Thanksgiving Vacation

On Thanksgiving day we drove 1 1/2 hrs south to Monterey. Traffic was the lightest we've ever seen it! We checked into the Portola Hotel & Spa where we made reservations at a great price months ago, and set out to explore. The hotel is right on the bay and the wharf. Little did we know, this would be the nicest weather we would get our whole visit!

We enjoyed poking around in several shops and checking out the different turkey dinners the restaurants were offering. Actually, we took turns enjoying poking around in stores since McKay was always ready to move on before we were and most stores had breakables right at his level. In the end, we ended up sticking with the restaurant we had reservations at, with a great view of the ocean. It was definitely a different Thanksgiving dinner than we've ever had before but clean up was great!

Friday morning we set out on the 17 Mile Drive. It goes right along the coast and has several points of interest on the way. You have to pay to drive it and they give you a map with the points of interest & explanations along the way. It was very windy and rainy when we started. The wind never died down but it did stop raining.

This first stop is Spanish Bay. The waves were huge! There were actually several fatalities over the weekend from people out in boats on the waves.

Point Joe
We got to where we'd only take McKay out of the car when he insisted or when we wanted a picture with all of us. The stops are quite close together and the wind was intense so he didn't mind too much.

The Restless Sea

There are a couple of ships at the bottom of the ocean here where early mariners crashed into the rocks. The water is just white and very turbulent.

China Rock

Fanshell Overlook

Cypress Point Lookout

The Harbor Seals were very entertaining to watch. This lookout is closed April & May because they have their pups here.

The Lone Cypress

This cypress grows out in the rocks and is over 250 years old.

The Ghost Tree

Pebble Beach

Wow, what a beautiful place!

We brought our tri-pod and used the timer on our camera to take some pictures at the 18th hole. We weren't sure how well it would work but McKay thought the blinking light that goes faster and faster was pretty cool! So we took advantage of it. More pictures to come. :)

All of the above houses except the house in the top right were people's homes along the 17 mile drive. W.O.W.! The picture on the top right is in Carmel. It is a Hansel & Gretle house.

We really enjoyed the drive & would highly recommend it to anyone who comes out this way. McKay fell asleep and we were hungry for dinner so we punched California Pizza Kitchen into Jack (gps) and headed back to Monterey. McKay was so tired he slept while Jordan carried him into the restaurant and while Jordan and I ate. It was nice and the food was great!

After dinner we went to Cannery Row in Monterey. They had this reindeer there from Wild Things, where they have animals that have been on movies etc. Looks like a cool place to visit sometime.

We had fun trying on hats in several stores. The only store it wasn't fun was one in Carmel when the guy basically kicked us out because McKay was trying on hats too. Jordan actually found hats that fit his head and I found one I liked too. Yay!

We were just in time to see the tree lighting in the plaza. McKay thought it was pretty neat and has since been enjoying all the decorated trees.

We enjoyed poking around and seeing what we could see and soaking up the atmosphere. There is a Ghirardelli shop there too. Peppermint bark chocolate was the sample. ummhmm.

Saturday we went back to Carmel and walked up and down Ocean Avenue and found a few more deals. The Jane Austen store is an antique store full of items that were found in the era Jane Austen wrote about. The owner appreciated that I recognized the connection. Of course we didn't buy anything. The bottom right picture is of one of the many cottages that has the 'bendy' roof, as Jordan calls it.

After a delicious Mexican dinner at El Torito (yes I was able to eat Mexican! Yay!) we went back to Ghirardelli and actually ordered a sundae. Every time we have been to Ghiradelli in San Francisco, the sample chocolate is enough even though we have wanted to try the famous sundae. It was good but we definitely got our 'fix' for quite a while!

We really enjoyed our little get-away and may have to make it a tradition! Every time we went to get into the car McKay would say 'no home, no home'. Guess he was having a good time too!

Garlic Ice Cream

On Saturday we went to Gilroy to check out the outlets. We all had several things we needed and had been putting off this day for quite a while. Neither of us are shoppers unless we are finding really good deals. There are 145 stores there and boy do they put Park City to shame! They have pretty much anything you need (and lots you don't need) for good prices - our kind of shopping! We didn't go on a holiday (thank goodness! - don't know if the sales would be worth the extra crowds) but there were still a lot of good deals. We spent all day there and didn't even get through half of the stores. McKay was a trooper... he only took a 1 hour nap (he has been sleeping A LOT lately recovering from our trip) and enjoyed running his hands along the clothes as we went by in the stroller. We stopped at a Famous Footwear in the evening and there weren't many people there so we ditched the stroller and let McKay walk around, get all the mirrors dirty, and grin at everyone. That may have been his favorite part of the day! It paid off too. The manager gave us $10 off a pair of brown leather shoes for Jordan and 10% off the whole purchase 'because she liked McKay'. Who says good looks don't get you anything!

There was also a store there called the Garlic Store. They had the famous Garlic Ice Cream as well as some garlic peanut butter cups. We figured we had to try it and everyone had told us it was actually pretty good. YUCK!! McKay ate more of the ice cream than we did! And he only did it because of the cute little spoons they gave us. It was terrible. And what a waste for the peanut butter cups! We decided we like garlic but it really needs to be kept separate from our dessert!