Monterey and Points South

We just returned from a fabulous trip to Monterey, Pacific Valley (no link available), San Simeon and Cambria. Our friends Bruno, Indira and Logan joined us for 2 nights at the Campbell family house in Pacific Valley. We enjoyed their company and the boys had a fabulous time playing together. We stayed an additional night returning today (Sunday). In Monterey, our main goal was to visit the aquarium which we did coming and going. Pacific Valley was wonderful, except the beach was in one of it's "no sand" years and thus was rocky beyond belief. I'm told this often happens in the winter time. Last year, same time, it was SO sandy and wonderful. Yet, it was still beautiful in all it's rockiness. On Saturday after our guests had headed back north, we headed south to San Simeon and Cambria. What a beautiful day it turned out to be. We thought of seeing Hearst Castle, but it's recommended that you have reservations and we weren't sure that Colin would let us enjoy it instead of chasing him out of the reflection pool. Instead we ogled the Elephant Seals from the cliffs. Cambria was my favorite part of the day. We ate lunch at a wonderful little place called the Creekside Cafe
. The food was wonderful in this little off hole in the wall place off the main street. I had the mexican pizza, Alex had the taco salad and Colin the ever popular grilled cheese. If you're ever there, check it out. On the way back north we stopped at the beach across from the entrance to Hearst Castle. We stayed there for about 2 hours before heading back to the house.

Today we are finally home and tomorrow begins another week of work for Alex and school for myself and Colin.

**Special thanks to all the Campbell Clan who assisted with rebuilding the new wonderful and greatly improved deck features and fencing. We also loved the new (BIGGER) fridge.

and thank you to Aunt Super Sudz for feeding the animals. They're all still alive!