Mr. Joe made the journey out to visit me during his summer vacation. Notable trips:
-Mountain Grandview Restaurant - San Jose - I took Joe here the night he flew in. I got lost in the mountains, so we didn't get to dinner at sunset for the "romantic" meal I planned, but it was still pretty neat. This was my first of many personal experiences this week with mountain driving in the bay area. This restaurant is tucked up in the middle of a remote affluent middle-of-nowhere mansion area up in the Mount Hamilton area. It looked very much like a ski lodge, but the food was quite delicious. Apparently there are a lot of regulars there because the chef herself came out to say hello to them. I noticed a bizarre man standing outside the window on the hill taking photographs of all of us inside. He then came inside and was talking to some of the restaurant patrons and the chef. When he left, the chef came over to me, put her hand on my shoulder and said, "That guy is a real weirdo."
-Monte Bello Open Space Preserve - we hiked the Stevens Creek Nature Trail. There were lots of little lizards, though the Wildcat trail in Rancho San Antonio (which I went on earlier this summer) had a lot more wildlife. The neatest part was walking along parts of the San Andreas fault where the earth had cracked open and let groundwater seep up and create marshes in the middle of this very dry park. The drive to Monte Bello from San Jose is not for the feint of heart. Curvy one-lane roads for two-way traffic along hundred feet dropoffs - something that will haunt my nightmares for years to come. I took a more roundabout, but much less frightening way back.
-Hakone Gardens - Japanese garden in Saratoga. Pretty, but didn't take very much time to get through the whole thing.
-Winchester Mystery House - The historic San Jose home of the eccentric hier to the Winchester Rifle "throne." Rumor has it, a psychic convinced her that the death of her husband and child were caused by the furious spirits of those killed by the Winchester rifles. The only way to make the spirits happy was to continuously build her home. The front 30 rooms were damaged by a 1906 earthquake; she took that as a sign that she had spent too much time on the front part of the house and boarded it up, but kept building backward. We took the grand estate tour - it was awesome.
-San Francisco - I had to book a tour of Alcatraz well in advance, and it was well worth it. We rode with Alcatraz Cruises which is apparently the only way you can actually get ON the island. Then I took Joe on the obligatory SanFran sights tour - Ghiradelli Square, trolley cars, Union Square, China Town, Lombard Street & Russian Hill. We drove over the Golden Gate bridge, but it was too foggy to see much. The drive through the intense fog and blasting winds was an unforgettable experience all of its own.
-Big Basin Redwoods Park - Boulder Creek - The drive to Boulder Creek from San Jose is ALSO not for the feint of heart. Curvy one-lane roads for two-way traffic along hundred feet dropoffs - something that will haunt my nightmares for years to come. This was on the way to our next trip, however, and it was a cool little stop. We took the 45-minute walk on the Redwood Loop Trail, which took us by some of the park's coolest trees: Mother, Father & Chimney tree. Chimney tree was my favorite. It was completely burnt out on the inside from forest fires so much that it actually supposedly expelled smoke through the top, but redwoods are so resilient, it continues to grow without its heartwood.
-Santa Cruz - The end of Joe's stay was also the last full weekend in town for my intern friends, so we made a nice go of it. We rented out a little beach house in Santa Cruz. While the oceanside house was not really a beach house so much as a right-by-a-rocky-cliff house, we could get sufficiently close to the water just the same. The waves were incredible. We were "within" "walking distance" to the boardwalk, and took the trek. Most of our time was spent at the arcade on the boardwalk. I used my tickets to buy a beach ball, and a "plug pal" (whatever that is - it was shaped like a turtle).
206 picture-slide show is below. I recommend you check out the actual album for the Full Effect.
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