Regina, Alexander, Ethan and I finally were able to escape the hustle and bustle of life and retreat to the bay, Monterey Bay. Regina did all the planning which helped me focus on relaxing. I’ve been knee deep in inane work exercises in futility and was in no mood to do any more ‘decision making’.
The only part of the plan that I contributed was the start time. I wanted to leave out the house, the worries and the cares by 9:30 AM on Friday. Of course with two small children the plan got readjusted to 11:00 AM.
We decided to take the scenic route to Monterey by driving over the San Mateo bridge and taking CA-92 all the the way to Half Moon Bay and then hang a right onto CA-1. Regina had packed a lunch and we stopped somewhere between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz at a little beach complete with picnic tables. The sun was shining, mostly and the food was great.
After walking up and down the beach, sitting in the sun and feeling the warming sand between our toes we piled back into the mini-van feeling relaxed and ready to complete the drive to the Lighthouse Inn at Pacific Grove.
We arrived shortly shortly before dinner and checked into our Jr. Suite. Regina had planned that for Friday we would save money by not going out for food. The Inn we were staying came with complimentary BBQ (hot dogs, burgers) and Hours d’ Vours. We hit up both selections and quickly understood why it was free. While not bad it was certainly nothing to write home about (well I suppose in a way I just did). We capped the evening with Alexander and I taking a dip in the pool while Ethan and Regina cooled their toes in the water.
Retiring back to the room we washed up, put on our pajamas and snuggled up on the bed with the boys and watched Man vs. Wild on the Discovery channel. We never watch T.V. (especially live T.V.) but somehow we stumbled across this good show and all four of had fun watching, learning and just being a happy family away from the cares of work, weeks and boring family stuff.