And so we reach the last day. We're a little sad that its almost over but we've one day left and we're determined to enjoy it. The main highlight of the day is a tour of alcatraz!
The morning is spent collecting our alcatraz tickets and getting in a last bit of honeymoon shopping. I pick out a nice t-shirt and Izy picks up another set of Lucky brand Jeans. We look in a few other shops and make one other purchase but we dont go crazy as our cases are already close to bursting!!
Alcatraz is great. Its a shame our tickets are booked for 4pm really. That only gave us 2 hours which pretty much is the length of the audio tour of the prison part. It gave us very little time to explore the island and learn about the native indian takeover that happened after the prison closed. Still, the audio tour was really good and we get some great photos and memories to go into the scrap book!
The final evening is a repeat of the sushi from Saturday but this time we eat out for a more romantic affair.
The return leg on the Tuesday is an uneventful affair. We pay to move to the door seats which gives me more leg room than I can use and gives Izy quite a bit more as well (the door extends inwards a little). It was only $100 extra for the two seats so I'd defo do it again. Once home we crash into bed for a quick snooze and take it easy. Its sad to be home but we've had a wonderful time.
From here on out the blog will be updated much less but will cover various things I find interesting such as sport, tv, movies, games etc. Cheers for reading and check back if any of that sounds appealing.
Monday 24 September 2012
Sunday 23 September 2012
Food glorious food
Today is one of the days I've really been looking forward to!
Firstly we're going on a little bit of a food aventure. Before we got married we watched the Sanfran episode of Man v Food and it featured two places we're visiting today.
The first is a sandwhich shop in Mission called Ike's place. We order a Manage a trois on Dutch crunch bread with extra Mozzeralla sticks. Its amazing (if loaded with calories :)). I make a mental note to try and recreate it back home.
We enjoy the food in a local park that has tennis courts and basketball courts. The grounds a little wet in places and we have a private laugh as first one and then a second person try to walk down the bank to our right and completely wipe out.
Then its off to meet Izy's brother (and my new step brother) whos just moved out here with his family (wife and two kids, 3&0.5ish). We meet them also in mission and take them to the second food place. La Cumbre! Its a burito place that has apparently the best buritos in the district. I'm still pretty full from earlier so I only manage half of mine but its very tasty. I save the rest for tea as its too good to waste. After which is back to the park to hit the kiddie playground with the little ones. We spend an hour watching Jonah (the 3 year old) run, jump and swing with boundless energy. I'm tired just watching!
Tired and a little hot from all the sun we grab an icecream on the way home and say our farewells.
The evening is an exciting affair. We goto the local blues bar. Sunday nights is jam night and throughout the evening the band lineup is forever changing as local established musicians come and go. Its amazing to watch and listen to them playing and Izy and I hit the dance floor on more than one occasion to lay down some moves that are mostly stolen from our wedding routine!!
Firstly we're going on a little bit of a food aventure. Before we got married we watched the Sanfran episode of Man v Food and it featured two places we're visiting today.
The first is a sandwhich shop in Mission called Ike's place. We order a Manage a trois on Dutch crunch bread with extra Mozzeralla sticks. Its amazing (if loaded with calories :)). I make a mental note to try and recreate it back home.
We enjoy the food in a local park that has tennis courts and basketball courts. The grounds a little wet in places and we have a private laugh as first one and then a second person try to walk down the bank to our right and completely wipe out.
Then its off to meet Izy's brother (and my new step brother) whos just moved out here with his family (wife and two kids, 3&0.5ish). We meet them also in mission and take them to the second food place. La Cumbre! Its a burito place that has apparently the best buritos in the district. I'm still pretty full from earlier so I only manage half of mine but its very tasty. I save the rest for tea as its too good to waste. After which is back to the park to hit the kiddie playground with the little ones. We spend an hour watching Jonah (the 3 year old) run, jump and swing with boundless energy. I'm tired just watching!
Tired and a little hot from all the sun we grab an icecream on the way home and say our farewells.
