up with them later and had thai food. This was the first person I had ever met from Tyler's life in California and was one of the people who the Lord used to reveal Himself to him!!! I feel totally blessed to have met Josh and Carrie. What's better is they offered us a place to stay if we needed it. You never know, right? We went back to their house and played some music. (josh's band Ivory Owl can be found here: Ivory Owl Myspace ). Then we drove back to Will and Megan's place.
Walking through the land of George Lucas
vineyards next to T's old neighborhood
T's old house
view from T's old neighborhood
some pix we took from the clubhouse in his old neighborhood
Day 06:
The agenda today called for a trip to the beach at Capitola. The problem was, though, that it was supposed to me moderately cold and, even so, I didn't have a bathing suit. Let me just add in here, it is AWESOME to go to a place like SF with someone who grew up there and knows all the fun little things to do. Thanks Ty for always knowing whats the best of the best! I don't think I would have had nearly as lovely of a vacation if I went with someone who didn't know every fun little thing about SF and the surrounding areas! So, naturally, we drove up highway 1 along the cost(instead of the quicker way where we would have had to drive through city after city) and the drive was lovely! When we got there we parked and walked around downtown Capitola. We watched some people surf near the kelp beds and I saw a harbor seal! I bought a swim suite and then we headed to the beach that Tyler used to go to with his friends who's father used to have a beach house right down there. The beach wasn't very warm but we kicked it in our swim suites just to say that we did. We walked all along the beach and saw crabs and sea anemones in the tidal pools! Once the sun started to set it got a lot colder so we headed into the little skate and surf part of town and ate dinner at Pleasure Pizza. After that we started the drive home but we HAD to pull off at this little spot we saw on our drive in. It was this crazy cove with caves and cliffs. We explored that till it got dark, jumped back in the car and drove home. (passed by this church called vintage church! haha)
Inside Pleasure Pizza
The cove near the highway and the railroad tracks that we explored on the way back. It was super creepy and cool at the same time.
Didn't have a light so we didn't go in far.
Day 07:
This morning we learned that Megan's parents (who were going to be visiting Will and Megan the day RIGHT after we leave which was supposed to be tomorrow) were going to be coming earlier than they thought so we had to figure something out if we wanted to stay one more day (and we did because critical mass was what we had planned for day 08 and we couldn't miss that!!). Will offered us the opportunity to stay at the apartment he had just moved out of because he was still paying rent there. We figured, why not? We packed up our stuff and put it in the car then jumped on the buss and took it down to the piers. We had on the agenda to go whale watching in the early morning but it was canceled due to high winds :(:(. I was bummed because I really wanted to go- next time maybe! Anyway, we did get a chance to follow the rest of our agenda which was to walk around the peers, go to Embarkedaro square, and then take advantage of the SF Museum of Modern Art's half price night (only cost us $6 haha)! We got a chance to do all of that!Hillarious! We also ate at Bubba Gump's (i know i am seriously unworthy because i STILL haven't seen Forrest Gump), went to an old school arcade game mechanical museum (terrifying), and walked around the old ships they had docked for visitors to see- like a floating museum. Seeing those old ships that we got a picture of the first day just heightened Tyler's dream of living on a giant old sail boat. I'm game. A highlight of the day was watching a bum hide behind some cut tree branches and scare people as they walked by. The single best thing that happened all day was, however, that while we were at the Museum of Modern Art, we found Waldo. After all of that we met up with Will and Meg for their friend (whome we have decided we absolutly LOVE) Mike Jutan the Canadian's birthday! We met up at a BBQ place near their apartment then went to this way fun bar where we played all these cool games like ski ball and stuff and then took those booth pictures. Yes we had to do it even though it cost like $3. Happy B-day Jutan!
When we got back to the car we headed out to find Will's old apartment. We got kinda lost and decided we were hungry. The first place we found that accepted cards (everyone only takes cash out there!!) was a Jack-in-the-Box so we went in to get some dinner. This bum approached Tyler and me and was like "pappa, pappa, get me some food!". It was so surprising that Tyler was like "uhh ok!" haha. I asked the guy what he wanted and he's all like "umm I'll have a number 1 with a large fries and coke". To which point I just kinda looked at him. He got the hint and changed his mind to getting a 99 cent burger with a small fries and coke. haha. It was all just really funny. We hooked him up and got ourselves some food then took off. After we found the apartment we settled in and found the air mattress Will said he had. He had the mattress but didn't have a pump. After about 5 minutes of unsuccessfully trying to BLOW it up- yes impossible, i know- I found a little foot bike pump. Tyler McGivered a plastic rig where the foot pump would work and, an hour or so later, we had the thing pumped up! hahahah. It held it's air all night and we were out of there first thing in the morning. What an adventurous day.
