Pictures of My California Trip
After writing about my trip to California, I finally got all the photos associated with it uploaded to my pictures page. Inside of the gallery, it is broken up by days and then by each site I visited or took pictures of. In places where I only visited one thing I didn't see point of having another sublevel, so you'll just get the photos. Some of the photos are kind of blurry and will probably be removed as I look through all the photos again. If I left them there, you can assume there is some artistic value to them 
.
If for some reason you want to revisit my rambling posts about my trip they are here, here, here, here and here.
Day Seven, Eight, Nine and Ten of the California Trip
Thursday started out like the past few days have started out, eating breakfast in Allison's under-furnitured apartment then later on in the day, dropped our dad off at SFO and then came back to the apartment to find something good to eat. Using the wonderful website of Yelp, we decided on luch at Sweet Basil in Foster City, just a few blocks from her apartment (like most everything in Foster City from what I can tell). I had their curry and it was very good curry, although I should have asked for it to be a little more spice and heat.
A few hours later I was waiting waiting my friend, Michael at Coupa Cafe where I had their tasty Mayan Hot Chocolate. However, a few minutes after I ordered it, Michael showed up and we head out to Lake Tahoe. The trip was pretty good other than the multiple wrecks that seemed to get in the way of what was a nice fast trip. Once arriving in Tahoe we ate at T's Mesquite Rotisserie, which was a combination of Mexican food and BBQ. All the sides were typical mexican food sides like Spanish rice, black beans and tortillas and then the BBQ was pretty tasty, although not a very Texan-BBQ. After eating, we found the hotel and turned in for the night getting ready for the a day of hiking. I watched the first hour of the movie Tampopo (but I needed to go to bed, to get ready for the day of hiking).
Friday, started with a little more sleeping in and ate at Rosie's Cafe which was a few blocks away from the hotel. I had one of their "Three Egg Omlets" and some hashbrowns and toast. After breakfast we head out to Squaw Valley around 9:30am only to find out they don't really get rolling until 10:40ish-am. Once we rode up the cable car, we went right to work hiking to Squaw Peak (a good 2000 ft and 2.x miles away) from the high camp. The views from the high camp were great and even better once we got to Squaw Peak. From there you can see Lake Tahoe and the high camp. Of course, at Squaw Peak, you had watch out since there was a radiation source (aka RADAR for the FAA). Hiking back down to the main camp we then swam at the High Camp swimming pool which was cool but I couldn't swim as much because the water depth was only 4ft and I could only stay in for 30 minutes thanks to my fake pancreas. Finally, we rode down the tram back to the lower camp and took off looking for some food. Again, using the power of Yelp, we decided on Fasta Pasta since it was a 4.5/5. After eating it, I'd say it is what it is and for $10 for two people to eat, it fits the 4.5/5 score given to it on Yelp.
And, if you think the day was over after that, you'd be wrong. Since Tahoe basically shuts down after the ski places close down we drove around looking for things to do and decided to drive the perimeter of Lake Tahoe. We stopped at two state parks and a vista point. At the vista point I took some pictures of the sunset over Lake Tahoe, it was pretty although it wasn't as pretty as I had hoped since the fog (or maybe smoke from the LA fires) was hanging in the air blocking the sun as it fell below the mountains. Once the sunset was over and we got back to the hotel, we decided to walk around some and see what Tahoe had. Right next door we found a Wine Bar called Corkscrews. While there I tried a few different red wines and cheeses and ended up receiving a dessert wine from my friend for a birthday present. I suppose I'll have to try it out when I get back to Austin.
The day finally wound down with me watching the movie Tampopo. A noodle western from a Japanese director. What it had to do with westerns, I don't quite know because the movie often went completely off-topic to do some random scene (often very funny). I'll have to look for this film in the future.
