Through the Redwood Forest

Hope everyone is having a wonderful start to your week!

I thought I’d take a quick break from finishing all those pizza posts and bring some more non food photos from our road trip. One of my absolute favorite parts of the drive was the redwood trees. We drove on Avenue of the Giants highway on our way up the coast and it was so incredibly beautiful. It’s crazy how huge some of those trees are, not only wide but tall!



Since I’m all nerdy like that … some fun facts about the redwoods:

• California used to be home to over two million acres of redwoods but after a lot of logging since 1850, only 4%, or 85,000 acres of that old growth is still standing.
• A large redwood can hold approximately 34,000 pounds of water.
• Currently, the largest redwood tree discovered, named Hyperion, is 378.1 feet tall and is in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park.
• Redwoods can grow up to 22 feet in diameter and their bark is as thick as 12 inches which helps protect the trees.
• Coastal redwoods survive to be over 2,000 years old and average probably 500 to 700 years.
• Despite how tall they are, redwood tree roots are very shallow, often only five or six feet deep.

And now some more pictures!

Whale Watching Tour

Well, we’ve reached the near end of our road trip that started on July 4th! We began our trek back to Kansas City, but have to stop in Nebraska at my parents to pick up Erik’s new ride. Not surprisingly, I still have a lot to blog about, as we’ve done so many things these past few weeks.  One of the highlights for me was whale watching!

Whale Watching

I’ve always wanted to see a whale in its natural habitat. I remember distinctly one day in kindergarten when my teacher told us whales were as long as the back end of our classroom all the way out to the end of the playground and I thought it was CRAZY. Ha, I think that’s what first sparked my interest.

After Googling a good place to go on a whale watching tour, Monterey Bay came up. So on the way to San Francisco, we stayed in Monterey a night and booked a whale watching tour with the Monterey Bay Whale Watch Center.

I loved it! We got to see the following:

• Many different  birds
• Moon Jellyfish
• Sea Lions
• 10 Humpback Whales
• 2 Blue Whales
• 100 Risso Dolphins
• 100 Northern Right-Whale Dolphins
• 1 Elephant Seal
• 1 Mola Mola

 

Our tour lasted about 4 hours, beginning at 9 a.m. At one point at the end of our tour, we were surrounded  by hundreds of dolphins, with multiple whales coming up to blow.
 
  

My thoughts?

• I loved it, and would definitely go on another whale watching tour!
• We (obviously) went in July and it was very chilly! Even though they do tell you to dress warm, I only had a thin hoodie on with another thin jacket and was cold. On hindsight, I would have worn gloves, a thicker sweatshirt or coat, and had a hat to cover my ears.
• Our morning tour was about $50 a ticket, with Monterey Bay Whale Watch and lasted about four hours. The staff on our boat were great;  very knowledgeable, and you could tell they all very much cared about the whales and were really in it to observe the marine life and to educate each tour. They’re great about not hurrying, and will even linger if you are around a lot of whale activity.

In summary, I was very happy with our experience, would certainly recommend Monterey Bay Whale Watch for tours!  Tomorrow is another day on the road for us, but for now a little resting before bed with some Whale Wars. (How appropriate, right? Ha).
 

Sage Organic Vegan Bistro

And so it continues …

I’ve been trying to blog each day to keep up with all the photos we’ve been taking and all the places we’ve been going, but yesterday I decided not to. So here I am playing a little catch up! We’re all the way up in Oregon now, and it was a beautiful drive through the Redwoods and along the coast!  But first … a little catch up from a few restaurants in Southern CA.

Sage

We didn’t spent a lot of time in LA because of the horrendous traffic in between there and Lake Elsinore (where my friend lives who we were staying with), but one place we ate at was Sage, an “organic vegan bistro”.



Sage is located at 1700 West Sunset Boulevard in LA. Their hours are as follows:

Sun 9am-4pm & 5pm-10pm
Mon-Wed 11am-10pm
Thu-Fri 11am-11pm
Sat 9am-4pm & 5pm-11pm
Brunch:
Sat-Sun 9-4

They have a very extensive menu that includes wonderful desserts, and a dipping cabinet full of KindKreme ice cream.



