This makes me want to travel

With baby coming in a month or so, we won't be traveling anytime soon, but I will dream!

Award: Most Ghetto Campsite Ever.

Last weekend, we went to the Paso Robles area for an inner healing intensive two days. The "retreat" was Sunday night through Tuesday, so we decided to camp out Saturday night at a nearby hot springs. The website did not show how ghetto the place really was and we almost left once we got there. But, it was cheap and we are cheapos, so we stayed.

We cooked our dinner Friday night over the fire: sausages, corn on the cob and sweet potatoes. The next morning,we used our new-t0-us Korean style stove and made oatmeal with blueberries. Yummy camp food.


In between, we had some relaxing time at the hot springs, which weren't all that hot, but still felt really great. We had the place mostly to ourselves most of the time, except for a group of three Russians that were there both days and a large crowd of locals that came to enjoy the hot springs at night.



Before we headed to our destination, we stopped off at Farmstand 46, in the middle of a bunch of wineries, and had a delicious lunch. If you're in the Paso Robles area, check this place out! They have a garden out back where they grow some of their own veggies.

San Francisco: the food post

Admittedly, we did spend a large percentage of our San Francisco time finding and eating at yummy places. We kind of thought we deserved it since we spent the next greatest percentage of time biking.
I highly recommend the farmers market behind the Ferry Building. There were looong lines of people waiting for the food booths here, so we didn't eat here, but we did take advantage of the samples!

We bought a (compostable) bag of this purple spinach. It was amazing. It's salty. So salty it could almost sub for potato chips! I want to find this and grow it. Sooo good.

Our big find of the trip was Brenda's French Soul Food. I looked up a few places on yelp and gave Colin the choices. He chose Brendas because "French soul food" sounded intriguing.

We got the specials on Saturday morning: eggs benedict on Brenda's amazing biscuits with cheese grits, and sweet potato pancakes. It was nothing short of perfect, especially with chicory coffee!

Bi Rite creamery was recommended by a few friends (I solicited help on Facebook), so we made the trek there Saturday night after dinner at The Slanted Door, which was also recommended. Yay for both of these places.

Sunday morning I chose to eat at Farm:Table, which was very good. A fun, simple little San Francisco experience.

But we had to end our trip the way we started it. We ate lunch on Sunday at Brenda's again. Colin was craving the grits. This time I got a goat cheese, shrimp, and caramelized onion omelette with tomato relish on top that was pretty much perfect. Oh, and watermelon iced tea. (I really want to have one of those biscuits every Saturday for the rest of my life and also learn how to make that tomato relish and iced tea.)

San Francisco!

To celebrate our first anniversary, we went to San Francisco. It was a longer drive than either of us anticipated, but we enjoyed a full day Saturday and half a day on Sunday - mostly riding our bikes up and down hills, eating at YUMMY restaurants, and seeing a few sights. It was my first time to visit the bay area, and I now see what all the hype is about. We are going to have to find another weekend to visit to see more!

The last of the China pics

I found a few more pictures from China. With all that's in the news lately, I'm thinking and praying for that part of the world now.
The meat grinder lady who also sells noodles and dumpling wrappers.




The last week we were there, it was time to make kimchi to last all winter. In China, you can actually get vegetables all winter, but it's Korean tradition to pickle and ferment cabbage in large quantities as winter comes in. So, they sell it in huge mounds on the street corners.

On Our Way Home!

This is a picture from a road we crossed in China to get to a factory where we have a few boxes stored. The taxi we were in had to stop here instead of take us all the way to our destination. When we returned down the same road later, they had filled in enough dirt to let cars pass.


We had a great month (extended a week longer than we originally intended) in China and beyond and are now waiting just another two hours in Seoul for our flight to LA!

Notes from the plane

After a hurried day of too many last minute errands, we were whisked off to the airport by some friends, boarded a plane and have landed in Seoul, an airport with free wi-fi. Just about an hour left until we board the plane for China!