The cycling game we played at the arcade museum
The Gypsey Queen never actually gave me my fortune! SCAM!
No joke you pay this creepy thing to just shake and laugh it's terrifying
This one said "look inside to see a real monster! haha this is what we saw
Here Tyler paid 25 cents to see what a belly dancer did on her day off- turns out she undresses behind a curtain then takes a bath. 25 cents and not even a booty! haha. For the record- I was the one who was curious hahaha
Bubba Gumps- I'm tottally in Forrest's shoes. tottally
Thought this was a cool food stand fosho
Embarcadero Square was empty and the fountain wasn't on! wtf!
Enterence to the MOMA SF. Honestly the museum wasn't very impressive but it was fun to go anyway. Saw some sweet sculpture and was graced by an Alexander Calder piece (pictured next) so that was sweet. It's not every day you see a Calder in person. Made me think of you Geeta!
I love some of the art that makes it into museums haha
THE BEST PART OF THE WHOLE DAY WAS WE FOUND WALDO!!! This was taken out the window near the cafe at the MOMA SF! Click the photo to zoom in and see Waldo yourself! BUSTED!!!
Day 08:
Getting back to the city from Will's old place kinda out by the ocean we somehow got totally lost but ended up on St. Francis St. San Francisco I guess was named for St. Francis which made me kinda excited. If St. Francis saw the street named after him, though, he'd like flip in his grave. The houses had to have been worth millionS of dollars. haha. Today we decided to hit up the downtown area again, catch up with critical mass, and then go stay with Josh and Carrie before heading out to Tahoe and then back home. Before we deiced to park and jump on the bus again, Ty came with me down to the beach I had gone running to a few days before. We spent way longer than we expected on that beach collecting sea glass and trying to advert our eyes when encountering a naked man tanning by the rocks!!! ahh! haha.
We finally realized how late it was and took off for downtown to try to catch Critical Mass! Originally we were going to bring our bicycles and ride in it but we decided against that. Maybe we'd rent bikes but we decided against that too (because it was so late in the day!). Instead we just went to where all the cyclists meet and just tried to take it all in. In SF there is actually a legit police escort for critical mass so they can go through lights and stuff. Good thing because there seemed to be about 800-1000 riders. Tons of fixed gears and mountain bikers but not ONE tall bike. No kidding! It was way cool. We'll ride in it next time fosho. After that we decided to walk around. We hit up China town for a bit then decided that we HAD to take one of those street cars we kept seeing so we took a ride in one of those too. Tyler got to see his favorite building in all of SF and I got to get one last walk through downtown before heading out that evening. We took some photos, took the bus back to our car, ate some curry at this place called Volcano Curry, and then took off toward Josh's house across the Bay bridge. Josh had his guest room all ready for us and we crashed! Goodbye SF!
The beach near Will and Meg's house again
SF Critical Mass! With a police escort!
Cable cars were just part of the normal bus system so we took a ride!
interior of the cable car
more china town
T's fav building
We <3 SF
Day 09:
Woke up and had a big breakfast with Josh and Carrie as well as their roommate (Eric?) and his girlfriend Jess. As we were telling them of our plans to go to Lake Tahoe for one night Jess offered us her family's cottage to stay in! Holy crappp! So we drove to Lake Tahoe (and stopped at In&Out burger along the way! WOO!), pulled into their BEAUTIFUL cottage in the Tahoe Keys, unloaded then went.... MOUNTAIN BIKING TO THE BEACH! We met one of their neighbors named George and he showed us the trails to take. We watched the sunset, made dinner, and just had an overall fab night. They gave us permission to stay the next night too!!!!
Our drive to Lake Tahoe. T is wearing a new shirt he got in Berkley
My first peek at LT
Our own private cottage in the LT Keys!
a peek inside
The view from their balcony in the back
biking to the beach
Sorry Lake Michigan but Lake Tahoe wins when it comes to beauty!
Tyler lived near Lake Tahoe too and thanks to him we were right at home in this place, one of his favorite in the wold.
The water was FREEZING but that didn't stop us from swimming the next day
I have the best boyfriend in the world
We are cuter than you.
