Del Mar Heights

Living out of a suitcase has always come easy to us, so returning to a normalized schedule is always a bit tough. That being said, we deeply appreciate that our everyday lives have afforded us opportunities like this one.

Anyway, with a somber note, we started off the day with the necessary coffee from a local shop. Today's cup was from Scorpion Bay Coffee just a block down the road from our hotel.

Our first stop for the day was a slam-on-the-brakes, pull-to-the-side one at Ostrichland USA. We couldn't pass up the chance to hang out with some weird birds in the middle of wine country. They made short work of the bowl of snacks that Danielle fed them, then we watched the emus and their little watermelon-striped babies before getting Wesley out of the sun.

Just down the road, we stopped for a short walk around Solvang, a little Danish heritage town. Being a bit short on enthusiasm, we had some Danish pastries, æbleskiver, and polkagris from a Swedish candy shop, then strapped in our sleeping baby for the more unfortunate portion of our drive...

We don't like LA, Welsey didn't like LA, and LA apparently doesn't like us. On a positive note, driving through the rectum of the West Coast always reminds us to be more appreciative of where we live. A few hours through hot, standstill traffic and we were on the 15 for what we thought was the home stretch... Lake Elsinore had other plans for us. Stopped at an unusual spot for traffic, Danielle looked up what was happening ahead of us. Sure enough there was an accident. Unfortunately for everyone involved, it was a horrific accident. We put the car in park and watched as dozens of CHP cars flew by, news helicopters circled like vultures, ambulances, fire engines, and Caltrans trucks all close behind. Our 8 hour day quickly became a 10 hour one. We guess that today is what it took to make us happy to be done with our vacation.

After the close of our impromptu vacation, we have to mention how impressed we are with little Wesley. Something to the tune of 3,000 miles and 50 hours in the car and he handled it like a champ! There were some rough times, but to expect anything more from a teething 4 month old would be crazy. We are so thankful for having such a great little kid and, although he won't remember any of this, we're happy that these experiences helped us get to know him a little better. With real life starting back up on Monday, we'll both miss spending our whole days with the chunky little bear!

Also, we again want to thank our trusty steed for keeping us all safe and feeling secure throughout the trip. We picked her out for a reason and she really showed us what she's made of on this trip. Now off to the carwash for a deep cleaning...

Finally, we thought it would be fun to point out some things we noticed along the way... men's restrooms RARELY have a changing table; we are all more comfortable with a cooler climate; the further south we traveled, the ruder the drivers; we need more trains and less trucks on the roads.

Until the next adventure...Baca lagi