Monterey/Big Sur: one last family hurrah!!

We had been contemplating a family vacay south of here to Monterey for quite some time, anxious to see the famous aquarium, but held off for a while. But when we got the call with Matt's job offer, we decided to take the plunge and a few days later, we were off to Monterey. It was fun to splurge a little after cutting back for a few months. We made a deliberate stop in Gilroy to shop in the outlets, thanks for the tip, Laura! They were by far the best outlets I have ever been. And I have been to many :) They had a Billabong store, SO COOL! We had lunch at In-N-Out next door, another nice bonus to the outlets. By the way, if anyone needs directions from East Bay to Gilroy, don't get them from mapquest. They gave us the farm tour of Gilroy, taking us through cow farms and everything. We got a good laugh out of that. It was an extra 15 minutes or so, but on the positive side, we did see scenic chicken coups and horse pastures.

We arrived at our hotel in downtown Monterey, Portola Hotel and Spa. It was beautiful and overlooked the Marina. We threw out luggage down and headed out on the coastal jogging path that lead to the aqarium. What a beautiful day it was and it felt nice to stroll down by the water.

We have hummmed and haawwed since we moved here 5 years ago whether to pay the 30 dollars it cost to get into the aquarium. I am not exactly a fish lover and Matt is an accountant, so would we get the bang for our buck? Turns out we did. We bought 2-day passes, so that we could go Thursday afternoon and Friday morning. It was worth it, the fish and tanks were amazing. I have never seen so many species so up close.

Even Nolan was amazed!

This seahorse wins the award for "Sharpest Beak." I decided I want to be a seahorse in the next life, the dudes are the ones who get pregnant and birth babies!

"Strangest Thing" award. Seriously, after staring for 5 minutes, I still did not figure out WHAT this is! Something that has to do with garbage.

"Prettiest"

The next two are a tie for "FREAKIEST!!!" I hate snakes and fish scare me, so hands down, this eel below (whose face slightly resembles Chucky the killer doll) and the sand snakes win this prize. I seriously got the chills looking in their tanks. Good thing Nolan was in riding in the baby bjorn to protect me.

"Celebrity look-alike."

"Smelliest." Seriously, the penguin exhibit REEKED! You could smell it before you got there. This was also Reagan's favorite exhibit. Ever since we brought out the Curious George book where he saves the penguin, she has been fond of them.

"UGLIEST." This crab got beat with the ugly stick, that is all I'm gonna say.

"Most Memorable." Throughout the entire 2 days there, all anyone could say to us was, "Have you seen our Great White Shark?" We were like yeah, we did, who gives? I mean, EVERYONE who worked there was going bananas over this thing. We would be in the sea otters or something and we would ask about the diet of the female sea otter and the worker would say, "We give her fish...but have you seen our great white shark over in outer bay???"

Well, we finally found out that this little gal was brought in the day before we got there. So she was like a newbie newbie. Everyone was worried about her well-being. She was being monitored very closely to make sure she adjusted well (she was) and it was just plain a big deal.

So I guess it was really cool to see this great white. She was actually much smaller than some of the other sharks, but hey, I saw JAWS, I am no fool.

Reagan was tickled to get a little wave from the scuba guy cleaning out the tank. Another fun one: this tunnel flushed water over you every 30 seconds or so, it felt like a wave crashing over your head.

Closing time at the aquarium meant finding some food. We are limited in our fish tastes, we mainly keep it to clam chowder and Rubios fish tacos, with an ocasional tuna fish sandwich thrown in there. But I mean, we were in Monterey, I can get a hamburger in Concord, you know? We settled on Bubba Gumps Shrimp Co and you know, for a chain restaurant, it was pretty dang good!!

Matt and I loved our soup (clam chowder) and salad, but Reagan's boat won us over.

We perused Cannery Row a bit, stopping in Candy Land for some over-priced sugar. It was such a fun, lax atmosphere. The weather was beautiful, people were just strolling along, stopping to chat and gaze at the water. We sat on a bench for a while as I nursed Nolan and watched people. There was a guy playing music and singing covers of all sorts of songs. He was really good. I will always remember him singing "Tuesday Afternoon" by the Moody Blues. That song forever ties me to that evening in Monterey.

The view of the marina from the back of our hotel, on the bike path. That is fishermans wharf in the background.

The next day, after the aquarium and lunch, we headed down south for a vehicular excursion. We took the 1 down through Big Sur, stopping at scenic places and enjoying the view. We had a few destinations.

Below is beautiful coastline just past Carmel.

Just us in the pic above because our sweet chillen were doing this:

Destination #1 was Historic Bixby Bridge. Very very cool.

Destination #2 was McWay Falls, just opposite of Julia Pfeiffer State Beach. We parked on the side of the road and took the 7 minute hike down to the overlook. The waterfall drops right onto the beach. Pictures don't do it justice, it was breathtaking.

Oh, my Reggies was so tired and thirsty at this point. But she was a real trooper.

After destination #2, we hopped in the car and headed home. We were all exhausted (the kids didn't sleep real well the night before) and it was a long, traffic-y drive home. We all collapsed and slept rather well that night.

I will always remember this family vacation. It was a special time, the first real vacation we have taken as a family of 4. I felt like, in a funny way, all four of us bonded. The kids have had a special love for each other since then and it was nice to enjoy some time together before Matt heads back to work.