As some of you may know, Blaine and I took a vacation to scenic and exotic *cough*Norcal*cough*. Blaine has already done some fairly extensive blogging chronicling said vacation, and I’m going to try not to repeat anything here. I just thought I would share my take on it. =P
It’s a rock. Hurray Norcal!
Much, much more after the cut.
It all started off quite nicely. Because we got the feeling that it was going to feel like a whole different country even though we were only going a few hundred miles north, we stopped at Starbucks and King Taco, to give us our last dose of the familiar and delicious, respectively.
Blaine and I driving through Starbucks. An adventure can’t begin wtihout Starbucks! 
Blaine, in front of King Taco’s extensive (and delicious) menu…more appetizing than Blaine’s nosehairs, kekekeke.
We ended up eating delicious carne asada tacos, and taking six all-meat carne asada burritos to go. Our friend Aaron attests that they keep extremely well, so we figured six burritos was enough to satisfy our longings and sustain a taste of home throughout the week. After that, it was time for hours and hours of no leg room and Columbo’s. I can’t complain too much, though. Blaine drove all of the way, and I was able to replenish some of my lost sleep. Some long, winding roads and many, many, many cows later, we ended up in the middle of nowhere to our destination—Angels Camp, California!
The next day, we all went to go visit the local cave, where apparently, all the hip cats of rural Northern California hang out. It was a place called The Moaning Cavern, where Blaine’s sister, Danise, and I decided to do their rappel. For those of you who don’t know, rappeling is the opposite of climbing. Oh, those crazy white people and their inventions! Now, I thought they were going to guide us on a more exciting trip to get to the rappel location, where we would have to hike through dense brush and exotic terrain to get to the designated hole in the ground. Nope. Instead, they guided us to the back of the shop….with the designated hole in the ground.
Yep, that’s a hole alright.
So, they hook you up to those colored ropes, and you make your way down the hole with only an ingenious piece of metal stopping you from falling to your death. The picture up there might not make it seem like the cave is very deep, but that’s just a “platform” that’s there to let you take a breather, and perhaps give you your last chance to turn back. This is how a conversation went between me and the adventure guide or whatever the fuck he was, who was yelling me to me from safety:
Me: Hurray, I made it to the platform! This is easy!
Adventure Guide: GREAT! NOW YOU JUST HAVE TO MAKE YOUR WAY DOWN THAT NEXT HOLE.
Me: …….
Adventure Guide: IS THERE A PROBLEM?!
Me: IT’S DARK IN THERE.
Yeah, with the quaint little shop and the hole being in a building and everything, I had forgotten for a second that I was supposed to be in a fuckin’ cave. Despite my fears and a little bit of trouble squeezing my ass through a slit of rock, I made my way down to the caverns. It was a good adrenaline rush. Don’t get me wrong, it was scary as hell, and I was constantly worrying about letting go of my footing, or slipping and getting knocked out on a rock and dying. Not to mention, I realized that this activity requires a lot of upper body strength, which I regretted lacking. Anyway, I made it safely down to where Blaine and rest were, and I didn’t end up telling myself that I should have just taken the stairs. Blaine took some video of the course of my adventure, but the video turned out badly since Blaine was, as he puts it, in a cave.
Me, kinda sorta getting to be just like my hero!
That was great fun, and I found that, having only seen such a large one on TV and Planet Earth, I have a certain fondness for caves. I definitely wanted to go take their three-hour tour. The brochure described as an adventure that lets you “come out of spider holes and into sticky mud.” Nobody else wanted to do it. =(
Tuesday was also quite eventful. I ended up crossing off #17, “Go Fishing” on my 101/1001 List that day. Blaine, Tony (Blaine’s sister’s husband, who is our brother-in-law), and I woke up way before dawn and made our way to New Melones Lake.
Dawn at the lake. IT’S TOO EARLY!
