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Published: July 28th 2008
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The Flamingo!
The new purchase has provided many laughs! Hello everyone...California has been so busy and crazy that my blogging time has been significantly decreased. I am sorry to keep you all waiting with our adventures. I was thinking that there would be more comments on my new investment but maybe you are all too overwhelmed with all of these adventures. The last message I put up was about Vegas and since then we have been off and running. We drove from Vegas to Escondido, CA which is just north of San Diego. We used this as our home base for three nights to make our lives easier. I have to put out there that we are fine and that the RV is safe but what a pain. We had a brake light come on as we headed into Vegas and we did the responsible thing and called Cruise America. Oh, did I fail to mention the loose plastic tube hanging from the undercarriage. Arghh. Well a nice man came two days later and took care of the hose and said all I needed was to fill my brake fluid. Now as many of you know my Dad is a mechanic and I was a little embarrassed for not realizing
Nick's new friend.
I am glad he didn't want this as a new friend. something so simple. I can also say that my cars have not needed this much brake fluid in 5-10 years. We have a little leak and add fluid every few days. Again, we are safe and you should know that I taught Devin how to pop the hood and add the fluid. Gotta start them young. Dad, aren't you proud? Devin was pretty tickled with himself.
I will say that the weather in Southern California was superb. Warm days and cool nights. Day 1 we went to the San Diego Zoo. It was great! I am pretty sure that Chris went out of love for the rest of us which love little meerkats and pandas but he was a real trooper. The boys' and I had a hard time deciding where to go next and after 6 hours (Yeah, Chris was super patient) we still hadn't seen everything and had to call it a day. What a clean zoo....Biology dork was out in full form on this adventure. Nick added one more friend which may be his last since his money is almost gone. A new panda named Beijing....cute, cuddly and there are "friends" all over the RV.
A rare photo moment.
Being 13 does not allow one to pose in embarrassing pictures but I did get Devin into this Sharks mouth. The second day in San Diego we actually separated a little...not because we were sick of each other but because LegoLand costs about a million dollars to visit and seemed a little young for Devin. Devin and I dropped Nick and Chris off in Carlsbad, CA at LegoLand where they road many rides and saw all of the cool lego structures on display. I do regret not seeing the Einstein bust but it just was not meant to be. Devin and I then continued down Route 101 allowing the Pacific coast. It was beautiful. We got the first opportunity to see the other side of our country and we sure enjoyed it. We drove by Torrey Pines and Pa was remembered in fondness. Devin would say we played 18 holes but it only happened in our dreams. Devin and I went to the Scrips Oceanographic Institutes's Birch Aquarium and had a great time. We pet sharks...were they living you ask? Why, of course they were. Shark week is coming up on the Discovery Channel so the Aquarium was doing a little promotion of how sharks just aren't that bad and I would agree with them. I am not sure that
Dad and Devin
I love this pictures!!! Devin has decided this is true but he did pet the shark. Woo-hoooo!!! I also got Devin to eat a peanut butter and banana whole wheat wrap, only in CA...it was really peanut butter, banana, granny smith apples, raisins and sunflower seeds and he ate it! Give that boy an A. After lunch we went to Old Town because of discussions we had with Gemma and Pa. We saw Old Town but did not have a lot of time and parking the RV is a little tough. Dev had to help me park it at the Aquarium and it was a real hoot. He is still learning how to be a navigator but each day he is looking at the maps and atlas' more frequently. Soon he will be a world traveler. That night we all went to the Pacific and ate in a small town called Oceanside and let the boys jump right in to the water while we watched the sunset. Ahhhhh...we felt accomplished. I cannot tell you how relieved you feel when you actually make it across this vast country.
Yesterday we left Escondido and headed to LA. Now it is only 120 miles or so
but in RV those miles felt like forever. Lanes and lanes of traffic, shopping mall after shopping mall. I did not see anything from the road that looked all that great. We've had a difficult time making decisions at times. We hear a lot of I don't knows which makes it tough for Chris and I to make decisions so I took the lead as we entered LA. I chose to visit the La Brea tar pits (really its asphalt..but how was I to know and why do they always call them the tar pits if it isn't true?) on Wiltshire Blvd. and we managed to get there in great form. This is the only place we've visited so far that lets teachers in for free, hurray for us. We work so hard to get into the tar pits. Now you all know what your vacation can be next summer. This was a smelly spot but really neat to see. It took a couple of hours and then the moment came to make a decision as to the rest of the day. Sometime during our travels Chris and I had mentioned possibly visiting a movie studio....well Devin locked on to this and when we mentioned we weren't sure whether there would be time or not Devin the teenager came out. We chilled out by driving by Rodeo Drive and making a stop on Westwood Ave at UCLA to gear up for future NCAA tournaments. While we got a snack we called a few RV places up by Santa Barbara only to be told they were all full (Saturdays are big RV nights) so we decided that we would stay in a hotel and drive up anyway.
We did our best and drove to Universal Studios which robs you blind (17 to park, 64 to enter and X for food) in order to take a studio tour. This would help tame the adolescent beast that took over Devin and it did. The tour was cool. Chris had been many moons ago but doesn't seem to remember it being such a pain or that expensive. We left at 8pm and I started driving North. I was ready to get out of LA. Nothing personal for all of you LA lovers but it was a little much for this small town VT girl. We decided to push it to Santa Barabara, which we did. I had a lady in her RV actually hit my mirror and push it away (you know how mirrors are able to fold?), though I knew I could pull it back it didn't make it any less stressful. We paid about 4.50 for some gas and then went searching for a hotel. We checked all those that were away from the beach and found them all to be full. A dilemma at 10:30 pm so a decision had to be made...
The decision? We slept next to the Holiday Inn on the side of road. It was a residential neighborhood...no worries. This is truly an adventure. Trains went by, people stayed outside our RV talking but we were not bothered and then in the morning we passed other RVs just parked along the side of the road...hmmmm....did they do the same thing? We will never know...
We hit the road at 7:30am and headed towards Monterey Bay.
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Michelle
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CHOCO-TINI
I'm just happy to read that a fancy martini came into the picture well before Vegas, and that they seemingly had nothing to do with the condo purchase! Chris, have one for me soon...or should I say, have one for MINTZ soon? He's probably staying away from them, so have one in his honor (zzzzz).