re-thinking getaways

When we lived in Gilroy going on a getaway was easy. If we wanted to visit our good friends Emily and Raymond at the (now closed) Goose & Turrets Bed and Breakfast in Montara we would head up Highway 85 to Interstate 280, take Highway 92 to California Highway 1, drive a few miles north and we were there. The drive was less than two hours.

If we wanted to go to another favorite destination, Cambria, we hopped on U.S. 101 and drove south to California Highway 46, headed west, and connected with Highway 1. Then it was only a few minutes to Cambria. It was a manageable three-hour drive.

Here in Hemet it’s not so simple. It’s easy enough to get to the San Diego County coast, but it is more crowded than we would like. We could head to the San Jacinto mountains or the low desert, but those don’t offer the getaways on the water that we love.

Terry decided that we needed to go back to Cambria. Our favorite motel, the White Water Inn, had gone all upscale on us, completely refurbishing rooms and doubling their rates. So she found us a room at a place called the Fog Catcher Inn. She reserved a partial ocean view room but we got a full ocean view room instead. That was marvelous. It was also halfway between our two favorite restaurants, Moonstone Bar and Grill and the incredible Sea Chest, both in walking distance.

But to get to Cambria from Hemet we have to go through the Los Angeles basin. There is simply no way around it. The drive to Cambria was six-and-a-half hours. We had a wonderful time and being at the ocean is always reinvigorating and healing, but we ate too much rich food and both our digestive systems made that clear to us. We just can’t eat rich food in the way we once could.

The drive home took seven-and-quarter hours. We made more stops and longer stops than on the drive north. My first thought when we arrived at home was the same as it was when we would get home to Gilroy after a trip down here to Southern California, braving that infamous, unforgiving Interstate 5: “Oh, Aunty Em, I’m so glad to be home and I’m never going to go away again!”

After catching our breath upon our arrival here Terry said that we need to find getaways closer to home.

She’s right. We do.

repairing my favorite jacket (and remembering a getaway)

Somehow it seems that most of the jackets that I own my marvelous wife Terry bought for me. But one is my favorite. It is a Pendleton. I love it.

The jacket has quite the history. Back in December 2010 Terry and I headed up to the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn for her birthday. It was mid-afternoon on our way into the town of Sonoma and I was in one of those need-food-now low blood sugar states (these days the word is “hangry”). We therefore stopped at the first restaurant we saw, which was Pizzeria Capri Ristorante. (I didn’t actually remember that. I’m referring back to my account of the trip on this blog.) It was a cold, rainy day. The pizza was delicious and the place was playing acoustic music from the Coffee House channel on SiriusXM. We checked in at the resort and did very little the rest of the day except for enjoying the fire in the fireplace and some wine. We likely had cheese and crackers or something similar as well.

The next morning we had breakfast at the coffee shop affiliated with the resort but facing out on the main street of town. Terry did a spa treatment in the afternoon and I did some writing in our room while it rained. We had dinner at the Santé Restaurant, which was relaxed and leisurely with marvelous food and impeccable service. It was a marvelous weekend.

It was that morning, however, after breakfast at the coffee shop that we went across the street to a local espresso shop. Next door was a Western shop. In the window was a beautiful Pendleton jacket. I asked Terry if that could be my Christmas present rather than the new jeans jacket I had originally asked for. She liked the jacket as well and was quite agreeable. Thank you, Terry!

The jacket is very well made, except for the pockets, which quickly wore through. This was a problem, as I would take Tasha for her walks on cold mornings and I would have to dig into the jacket lining to retrieve Tasha’s pickup bags. I kept thinking that I needed to get that fixed, but never did.

Earlier this month Terry went to a local tailor shop to have an outfit of hers repaired. When she was going to pick it up I asked her to take the jacket in. She did and the pockets are now repaired.

I only regret that I took so long to have that done.