Blaine and Tony showed me how to hook the bait and cast a rod, which took a bit of time to get used to. Once I got past the learning curve, it was just a matter of waiting. Despite the loneliness of it (no one was there but us), the eerie quietness, and the whole no-talking bit, I surprisingly found it lots of fun. Being in the middle of all that nature, with no people, is a very peaceful and humbling experience.
Nothing but the sound of “zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz” then “Bloop!” of the fishing rods casting. 
Waiting for some poor fish to die.
As you might see from that first picture, I was sitting quite far away from the guys. They thought that the deeper waters where they were at was a smarter spot, and it probably was. For some reason, though, I had a good feeling about the spot to the left of everything. Was it the sound of fish biting in that area? Was it the birds landing there? Could it be that it was because there was already some rocks and resting stick already set up there? HMMMM. Naaaaah. Let’s just call it “woman’s intuition.” Well, apparently, having a vagina helps because I was the only one that ended up catching a fish!
Woman’s Intuition is also good friends with Beginner’s Luck. 
Tony was kind enough to teach me how to put the dead fish on a leash to keep it from escaping….and also to keep it fresh while were still fishing. 
“FOOD CHAAAAAAAAAAAAIN!” 
Being an aspiring chef studying at Cordon Bleu, Tony also taught me how to properly scale, filet, and cook the fish! 
But he didn’t have to teach me how to eat it! HA HAR!
Later that day, with only four hours of sleep under our belts, we made a longer-than-expected drive to Yosemite. Blaine already accounted on this “adventure” in this post, which you can go read because I won’t care to repeat it. But here’s some majesty you can look at.
I thought we left L.A. so we could avoid the traffic? 
Water. That is falling. 
FANTASTIC! 
Mmmm, people food. 
Seriously? A squirrel? I came for the bears, dammit. 
The majesty of nature….from the car.
Wednesday ended up being pretty uneventful. We just kind of all sat around and watched Columbo or Psych episodes. I owned Blaine at billiards and airhockey, and I learned how to knit that day, so it was a little bit productive. I didn’t complete my knitting project on this trip, so I can’t say I crossed it off my list yet, but I’m getting there! In the meantime, here are some random pictures!
This is the Glory Hole Center. It is where fishermen, hunters, and outdoor sportsmen come to hang out. I’m just sayin’. 
Apparently, Northern Californians are too dumb to know what “compact” means. 
And oh my god it’s a baby in my Chuck Norris hat! AWWWWWWW!
On Thursday, Danise and I went horseback riding, which crosses off #47 on my list, “Learn how to ride a horse.” Granted, it was a very tame horse, but I learned how to ride one nonetheless! =P We met up with a nice gentleman named Mike, who showed us how to ride the horses and took us on a very scenic trail. He was yelling some great anecdotes to us along the way, with his faithful dog, Molly, running playfully by our sides the whole time. Mike and his dog were like from a movie; it was fantastic! Anyway, the view was beautiful and the stories were entertaining. He told us about what goes into our hotdogs, which was funny. He also told us that the horse I was riding was twenty-seven years old and that he could die and flop over any minute. That was not as funny.
This is Cowboy Mike, and he and his mustache are a lot cooler than you. 
Danise and I with Mr. Mike. 
So this is what it’s like to be on top of a horse. 
Mr. Mike, pointing out some scenery. 
Posing with our horses by the lake. 
More scenery. 
Me, with my horse, Pig, who is apparently a senior citizen by horse standards.
We hung out at a small town called Sonora for the rest of the day. It’s one of those cute, little, almost ghost-type towns with like a hundred antique shops and bright-eyed, talkative ladies sell fudge. We went into a pretty cool candy shop, where I bought some candy cigarettes, and Blaine bought a ringpop.
Awww.
