The next day was spent driving up the Pacific Coast with breathtaking views and the occasional stop to take pictures. At one point we came up on Elephant Seal Beach. What I sight to behold! Enormous beasts littered the beach. These creatures are big!!!! Looking like an Elephant crossed with a mermaid that has an eating disorder. Apparently December is mating season so there was a lot of commotion with the males.
We pulled over at one point to see the view and up the road came this dude that blew me away! Pretty sure this was Jesus reincarnated. This is how I would want him to come to me if he ever did! :) Ha ha
Pretty sure he was riding a walmart special in low gear pulling a trailer. all his belongings wrapped in a tarp. I said thats how you do it. he said "it's a one way trip my friend!" for some reason this hit home. awesome.
Eventually we maid it to Graeme's house. We met with Graeme, Karen and baby Emma. What a beautiful family! Good work Graeme :) Graeme then took us to a great Burrito Joint!
The next day after going out to breakfast with our hosts Graeme took Anne and Myself for a bike ride all around San Fransisco. I'm so glad we brought the bikes!
After the ride Graeme took us to an amazing Indian restaurant where we enjoyed delicious Indian food! Yummy!!!
The next day we woke early even though we were tired from the day previous. We loaded up and after breakfast started heading east for Toronto.
The first night we stayed in Nevada. The next day we decided to pull an all nighter and try to make our way to Ann Arbor, Michigan - but about 2 in the morning the weather got really poor and shut down the Interstate. We tried to find a hotel but the one we went to was closed so we slept in the car.
(wal mart looking for stocking stuff)Today we are still stranded at the Quality Inn waiting for the roads to open. At least we have each other today :)
Merry Christmas Everyone!
anne: we left venice a little later than expected but just in time to see the sunset at a beach close to santa monica along hwy 1 and camped there for the night. our spot was between highway and ocean and the ocean was so loud at times i thought it would take us under during the night! we made pasta with bok choy salads (donated to us by Matt Potter from his very own garden) and blueberry pancakes the next morning and headed toward san francisco. we also snacked on the bok choy in the car.
It was mostly foggy throughout hwy 1 but still pretty beautiful. we stopped to see the elephant seals and then the sun finally broke through the clouds late afternoon and gave us some wonderful pix! we stopped at one point just before big sur when the sun was breaking through.
we arrived in san francisco later that night at jon's friend gram, karen, and 1 1/2 yr old emma's apartment. the next morning we went to bernie's for coffee, la boulange for breakfast, then rode around san francisco on bikes with gram. we saw all kinds of cool things by bike, thanks to gram's lead! jon got a little queasy on the golden gate bridge so we turned around halfway : ) thank goodness gram wasn't serious about riding up the really big hills...I can't imagine people riding bikes up those steep streets but maybe they do? that night he took us to the most awesome indian restaurant called chutney and ordered his favorite dishes for us to try. we later met jon's friend captain brownie at a bar called blur, then headed home via the zeitgeist bar - which we now wish we'd skipped... the next morning we ate breakfast at la boulange and ordered large coffees which came in soupbowls, then headed out toronto bound on 80...
by the time we reached close to cheyenne, wyoming, we saw nothing but white - and realized we were being blinded by a snowstorm and spent the night in our car beside the post office in elk mountain, wyoming b/c we couldn't travel any further and there were no hotels around!
(waking up in the car)
we drove further in the morning but made it only to laramie, wyoming when we found out 80 was closed. we ate an awesome breakfast buffet at a truck stop and found a great deal at the pet friendly quality inn with an indoor pool and spent christmas day there. we opened stockings we made for each other and skyped our families but we're really bummed about not following through with our visiting plans : (
rudee even looked bummed, even after giving her some chew stix in her stocking.
waiting on the road to clear up, we walked around the town - which is very cool, and had hot tea and awesome soup at a place called jeffery's.
