Vacation in California

As mentioned in our previous blog post we took a vacation to California to visit Brian's parents recently. Brian also had a job interview for a physics faculty position at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey. On the way to CA we split up the drive and stayed for $40 at Circus Circus in Reno. It was a fun experience for our kids. They liked the train that you ride between buildings and the carnival type games area. Here's Marcus and Travis enjoying the view out our 14th story room.

We did a bike/scooter ride with Brian's parents one day and the kids had a good time. Marcus didn't allow us to go very fast because he has recently been insistent that he ride a scooter as well. Let's just say he's not a speed racer yet.

There's a fun, large concrete slide at a park near their house that the kids ride on cardboard down and they really have fun.

During this time Brian was down in Monterey and so Marcus clung to Grandpa and made good friends with him.

Here's another fun slide nearby. It's a really long one (see the second video below). Note Marcus with Grandpa again.

Then Angela, the boys, Grandpa and Grandma, and Marci (who drove over and vacationed with us) met Brian down in Monterey for a half day. They had a really cool park in town with a roller slide. You might be catching on by now that the theme of our vacation seemed to center around slides. Here's Lucas and Marcus enjoying the roller slide.There's also a real train at this park in Monterey that the kids can climb on. Travis and Lucas sure enjoyed climbing on it.

The beaches there are generally cold and not so sandy for the most part but still very beautiful. Here's a family photo we had taken.

Brian took the boys out on the rocks a ways so that they could look at the tide pools and sea shells out there.

And here's a photo of Grandma and Grandpa with our boys. They sure had fun spending quality time with their grandparents.

That evening Grandma and Grandpa and Marci took our boys back home with them and Angela got to stay with Brian in Monterey for a night. It was a week shy of our 10th anniversary and we had honeymooned in Monterey 10 years ago. One of the restaurants that we had enjoyed back then is called the Fish Wife and it's out near the coast in Pacific Grove. We got to eat there again that night for dinner which was fun. Great great food! If you ever get a chance to eat there, do so!

Here's a picture of the "hotel" on campus where Brian stayed for his interview. This is a restored version of the original famous hotel in Monterey that really got things started for this area in terms of tourism. This was the fancy place for the rich and famous to go stay. It had burned down a couple times and been rebuilt. At some point the Navy bought this land and built the Postgraduate School here.

So here's video of the concrete slide.

Then the long metal slide...

And here's video of Marcus chasing the seagulls, quite cute.