With a personal TV screen where I can choose the movies and even fast forward, pause, and reverse them, even a long flight to the other side of the world goes by so quickly. I chose Sex and the City 2, The Backup Plan, and most of I Am Love (the last watched in Korean with English subtitles in a half-hearted attempt to get some listening practice).

The lady behind me has no regard for the fact that she bumps the back of my chair often. At first, because I'm irritated by the strains of the day, this bothers me and I consider giving her a look. I then decide that it won't bother me until she starts to poke my elbow when she puts her toes on the armrest. I retaliate to this by sliding my elbow a little further back.

After a dinner of bibimbap (the surprisingly good meal that Korean Air is known for), a movie and some good sleep, I wake up to find a snack size Three Musketeers bar in my shoe. I think that Colin put it there for me until I also find a half consumed ring pop stuck to my sock and realize these treats have been dropped by the 5 year old girl in front of me. Colin later wakes up to an unopened yogurt in his shoe and we feel like we've been visited by a Dutch Santa.

We disembark and find our gate, which is just next to a Starbucks. Colin fishes out some leftover Korean money he's been saving to fund my last latte for a while. The coins and bills he hands me used to be a normal part of life here but now feel odd. I speak to the Starbucks guy in my simple Korean, though, to mark this first step back into my foreign world.

Yosemite

I remember hearing about Yosemite from my sophomore year roommate Jenn Gray. She had a poster hanging above her part of the bunk bed, as I recall. Well, many years later, I finally made it, thanks to a friend who got us a coveted spot at the Upper Pines campground for 6 nights.


We took our bikes and rode them around the valley. Colin packed up our chairs and books so that we could get set up with our feet in the river to read all afternoon.




We went with our friends Raymond and Cathy, split up the meal planning, and ate all but one of our meals either on the trail or at our campground. I borrowed a dutch oven and we made veggie lasagna over the fire. Yum!

The one non-camping experience - yummy Sunday brunch at the Ahwahnee.


Huge Sequoias at Wawona.

Cooking dinner on Glacier Point with Half Dome behind us!

Our last day at Yosemite, Colin and I hiked Half Dome. After an early morning trip to the Clinic in the valley and getting lost trying to find the trail up, we were on our way.

After stopping at the base of the rock for lunch, this is what we faced. I almost told Colin I'd wait for him here. That line of people on the left side of the picture are going up holding on to cables. Going up was pretty hard, but I was glad I didn't stay at the bottom once I got to the top.

At the top of the cables.

Colin at the top with the valley below!

Going back down the cables is a lot easier, so I was able to smile some while we waited for others to come up around us.So happy to be off those cables!

The mist trail going back down from Half Dome is really beautiful! We would have taken more pictures here, but we were pretty ready to get back to camp after a 19 mile roundtrip hike!

And really happy that Ray and Cathy had curry for us to eat. As soon as we started eating it, though, we found out that there was bear in Curry Village, so we took our curry with us to get a glimpse. Colin made me take a picture of him eating curry in Curry Village before I took a picture of the bear. I think he was pretty delirious at this point.

So, we did see the bear - eating apples out of a tree. You can't really see him in the pics, but this completed our Yosemite trip!

Oh, and a last use of the dutch oven for campfire peach cobbler! Yeah!
A great trip!

Portland

We took a little trip up to Portland, where Colin's brother Boone lives, for the long weekend. We stopped by Redding on the way up and the way back, where my friend Joanne lives. We went to the Friday night service at Bethel on the way up and had dinner and loads of encouragement from her and her friends on the way back, but I didn't get any pictures of our time with her.


Colin bought two things for this trip: a bike rack for the car and a self timer for watering the garden. We loved following Boone all around downtown Portland on our bikes.


We spent the afternoon and evening at the Blues Festival, where Boone was drawn to swing the hammer. His first swing drew many oohs and aahs from the crowd.

And we ended the day on Sunday with fireworks. A lovely July 4th.