Not much to say, other than I can’t thank Jody enough for sharing her family’s beach house with us.  It’s always a great time and the scenery is so beautiful.

Thanks Jody!

Jody invited us to go camping up at Ice House Reservoir, near Placerville.  We borrowed a tent and headed up.  Despite the threatening weather (thunder and lightning), the weather turned out to be great.  We tried to do a little fishing, but the recent hot weather apparently drove the fish down to the bottom of the lake.

We stopped on the way out and grabbed some linguica, potatoes and onions.  The built a nice fire and threw our cast iron skillet on top.  The food was great, and beat anything you get out of a camping package.  Full and happy, we sat back, at some smores and drank some beer.  I finally realized why people go camping, and lamented the fact that Tahoe is so close, and we have never gone before this.

After hanging out until around midnight, we finally packed all our food into the coolers, piled them on the tables and headed to our respective tents.  About 30 minutes later we are just about asleep, and we hear the cooler fall off the picnic table.  “Must be racoons,” I comment to Allison, and then her cell phone rings.  Because of the poor cell reception, we can hardly hear her, but we finally understand the following, “There’s a BEAR outside my tent!” Aaaaaaahhhhh!  Definetly not racoons.  Allison and I start making noise, clapping and hollering as we put our shoes on.  We unzip the tent and I poke my head out and look up the path and standing there staring at me is a full grown bear.  I’m not sure what the ‘appropriate action’ is when dealing with a bear, but some more hollering and clapping finally convinced the bear to move on to other campsites.  And since we knew we weren’t going to sleep, and we were only an hour from home, we decide to grab everything and head for home.

In retrospect, cooking greasy food and leaving it sitting next to our campsite was foolish, and we all should have known better.  There were no warning signs around the campsites, and no bear boxes.  Next time we will be eating  the backpacking meals and storing all our leftovers far from camp.  I expect that I’ll never see a bear that close again, but I’d rather play it safe.  I don’t actually think that we were in imminent danger, but I believe in the unpredictability of wild animals.  And I don’t need to end up like the guy who got mauled by a bear at Ice House 30 days before we were there.

We headed out to Michigan on somewhat short notice to help celebrate Jeff’s graduation from the Masters program, as well as his 40th birthday.  The party was an absolutely blast and it was great to see all Jeff’s old Michigan pals, drink regional cherry vodka, and sing some karaoke.

We spent some time up in Traverse City fishing, boating, and we even headed out to the beach at midnight to check out an unusually low occurrence of the northern lights.  We had so much fun and it was extremely relaxing.

After a few days we headed back down to Grand Rapids and ate a TON of really great food.  G.R. has really expanded its culinary treats since the last time we were there.  It seemed like every place we ate wasn’t just good, it was fantastic.

As always the trip was too short and we can’t wait to go back.

World Cup!  Go Britain! …….. uh….. United States!

We headed to a little pub in Marin with Jody and a couple other TJ’s friends to watch the match.  This place was really fun and since the match was so early, they even offered a full english breakfast.  Mmmmm….. It was P-A-C-K-E-D and the crowd was really into the game.

Afterwards we headed out to Jody’s place in Bolinas for the weekend.  I love that place….

Our good friend, Jody, invited us up to Tahoe for the weekend.  Neither Allison or I have spent much time up in Tahoe.  Which is surprising, considering it’s only a few hours away.  The previous friday had been a serious downpour and so a ton of new snow had fallen.  Fortunately, the storm as over before we headed up, so not only were the roads clear and dry, but the weather for the entirety of our trips was beautiful.  We drove up Saturday night after work and got up there around 10pm, immediately settling in, chatting a bit, and then heading for bed.

Sunday we woke up, made a quick breakfast and then drove to Donner Lake to hike.  The trails were well groomed and so it was a nice relaxing walk through the fresh snow.  The sunny weather was melting the snow that was trapped on all the tree limbs, so we were constantly seeing big clumps of snow falling in the forest around us.  After the hike we headed to a little taqueria and ate some of the best tacos and ceviche.  Mmmmmmm……

Monday we headed out for some snow shoeing.  We had a little trouble finding the trails at the park we went to, since they apparently don’t mark them in the winter.  But we found our way around okay.  We walked out on a pier we came upon and I really got to appreciate the amazing clarity of the water for the first time.

Afterwards we drove up to VikingHolm and Eagle Falls.  Amazing views, as usual, but VikingHolm itself is closed during the winter.  We’ll have to head back up in the summer to get a closer look.

On the way back to the cabin, we stopped at ‘Balancing Rock’ and Jody led us out off the road about 150 yards to this somewhat hidden rock formation.  Allison was the only smart one, who put on her snow shoes.  Jody and I were falling in up to our knees at every other step, and we even went up to our hips on occasion.

After we carefully made our way back to the car, we headed to a local restaurant for some beer and burgers.  Then we all headed out to the waterline to take some sunset pictures, which made a great finish to a great day.

Before we headed home on Tuesday we went to a local restaurant for some breakfast, then cleaned the cabin, and got on the road for home.  It ended up only taking us about 2.5 hours, door to door.

Thanks Jody for inviting us and showing us all the sights around Tahoe.  We had such a great time and can’t wait to go back up.

Our final day began with sunshine and a cup of coffee at the Blue Kangaroo, a little place in the Selwood neighborhood. After a nice wake up snack (yummy bagels), we loaded into the car and went to visit another neighborhood called Mississippi. There were tons of neat little shops and resteraunts, and it was really nice to wander around and take pictures.

