Flight and settling in

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The flight from Chicago to San Francisco went smooth with only a few bumps in the air. We hit one small bump going through security in Chicago. I had made and packed the candles for the wedding and they were in one of the carry ons. Did you know that candles give the same blimp in the security system as an explosive device. I know now! The suitcase was unpacked. The plastic ziploc bags that contained the candles all had to be tested. Thank goodness I had packed all of the candles on one side of the suitcase so that the whole thing didn't have to be unpacked. And we had a cushion of time to get to the gate so all was well.

Unfortunately it was cloudy the whole way so Rebekah and Manuel had no chance to see the mountains as we flew over them. We all took a nap for about an hour on the plane...in fact I think the whole plane was napping (except for the crew) because it was so quiet on board. Grabbed the rental car and made our way out of SF.

I have been to SF a few times but it was lovely to be refreshed by the scenery. It was also lovely to see Rebekah and Manuel's reaction to SF. They have never been there. Rebekah has only been in California once and that was sitting in LAX waiting to get to Hawaii. I was hoping to get a peak at the Presidio where my dad was based before he went to Alaska but it was upon us before I knew it. All of a sudden I saw the exit sign for the Presidio and I looked to my left and there were the buildings that are in my dad's pictures. It was fabulous.

We took Highway 101 up to Sonoma because I didn't want to go through the mountains and get motion sickness. That route also took us across the Golden Gate Bridge. It was so much fun to watch Rebekah's reaction to the whole scene and her comments about how beautiful it all was. We saw Alcatraz and the road winds in and around SF Bay. The hills were beautiful with the occasional cloud snuggling a top of one.

We joked about the happy cows of California along the way but Rebekah questioned why cows would be on the hillside with no barn or anything nearby, just a lot of grass. She wondered where they went at night. She's used to WI dairy cows that are always near their dairy barn. So what do the California cows do at night?

We got to the hotel, The Flamingo Inn, got our rooms and I settled in to rest. I had dinner in the hotel's restaurant and Jay kept me company. He said that the contingency rain plans have been put into effect and that there would be errands to run on Thursday so I'm on tap for errand running. Rebekah and Manuel are doing wine tours today that he had arranged with vendors at the restaurant.

Slept in this morning to get onto California time. It's raining this morning. Time for tea and yoga.

No photos from our drive yesterday. I didn't unpack the camera. But the camera is out now so undoubtedly there will be photos tomorrow.

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