Sunset from their back balcony
epic
Day 10:
Went to the grocery store to prepare for our trip home tomorrow and got some chinese food for lunch! Went kayaking through they keys and then out into Lake Tahoe. We got rained on while we were out there but not bad. We watched ospreys dive for fish and Tyler saw an Otter- scared an otter I should say. The poor thing almost got nailed with a paddle! After we got home we decided to go mountain biking again back to Pope's beach where we were yesterday. I layed out while Ty bummed around the beach. FINALLY A BEACH WHERE IT WAS WARM ENOUGH TO BE IN BATHING SUITES! We even went into the water looking for pyrite (fools gold). The water was insanely freezing so we didn't do that for long. I went out up to my shoulders and Ty up to his chest! hahaha people on the beach probably though we were nuts, wait- NOBODY WAS ON THE BEACH. We were at Lake Tahoe like practically ALONE! It was insanely beautiful and awesome.
When we got back we went FISHING off of their dock and I caught 3 fish! (not like it was hard- they'd acutally jump OUT of the water for a piece of cheese.) The first was a bule-gill, the second a sunfish and the third was a small lake trout! We saw a HUGE bass and we got it to bight but didn't catch it. I think the hook was too small. We saw tons of wildlife while we were in Tahoe- A beaver, an otter, a raccoon, bats, mice, voles, fish, lizzards, birds, eagles, hawks, you name it! Once it was way to dark to even see the bats catching water bugs we went inside and made burritos. We watched some TV, read some of the fun fact books they had laying around, talked for hours, and finally hit the sack. What a great day to end a great vacation!
view from the Tahoe Keys
KAYAKING!
in our boats!
The water is so clear you can see through it like forever.
click it to see a larger and more epic photo.
FISHING!
Tyler didn't catch anything so sad
Probably because God knew if he caught a fish he was gonna throw it to this guy and everyone knows there's no such thing as a free lunch
fish # 3 caught by me
brown bat caught on camera by T. Click the image and you'll see a sweet close-up
Day 11 (the final day):
We woke up and cleaned the house before taking off. We wrote in their cottage journal (that was the one request Jess's family had of us- "write in the journal!") alongside all of the other people who had been blessed with a stay there. When we drove through South Lake Tahoe we stopped and picked up a few "Keep Tahoe Blue" stickers. As of right now that sticker is the ONLY sticker tyler thought worthy of putting on his car. The ride home was rainy. The desert was green and in bloom and the rain just kept coming. At one point, when we were in a mountainous area, we saw a land slide JUST starting. If we were five minutes later the road would have been closed and we would have been stopped indefinitely! We were lucky and snuck through before the whole mountain turned to mud. Out there in the country there is no trees, only desert and dust. Flash floods were everywhere and then.... HAIL! Yes it started hailing marble sized hail on us. It stopped as quickly as it started and we kept going. The desert seemed to be under water. Same with the salt flats, so much of them were submerged. Crazy!
Despite all of the storms we made it home safe and sound. Yet another epic Tyler and Chelsea adventure under our belts (as well as over a thousand photos that Tyler and I took with his new digital slr camera. oi). What's next for us? Who knows!
Thanks to everyone who welcomed us and made this trip possible!!!
hail!
Wendover and the Salt Flats beyond
epic death over the salt flats which were pretty-much underwater at the time
Alas, we made it home safe and sound! I'd do the whole thing over again in a heartbeat.
God bless you all!
We could be closer than you know.
Tyler and I have been talking about going to San Francisco for months and months! Finally, we were both able to follow through with it. We left friday morning around 8am driving Tyler's car with a cooler full of sandwich making materials and, in my case, more clothes than I needed. (this tuned out to be a good thing upon discovering how much colder SF is than Utah. I almost didn't bring my colder weather clothes but now I'm so glad that I did. For once over packing paid off.)
The trip is normally a 14 or so hour trip. We got there by just a little after 7pm. WOO! Ty and I've decided that we're good road trippers.
Here is a recap of each day with pictures to accompany each:
Day 01:
Drove to SF, arrived at Will and Megan's place. Will is an old friend from college. He and his lovely girlfriend Meg have a way cool apartment in just the nicest part of SF right by Golden Gate park not a mile from the ocean! Went out to eat with them at a place called "Q" and met some of their friends (they have awesome friends!). Got settled in, played some Nintendo Wee and crashed.
