Friday March 7th Cont.
When I left off we were on our way to Stinson Beach, up in Marin County north of San Francisco. First we wanted to stop at the roasted chicken place we went to a couple of years ago, Sol Food, a Puerto Rican Restaurant. Only problem was there are a few different locations and the first one we tried was their carryout place. Then we went to the right place, which is in San Rafael. It was as good as we remembered, but the chicken plate was awfully big, a half chicken with salad, rice, beans and fries (last time I got plantains but even though I love bananas I’m not crazy about plantains so I got fries instead). Then we drove to Stinson Beach which is wayyyy off the beaten path. I’m all for just hanging out here for 3 days, but I think Lee may get restless. There’s a small grocery store and a few restaurants and a beautiful beach.
Saturday March 8
Our room at the Surf Lodge is just darling. It’s a very small place, I think 8 rooms. Each room is a little standalone cabin. Ours has a small living area, a king-size bed, a kitchenette and a bathroom. Not huge but plenty of room for us. For dinner last night we went to one of the 2 restaurants, Breakers Cafe, right across the road from us. We both got tortilla soup and margaritas because we just weren’t very hungry after our giant lunches. There’s a very nice patio with heaters but we were freezing so we ate inside.
In the morning we had a Nepresso coffee maker crisis. I could NOT figure out how to get it to work, despite watching the you tube video multiple times. Finally Lee noticed that the light on top was flashing green AND red instead of just green and looked up what that meant. The damn thing needed to be descaled! So my genius engineer found the you tube video for THAT and then we were on our way. It makes pretty good coffee once it’s working!
After breakfast and a shower we went for a walk along the beach. SO BEAUTIFUL! We walked north along the shore for about 2 miles and then turned around and walked back. Birds, dogs, people, kids, blue sky, fog in the distance, mountains to the east. It was chilly but not too bad. Afterwards we sat on a bench and watched the world go by Then we went back to the lodge to eat lunch . We ate some of our leftover chicken from yesterday, and I had an orange and a cookie too. I STILL have some chicken left! I think I’m going to throw it away, I’m getting suspicious of its edibility after sitting around for the afternoon in the car, even if we did put it in the fridge when we got here.
We are mostly relaxing this afternoon, with a break for an afternoon latte. We sat in the little park for a while. There are a lot of cyclists here today, most of them with very nice bikes, which you pretty much need if you are going to bike over these hills!
Sunday March 9
Around 5:40 we walked over to the beach to watch the sunset, which set promptly at 6:10. It was beautiful but not spectacular because there wasn’t a cloud in the sky! It’s novel to watch the sun set over the ocean because the sun drifts down and then just drops like a rock. In a minute it seems, it was gone.
Last night we ate at the Parkside Cafe. It gets mixed reviews, but not because of the food. Some people had bad service experiences but we did not. In fact it was pretty wonderful all around. The waitress was attentive and the food was great! I got the seafood stew and Lee got the chilled seafood platter which came with 3 gouterres (basically a savory cheese profiterole), one of which I ate. I also had some of his tuna poke and smoked salmon. It was all very very good!
Last night was the “spring forward” time change, so we lost an hour. I slept pretty late for me anyway. I woke up at 6:20 but went back to sleep and the next thing I knew it was 7:30! I guess I was tired. I’m actually going to set my alarm tonight because otherwise it will be very hard to get up in time to run because we babysit for Emi on Tuesday.
Lee caught another cold from Emi. He seems pretty miserable today, coughing and sneezing a lot. We hiked part of the Dipsea trail this morning. What a beautiful trail! A lot of elevation gain with gorgeous views as our reward. Lee made it about a mile and a half before his cold forced him to turn around. I went two and a half miles, far enough to make it over the next hill and see the view south along the coast. Amazing! The trail goes all the way to Muir Woods, about 9 miles one way. I did 5 miles total, with 1400 ft of elevation gain. I loved it!
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| The Famous Dipsea Steps, Maybe! |
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| Views North on The Dipsea Trail |
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| Redwoods Along the Dipsea Trail |
Afterwards we got sandwiches and french fries at Parkside and sat outside in the little park. Now we’re basically being lazy, again.
Tomorrow it’s back to Los Altos and Emi.
Monday March 10
Last night we got a carryout pizza from Parkside. We didn’t think it would be very polite to sit in a restaurant while Lee was coughing away. The pizza was good too. I set my alarm for 6 but it was still very hard to get up. I managed, but lazed around for a while before finally going on a short run. I was supposed to run 4 miles but it was really hard to find a decent place to run. The road I tried ended at a private resort so I cut over to the beach, but the sand was very squishy. I ran north on the beach until it petered out and then took a path along the shore back to town. I made it 3 miles and decided that was good enough.
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| My Run Attempt Petered Out Along the Beach |
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| Highway One Snaking Back and Forth |
Around 10:30 we headed up highway 1 back to Los Altos. Man that is a scary road! Lee drove and I’m glad. We stopped in San Mateo for dumplings at a little place called Town of Dumplings. Homemade dumplings. We got shanghai soup dumplings, pork dumplings, cucumber salad, scallion pancakes, and hot and sour soup. Way too much food and it was all really good! We plan on remembering this place. Very Chinese, they were all speaking Mandarin.