Saturday was a lazy morning since we found out all the other hiking spots in the various resorts around Lake Tahoe were all shut down and hiking Squaw Valley again would be sort of boring since we had already hiked most of it the day before. We got out of Tahoe around 10am and took a scenic route to Terre Rouge Wineries. Along the way we stopped at Caples Lake around Carson Pass and took a few pictures of the lake. It wasn't near as clear as Lake Tahoe, but it was still very pretty (and the only pictures I took on Saturday). We finally made it into Terre Rouge Wineries around 2pm and did their wine tasting -- the main reason we came to this winery was their dessert wine we had at Chez TJ was very good and Michael noticed they were on the way back to San Francisco (albeit a little detour was needed). I bought a bottle of their Mourvèdre and Michael got a bottle of their Noir and we both split a case of their dessert wine (it is that good). I also purchased a container to allow me to take the wine as checked luggage on the airplane. Once on the road again we set our sites on China Village Restaurant in Berkeley in order to get some tasty Schezuan-style food and we ate a lot of it. My personal favorites of MaPo Tofu and water-boiled beef (or sometimes called Spicy Beef Fillet) were had along with a few other dishes I forgot the name of (but also tasty). This meal more than made up for missing lunch.
Finally, we made it back to Allison's apartment which is now filled with boxes and some furniture (more than the high class outdoor furniture that was there initially). I was tasked with setting up her wireless router with the Comcast service she has in her apartment. Since I'm writing about it, you know it can't be as easy as one would hope. After an hour and a half or so I ended up having to reset her router and set it up from scratch. Of course, the next step was to get the wine ready to be checked baggage (which seems a lot harder than I first thought). I placed every bottle of wine in a gallon ziploc container, then wrapped them in packing paper, then finally placed them into the aforementioned packing container. And right now I'm watching Chelsea Lately on E!, which is really damn funny and probably worth watching.. more so than the things on the main networks.
Now, in a bit of premonition, I am going to guess on what my tenth day of the trip is going to be... getting up, eating breakfast, getting to the airport, going through the lines at SFO and finally hopping onto and off of the plane a few hours later. At which point I'll be able to get all my luggage and be ready to go home and get some sleep.
Days Four and Five in California
On Monday we got up and headed out toward Hearst Castle, on the way we stopped off on some vista points on Highway 1. At the vista point I saw an Albatross resting on the ocean and got a few very nice pictures of it, then we turned into Hearst Castle. Hearst Castle (as it is called by everyone but Hearst himself, who called it a ranch) is about five miles from the visitor center where the tour starts. We chose the first tour that showed a floor of one of the guest houses and main floor of the main house. Hearst Castle's guest houses were a small 2500 to 4500 square feet compared to the main house's 17000 square feet. The grounds around the buildings were covered in ancient sculptures and columns and the houses and grounds were designed around the art. Words can't describe the opulence of the main building, even the guest houses leave you floored, the you see the main building and can't believe just what it looks like. Needless to say, I was very impressed and now need to go check out The Biltmore Estate.
After finishing up at Hearst Castle we hopped back onto The Pacific Coast Highway to make our way to Foster City. I was hoping to eat at Nepenthe on the PCH, however two problems occurred. First, the GPS unit had the restaurant marked wrong by about eight miles. Secondly, Nepenthe was completely packed and there didn't seem to be a parking spot for a good mile in either direction. So, we kept going onto the next destination, a beach in Carmel, Ca. Of course, much like Nepenthe, we had the same problem. The turn off for the beach was backed up a very, very long ways and my need for food was overcoming my need to see the beach. As such, we headed someplace to get some gasoline and eat some food. I chose Isidro's Taco Shop, a small family run shop that made some very good burritos and chimichangas.
After eating we started back out on the highway and after many, many hours and trips we finally made it to Allison's apartment. It felt nice to actually sleep in a home as to a hotel. However, the house lacked Internet (which was fixed before the trip to Muir Woods) so it felt funny to not be able to check email or cruise the Internet. I felt incomplete without my Internet .
The next day, the Comcast person showed up and got Allison some Internets (and TV, but who cares about that anyway). We then visited In and Out Burger since I wanted some cheap California-centric fast food before heading out to Muir Woods. Muir Woods is just on the north side of the Golden Gate Bridge and is home to an enormous amount of Redwoods (not the really large, drive your car through them type) on a mountain that you can walk multiple paths toward the top and even get a view of the Pacific Ocean when the weather is nice and the fog hasn't rolled in. On this day however, we didn't get to see the Pacific Ocean since the fog rolled in. Instead we enjoyed the trek around the park and I enjoyed the views of the forest and took a lot of pictures again (you should be seeing a pattern with me and pictures at this point).
I met up with a friend for dinner and had in his opinion the best Ramen noodles in the Bay Area at Maru Ichi in Mountain View. After the meal, I have to concur that they were very damn good.
Now, it is time for some sleep and getting ready for another fun-filled day of adventure tomorrow.