There's No Place Like Home - Not Even California Unless CA is Your Home

When we woke up that Saturday morning, we were on a mission to get those 4 suitcases packed up and ready to go. We ended up leaving our water bottles and some of our snacks with the hotel staff because we couldn’t take it with us.

We ate breakfast at the hotel and then got gas at the station on the corner. There was a car with a man, woman and child in it, and the guy was asking for money to get home. Whether he was telling the truth or scamming people wasn’t our responsibility, but we did give them $20 and Jim told the clerk they were out there.

Turning Challenger in to Enterprise was a little bittersweet.

We got to the airport a little early, but it was okay. We sat and played… wait for it… CANASTA! And we ate lunch.

I would say that leaving the area was a little tough, however, we had our family waiting for us at home, and that made it good.

The layover in Las Vegas was HOT. The airport was hot, and it was just plain hot.

It seemed like the flight into Dallas took forever, but we finally arrived! Our luggage was one of the last to come off the plane, so we stood and waited for a long time. A lady from Plano was actually waiting, too, and we started talking. They were flying home from Chicago, and we agreed that it was very nice to be home.

Jonah had to drive around the terminal several times in order for him to stop and pick us up. But finally, it happened, and we were on the road to home.

Isaac stayed up to see us, but Jesse and Caleb were asleep.

Could our trip really be over? It went by in the blink of an eye.

I wish I could explain the emotions I feel when I think about this trip and what it meant to me. Maybe someday I will have adequate words, but for now, when someone says “California,” I just smile.

Our Last Day in California

It was the last full day we had in California. A bittersweet day, to say the least.

Jim asked someone at the hotel if there was a good breakfast place around, and they said there wasn’t and we would be better off to find somewhere on our way to Sacramento.

The traffic was insane on the way! And it cost $5 to drive over a bridge. And it wasn’t even the Golden Gate Bridge. We thought about going into San Francisco and driving over it, but it would have probably added 2-3 hours onto our drive for the day. When I originally planned the hotels/drives, I thought it would be great that we only had about 80 miles to our hotel in Sacramento, that it wouldn’t take that long. But it did.

We finally stopped at an IHOP along the way. It was probably halfway between Berkeley and our destination.

This was after we watched motorcycles drive down the middle line between cars going the same direction. When the cars were stopped, the cycles drove right down the middle. It was very scary to think about what might happen to them especially remembering the accident our friend was in last year just following the rules of the road.

 

It was a weird feeling, saying goodbye to the Pacific. Seeing it was something I had wanted to do for a long time. It was one of those things in your life that you want to do but you know there is a possibility you will never see it.

But I did.

To say I fell in love with California might be a little dramatic, but I feel the passion in my heart each time I mention this trip… every time I relive a day we spent there together, just the two of us in a crowd of people with the ocean playing its symphony in the background.

And the weather had changed so much! It was about 60 the whole time we were on the coast, but just 70 miles inland, it was 90. Isn't that just crazy?

We finally made it to our hotel, which was a nice little Fairfield Inn by the airport. The room was smaller (and less expensive!) than we had been staying in, but it was pretty nice. After Jim hauled everything into the room, I wondered how we were every going to pack it all in the four suitcases we brought. We had added stuff along the way, water, snacks, souvenirs, a fan. We decided we would leave the water and the snacks we couldn’t pack away with the hotel staff.

We were both feeling the exhaustion at this point. I had such great plans for seeing the capital building after meeting a friend for dinner. But after we ate dinner, we found a Walmart (and I can’t remember why we even went there) and went back to the hotel. At 7:00, we were down in the lobby in our pajamas with our snacks and cards. We watched the Olympics women’s soccer match while playing. Finally, at 10, we were worn out and went back to the room.

It was pretty neat that we weren’t the only hotel guests that were hanging out in the lobby. People were coming in and using the microwave and making coffee and hanging around if even for a few minutes.

We didn’t take a lot of pictures this last day. Only the traffic one and this one of us with our friend and her son.