Day 02:
Went with Will and Meg to the rainbow grocery store ( rainbowgrocery.org). As it turns out SF has the way coolest grocery stores ever with everything I'd ever be able to eat with all my dumb eating restrictions! You could buy stuff in bulk and bring your own jar for it or buy one of theirs. I got some peanut butter and I swear it was the yummiest peanut butter I've ever had. I'd move to SF just to be able to shop at their grocery stores. Anyway, we took the bus downtown after that and did touristy stuff. Saw Lumbard St. Scoped out Trolleys and those huge hills. Saw the ocean from the top of the hills and this huge super awesome ship! We then went parrot hunting on Telegraph hill!!!! Parrot hunting was by far my favorite part of the day. Learn about SF's wild parrots here: (wildparrotsfilm.com). I couldn't believe we found them!!! With a little patience we got a few good photos! Then we went and explored Chinatown. Nuff said. Ty took me to some famous skate spots and then, exhausted, we headed back toward Will's house and met him and more friends for sushi at a place called Drunken Sushi. The sushi was AWESOME. They had this roll that was a CA roll but with melted american cheese on top- sounds nasty right? wrong. It was delicious!
Day 03:
Today we went shopping in Berkley all day! They have a ton of fun thrift stores. I bought three pairs of earrings, and 4 pairs of pants!!!! haha. Tyler bought this sweet old school cycling jersey and a cowboy button-up. All super good sales. I love that my boyfriend set aside an entire day for shopping in our vacation. I even got to see where he got his lip pierced when he was younger. Later we walked around the the campus there and I saw my first fo-real redwood tree!!! We had a lot of fun in Berkley.
Day 04:
Today I took an early morning run down to the ocean. Holy crap! Why don't the people who live here spend every morning running to this beach?! Then we all went to this Indian restaurant with an all you can eat lunch buffet for only 10 bucks!!! Will had the day off of work and he treated us all! THANKS WILL! Later we ventured across the golden gate bridge out of the fog and into the warm and sunny Muir Woods National Park. Muir woods makes you feel like either a dinosaur is going to jump out from somewhere and eat you any minute or maybe you accidently got lost in Star Wars. Once you get above the forrest the fog in this place is unreal. It moves SO fast and just whites out the view then just dissapeers! We hiked there for hours and got only moderately lost. We found out way back via goat path and then crossed the bridge back into the city. When we got back we chilled with Meg, Will, and friends at a beach BBQ! It was freezing on the beach but we grilled hotdogs on skewers over the fire anyway! haha.
Day 05:
The first thing we did today was go to lunch at LMI (the visual effects branch of George Lucas's whole opperation) That was lovely! Will works there and he gave us a tour of his whole building! We weren't alowed to take photos so all we did was get some of the outside campus. What a pleasure to get a personal tour of LMI!
After that we went to Pleasenton. Ty lived in Pleasenton for his high school and early college years. We walked around downtown Pleasenton and he showed me his high school (which was the most epic high school i had ever seen. Everything opens to the out doors and it's like exactly what you'd dream of if you were 14 and about to go to high school in California!) We then got a chance to go to his old neighborhood and he showed me the house he lived in and a ton of other things. We got out and took some photos around the beautiful club house his neighborhood has. I was most excited to see his church. When we got there we found out that the door was open so as we were walking in an old friend of Ty's named Josh was walking out!!!!! He was the old high school music minister when Ty was in high school! Josh invited us out to dinner with his wife Carrie! We met up with them later and had thai food. This was the first person I had ever met from Tyler's life in California and was one of the people who the Lord used to reveal Himself to him!!! I feel totally blessed to have met Josh and Carrie. What's better is they offered us a place to stay if we needed it. You never know, right? We went back to their house and played some music. (josh's band Ivory Owl can be found here: Ivory Owl Myspace ). Then we drove back to Will and Megan's place.
