California Trip, Part One

Kenny's sister Debbie and her family live in Berkeley, California. The boys, especially Riley, have been wanting to go visit them for a long time. Well, we finally made that happen this summer. We spent 6 days out there at the end of July and had an amazing time.

The whole family flew out of New Orleans on July 27. The boys hadn't been on an airplane for a few years, so they were pretty excited. And they did really well on all of our flights. They snacked, they cuddled with their friends, they played games, and they watched movies and tv shows.

We flew into the San Francisco airport and took the BART out to Berkeley. Debbie and Paul picked us up at the station right down the hill from their house. We were finally in California!

We had a really great dinner at their house the first night, with lots of different options from a place called Market Hall. Kenny and I also got to see the massive renovations Debbie and Paul had done a few years ago. Their house looks totally different than it did when we were last there in 2009. It's built into a hill, and the views from their new deck are pretty stellar. It quickly became my favorite place to sit in the evenings.

Since there were 8 of us invading their space, sleeping arrangements got a little creative. Kenny, Grandpa, and I ended up at an AirBnB less than a mile from Deb's house (which was a super cool place; see pics below). Riley and Rory slept in the new bonus room addition at the house, Grandma took over Nicholas's room, and Steve and Zac bunked in James's room. James actually stayed with us at the AirBnb for a few nights before he decided to just sleep on the couch in his own house. It all worked out pretty well, and Kenny and I somehow escaped any morning responsibility for our boys!

I wasn't sure how the boys would handle the planned activity on our first full day there, what with being up late the night before, sleeping in a strange place, and dealing with the time change, but they ended up doing great. We all drove over to Mill Valley and went for a hike in Muir Woods. Kenny and I hiked there ten years ago, and it's still just as peaceful and beautiful as it was back then.

We started at a trail head near the top of a ridge and dropped down into the valley. We were supposed to make a complete loop and end up back where we started, but we ran out of time. We had lunch reservations at Mountain Home Inn, located across the street from our starting point, so most of the guys hiked back up the way we had come and hightailed it to the restaurant. Meanwhile, the rest of us continued down into the valley and ended up at the Muir Woods Visitor Center, where Paul picked us up and drove us back up to lunch.

We sat outside in the glorious weather and had a great lunch at Mountain Home. However, I failed to put sunscreen on and got pretty sunburned. Totally worth it, though. You can't beat the view.

After our leisurely lunch, we drove down to Muir Beach so we could see and touch the Pacific Ocean. The water was freezing (Paul estimated around 55 degrees), but I really think Rory would have dove right in if he had had his bathing suit. He ended up getting mostly soaked anyway; he had so much fun. Riley too.

We got back to the house around 6:30 that evening. We picked up dinner from Cactus, a great Mexican place near their house, and settled in for a relaxing night. Lots more to come!