The evening is an exciting affair. We goto the local blues bar. Sunday nights is jam night and throughout the evening the band lineup is forever changing as local established musicians come and go. Its amazing to watch and listen to them playing and Izy and I hit the dance floor on more than one occasion to lay down some moves that are mostly stolen from our wedding routine!!
Saturday 22 September 2012
A little bit of history
We wake up excited by our first day in San Francisco. Or at least we kind of do. I'm pretty hungover but Izy persuades me to get up and embrace the hotel breakfast which is passable (we've been in better places) at least until we reach the nearest Starbucks.
The sun is shining and we wander up through Union Square and north to North Beach to the Beat Museum. On the way we stumble across a Chinese Street Festival which is teeming with crowds and street stalls and generally lots of fun. I manage to get some good photos - our new camera has seen a lot of action this holiday.
The Beat Museum is really good - obviously the owners are pretty clued into the whole scene and in touch with the defendants of the legendary Neil Cassidy and the director and actors of the new film of On the Road. We have a slightly sad chat about the demise of Jack Kerouac - Izy has been re-reading Big Sur on the drive up Highway 1 - and spend quite a while looking around the museum which is really interesting and informative if a little lacking in actual stuff - the referee shirt worn by Neil Cassidy while driving Ken Kasey's Further Bus is the only actual relic of the period - although the photos and video interviews are fascinating. Afterwards we go to the famous City Lights bookshop - which was the publisher of most of the seminal Beat writing - including Howl which was the subject of an obscenity trial in the late 50s. Mindful of how small our suitcases are we try, however, not to get too carried away at the till but Izy gets a few postcards and its good to have been there.
After all of that, we're off to Fisherman's Wharf to experience the famous arcade museum. The huge former shipping warehouse has hundreds of well-preserved arcade machines and so on from as early as the late 1800s. These include Waltzer pianos and some pretty tricky antique baseball games - all completely playable. I am in my element getting to grips with a classic Star Wars arcade machine and finally the brilliant Pirates of the Caribbean pinball machine after i manage to wrestle the controls off an annoyingly tenacious 40 year old man. Izy wanders around reading up about the emergence of the fairground culture in turn of the century America and wracking up the high scores on Skee Ball.
Finally as the chill sets in in the late afternoon light, we scale the hilly heights back to our hotel where we settle in with take away sushi to watch the Real Housewives of Atlanta followed by the Real Housewives of Miami and then, for a bit of culture, the Real Housewives of New Jersey - a classic old school American hotel experience.
The sun is shining and we wander up through Union Square and north to North Beach to the Beat Museum. On the way we stumble across a Chinese Street Festival which is teeming with crowds and street stalls and generally lots of fun. I manage to get some good photos - our new camera has seen a lot of action this holiday.
The Beat Museum is really good - obviously the owners are pretty clued into the whole scene and in touch with the defendants of the legendary Neil Cassidy and the director and actors of the new film of On the Road. We have a slightly sad chat about the demise of Jack Kerouac - Izy has been re-reading Big Sur on the drive up Highway 1 - and spend quite a while looking around the museum which is really interesting and informative if a little lacking in actual stuff - the referee shirt worn by Neil Cassidy while driving Ken Kasey's Further Bus is the only actual relic of the period - although the photos and video interviews are fascinating. Afterwards we go to the famous City Lights bookshop - which was the publisher of most of the seminal Beat writing - including Howl which was the subject of an obscenity trial in the late 50s. Mindful of how small our suitcases are we try, however, not to get too carried away at the till but Izy gets a few postcards and its good to have been there.
After all of that, we're off to Fisherman's Wharf to experience the famous arcade museum. The huge former shipping warehouse has hundreds of well-preserved arcade machines and so on from as early as the late 1800s. These include Waltzer pianos and some pretty tricky antique baseball games - all completely playable. I am in my element getting to grips with a classic Star Wars arcade machine and finally the brilliant Pirates of the Caribbean pinball machine after i manage to wrestle the controls off an annoyingly tenacious 40 year old man. Izy wanders around reading up about the emergence of the fairground culture in turn of the century America and wracking up the high scores on Skee Ball.
