Monterey to see Leah and Friends

 Wednesday I finally did the “bike ride plus wet suit swim” adventure. Epic. I did have a concerned kayaker question me (and/or my sanity) which was kind of amusing. It was so much fun even though my wetsuit was too big and the sleeves took on water when I did freestyle strokes. I took a picture before I got in the lake, unfortunately that photo will never be seen. Public service announcement: do not submerge your dry bag inside your wetsuit during a one hour swim, your iPhone will be dead by the time you return to shore.

This weekend, while Jon and I got to go down to Monterey and see Leah, Axel stayed back with Mimi who took him to his lacrosse game in Granite Bay. Stampede won 12-8, yay! Thanks Mimi for all the meals, pancakes, bonfires, and sporting transportation.

On Friday I walked from the hotel over to Leah’s place and hung out with Leah, Michael, Sansa (pictured) and Sonny (next picture). Sansa had just gotten flea medicine and was sporting a 1950’s house dress to keep it in place.

Sonny must be fed right before bedtime otherwise he will complain loudly at bedroom doors all night. This is Leah showing me some of Sonny’s food as he gets all excited about it.

Selfie with the fur babies.

Saturday I started the day by walking to Leah’s house via the beach. Here was my route:

I chose to walk the sand portion (aka most of it) barefoot. I received several sanity-questioning looks from the only other people: surf-fisherman dressed in parkas and waders. I find myself in these situations a lot, where I’m doing something weird and the other humans are wondering WTF I am doing. Well, can confirm, their questioning looks were warranted as I wore the skin off of two toes on my left foot. The sand in Monterey is sharper and coarser than Maui’s.

Selfie on the trail up over the dune to Leah’s house.

After hanging out with Leah and Pepper for a bit, we all went to Carmel for lunch and shopping. Jon met us via bicycle (naturally). Jon reports that the ride through Carmel Valley is beautiful.

Leah and I bought matching knit short/sweater sets at the Carmel Anthropologie. Here we are in the dressing room, photo credit Pepper.

Later we went for pre-dinner drinks at Dust Bowl (a brewery in the old Monterey Train Depot).

Pepper, Leah, and Michael. Three of my favorite people. If their life was a TV show I would totally watch. Later we had dinner and our server was one of Micheal’s staff at Panera. Micheal reported that his Moscow Mule was quite powerful. All the drinks were as a matter of fact. Pays to know people.

I had to be careful not to drink too much as the next morning at 6am I drove up to Santa Cruz to surf with my friend of 32 years, Jennifer. She had just gotten off her night shift (as a Labor and Delivery nurse) and met me with her Jeep, two long boards, and two wetsuits.

Here we are pre-surf. We had a great time riding the waves until our feet went numb and we had to come in. The Santa Cruz water is much colder than the Maui water but the waves were enjoyable and we were stoked.

When I got back from surfing, Leah and I went to Cannery Row. Jon met us there by transportation I will let you guess at. We had some clam chowder (I had four different clam chowders this weekend) and then went to the weird, dusty, animatronic Steinbeck museum. I fondly remembered this museum from my childhood and was surprised to find it almost entirely unchanged.

Leah and an animatronic sea gull.

A tin of museum-goers.

On the drive home this evening Jon and I listened to over half of Cannery Row on Audible. We need another two hour drive to somewhere to find out what happens with Mack, and Lee, and Doc, and all those frogs.