I’m not much for antiquing, but I admit that I find looking at very old jewelry, clothes, and hats to be very fascinating. I love seeing things in real life that I would see on an episode of Poirot. There was this “vintage” mink stole I saw that I would love to have, but by “vintage” I mean “probably stolen off a dead old lady,” so I’m always hesitant about that sort of thing. After seeing one antique shop, though, it seems like you’ve seen them all. It was in this town, however, that I went into the best shop ever. I don’t have any pictures of it, but it was a bar that sold guns, knives, and crossbows, and had deer heads hanging on the walls. It’s quite possibly the manliest store ever. Besides that, there were other interesting things to see.
Like this church. 
And this dog…
I got nothin’.
Friday was our big day in San Francisco! Blaine also did a full account of this trip in his blog, so I’ll try to be brief. It was a very interesting trip, and San Francisco is probably the prettiest big city I’ve ever been in. Blaine and I decided to park by the Metreon and just hoof it all around the city. We figure we’d save ourselves the stress of driving in narrow, one-way streets with a bunch of crazy tourists. With the exception of Ellis Street, it ended was a nice way to see the city, and the public transportation there is fantastic. Blaine rode a public bus for the first time in his life! I’m so proud!
Go Sony! 
Snake vs. Android 
The Metreon had, what I like to call “The Hall of Claw Machines.” It has this in it, which is the best claw machine in the history of mankind. I want that Penguin plush so bad. 
WHAT IS GOING ON WHY ARE THOSE LIGHTS BLINKING?! 
A view of some buildings from the Embarcadero.
Japantown ended up being “okay”, since most of the stuff there I could get online for cheaper, and the stuff I really wanted were really expensive. I did have a delicious fruit tart before heading out to our next stop. We decided to skip Chinatown in favor of the Embarcadero because apparently that was the place to be. It just ended up being a really long, cold, windy walk. I really wanted to get to the vista overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge, but our dinner reservation at Faralon was creeping up and we didn’t get the time. We went back to the parking structure to luxuriously get ready in the car.
Now, Blaine complains about how it took me 45 minutes to get ready, but you realize that I had to change into a nice dress, do my hair AND make up in a freaking car.
Despite Blaine stressing out, we got ready, hiked up to the restaurant with me in heels, and made our dinner reservation. Blaine was even nice enough to stop and buy me a flower for my hair along the way. It ended up being a super nice place, with great decor and ambience. The food was very expensive and perhaps overrated, but nice nonetheless. Blaine made a point that he wanted to save our money during the vacation for the fancy dinner, so I ended up ordering oysters and a $17 glass of wine. No, it didn’t have cocaine in it, but hell, I didn’t feel as stupid and gypped from it compared to that one time we bought Voss water. I sure do love me my mollusks, though.
The front of the restaurant. 
The view from where we were sitting. 
Blaine and I at our table.
The dinner was really fantastic, and it was nice to see Blaine in his suit looking very handsome. There’s something to be said about walking around in a big city all dressed up in the middle of the night. Walking back, it was quite lucky that we ran into this nice man taking pictures. We didn’t get to take our picture in front of the Golden Gate Bridge earlier in the day, like most tourists do, but this picture of us in front of a painting of one will do quite nicely.
I would have taken off Blaine’s coat, but it was REALLY effing cold and windy. 
The view of the Metreon at night, on our way back to the parking structure.
Blaine already mentioned the part about our horrible cramps and the killer milkshakes, so I’ll spare the details. Besides aching feet and concentrating hard to focus off the pain, I don’t remember much anyway. All I remember was a closed McDonald’s and going to the bathroom at a Shell Station, debating with myself whether or not it was urgent enough that I skip the toilet seat liner. I didn’t, incidentally. It is San Francisco, after all. That liner might have been the only thing that saved me from The HIV.
Whew! That was a long post! 1500 miles and 6 carne asada burritos later, we’re still alive! Suffice to say, despite missing the comforts of Socal, that was a pretty interesting vacation. It expanded some horizons, you could say. I suppose when all you see are horizons for miles on out, it helps expand them. =P It’s good to be home.