Day 06:
The agenda today called for a trip to the beach at Capitola. The problem was, though, that it was supposed to me moderately cold and, even so, I didn't have a bathing suit. Let me just add in here, it is AWESOME to go to a place like SF with someone who grew up there and knows all the fun little things to do. Thanks Ty for always knowing whats the best of the best! I don't think I would have had nearly as lovely of a vacation if I went with someone who didn't know every fun little thing about SF and the surrounding areas! So, naturally, we drove up highway 1 along the cost(instead of the quicker way where we would have had to drive through city after city) and the drive was lovely! When we got there we parked and walked around downtown Capitola. We watched some people surf near the kelp beds and I saw a harbor seal! I bought a swim suite and then we headed to the beach that Tyler used to go to with his friends who's father used to have a beach house right down there. The beach wasn't very warm but we kicked it in our swim suites just to say that we did. We walked all along the beach and saw crabs and sea anemones in the tidal pools! Once the sun started to set it got a lot colder so we headed into the little skate and surf part of town and ate dinner at Pleasure Pizza. After that we started the drive home but we HAD to pull off at this little spot we saw on our drive in. It was this crazy cove with caves and cliffs. We explored that till it got dark, jumped back in the car and drove home. (passed by this church called vintage church! haha)
Day 07:
This morning we learned that Megan's parents (who were going to be visiting Will and Megan the day RIGHT after we leave which was supposed to be tomorrow) were going to be coming earlier than they thought so we had to figure something out if we wanted to stay one more day (and we did because critical mass was what we had planned for day 08 and we couldn't miss that!!). Will offered us the opportunity to stay at the apartment he had just moved out of because he was still paying rent there. We figured, why not? We packed up our stuff and put it in the car then jumped on the buss and took it down to the piers. We had on the agenda to go whale watching in the early morning but it was canceled due to high winds :(:(. I was bummed because I really wanted to go- next time maybe! Anyway, we did get a chance to follow the rest of our agenda which was to walk around the peers, go to Embarkedaro square, and then take advantage of the SF Museum of Modern Art's half price night (only cost us $6 haha)! We got a chance to do all of that!Hillarious! We also ate at Bubba Gump's (i know i am seriously unworthy because i STILL haven't seen Forrest Gump), went to an old school arcade game mechanical museum (terrifying), and walked around the old ships they had docked for visitors to see- like a floating museum. Seeing those old ships that we got a picture of the first day just heightened Tyler's dream of living on a giant old sail boat. I'm game. A highlight of the day was watching a bum hide behind some cut tree branches and scare people as they walked by. The single best thing that happened all day was, however, that while we were at the Museum of Modern Art, we found Waldo. After all of that we met up with Will and Meg for their friend (whome we have decided we absolutly LOVE) Mike Jutan the Canadian's birthday! We met up at a BBQ place near their apartment then went to this way fun bar where we played all these cool games like ski ball and stuff and then took those booth pictures. Yes we had to do it even though it cost like $3. Happy B-day Jutan!
When we got back to the car we headed out to find Will's old apartment. We got kinda lost and decided we were hungry. The first place we found that accepted cards (everyone only takes cash out there!!) was a Jack-in-the-Box so we went in to get some dinner. This bum approached Tyler and me and was like "pappa, pappa, get me some food!". It was so surprising that Tyler was like "uhh ok!" haha. I asked the guy what he wanted and he's all like "umm I'll have a number 1 with a large fries and coke". To which point I just kinda looked at him. He got the hint and changed his mind to getting a 99 cent burger with a small fries and coke. haha. It was all just really funny. We hooked him up and got ourselves some food then took off. After we found the apartment we settled in and found the air mattress Will said he had. He had the mattress but didn't have a pump. After about 5 minutes of unsuccessfully trying to BLOW it up- yes impossible, i know- I found a little foot bike pump. Tyler McGivered a plastic rig where the foot pump would work and, an hour or so later, we had the thing pumped up! hahahah. It held it's air all night and we were out of there first thing in the morning. What an adventurous day.
Day 08:
Getting back to the city from Will's old place kinda out by the ocean we somehow got totally lost but ended up on St. Francis St. San Francisco I guess was named for St. Francis which made me kinda excited. If St. Francis saw the street named after him, though, he'd like flip in his grave. The houses had to have been worth millionS of dollars. haha. Today we decided to hit up the downtown area again, catch up with critical mass, and then go stay with Josh and Carrie before heading out to Tahoe and then back home. Before we deiced to park and jump on the bus again, Ty came with me down to the beach I had gone running to a few days before. We spent way longer than we expected on that beach collecting sea glass and trying to advert our eyes when encountering a naked man tanning by the rocks!!! ahh! haha.
We finally realized how late it was and took off for downtown to try to catch Critical Mass! Originally we were going to bring our bicycles and ride in it but we decided against that. Maybe we'd rent bikes but we decided against that too (because it was so late in the day!). Instead we just went to where all the cyclists meet and just tried to take it all in. In SF there is actually a legit police escort for critical mass so they can go through lights and stuff. Good thing because there seemed to be about 800-1000 riders. Tons of fixed gears and mountain bikers but not ONE tall bike. No kidding! It was way cool. We'll ride in it next time fosho. After that we decided to walk around. We hit up China town for a bit then decided that we HAD to take one of those street cars we kept seeing so we took a ride in one of those too. Tyler got to see his favorite building in all of SF and I got to get one last walk through downtown before heading out that evening. We took some photos, took the bus back to our car, ate some curry at this place called Volcano Curry, and then took off toward Josh's house across the Bay bridge. Josh had his guest room all ready for us and we crashed! Goodbye SF!
