Mike and I decided that, since we have been together for so long and because we were showered with SO many gifts this year from the wedding festivities, we would simply enjoy each others company for Christmas. And what a gift that was!
It was also a gift to hang out in a new place, and explore what a beautiful and amazing state we live in. Seriously, there are some beautiful places here. We decided to go to Monterey, after having found a really good deal on a hotel there over the New Years weekend. It was a beautiful place, right by the old fisherman's wharf, and greeted us with warm, freshly baked chocolate chip cookies upon check in! I was sold right away! (It was a really good cookie, too. Thinking about it now makes me want another one!) We had been to Monterey before, actually for our first Christmas together. But, it is always cool to come back to a place so many years later, and now we're married!
We spent the days just walking around, down to the wharf, down to Cannery Row, visiting the Aquarium (which is pretty cool). The last time we were there, the Aquarium was being remodeled and so a lot of it was shut down. It has a lot of cool new exhibits that we enjoyed. We stopped for lunch at this little place on the beach. The great thing about Monterey is that all of the restaurants have someone outside offering you little cups of their clam chowder, which was invariably first place in some kind of local competition. They must have a LOT of competitions because almost every restaurant somehow had a first place chowder... Since it is my year of "yes", I made sure I said yes to midday cocktails!
One of the days we also decided to take a drive up the coast to Carmel and Big Sur. I had never been there, and definitely wanted to see it. Man oh man. California is beautiful. It is amazing how you can, in one moment, be right on the ocean, and then the next minute in the middle of a forest. It rained a bit while we were there, but that didn't stop us from taking a little New Year's day hike! We stopped on the way and enjoyed the ocean a bit, and took the opportunity to play around with our new camera. We also just like to be photographed being silly.
All in all, it was a successful and refreshing start to the new year. It will be a great one, full of adventure, fun and love in our new married bliss.
that whole area is so pretty - i loved it when we went for a trip through those areas too. and your pics are fabulous and so very you. cheers to all of the fun adventures to come in 2011!
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