From there we headed to the main event, Portland’s famous food carts. Allison had done some research ahead off time, so after wandering around and looking at all the great food we got a fresh baguette sandwich with butter, home smoked ham and gruyere to split. Super fantastic!!! From another cart we ordered a cup of great mushroom soup. I also got a spinach ‘pita’ from a Lebanese food cart, and an order of jambalaya from a place called The Swamp Shack. Wandering around the variety of food purveyors, and smelling all the great aromas made for a really entertaining experience not to mention a delicious lunch.

Our last stop in Portland was the Horse Brass pub. They had a ton of great beer and a really classic vibe. But after nursing a pint, it was time to head for the airport.

We all had a great time. Thanks to Jody for hooking us up with lodging and tour guides, as well as being a great travelling companion. Can’t wait for the next adventure.

Our Sunday started with a stroll down the street to a cafe called The Delta. It’s an ecclectic little diner that is apparently also a bar at night. We sat down right away and looked over the menu. They had a lot of great choices and I picked the biscuts and gravy, having seen the massive biscuits on their way to other tables. Allison ordered the Brioche french toast, and Jody couldn’t resist another round of corned beef hash. The girls also decided to partake of the build your own bloody mary bar, which was really neat. I abstained, since I had never had a bloody mary and also would be driving soon. The bloody mary bar was really fun, and I got to sample both concoctions. I’m a fan now.

It was raining when we left which made the walk home a little miserable. After a quick respite, we drove down to Hawthorne to check out the Powells book stores, which are apparently a landmark. The ‘normal’ bookstore wasn’t anything that special, but the Powells Home And Garden bookstore was awesome. Not only did it have a great selection of cookbooks and other culinary literature, it had kitchen knick knacks and other interesting bric-a-brac. It also has a walk-through to the market next door. The market had the most beautiful breads, cheeses, cured meats, veg, and fresh pasta. I wanted to eat everything and then buy more to gorge later. We settled to just pick up a container of the outstanding local hot sauce we had at breakfast. And it didn’t end there, because attached to the market was a great looking little resteraunt where your food is prepared right in front of you, reminiscent of Benihana.

From the bookstore we headed to a place we had read had the largest selection of local beers on tap, Belmont Station. They had a HUGE selection of six packs from all over the world, but we tried a few of the beers they had on tap. Apparently they had just finished up a dark beer festival, so that’s all we had to choice from. But we were able to find a couple of really nice dark ales to sit and enjoy.

For dinner we accidentally chose a great looking little crepe shop that turned out to be closed, and so we just popped into a local italian chain which was pretty good. From there we headed to the famous Voodoo Doughnuts for grape, blue raspberry, Arnold Palmer, and mango doughtnuts. YUM!!!

After some board games and some laughs it was time to call it a night.

Today we popped up early, grabbed a cup of coff and a shower and set off for Zell’s for breakfast. It was a great little breakfast place offer inventive favorites with seasonal local goodies. I had a German pancake with pear compote that was yummy, Allison had a salmon scramble, and Jody had corned beef hash that was outstanding. I was totally jealous.

Once we had completely stuffed ourselves, we took a little walk around Laurel Hurst Park. It’s a great little park with a lake in the center. Walking was the perfect way to get our digestion going and we were entertained by the dogs playing (including a pair of adorable Corgis).

From the park we headed downtown, planning to head to the Portland City Grill which is near the top of one of the highrises. Unfortunately, once we arrived, we discovered that they didn’t open until 4. So we walked around downtown, stopping at a place called Jake’s for some hot and surprisingly STRONG drinks (Irish coffee & hot toddie).

We continued our walk around downtown, stopping in a few places here and there, and ended up at a sandwich place called Kenny & Zuke’s for some authentic Reubens, which were absolutely outstanding. They had some really great pickled onions.

After lunch, we stopped back home for a little nap and then some games. After a mellow evening we hooked up with one of oldest friends who lives up here. We went to the lounge where her husband works, called the Night Light Lounge. They had tons of great local beers and really great snacks, we had nachos and fries.

Hanging out with Wendy was a really fantastic way to end the day.

A couple of weeks ago we were hanging with our friend Jody and for whatever reason, we all decided to take advantage of super cheap Southwest fares to visit Portland.

Today is day one of our trip and it started out looking really bad. We all jumped in the car and left Napa around 3:30 to jump in 80E traffic for our 7:30 flight from Sacto. We ended up making great time and arrived at the airport around 5:30, which was great. But as soon as we got in line to check our bags we realized that our 7:30 flight had been delayed until 9:45. Dreading the thought of spending the next four hours twiddling our thumbs we got up to the counter and crossed our fingers that their might be seats on the earlier flight leaving at 6:30. Holding our breath, we were told that the flight was completely full, but we were 4, 5, 6 on the standby list. So we went through security, got a snack and a coffee, and waited for the flight to arrive. Finally the woman at the counter started calling off the standby list, and surprisingly we made the cut!

In Portland we are staying with some of Jody’s old friends and so they picked us up. We headed out to a bar called Back Stage, which is literally the back stage of an old theater that’s been converted. They had mediocre burgers and decent beer, but he ambiance was priceless. Really cool vibe.

We left Back Stage and went to a patisserie called Pix for dessert. They were very fancy little treats and lots of neat apertif. But by this time we were all pretty wrecked and ready to get some sleep, so I don’t think we could really enjoy it.

But I’m really glad we got the earlier flight, because otherwise we would have missed both of those opportunities and we would just be getting in now, at midnight.