The next morning, we were packing up and heading home to see our family. We were glad to be seeing them, for sure, but we were also a little sad that our trip was coming to an end.

CA Trip Day 5 - Take 2

Oh, Day 5… I have already written this once, and deleted off my blog by accident! Of course, I didn’t keep a copy. I’ve used this as a debriefing, and now I’m going to relive it again.

Okay, so here we go…

We woke up in Pismo Beach that Wednesday morning. I actually woke up before Jim did. The seagulls were calling to each other and anyone else who would listen, so I stood next to the sliding door and watched the waves crash in, the birds flying by, and the clouds hanging low over the ocean. All of a sudden, I saw something in the water, so I woke Jim up.

 

“Hey, I think there’s a dolphin out here!” I said excitedly. “Come look!”

“Is it the rocks?” he asked.

 

And we both laughed We had already had this conversation the night before except it was him thinking it was something then. No such luck. It was the rocks.

We got ready and went down to eat breakfast at the buffet. This was the first time we had breakfast at the hotel since we had been on our trip. It was so crazy crowded! People were standing around with their plates waiting for someone to get up from the table.

After we loaded everything up again, we went to the outlet mall. Jim was looking for some different shoes, so we went into the Vans store and got a great deal. Then he thought Challenger (there is no sense in using THE before it anymore) needed a car wash. On our way out of town, we stopped at another little shopping area for some coffee at Starbucks. When we were walking by a bagel store, Broadway Bagel Café, we decided to in there instead. They were playing music from musicals, and we had some really good coffee and bagel sandwiches.

 

Then we headed down the road to Monterey.

 

We were taking the PCH, Pacific Coast Highway. I had in my mind how beautiful it would be, but nothing I imagined could compare to the actual scenery of it all. The vastness of the water and the sailboats, the people, the sights are just something I am still finding hard to find words for.

When we started heading up in the mountains near Big Sur, things started changing for me, and I was pretty nervous. I had been looking at the map for so long while planning this trip, and it seemed like there was always at least one accident on the PCH. Thankfully, we didn’t see any on our trip. The up and down, curving this way and that, it was a good thing I took Dramamine or I really would have been in trouble.

We stayed at a little place in Pacific Grove, The Best Western Plus, which was located in a residential neighborhood. When the clerk learned it was my birthday the next day and we were celebrating our 25^th anniversary, he went into the back room and came out with a bottle of wine for us, which I thought was very sweet.

This place must have been a former townhouse community because we even had garages to park in, which was a nice touch. And it was funny the number of the room we stayed in… 114. Because we consider 14 our “lucky” number. We met on the 14^th, Jim became a Christ-follower on the 14^th (the same 14^th, by the way), and our son, Caleb, was born on the 14^th. Coincidence? 

 

We only stayed in the room long enough to get settled, and then we left for our adventure in Monterey on Cannery Row. Of course, it was hard to find parking, so we paid to park in a lot on one of the ends of the street. My directions were so turned around that I can’t even tell you what direction we were.

In the meantime, our friends were giving us suggestions about places to go and restaurants. We took some advice and had dinner at Louie Linguini’s. We sat out on the patio under heating lamps. It was still foggy, damp, cloudy, and the smoke from the fires was also hanging around. It was a great location, though.

 

 

 

I kept wondering if we were ever going to see the sun set on the ocean. It hadn’t happened so far, and it was one of the things I was most looking forward to. Watching the sun disappear over the water...

After dinner, we walked around the little stores on Lighthouse Avenue. It was a lot of fun.

 

When we got back to the car, we had to drive around and search for a corkscrew for the wine because we just don’t carry one with us. We went into a Trader Joe’s because we’ve never been in one before. They were out of stock. Can you believe that? We did find one at another grocery store, and then we went back to the room and played Canasta.

When we went to bed that night, it would be my last day being 50. This trip was something that I had been looking forward to for so long, and it wasn’t disappointing. I was missing my kids, but I was not missing the Texas heat.