Conversations between B and InterWebs: California Road Trip: Monterey & Carmel

2.8.13

California Road Trip: Monterey & Carmel

So I don't know if you're as obsessed with my comings and goings as I like to think you are, InterWebs, but my little sister and I are currently on a California road trip.

Let me tell you how WEIRD it is to go on a vacation as an adult. I spent the first three days of vacation agonizing about this report I'd done for work and whether or not people knew where to reach me in case of some catastrophic work emergency, like, does anyone know what bRob renamed that one stupid file? and then i anxiously bit my nails and waited for people to send emails back and forth going, ugh bRob is the worst how could she leave us in the middle of this project OR ugh bRob is the worst thank heavens she's gone. But apparently no one's sent that email yet or they've just forgotten to 'cc' me.

Paranoia aside, I figured I might chronicle some of our travelings across southern California (you'll note that I refrained from calling it SoCal, and for your sake, will continue to do so), so at the very least, Grandma won't be so worried about whether or not we've been kidnapped by hippies and whether or not we're staying hydrated (we aren't).

It should be noted I put WAY too much faith in my phone camera. I kind of gave up using my camera camera, because it doesn't always get colors right, but apparently once you expand a phone photo to larger than 2 pixels, it looks like someone drew it with a crayon. And what i mean by that is why is my phone camera so blurry...

Day 1: Monterey & Carmel-By-The Sea

I was a little disappointed in Monterey. While the aquarium was lovely, the town itself was a bit of a drip. I did find a great used bookstore, much to Marena's disappointment. And then, in addition to the eight books I brought with me, I bought two more used books. About dragons. Whatever, I go through weird phases when I'm on vacation.

[Number of books purchased: 2. This will be an ongoing count throughout the roadtrip.]

Without further ado, I present: the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

It blew my mind a little bit that this is what sand dollars (a sand dollar colony?) actually look like when they're not dead and on your Christmas tree.

This little buddy was a bit of a camera hog. Baby Turtle was dallying and dancing right in front of the glass and this was the best photo I could capture. Typical.

An angel seahorse. That's not what it's officially called, but that's what I would call it if someone bothered to ask me my opinion.

This picture, in case you can't make it out, is the picture of a dwarf seahorse. As if seahorses weren't cute enough. My sister's finger for scale.

These are jellyfish. Can you believe it. Also - you should probably be super grateful, I've spared you, no joke, 37 mediocre blurry jellyfish pictures right now.

An overly attentive aquarium worker trapped us for 15 minutes to tell us about all the birds surrounding the aquariums. the BIRDS. Not only am I an introvert who doesn't like to be trapped in conversation, but I especially don't super want to be trapped in a conversation about birds. So I asked him to take a picture so he'd stop talking and then tried to escape like 3 more times.

color me hilarious.

This next series of photographs is from Carmel-By-The-Sea. They sure don't do the place any justice, but I am in LOVE with Carmel. It reminds me a lot of the Hamptons. It's absolutely gorgeous, on the ocean, romantic, quiet, and a lot of delusional rich people live there. And the window displays are to die for.

Obviously you can't see because 70% of this picture is road, but Carmel has amazing, beautiful houses. Glamorous, modern, etc. All on the edge of the ocean (that is too cold to swim in, might i add) with these giant trees shading them.