California Adventures

This past weekend, I visited California with my mother and sister. We arrived in Sacramento around lunch time on Saturday. We picked up our rental car and headed up to Napa. After checking in to our hotel and showering, we headed to the V marketplace in Yountville. We did some window shopping while waiting for our dinner reservation at Michael Chiarello's restaurant, Bottega. Dinner was FABULOUS and we even got a visit from the Top Chef Masters runner up himself. We woke up early the next morning and ate breakfast before heading off to tour the Robert Mondavi winery. We learned a lot about how wine is made from the growing of the grapes, to the harvest and making of the wine. We participated in a tasting before heading back to Yountville to have lunch and taste the family wines at NapaStyle (Michael Chiarello's store). We then headed our for our last tasting at the Hess winery. This one was a wine and cheese pairing. They picked some super yummy cheeses and served it with candied walnuts and cranberries. We then headed back to the hotel to rest a bit before heading to the Napa Valley Wine Train. We got to see almost the whole valley on the train ride and the food was fantastic yet again. We were super stuffed when we walked off the train that night.

Monday morning, we got up and loaded up the car for our drive down to San Francisco. We got lucky that there was no fog as we drove over the bridge although it was raining lightly. We got all checked into our hotel and then headed out to find some lunch. It was still drizzling a bit but we braved the weather and walked down to Ghirardelli Square for chocolate and then Fisherman's Wharf. We walked all the way down to pier 39 for lunch at Bubba Gump's. The food was super yummy. After lunch we walked around the pier a bit and got some crepes for dessert. After that we walked back to the hotel for a rest. We again headed out in the light rain for some dinner. This was the one meal that was disappointing. It must have been authentic Italian because it was nothing like we had ever eaten before. Thankfully we weren't very hungry because we all left quite a bit on our plates.

Tuesday morning we had to get up pretty early so we could drive down to the Ferry terminal and eat breakfast before our 9 am city tour. We boarded the tour bus and were on our way around San Francisco. Our tour guide did a fantastic job telling us the history of the city and taking us to all the most important sights. We got to see the crooked street, Nob Hill, Golden Gate Park, the Golden Gate Bridge, and a bunch of other city highlights. We had lunch in Sausalito before heading off to Muir Woods for the rest of our tour. The forest was absolutely beautiful. We got to take a nice mile long walk through the woods. After that we drove out to Muir Beach which wasn't really a beach at all. There were stairs that led out to an incredible view of the bay. Our last stop was back in Sausalito to take the ferry back to San Francisco. We had a great view of the bridge, Alcatraz and the city. The weather held up all day long until the ferry ride and thankfully it barely sprinkled. Once we got back to the car, we headed off to Union Square to eat at Rick Bayless's restaurant Frontera under Macy's. The food was super yummy and we were all really hungry. After dinner, we took the elevator up to the 8th floor to get some cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory. It was super packed which was surprising for a Tuesday. We hopped back in the car and were off to the airport.

Thankfully the airport was super easy to find and it was surprisingly easy to return our rental car. We then hopped on the tram and got to the terminal. Checked the bags, got through security and then began the long wait for our red eye flight to Chicago. This was the first red eye I'd ever taken and was shocked at how full it was. There were only a few empty seats on the whole plane. Needless to say, none of us slept well and arrived in Chicago super tired and hungry. Well I was hungry but had motion sickness from all the turbulence and chose not to eat. We made it home just around noon. I drive us all back to my parents' house and then picked up Whinnie and drove back home to Katy. All in all, it was a great trip. We got to see and do so much thanks to my mom's careful planning.

Pictures to come soon. Brian took the camera for his NYC trip before I had a chance to get them off the memory card.