Camping

So the 2nd week of my Christmas vacation I went camping. I went with Amy, whom you may remember I dated a few years back. She just finished her nursing degree and BYU-Idaho and her original plan of Costa Rica fell through. As she needed to come to California to take care of some stuff before she moves here for her new job at Children's Hospital of Orange County, we decided to take a camping trip together.

We spent the first day (Wednesday) driving up highway one, and due to a late start after having breakfast with old friends and slow traffic we didn't get to the campground until well after dark. Since the station was closed it took us a while to figure out what camping areas were open. And I ran over a nail. So the first night wasn't much camping. Mostly just sleeping in a tent. Amy ended up in the car midway through the night due to the cold. I had plenty of warm clothes so I was fine.

The next morning we went for a hike, got the flat fixed in a nearby town and then drove to San Francisco, with a side excursion to Half Moon Bay to check out the big wave spot, Mavericks. Unfortunately, it wasn't breaking, but the beach was pretty nice. We stayed at a hotel in the union district, just a couple of blocks from China town. So after a dinner of pork fried rice and orange peel beef we went out lindy hopping. The dance was held at the Russian Center, which had a huge nice ballroom. It was the best venue I have ever danced in. The crowd was relatively small, 40-50 at the peak, and mostly beginning to intermediate dancers so the music was primarilly medium tempo. They did a jam dance for all of the out of towners, which turned out to be about a third of the crowd. I love jams because you get to dance with a lot of people, and it's always nice to have girls fighting to dance with you. I met a couple of girls from LA, one of whom has been dancing at Atomic ballrom in Orange County a few times. Amy isn't a lindy hopper, but she follows well so it works. There was a guy there who had a little thing for her, evidenced by the apearance of Mr. Happy during their dance. He asked her to dance a few more times throughout the night, luckily for her, on faster songs.

Friday we slept in late and then took a stroll through china town and down to the wharf. We spent some time watching the sea lions, which were hilarious. They're like pushy little kids that like each other, but have trouble getting along. They were laying out on small docks and whenever a new one would get up on it they'd start barking and sometimes push them back into the water. If the new one managed to stay up it would flop it's way onto the top of the pile and then sort of wriggle its way down into the mass. There were some juveniles playing what looked to be a game of king of the hill, just trying to push each other around on the dock and into the water. The highlight of the day was the scooter rental. We rented a 3-wheel two person scooter and drove around the north end of the peninsula. You'd think people wouldn't think much of seeing people in dorky helmets cruising around in a tiny little vehicle, but evidently it's one of the most entertaining sights in San Francisco. People would sort of catch a sideways glimpse, and then they would look and just get a big grin. Little kids would smile and wave. there was one hippy looking guy in the Haight-Ashbury district who may have been high, but thought we were the greatest thing ever. Amy spent a lot of time honking and waving when she would catch people looking. I just laughed.

By the time we got back it was cold and the sun was disappearing. We stopped into a Barnes and Noble to get a drink and warm up. I wouldn't normally mention that I also took a trip to the restroom, except that this time was noteworthy because as I unbuckled my belt, leaning over slightly, my digital camera decided it was a high diver and took the plunge from my jacket pocket into the toilet. I quickly retreived it and dried it under the hand drier. It wouldn't turn on, but I knew th battery was about dead, so I wasn't sure if it was that or if it was broken. Not having the foresight to bring the charger, I was without a camera for the remainder of the trip. I checked when I got home, and it does still work.

That night we were looking for a coffee shop or something similar to go listen to some music but were unable to find anything of the sort, depsite looking in an entertainment publication and asking both the hotel staff and our dinner waiter at the pizza parlor. So we just ended up watching Law and Order.

Saturday we drove north up the 1 to the south end of the redwood forests. We pitched camp, started a fire and then proceeded to cook some hobo dinenrs that smelled so horrible that we tossed them. My guess is that thought they started out frozen and were placed in a cooler, that over the previous days they had thawed and the meat had spoiled. So instead we ate hot dogs and smores, which was just fine. By that time it was late so we hit our tents. The next day we basically wasted by cruising around on the "Avenue of the Giants" road that runs through the park and poking sticks in the fire. Seriously. Poked sticks in a fire. Ok, we read and played cards and watched movies as well. We got up early monday morning and cruised back home. Traffic was light and we made it back early in the evening.

What few photos I took can be found at http://s77.photobucket.com/albums/j47/werath/random%20pics%20of%20my%20life/