Finally as the chill sets in in the late afternoon light, we scale the hilly heights back to our hotel where we settle in with take away sushi to watch the Real Housewives of Atlanta followed by the Real Housewives of Miami and then, for a bit of culture, the Real Housewives of New Jersey - a classic old school American hotel experience.
Friday 21 September 2012
Goodbye little car! You served us well!
So this is it. We grab breakfast and enjoy a chat with some of the other guests about American politics, Obamacare, OJ Simpson and Drug companies before loading up the car and setting off on our last journey to San Fransisco. Its uneventful until we get to the bay bridge which is massive and actually rather fun if a little slow (city traffic!). Its also made the more lively by the fact that the fuel needle is on E as I was doing my best to get to car drop off with as little fuel in as possible to save money. A task thats made harder by the gauge not being to scale! (at least it seems that way). After the bridge I bite the bullet and put in a little fuel to play it safe and we drive the last few miles to the hotel. Parking is a crazy $39 dollars so we swing round the corner and park in a multi storey that is still crazy at $3 for 15 mins but then we're only dropping the bags at this point. We do that and then drop the car off. We wave good bye and head out for a little explore which as per usual includes a coffee from Starbucks.
The evening involves us walking to the Ferry building at the far east of the city to meet up with Anya's friend Gina. We do so and head to a local cocktail bar and begin throwing back white russians and Boscia's. We chat for ages and are having a great time but Gina has to head to a house party. She invites us too and hey, why not! The party is on the other side of town so we take our first bus journey and head over there. On the way Gina warns us of the area called the tenderloin that sits between our hotel and the party we're going to. "Don't walk it at night" she warns.
The party is fun but we don't stay too long and end up getting a taxi back to the hotel. All in all a lovely first day in SF!
The evening involves us walking to the Ferry building at the far east of the city to meet up with Anya's friend Gina. We do so and head to a local cocktail bar and begin throwing back white russians and Boscia's. We chat for ages and are having a great time but Gina has to head to a house party. She invites us too and hey, why not! The party is on the other side of town so we take our first bus journey and head over there. On the way Gina warns us of the area called the tenderloin that sits between our hotel and the party we're going to. "Don't walk it at night" she warns.
The party is fun but we don't stay too long and end up getting a taxi back to the hotel. All in all a lovely first day in SF!
Thursday 20 September 2012
Wine, wine, pizza and a star!
Today is the big day for Napa. We've planned two wine tastings and a Michelin Star restaurant for the evening.
First up is the Sterling vineyard in northern Napa. The tour is $20 each (inc $5 discount) and starts with a cable car ride up to the tasting and wine production area. From there we go on a 2 hour self guided tour with 5 tasting stops along the way. The tour describes the whole wine making process and is a mixture of text boards, videos and actual wine making rooms and equipment. Its a fascinating insight into what goes on behind the scenes.
We get to sample a couple of reds and a couple of whites but the star for me is a 2011 Riesling reserve desert wine. Its sweet and honey flavour is exactly what I like and I buy a bottle from the shop. Izy goes for a $22 Cabernet Sauvignon.
The second vineyard is Mumm about halfway up the Silverado trail (the road that splits the two mountain ridges that form the napa valley and give the wine its world beating properties). Its speciality is sparkling wine so this place is heaven for Izy. We pay $20 for three full glasses of expensive sparkling wine. Two white's (one brut and one Cuvee M) and one Rose. The sweeter Cuvee M is my fav but Izy prefers the Brut (actually made from exactly the same grapes). However we're not blown away and so pick up a little one serving bottle instead of a full 750ml bottle.
Dinner is a pizza back at the B&B followed by a 2h nap to ensure we're able to last for the 9:30 appointment at Bouchon in Yountville. This is Thomas Kellers second restaurant in Napa and he once joked he built it so he'd have somewhere to go after a hard night cooking at the 5 (yes really) Michelin stared French Laundry (so exclusive they apparently once told Julia Roberts she wasn't famous enough and theres typically a month wait). Given theres a 3* restaurant in Napa we looked at which was $1000 a night a shudder to think what it costs at the Laundry.
