We woke up this morning to a nice marine layer and a mist in
the air. Felt a lot like home! We ate a breakfast of convenience at a
restaurant that doesn’t deserve a mention on THIS blog. Then we headed down the
Redwood Highway through beautiful green, rolling hills covered with grape
vines, apple trees, grazing sheep and cows and beautiful wild flowers. It was
amazing and my mom made me take pictures the whole way. Finally we reached Sana
Rosa where found a restaurant from a Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives show. We were
so excited to get to California where they know how to make Mexican food the
right way. We weren’t disappointed and I found my enchiladas to have plenty of “kick”.
The star of the show was my dad’s dish which was called molcajete. It was
served in a large caldron looking pot which kept it hot from first bite to
last. It was filled with chicken, steak, shrimp, cheese, green peppers, green
onions, and a spicy tomato sauce. It was served with home-made corn tortillas,
rice and beans. Mom’s dish was called huarache and she said the flavor of the meat
was out of this world. Her favorite part of the meal was the white beans. They
were so much better than the refried beans we get at Mexican restaurants in
Seattle. Since Mexican isn’t my favorite I hope this is our last stop at a
Mexican restaurant but I’m going to have to hold my ground since both mom and
dad LOVE Mexican food.
Enchiladas |
Fish Tacos |
Huarache |
Hamburger |
Molcajete |
We couldn't visit Santa Rosa without a quick stop at the house where my dad lived for a big portion of his mission almost 30 years ago! To our surprise the house was still standing and it looked the same to dad except that it wasn't yellow any more. We stopped to take a quick photo and that made dad happy.
There’s no way you could be anything but happy after a meal
like this but the day just seemed to get better and better. We drove over to
the coast to Bodega Bay and we hiked down the cliff to the water. It was
amazing and so fun and we took a ton of pictures and tried to avoid the waves
since the water was freezing! Then we drove up highway 1 along the coastline to
our next stop – the giant redwoods in Muir Woods. Could this day get any
better? We took a leisurely stroll through the woods and we read most of the
plaques describing the majestic trees and their “life stories”. There was a
stream running through the pathway and it was so soothing and peaceful. We
stayed as long as Michael had patience for and then we got back in the car and
headed toward San Francisco – finally! We drove up the hill out of Muir Woods
and when we reached the top we got our first glimpse of the city. I was so
excited.
We drove to a great lookout to see the Golden Gate Bridge.
There were a lot of people there but we managed to find a place to pull off the
road and get some pictures of this amazing structure. Seeing it in real life
was so much better than all the pictures I’d seen in the movies and on
television. Then we drove down the hill and across the bridge and dad found our
hotel, thank you car navigation system. To say that this hotel is an
improvement over last night’s dump is an understatement. Our room has a view of
the Bay and Alcatraz Island is right there! They took care of our luggage for
us, park our car in some secret place and told us a good place to grab a quick
dinner since it was almost 8 pm and we were starving, don’t know how that’s
possible but we were.
Dinner was just up the street and Lou’s. We ordered a crab
bisque soup to share and it was delicious. Mom ordered a hamburger and I ordered
fish and chips but we decided to do a switcheroo because she liked mine better
and I liked her hamburger better so it was a win/win for both of us. Dad had a
chicken breast and veggies – boring! He keeps reminding us that SOMEONE has to
be good on this trip. That might have been true for dinner but he was about
ready to blow it because I had a plan.
I’ve been wanting to visit Ghiradelli Square ever since we
started planning this trip. We walked up this hill to get to the square from
where we had dinner. There is a huge sign over the top of the square that says
Ghiradelli. As we walked into one of the chocolate stores we were handed
chocolate samples that had a bunny in it for Easter. We walked around the store
for a little bit and no joke ever corner seemed to be filled with some sort of
chocolate goodness. While we were in the store dad was waiting in line for us,
so that we could get some ice cream. Dad orders a banana milkshake with no
banana, because he wanted a chocolate caramel milkshake. This was more vanilla
ice cream with their caramel chocolate bar all crunched in it. Mom got a salted
caramel Sunday and it was yummy! It had vanilla ice cream chocolate sauce and
caramel sauce and whipped cream. I got an ice cream Sunday with cookie on the
bottom and yet again mom liked my ice cream better. Michael Goober got just a
one scoop ice cream Sunday he ended up eating more of dad’s than his own.
I didn't know your dad served his mission there - very cool! Loved the pics of you and Goober with the bridge in the background...love the Mexican food...how can you not love it as much as me?!?! Love reading about your meals...makes me hungry...gee, maybe I'll go snack on a rice cake or something since I missed Zumba...yet again.
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