Day 09:
Woke up and had a big breakfast with Josh and Carrie as well as their roommate (Eric?) and his girlfriend Jess. As we were telling them of our plans to go to Lake Tahoe for one night Jess offered us her family's cottage to stay in! Holy crappp! So we drove to Lake Tahoe (and stopped at In&Out burger along the way! WOO!), pulled into their BEAUTIFUL cottage in the Tahoe Keys, unloaded then went.... MOUNTAIN BIKING TO THE BEACH! We met one of their neighbors named George and he showed us the trails to take. We watched the sunset, made dinner, and just had an overall fab night. They gave us permission to stay the next night too!!!!
Day 10:
Went to the grocery store to prepare for our trip home tomorrow and got some chinese food for lunch! Went kayaking through they keys and then out into Lake Tahoe. We got rained on while we were out there but not bad. We watched ospreys dive for fish and Tyler saw an Otter- scared an otter I should say. The poor thing almost got nailed with a paddle! After we got home we decided to go mountain biking again back to Pope's beach where we were yesterday. I layed out while Ty bummed around the beach. FINALLY A BEACH WHERE IT WAS WARM ENOUGH TO BE IN BATHING SUITES! We even went into the water looking for pyrite (fools gold). The water was insanely freezing so we didn't do that for long. I went out up to my shoulders and Ty up to his chest! hahaha people on the beach probably though we were nuts, wait- NOBODY WAS ON THE BEACH. We were at Lake Tahoe like practically ALONE! It was insanely beautiful and awesome.
When we got back we went FISHING off of their dock and I caught 3 fish! (not like it was hard- they'd acutally jump OUT of the water for a piece of cheese.) The first was a bule-gill, the second a sunfish and the third was a small lake trout! We saw a HUGE bass and we got it to bight but didn't catch it. I think the hook was too small. We saw tons of wildlife while we were in Tahoe- A beaver, an otter, a raccoon, bats, mice, voles, fish, lizzards, birds, eagles, hawks, you name it! Once it was way to dark to even see the bats catching water bugs we went inside and made burritos. We watched some TV, read some of the fun fact books they had laying around, talked for hours, and finally hit the sack. What a great day to end a great vacation!
Day 11 (the final day):
We woke up and cleaned the house before taking off. We wrote in their cottage journal (that was the one request Jess's family had of us- "write in the journal!") alongside all of the other people who had been blessed with a stay there. When we drove through South Lake Tahoe we stopped and picked up a few "Keep Tahoe Blue" stickers. As of right now that sticker is the ONLY sticker tyler thought worthy of putting on his car. The ride home was rainy. The desert was green and in bloom and the rain just kept coming. At one point, when we were in a mountainous area, we saw a land slide JUST starting. If we were five minutes later the road would have been closed and we would have been stopped indefinitely! We were lucky and snuck through before the whole mountain turned to mud. Out there in the country there is no trees, only desert and dust. Flash floods were everywhere and then.... HAIL! Yes it started hailing marble sized hail on us. It stopped as quickly as it started and we kept going. The desert seemed to be under water. Same with the salt flats, so much of them were submerged. Crazy!
Despite all of the storms we made it home safe and sound. Yet another epic Tyler and Chelsea adventure under our belts (as well as over a thousand photos that Tyler and I took with his new digital slr camera. oi). What's next for us? Who knows!
Thanks to everyone who welcomed us and made this trip possible!!!
Alas, we made it home safe and sound! I'd do the whole thing over again in a heartbeat.
God bless you all!
We could be closer than you know.
Labels: bicycle, SanFransisco, Summer, travel
posted by Chelsea at 12:21 PM
3 Comments:
Dearest Chelsea,
You are soo pretty in all these pics. You and TY are sooooo adorable. Thanks for sharing the pics. There are some that are so gorgeous, they're frame worthy. I miss your more than a desert misses the rain. :( Hopefully we can meet up sometime soon. It's been far too long, my friend.
I miss you like a chipmunk misses acorns!
YAY
I love cali. So jealous...
PS I demand a link on your site
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