Bouchon is lovely and we have a wonderful time eating expertly prepared roast chicken and Tuna. We, not very subtly, drop in we're on our honeymoon and are treated to a complementary book with articles about the restaurants and a host of recipes which is great!
Naturally we're shattered afterwards and fall asleep watching Conan. Tomorrow is the final leg of our journey and the last time we'll be in the car. I'm actually a little sad!
First up is the Sterling vineyard in northern Napa. The tour is $20 each (inc $5 discount) and starts with a cable car ride up to the tasting and wine production area. From there we go on a 2 hour self guided tour with 5 tasting stops along the way. The tour describes the whole wine making process and is a mixture of text boards, videos and actual wine making rooms and equipment. Its a fascinating insight into what goes on behind the scenes.
We get to sample a couple of reds and a couple of whites but the star for me is a 2011 Riesling reserve desert wine. Its sweet and honey flavour is exactly what I like and I buy a bottle from the shop. Izy goes for a $22 Cabernet Sauvignon.
The second vineyard is Mumm about halfway up the Silverado trail (the road that splits the two mountain ridges that form the napa valley and give the wine its world beating properties). Its speciality is sparkling wine so this place is heaven for Izy. We pay $20 for three full glasses of expensive sparkling wine. Two white's (one brut and one Cuvee M) and one Rose. The sweeter Cuvee M is my fav but Izy prefers the Brut (actually made from exactly the same grapes). However we're not blown away and so pick up a little one serving bottle instead of a full 750ml bottle.
Dinner is a pizza back at the B&B followed by a 2h nap to ensure we're able to last for the 9:30 appointment at Bouchon in Yountville. This is Thomas Kellers second restaurant in Napa and he once joked he built it so he'd have somewhere to go after a hard night cooking at the 5 (yes really) Michelin stared French Laundry (so exclusive they apparently once told Julia Roberts she wasn't famous enough and theres typically a month wait). Given theres a 3* restaurant in Napa we looked at which was $1000 a night a shudder to think what it costs at the Laundry.
Bouchon is lovely and we have a wonderful time eating expertly prepared roast chicken and Tuna. We, not very subtly, drop in we're on our honeymoon and are treated to a complementary book with articles about the restaurants and a host of recipes which is great!
Naturally we're shattered afterwards and fall asleep watching Conan. Tomorrow is the final leg of our journey and the last time we'll be in the car. I'm actually a little sad!
Wednesday 19 September 2012
Napa
*(Bit behind at the moment. Will try to catch up later today)
We leave Monterey early and head up to Napa. The views are once again amazing and Izy takes lots of photos on the camera. It takes us about 2 and bit hours to make it to Napa and we park outside of this typical looking American early 20th century house. It looks better then the other houses on the street and the garden looks especially pretty. So far so good. Inside we're welcomed by Lorri and shown around and to our room. The place is great! (Monterey is now just a memory!) We're in the 'duck nook' extension. We've got a nice big and fancy room and a spacious bathroom with a two person spa bath. Lorri tells us that if we use the whole vial of bubble bath we can play hide and seek later.
Our first afternoon in Napa then consists of us heading to a winery called Luna after a recommendation from the Concierge Bonnie. Its not far and we're the only people there which is great because it means we can ask all the questions we want and take our time. The steward tells us all about how wine gets its flavours and hows its made and why certain wines have certain names and characteristics etc. We try 10 different wines and decide to purchase a bottle of white that we enjoyed. I actually try 6 different red wines but I still struggle to find them enjoyable (too smokey for me).
After luna we head to a place called Oxbow market which is a bit of a mini mall with stalls and stands selling local produce and treats etc. We buy some special cooking oils and a handful of special chocs. Then its back to the B&B for cheese and nibbles and a guide on where we should go while in Napa. At this session we meet 2 other couples around our age and we get talking for so long that its gone dark before we end. We quickly get changed and head out into town for dinner at a nice Fish restaurant called 'Fish Story'. We start with a delicious Tomato and Halloumi salad and then I go for cod and chips (nice and safe) while Izy goes for whole sole. They weren't kidding tho, its huge! Its tail is wrapped round and poked through its mouth to create a kind of ring look. Izy does very well but concedes defeat about 2/3'rds in. Then its back to the B&B for sleep!
