Well, I took my first real vaction in my lifetime. Up untill then I had only ever been about an 8 hour drive from home, and the only places outside of Ontario that I had been were Detroit (note that it's North of Windsor!), Hull and Montreal. So going to California set a bunch of records for me. I flew out of Ottawa on Friday Sept 18 and got into San Francisco at about 11pm their time. Both Helena and Urvashi were there to meet me at the airport since we were vacationing together. It was great seeing them because I hadn't see either one of them for a while.
We did a lot when were were there. Helena was a great tour guide.(I paid him to say that. J )She showed us San Fran, Napa Valley, and a bunch of other places that she had been before. The first thing we did was a California style breakfast - bagels and Jamba Juice. Jamba Juice is kind of like an Orange Julius smoothy, except without the sugar and more fruit. After that we set out to tour the city. We did Lombard street, fisherman's wharf (the only place Helena doesn't like going back to), and a bunch of other touristy things. Prashant arrived in San Fran on Sunday so we picked him up from the airport and took him to Standford where he's in his last year of his masters. We toured the campus while we were there and we saw some secret service agents, lots of cops and a couple limosines around. I guess Chelsea Clinton (or the offsprings of some middle-eastern oil mongul) must have been around.
On the Monday we did Napa valley which must have at least 30 wineries in it. We stopped at a bunch of them, took some tours and had lots of wine (or at least I did)! Good thing I wasn't driving : ). Francis Ford Copola has a winery there and inside he has a museum of his own with some of his oscars and propts that were used in his movies. You can find the Godfather desk there, a Tucker (some explanation was necessary there`for Urvashi and I, natually.), and the costumes for Dracula. We even did Close Pegas 3 times (twice after it was closed) and it's not exactly on the way to anywhere! The first time we went there we looked around and stayed a while. The second time we went there was because Urvashi wanted a souvenir from there and we got there just after it closed. The last time we went by it was because I was navigating and didn't realize that Helena had turned off of the road we wanted to be on (and so my search for the perfect map boy goes on). Anyway, it was good for a laugh because we ended up doing this big zig-zag between the two main roads a couple of times.
On Wednesday we started heading down the coast for Santa Barbara, stopping at the sights along the way. We stopped in Monteray and ate at the Bubba Gump restaurant, which is based on the movie Forest Gump. Outside the restaurant there is a bench with Forest's briefcase and his shoes where you can become the scene where Forest tells his whole tale. Helena wanted to get a picture of me there, so I sat on the bench and tried to take a serious picture. Well, as expected, it took a little while before I stopped laughing enough for Helena to take a serious picture. After Monteray, we continued down the coast, seeing the sights until we hit Santa Barbara. We left Santa Barbara on Friday to head back to San Fran since both Urvashi and myself were flying out Saturday at lunch time.
I'd have to say I really enjoyed myself on my vacation. I was great hanging out with Helena and Urvashi again. We talked about old times and made new memories. I'd recommend California to anyone looking into a vacation.
-- Joe
