Between our travels, we just took a 5 month vacation in Santa Barbara. Well, not really. We took quite a few side trips; a couple to the San Francisco area, a couple to Oregon, a weekend in Palm Springs, a Malibu wedding. But predominantly, for those months, we were actually based in Santa Barbara, in our home in the foothills. How unique!
We had some good times in Santa Barbara after we showed up from Chile in April. They included: Being just in time for Maria’s granddaughter Camila’s 12th birthday party on one of the local beaches. Having Andy and Camila up to the Trout Club creek one afternoon. The creek is special, even though it is cold and gets very few hours of sun a day. There are pools to play in, it runs all year long and stays clear, and there is private access to Trout Club residents. We also had Maria’s other granddaughter, 7-year-old Ava, up to the house one afternoon; it was her first visit there since she was very young. The celebration of Maria’s birthday was done with a big party at the house, giving us a chance to see many friends that we don’t get to see often these days.
Randy’s niece Cassandra graduated from college in June. Although we did not attend the very rainy graduation ceremony (Randy’s usually doesn’t do graduation ceremonies!), we went up to the Bay Area for the celebration party at my sister’s house. My family was there in force, and Andy and his crew came up from Santa Barbara. A good celebration for my niece..
From the Bay Area celebration, we took a trip to Oregon to see Santiago and Ava. We could have stayed a couple more days in the SF and seen a great U2 concert, but Maria was too anxious (read that as obsessed) to see her granddaughter. The 9-10 hour drive up there was nowhere near as exciting as the last trip we took in snow and rain last November.
While up there, I took a day to myself and went up into the mountains around Mt Bachelor to fly-fish. It was a very beautiful sunny day amongst the snow-covered fields. The roads had just opened, with snow 10 feet high on some sides of the road, so there were very few people up there. I got to the headwaters of the famous Deschutes River to fish and did catch-and- release a few trout. At one point, though, I did have an experience that I left me with a sense of how old I am getting. During the normal course of fishing, I snapped my fly off the line. One then has to put a new fly on the leader. Well! Here I am, by the side of some remote stream, spending 10-15 minutes trying to thread the leader through the eye of the fly’s hook. With my glasses on. With my glasses off. It didn’t matter. I had the toughest time getting that thin, friggin leader through that small, friggin eyelet. When I finally finished that chore, I said to myself “Man. You haven’t gone fly-fishing in a long, long time! You use to have much better eyesight. ”
It was a fantastic time to be in the mountains, the prime of spring time. Water was flowing in all the rivers. Trees and flowers were budding. Gorgeous!!! On the way home, we traversed down the backside of the Sierras with my intent to go to Yosemite or the Eastern Sierras to languish in this beauty. Unfortunately, it was Maria’s intent to drive straight back to Santa Barbara for a friend’s birthday party. I relented and we drove straight back. I believe I learned a lesson. Rather than miss out on things like the U2 concert or an undoubtedly beautiful time in the Sierras, I have to choose, at judicious moments, to put Maria on a bus, let her do her thing and I do mine. It would have been much better in these cases, at least for me.
Tobias and his wife Raven came from India for a visit in July/August. On his trips to America, Tobias lines up some gigs to do with his old bands and belly dance groups, earn a little bit of money, which he then lives off in India the rest of the year. This year, in addition, he and Raven wanted to have a couple wedding receptions, one on the West Coast for Tobias’ family and friends and one on the East Coast for Raven’s family. We traveled from SB up to the Bay Area to meet them at the airport and hold the reception there. Most of my family was in attendance as well as Raven’s aunt and uncle, plus lots of Tobias’ friends whom do not get to see him much now that he is based in India. Raven’s mom Kimberly even journeyed from New York. I thought the whole event came off well, a simple ceremony followed by a potluck brunch. On the way back to Santa Barbara, Maria and I took the coast highway. We lucked out with a beautifully sunny day; the ocean was deep blue, the hills exploding with the color of wildflowers, and the elephant seals were basking on the beaches in the sun.
We saw little of Tobias and Raven after that first week. They first went up into the Sierras to attend a week-long music camp Tobias tries to get to whenever possible. Tobias took a road trip with his band Elemeno throughout California, including a stop to play in Soho in Santa Barbara. He followed that by going to the East Coast to spend some time with Raven’s family, and finished up his stay by going to Mexico City for a belly dance and workshop gig. Then back to Mysore, India.
Between his music camp and Elemeno tour, to get some more time together, Tobias, Raven, Maria and I took a trip up to Oregon. While Maria went to Bend and Raven stayed in Portland, Tobias and I took a few days to camp and tour around the Mt Hood recreational area. I hadn’t spent a lot of time in that area of Oregon before, and was pleasantly surprised how much open space is near a city as big as Portland. It seems like there are a hundred campgrounds with an hour or two of town. We stayed riverside in Green Canyon Campground along the Salmon River, hiked into wispy Ramona Falls, and explored the Columbia River Gorge. After dropping Tobias back in Portland with Raven, I spent another couple days squeezing in 2 lakeside hikes (Trillium Lake and Clear Lake) and 2 white water rafting trips, one on the wild White Salmon River and another on the more sedate Deschutes River. All of us met back up at Santiago’s in Bend and made the trip back to Santa Barbara.
Our last little side trip from Santa Barbara was a quick trip to Calabasas and Malibu for a wedding of the daughter of Lynda, my friend since college. It was a fun time. We stayed in a hotel in Calabasas, along with a group of girls (I really should say women) that are friends since those college days, and with my high school friend Grant. This is a group that doesn’t get together very often, and it is usually when Lynda has invited us all to stay at one of her houses (she very good at keeping us all together). In this case it was for her daughter’s wedding, which was held in the seaside Malibu estate of the actress Jane Seymour and director James Keach. Very posh event and everyone had to dress to the nines. I have a problem with that since, if I own any ‘dress’ clothes still, they are buried in some box somewhere. Friend Cali in Santa Barbara came to the rescue. Cali works at the SB City College drama department, and between Cali and Maria, they put together an ensemble for me from the pool of clothes they have for plays. Shoes and socks were supplemented from Cali’s husband Peter’s wardrobe. Maria looked her usual stunning self at the party, but I might have gotten more compliments, at least from the people that know me, that haven’t seen me dressed like that much over the years. I let some time pass before I related my friends the quite humorous story of where my wardrobe came from.
We did have a life-changing experience just before we left for our next trip, Maui. I may have a good laptop, and we always have a decent camera, but phones have never been high on my priority list. We used dumb phones, perfectly good enough for Maria to make and get her calls. The last one we had was handed down to us from Tobias. That all changed when Janet gave us her BlackBerry which she had replaced with an iPhone. Finally getting a data plan, and using texting, was a life changing experience. We entered the world of phone access to the internet, and there were some downloaded apps that were fun. The best feature by far was a networking app Beluga that the family used to keep everyone up-to-date on what everyone was doing, as well as sending pictures of them doing it, or drinking it, or eating it. I ‘pooh-poohed’ the idea of ever using the phone to look at emails and such. That notion probably lasted 4 days at the most, as we soon became hooked at seeing emails ‘on the fly’. The result of this was that the phone was no longer just Maria’s thing, but a resource that we shared.
It was a good stay in California, but as I said, it’s now off the Maui…
(NOTE: to go to the next picture, click on the larger pic)
