Grand Cayman 3/29/10

Today we went on an excursion to Grand Cayman. We took a brief glass bottom boat tour along the coast and saw a sea turtle swimming underneath. The land tour took us through Georgetown and along Seven Mile Beach (which the driver said was 5.5 miles long). The topography was very flat, but had a thriving shopping district, which is always good for me!

Seven Mile Beach

The best part of the excursion took us to a turtle farm. It was a hatchery for sea turtles. They had numerous tanks for the turtles in various stages of development. I loved seeing the full-grown turtles because they were so graceful as they swam. See the video clip below:



Sea turtles video clip

The conservationist allowed us to hold six-month-old turtles. They were very active flapping their flippers. You really needed a firm grip!

Jan and Ed

Sam

Kitty, only frogs turn into a prince!

As we walked through the park, a couple of iguanas were observing us from the palm trees above. I think this one was in desparate need of a manicure!

There was actually a lot more to the turtle farm, but we were "green wrist band" people as part of an excursion.  If you go to the turtle farm on your own, you can walk through the rest of the park and actually snorkel with the turtles.  It was a really cool place to visit.

Kevin petting an 18-month-old turtle.

Feeding Time Video Clip

The last stop on our tour was the town of Hell. Apparently, there are some strange rock formations in this town that light up a blazing orange-red in the afternoon sunset, thus the name. It was definitely a tourist trap, but interesting to see. Now when someone tells you to "Go to Hell", you will know where you're headed!

Kitty and our tour guide in Hell.

Once the official tour was done, Kevin, Ed and Sam returned to the ship for some R and R. We were pretty tired from the hot sun. Kitty and I stayed on the island to shop and get some lunch.

We grabbed a cheap $58 each burger lunch at the Paradise Restaurant. We didn't care, it was so relaxing outside by the water and exactly what we were looking for.

After our tour of Grand Cayman, Mike's family hosted a delicious Italian dinner for all of us at Portofino Restaurant on the ship.  Somehow I managed to have three alcoholic beverages at once.  Thanks Dani for capturing this Kodak moment!

Kelli and Mike's Wedding Cruise

Kelli and Mike celebrated their wedding day in Ochos Rios, Jamaica on March 30, 2010.  Family and friends were invited to join them on a Royal Caribbean cruise and we set sail from Miami on 3/27/10 for five nights.

Welcome aboard!

                 Our ship Navigator of the Seas.

                                           Pre-wedding photos in the Bolero Lounge.  

            

Monkey

Each night when we returned to our room, the housekeeper would leave us a towel animal on our bed.  The funniest had to be the monkey hanging from the ceiling.  In the dark it looked like some sacrificial ritual had been performed while we were away!

Dog

Stingray

February 15, 2010

No trip is complete without antics from the dogs.  They were very well behaved, which makes a nice trip for us.  We are really enjoying the motorhome and I think the dogs like it too!

Ingonish

Cabot

After saying our goodbyes, I drove the motorhome back to Milpitas.  Cabot was tucked under my seat and I couldn't even see his head.  Ingonish fell asleep draped over the passenger's seat, too bored by the bumper-to-bumper traffic on Route 101 to stay awake!

Hearst Castle

On Valentine's Day, we drove to Hearst Castle in San Simeon, roughly two hours south of Monterey on Route 1.  This 40,000 acre property was originally used as a camping retreat by a wealthy miner named George Hearst.  It was later inherited by his son and newspaper magnate, William Randolph Hearst, who built numerous guest houses, pools and gardens to flank a magnificent Mediterranean style main house, called Casa Grande.  In the 1920's-30's, this private retreat entertained many celebrities and business tycoons for fancy dinner parties and movie screenings.   The 250,000 acre property was actually a ranch, complete with orchards and farm animals for sustainability due to its remote location on the hill.  The over 60,000 square foot main house was built in the Gothic style, which is why it resembles a castle or cathedral.

We boarded a bus at the visitor's center and drove a couple miles up a windy road to the house.  There are still some animals grazing there today.  In 1923,  Hearst built the largest private zoo in the world to house exotic animals as if in their "natural" state.  He even had a special section for polar bears.  Imagine recreating an arctic environment in central California for the bears to survive.