Our dinners started out with a delicious salad:



I got the French Grain Vegetable Bowl, which is “served with basmati rice, quinoa and lentil with seasonal farmer’s market vegetables”



And Erik opted for the Chipotle Bowl: quinoa, grape tomatoes, chipotle pepper, grilled onions, black beans, sauteed kale, avocado and baby corn topped with pico de gallo, sunflower sprouts and battered, deep fried jalapeño and served on an organic corn tortilla served with a side of nacho cheese”



The verdict?

More often than I’d like, I feel like vegan meals out can easily be rather boring, with little thought to presentation of depth of flavor. The kind of meal where you leave feeling as if it was just okay. At Sage, we were pleasantly surprised. Our meals were presented beautifully and weren’t just a bowl of flavorless mush. They were both very flavorful and satisfying. If we lived in LA, I’m sure we would eat here regularly … yum!

We got an ice cream sandwich for dessert, but silly me, I was so anxious to eat it, I didn’t even snap a picture!



More road trip posts coming soon including a look inside our whale watching tour, and more delicious Neapolitan pizza!

It's Vacation Time! Part V: Southern California

The road trip continues.

Well, we’ve spend the last 4 days or so in the LA area staying with one of my friends, and one of my family members. Yesterday, we ventured up Highway 1 into Monterey.  We have an exciting adventure ahead of us today that I’m super excited for (besides The Great Neapolitan Pizza Quest, of course) but for now … some photos from Southern California and Highway 1.

laguna beach

 

 

 

me and friend, danelle after eating at Settebello Pasadena (coming soon)

 

 

some highway 1 travels

 

 

See you soon with more delicious and fun adventures!

It's Vacation Time! Part IV: Las Vegas

The road trip continues! We’re currently in Southern California staying with a friend. But first … our day in Las Vegas.

Before coming to CA, our last stop was in Las Vegas. The main highlight (especially for Erik) was stopping by Exotics Racing. In fact, it’s not too far off from our Great Neapolitan Pizza Quest. And Erik said, “Pizzas and Lamborghinis go hand in hand because they’re both hand crafted by Italian artisans”. Haha.



He drove a Lamborghini Gallardo LP 570-4 Superleggera, a 200 mile an hour car, which is Lamborghini superlight race version of the Gallardo, and then a Nissan GTR.



In each car, he got five laps around their 1.4 mile, 11 turn track. Here is his review of the experience:

“Driving the Superleggera was amazing. The racing instructor couldn’t have been any better. You could tell he was extremely passionate about racing and truly loved what he did. He told me exactly what to do every second of the track to optimize my lap times and made it a truly incredible experience. The GRT, on the other hand, was a major disappointment. My instructor for this car sat quietly in the passenger’s seat offering no assistance. It felt like being there was the last thing he wanted to do. It was truly a night and day experience. The GTR was also mysteriously shifting around 4 to 5,000 RPMs, way below its typical 7,000 RPM rev limiter. If I had gotten my first instructor for both cars, it would have truly been perfect.”

 
And then it was my turn to drive it!

 
Ha, okay, no, I didn’t.

Some more of Las Vegas via Instagram …

 
More of The Great Neapolitan Pizza Quest coming soon!

It's Vacation Time! Part III: Salt Lake City

Well, good-bye, cool Colorado weather, ha. We’re now in Vegas and at one point it was 117 degrees.

Onward on our road trip!

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, we spent the night in Salt Lake City. It was a tiring drive from Denver so once we got there we were pretty wiped out. We did, however, have enough energy and time to eat (coming soon) and check out the Great Salt Lake. We walked around, stuck our feet in, and snapped some photos.

  

The views driving through Utah, Arizona and Nevada have been fun! It’s made me realize just how flat Nebraska and Missouri are, ha. A nice change of landscape.

 

Since it’s just what I do, it may or may not seem weird that I haven’t been posting any meals … there is a reason, and that reason is coming soon!

Tomorrow … we head to California!