Shame On Me

It's been two weeks since I last posted. I totally suck. I admit it. But listen people... I have been swallowed up by the peach fuzzy goodness of California. We have been out doing so much stuff that I just straight up have not had it in me when we get home at night to write. Or to even think. I pretty much eat and go to sleep for like ten hours.

A quick recap would go something like this... we left Brook and Mike's ranch and went to Felton, CA which is right outside of Santa Cruz and in the redwood forest. It rocked. I loved Santa Cruz and I loved funky little Felton. Our camp was right next door to a redwood state park so we did a lot of exploring in there. We had a few really killer dinners out in Santa Cruz. If you are interested in vegetarian fare and are ever in Santa Cruz try out Malabar on Front St. They have a really far out Indian fusion sort of menu. We also ate at Dharma's which is an old school vegetarian place with a couple of dozen fabulous choices on their menu. The farmer's market in Felton provided us with THE BEST GRAPES I have ever eaten in my whole life. They were red muscat dessert grapes and they were heaven. I am forever ruined for regular old grocery store grapes.

OK... here is a smattering of photos from Santa Cruz and the redwoods etc. to give you an idea of how beautiful it is there...












OK. So we left Santa Cruz a few days ago and are now set up in Carmel Valley. People... for real.... Carmel is one of the best spots on the planet. It is so gorgeous. The houses in the village are so freakin' cute you feel like you are living inside a quaint little hobbit snow globe when you are walking around the neighborhoods in town. This is the town we will be closest to once we get set up camp hosting in Big Sur. Do you want to know the best part? Carmel is the most dog friendly town in the whole country. Hands down. Dogs are happenin' around here. Dog's are allowed. Dogs are encouraged. Dogs are workin' it at very corner like they own they joint. So that being said Rudy is in hog heaven here. He has run his little ass off on the town beach and has been out to eat and into stores. For those of you female readers who are into clothes... I can take Rudy into the Anthropologie store with me here. How nuts is that? If I had money falling out of my back end I could buy him a cashmere sweater in every hue... and a hand tooled leather collar for $100. A lot of the restaurants have doggie menus available. We are going to eat tomorrow at a place that will serve him his very own meatloaf. So that should be properly dumb fun.

Again... here's a whole bunch of pictures to sum it up. We are here for about another week so there will be lots more to follow... (for some of you the most exciting image here will be the one actually documenting the beard phase of Billy McLane... you really have to see it to believe it.)












And in case you have not had enough of me and my photos yet... here are some from a drive we took up the coast the other day on Hwy 1. Now I am pretty much just showing off.










How am I doin'? Are you throwing up pictures of the California coast, tree bark, rocks, my dog and pelicans yet? Good. That should do it for a few days right?