As we approached the property, we could see why this was such a prime location.  The view was breathtaking.  It didn't hurt that it was a gorgeous day!  Since the property was perched up high, you could see the beautiful green hillside from one vantage point, or turn and see the fog hovering over the Pacific from another angle.  Kevin and I enjoyed the view from the outside more than the house itself.  The grounds were spectacular.  The orchards had plenty of fuit on the trees throughout the property.  The gardens and terraces were filled with marble statues imported from Europe and Egypt. 

One of the many guest houses on the property.  The only bedrooms we were allowed to see on this particular tour were in the guest houses.

Our favorite part of the whole tour was the outdoor Neptune Pool.  There were three rennovations on this pool in order to provide Hearst's wife and children with a large pool for swimming.  Hearst Family descendants still use this pool for parties today.  The Roman structures surrounding the pool were men's and women's dressing rooms.  It was an amazing site. 

          Terrace overlooking the Neptune Pool

The main house itself was filled with antiques from all over the world.  Hearst wanted to recreate the grandeur of the castles he had seen in Europe.  The golden gates in front of the doorways were from a convent.  He had the largest collection of antique Spanish ceilings in the world on this propery.  I didn't know there was such a thing.  Everything in his house was a collectible from his travels abroad and could not be touched.  I had half a foot off the designated carpet path and the tour guide reprimanded me.  He wasn't very friendly.  Thank God for our main guide Linda, who was very nice and informative.

Inside the main house was a collection of various themes.  This common room was used to entertain guests.  The wood is very dark inside, even on a sunny day.  If you look closely, you will see a painting of the Madonna and Child, a Roman marble statue, and tapestries that often came from Finland.  There wasn't a common theme in the room, which is a style he carried throughout the house.  We had to laugh at the many religious references throughout the property due to the fact that he became estranged from his wife and took on a mistress.  His parties were a way for important people to have a good time.  It was a very indulgent lifestyle that actually turned us off.  He used his wealth to entertain, make exhorbitant rennovations and to create a lavish lifestyle just because he could.  I was surprised they didn't talk about any philanthropies or other charitable ways of spending his wealth.  He wanted what he wanted at whatever the cost.  It's no wonder he fell on hard financial times by the late 1930's.

                    Dining Room in the Main House

This is the indoor Roman Pool located in the main house.  It was completely tiled and accented with gold.  It was beautiful and our favorite part of the indoor tour.

After Hearst died in the 1950's, the entire property was donated to California State Parks.  If you are interested in learning about the history of Hearst Castle, click on the following link:

http://www.hearst-castle.org/history/index.asp.

On the way back to our campsite, we came upon the quaint town of Cambria and enjoyed a casual Valentine's Dinner at Mustache Pete's.  I was sorry to see the day come to an end!

Valentine's Weekend on the Coast

Kevin and I both had three days off for President's Weekend.  He was still at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, so we decided I would go down there.  Since we had gotten the new motorhome, I had only driven it around the block.  I was a little nervous, but the dogs and I drove down to Monterey on Friday 2/12/10.  It actually went very well.  The directions were easy, Ingonish didn't throw up, and the RV handled better than I expected.  I met up with Kevin at a campground at Laguna Seca.  The campsites overlook a large racetrack.  I'm not sure if there was a race that weekend, but plenty of cars were enjoying a casual 100 mph drive around the track.  When Kevin and I linked up, the dogs practically jumped over me in my seat to get to him.  I got a dozen red roses, and Kevin got his driver's seat back in the RV.  It was win-win.  What a great start to Valentine's weekend!

Saturday, we had a nice breakfast in the city of Monterey at Black Bear Diner.  They are a chain of diners on the west coast that have excellent food and customer service.  We went to one in Oregon previously, and this one didn't disappoint. 

During the afternoon, we (Kevin) took the dogs for a walk near the wharf in Monterey.  It was an absolutely breathtakingly gorgeous weekend.  It's so strange to not have snow in the winter, but we'll take it while we're here.  Vendors were set up in the common area near the wharf.  Later on, we walked the Recreation Trail along the water to get our favorite Ghirardelli sundaes.  It was a little tougher walking back with all that ice cream on board.