We leave Monterey early and head up to Napa. The views are once again amazing and Izy takes lots of photos on the camera. It takes us about 2 and bit hours to make it to Napa and we park outside of this typical looking American early 20th century house. It looks better then the other houses on the street and the garden looks especially pretty. So far so good. Inside we're welcomed by Lorri and shown around and to our room. The place is great! (Monterey is now just a memory!) We're in the 'duck nook' extension. We've got a nice big and fancy room and a spacious bathroom with a two person spa bath. Lorri tells us that if we use the whole vial of bubble bath we can play hide and seek later.
Our first afternoon in Napa then consists of us heading to a winery called Luna after a recommendation from the Concierge Bonnie. Its not far and we're the only people there which is great because it means we can ask all the questions we want and take our time. The steward tells us all about how wine gets its flavours and hows its made and why certain wines have certain names and characteristics etc. We try 10 different wines and decide to purchase a bottle of white that we enjoyed. I actually try 6 different red wines but I still struggle to find them enjoyable (too smokey for me).
After luna we head to a place called Oxbow market which is a bit of a mini mall with stalls and stands selling local produce and treats etc. We buy some special cooking oils and a handful of special chocs. Then its back to the B&B for cheese and nibbles and a guide on where we should go while in Napa. At this session we meet 2 other couples around our age and we get talking for so long that its gone dark before we end. We quickly get changed and head out into town for dinner at a nice Fish restaurant called 'Fish Story'. We start with a delicious Tomato and Halloumi salad and then I go for cod and chips (nice and safe) while Izy goes for whole sole. They weren't kidding tho, its huge! Its tail is wrapped round and poked through its mouth to create a kind of ring look. Izy does very well but concedes defeat about 2/3'rds in. Then its back to the B&B for sleep!
Tuesday 18 September 2012
High's to Low's
We've had such a lovely time in Big sur that we really don't want it to end. Thus after breakfast and packing our bags we decide to go on the midday hike. This is a paid excursion that lasts about 2-3 hours that visits one of the many hiking areas around big sur with a guide. In essence its much like yesterdays walk only longer and off property. Deciding what to do today was a toss up between the hike and heading to Monterey early, as we're only there for one night, so we cross fingers and hope we've made the right decision.
The hike is wonderful. We head about 10 miles south from the spa in our cars and then head inland on foot. The track quickly defends into the redwood forest and then heads uphill following a river that we're told forms further up from a natural spring (we ask if its drinkable but are told that while its pure further up its probably a little risky this low down as theres properties further up).
After following the, sometimes narrow, path for about 35 mins we get to a 15 foot waterfall. Its very picturesque (the whole trip has been really) and I take off my shoes and wade over to it. Isabella has slightly better shoes than me and is able to navigate the rocks in the river like stepping stones and we stand together just in front of the fall as the guide takes our picture.
After the waterfall we head back to the cars to collect a packed lunch and then head down the road opposite towards the sea. At the bottom is a little rocky cove with a few pebble towers made by previous hikers. Its quite a lovely place but we're not eating here. We head through a small tunnel and find ourselves standing up on a cliff overlooking the sea. Ignoring a stop/warning sign we walk out to the edge and sit down for lunch. Bliss.
Unfortunately thats it for Big Sur and we begin the drive to Monterey crossing our fingers its not a big let down after the wonderful time we've just had. It really couldn't have been more different. The hotel isn't great despite being labelled as a luxury hotel. The room, while decent sized, has odd pillars in it that make it claustrophobic. It also has just one small window and a tiny balcony that has a 10 foot wall on 3 sides.
We head into town and find a nice place for a crepe but most of the main street is tourist fair and such. We head inland and find an ok BBQ joint and decide to eat and get an early night. The food is decent and our good spirits from earlier carry us through. In fact we think that somehow despite the big let down we've still had a decent time and in the end fall asleep watching big bang theory.
Tomorrow we head to Napa to begin our wine odyssey. We're in a B&B so we've no idea what to expect in terms of quality. It can't be as bad as this surely?
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