Checked out of Calistoga this morning to ultimately head to San Francisco. First a few stops. The Petrified Forest is located near Calistoga and has a number of trees that were tumbled over 3,400,000 years ago. A volcano from nearby Mt. St. Helena erupted and now these giant redwoods, pines and firs are all turned to stone. It truly is remarkable to see what nature can do. Next stop is the town of Healdsburg, where we were treated to a private wine tasting at Hauck Cellars by Greg Hauck. Many years ago, Sweetie and Greg were classmates at Milton High School. Almost ten (10) years ago, Greg and his wife Jennifer moved to California and worked for local winemakers with a vision to make their own wine. Not only have they done this but have been ... read more

Woke up this morning and decided "we need one more day in Calistoga"! That is the beauty of this trip - flexibility. Decided to chill out by the Mineral Pools at the hotel. They have four (4) natural mineral pools with varying temperatures - 80, 90, 100 and 104. People start getting in at 8am and spend the day soaking in the pool and lounging nearby in the sun. We have been blessed with this weather - 73 and sunny - both of us got a little sunburned. Note to self - don't drink Pinot Grigio and take a nap. Calistoga Spa and Hot Springs rates high praise from us both. Not fancy but homey with kitchenettes and grills and ample picnic tables. A bunch of guests are grilling out and enjoying al fresco dining. It's ... read more

Today is a long day of driving - approximately 8 hours to get to Calistoga but we're up for the job! After a terrific breakfast with Debbie and Power Ranger Isaiah, we hit I-5 South. Not much to report about this day - Oregon is truly a beautiful state - green, mountainous, there just aren't words. We made sure to fill up with gas before crossing into California (thank you Wendy for the warning!). We Georgians are spoiled with our $3.69/gallon. Oregon is in the low 4s and California, at least Calistoga is holding in the mid 4s and offering slightly lower if you pay cash. The news is reporting high 5s in the bay area... Made it into Calistoga around 6:10 listening to the Dawgs get the shit kicked out of them by Gamecocks! Checked ... read more

So the day started off a little slow - our rental car wasn't ready but fortunately Hertz and Five Star Gold Membership got us an upgrade to a Chevy Traverse for less than what we were originally quoted - yes, Virginia, there is a Santa! We met up with Tim one more time in Issaquah at the Salmon Hatchery (I believe there is an underground movement to convince us Southerners that Salmon is Good Food...) The hatchery was pretty interesting and definitely worth seeing if you are interested. I had no idea that salmon return to their home river to spawn - check out the pics! From there, we headed to Bellevue because Sweetie, being sweet, read about a Chinese Dumpling place that only has 2 locations in the United States. Din Tai Fung was located ... read more

Today we left hotel and headed back down to water for breakfast at Lowells, located in Pike Place Market. Another beautiful day in Seattle with a little cooler temps. The breakfast was really good - Sweetie had a breakfast sandwich with bacon, egg, cheese and spinach. I had slow braised corn beef hash with poached eggs, yum-yum. A little shopping produced a long sleeve t-shirt from Pike place fish mkt. for me and Sweetie got a sweatshirt of this little piggy went to market. From there we went to EMP, Experience Music Project museum. Really cool museum with exhibits of the history of guitar (acoustic and electric), Nirvana, Jimi Hendrix and Rolling Stones Exile on Mainstreet 1972 tour. Sweetie's favorite though was Don't Look Now, a history of horror movies. Lunch today was at La Lot ... read more