The view from our table at Ghirardelli

After a well-deserved nap, we had dinner at one of our favorite Italian restaurants on the wharf, Isabella's.  Kevin needed to get a few things from his room at NPS.  So before heading back to our campsite, we took a little tour around the school grounds.  It was a beautiful campus, even at night.  Not a bad gig if you were going to be living there for a period of time.  Because the weather there is so mild, you would occasionally see raccoons walking around looking for scraps from dinner.  This little guy was very curious about us and stood on his hind legs to get a better view.  I'm sure he was hoping for a late night snack!

Eric's Visit

My cousin Eric has been living with his family in Melbourne Australia for the past number of years.  I haven't seen him since he left.  So when I heard he was going to be in the Bay Area on business in January, I was excited to see him and hang out. 

He flew in to San Francisco Saturday 1/30/10, but didn't have to report for his conference until Monday night.  That gave us plenty of time to catch up.  Eric was our first official overnight guest since we moved here last summer and I was a little nervous about how the dogs would react.  They loved him!  They loved being in his room and sniffing all his bags.  They were good and there were no mishaps!  Hopefully he didn't mind them too much!

Kevin had to report to the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey the next day for a month-long intense class "Security, Stability and Development", so he was not able to hang out with us. Eric had a big shopping list of items he couldn't get in Australia or were very expensive, so we headed out for a day at the mall. I'm sure Kevin was sorry he missed it ;)

Monarch at the Rainforest.  I was glad none of them landed on me.  The reality is, they are just bugs with wings!

                                                                

                                           Gotta love those Madagascar cockroaches!

I took Monday off so we could do a little sightseeing.  Eric and I headed up to San Francisco's Golden Gate Park to go to the California Academy of Sciences Museum.  The city is so much less crowded on a weekday!  The museum was very cool.  They had an aquarium and rainforest, a planetarium that we didn't have time to see, African penguin exhibit and plenty of bugs, lizards and other creatures of the land and sea from around the world.  Their focus was on conservation and they do a lot of research right on site.  It was a really cool place and a lot of fun.  I wish I brought my camera with me.  All I had was my phone.  There was so much to see, I could have gotten some amazing pictures! 

Dinner was at the Hard Rock Cafe on pier 39.  We got a great view of the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz Island along the way.  Even though we made a few wrong turns a couple of times, I was pretty impressed with my first drive into the city.  I'm used to riding shotgun fast asleep!

Thanks for visiting Eric.  I had a great time!

Christmas in Oregon

Kevin and I once again packed up the motorhome on 12/23/09 to celebrate Christmas in Oregon.  We wanted some colder weather and to experience the holiday in a small downtown.  There were many Indian casinos along our route through Northern California into Oregon.  They are large resorts with RV parks.  We stayed in two of them, one in CA, called Rolling Hills, and one in Canyonville, OR, called Seven Feathers.  They were very pet friendly and had a fenced in yard so the boys could run around freely. 

After the first night on Christmas Eve, the weather became chillier as we headed north.  The mountaintops were covered in snow and the trees were lightly frosted.  We passed Mount Shasta along the way.  You could see it for miles and miles, but this was my favorite view.  It was finally beginning to feel more like Christmas!

Christmas Day was very relaxing.  We slept in (as much as the dogs would let us) and enjoyed the NFL before dinner.  The resort had a traditional Christmas dinner buffet that was very delicious.  We decided to play a few slots before heading back to the RV.  We passed by a free Cabaret show in the lounge, so we stopped to see what it was about.  It was a musical Christmas extravaganza in drag!  My favorite number was "I want a boob job for Christmas......."  I thought Kevin was going to pass out.  I tried to take a picture with my phone, but was told I should stop before security got to me.  Apparently drag queens are camera shy.  It was a hoot!

It took three attempts to get our Christmas photo,  but we had fun in the process.  The dogs had to either face front or be out of the picture! 

 Take 1

Take 2

Take 3!

We headed back to Milpitas the day after Christmas with some scenic stops along the way.  The first was Grants Pass, OR and the other was Jacksonville, OR, which was decorated like a Victorian village.  The restaurants during our trip played traditional Christmas carols and the feeling was very festive, exactly what we were looking for.  We didn't have a lot of plans, but enjoyed just being together.  We hope you all had a Very Merry Christmas with many blessings to come in 2010!