March 29th, 2005 at 2:03 am (Uncategorized)
What a lovely Sunday I had yesterday. Tim and I finished up some house chores, went for a beautiful walk on the Guy Fleming Trail at Torrey Pines Park and we finished up the evening at my mom’s for Easter dinner. Fair Jeannine joined us for dinner, and my mother’s friend Arlene stopped by for a bit. Another perfect day filled with good company and good food. See more flower photos from our hike.
March 15th, 2005 at 4:31 pm (Uncategorized)
It’s hard to believe that this was our 6th annual trip out to the desert. Jeannine and Brian, who are also 6 year veterans, made it out, along with Wendy (5 years), Tim (3 years), and Michelle (her first year out). Also newly joining us were Brian & Wendy’s dogs Spike and Pharoah. What an awesome show the desert put on for us. The weather was gorgeous and flowers were blooming in every nook and cranny the area had to offer. I will apply Tim’s movie rating scale to our itinerary:
Michelle and I imitate chuparosa
1: Dudley’s (Totally did not suck)
2: Little Surprise Canyon (Totally did not suck)
3: Henderson Road (Totally, totally did not suck)
4: Vallecito County Park Campground (Did not suck)
5: Wind blowing strongly all night (Sucked)
6: Flowers off the S2 south of Vallecito (Totally did not suck)
7: Agua Caliente Hot Springs (Just barely sucked)
8: Canyon Sin Nombre (Totally did not suck)
Little Suprise Canyon is a really short hike starting at the southern end of the Hellhole Canyon Parking Lot. This area showed great variety and was easily accessible. Henderson Road, golden with desert sunflowers, had the most incredible smell. The strong winds, which we later cursed while trying to sleep, carried the smell of the nearby citrus groves. The five of us (yes five, as Tim was in the car) could have happily roamed those flower fields for hours bathing in the warm citrus scent. However, night was falling and we had a long drive to our campsite.
Vallecito, under the cover of night, seemed like a nice spot. We had shelter on three sides, a big fire ring, a table, a grill and plenty of flat ground. We happily roasted our habanero sausages and tried to make advances in smore-making technology. With the wind roaring on, my guess is that we all could have used a bit more sleep. In the morning, I realized that what I thought were good shelter were actually dead shrubs! Vallecito isn’t all that pretty. So after dipping into our baked goods stash, we pressed on down the road.
Like most of roads in the park, the S2 was skirted by fields of flowers on either side. After a few short miles we had pulled over to the side of the road to wander out to see what there was to offer. There were probably 20 different flower varieties to behold in this spot.
I had originally wanted to stay at Agua Caliente, as the thought of soaking in hot springs after a long day sounded oh so nice. However, the place was booked solid (~120 sites) when I went to make a reservation. In hindsight this was for the best, as the place was crawling with children. I had thought that Vallecito was unpretty, but Agua Caliente is 10 times uglier! My guess is the minerals in the soils, which makes for very white sand, also result in the very spartan landscape. Michelle, Jeannine and I did take the time to put our feet in the outdoor pool there. The water had a pleasant softness that I wouldn’t mind soaking more of me in at some later point in time.
Our last stop was a short hike in Canyon Sin Nombre. We were treated to many of the same flowers we had previously seen, plus a few new ones. We only ventured a bit into the slot canyon before we turned around. Brian & Wendy could only take their short-legged dogs so far. See photos from the 12th and the 13th.
March 2nd, 2005 at 2:27 pm (Uncategorized)
I love when Angela comes to town. We eat great food and discuss fun happenings. This time around Jeannine, Angela and I adventured to The Linkery in North Park. This very reasonably priced and yummy restaurant, owned by our hockey mate Jay Porter, held it’s grand opening last weekend. Angela informed me of Spamalot, a musical based on the Holy Grail, opening up on Broadway this month. This shows sounds awesome!! I hope it tours someday :). This of course inspired me to look into other shows. I still want to see Mama Mia which I had heard is coming back to San Diego in 2005. Nothing up at their website yet, but I’ll keep my eye out.
March 1st, 2005 at 10:56 am (Uncategorized)
I just spent a 3 day/night vacation in Las Vegas with Tim. I think it’s been two years since I’ve been to the city and not much has changed since my last visit. The trip came to pass since Tim had his yearly Can/Am hockey tournament to organize for his hockey crews.
We stayed at the Stratosphere across from EK, Dorothy, Jimm Reifsnyder (Tim’s goalie) and his wife Meryl. Spare and Parker were down the hall. Tim had entered two teams into the tournament, so there were a number of others at the Stratosphere and the Venetian. The Stratosphere is a decent hotel to stay at (decent beds, decent decor, decent shopping, smoke-free floor).
But I get ahead of myself. Where are these near misses you speak of? To start things off our flight out to Vegas was delayed. We landed in time to rent our very smoky Kia Sedona and head on over to the Luxor to catch the Blue Man Group. We scarfed down some “food court” food 10 minutes before show time. The Blue Man group is an interesting performance. I hadn’t really researched into what the performance was about as I like to be surprised.
Tim and Paul yuck it up
To summarize: percussion accompanied by vivid visuals largely spiced with comical antics. I am a cheapskate and have a real hard time shelling out $85 for a show (for the cheap seats even) and to me Blue Man Group was… not worth it. After the show we took our Blue Man compatriots (Parker, Spare, Jimm and Meryl) back to the Stratosphere to check in and catch dinner 10 minutes before the diner closed.
Insert 4 hockey games, a trip to Downtown, a buffet at Aladdin, Wheel of Fortune, cheerleaders, gorging at Samba, going to bed early and very, very, very narrowly making our flight back to San Diego and you have our vacation.
Now I’d like to touch on subject of smoking in casinos. I was still harboring a minor cough from my last cold when I arrived at Vegas. This was only exascerbated by the smoke in all the casinos and I was none too pleased.
Tim and I got to discussing about how curious it is that we know A LOT of people who would prefer a smoke-free environment when they gamble. By creating a smoke-free casino would you alienate such a large clientele that it would bankrupt you? Are the addictive habits of smoking and gambling intrinsicly linked?
Or would you be fending people off that would happily pay more to be in a healthier environment? Perhaps it would be too costly to monitor. In my initial search, the only smoke-free hotel I could find was a Harrah’s in Laughlin. I also found this recent article from the Las Vegas Sun on smoke-free poker rooms. While I think this is a great trend, it doesn’t help me the slot junkie. For those of you interested in a less smoky experience, I have seen lots of arrows pointing to the Main St. Station in Downtown as being the most smoke-free hotel. See all of the photos of this trip.