Our very good friends, Cami and Jeremy Petersen, invited us to come along on a mini vacation with them to Santa Cruz for a few days earlier this month. We were all married the same year and they had hoped to go on a Mexican cruise this year with us to celebrate our anniversaries together. We didn't have the money and aside from that they decided that doing something else would probably be more fun (and safe).
They called us a few months prior inviting us to come along. We were hesitant at first because of the cost, but they told us they were planning to rent a house for a few days whether we were there or not so it wouldn't cost us anything to stay. They also were already planning on driving down there so the cost of gas would be covered for us as well. 3 days with our friends only having to pay for food and souvenirs? We were in!
I got worried though because our kids were still in school. It was their last full week of school actually. Had they had more time in school like Jer and Cami's kids, I might not have worried about it as much. They took their kids out of school for a week and we kept our kids in. Tim's WONDERFUL parents agreed to not only let our kids stay at their house for the three days, but the got them up, off to school and picked up for us. Luckily, as it was the last week of school, they didn't have any homework, so that eased my stress a little.
So Monday morning I got the kids off to school as usual, dropped the puppy off to a friend, ran a couple of errands, took the kid's stuff over to Tim's folks and out of town we went. :)
We arrived in Capitola after taking the scenic route there (okay, we kinda got lost) and settled into the house. I, of course, had to photograph pretty much every square inch of the house :)
This was mine and Tim's room. I had a hard time with sleeping on a queen size bed. I am so used to our Cal King.
This was the room between ours and Jer & Cami's. Everything was so brightly painted.
The chandelier in the middle bedroom
This was Jer & Cami's pretty room.
Jer & Cami's bathroom
The dining room and part of the family room
The other side of the family room
The view of the backyard standing in the family room
The nice backyard. There was a fire pit and a barbecue we could have used too.
The cute little kitchen
The breakfast nook
The living room
The view of the living room standing just outside the front door
When you walked in the front door and turned toward the left our bedroom and the middle bedroom were over there. This bathroom was between our bedroom and the pink and green bedroom
This was the cute little patio in front of the house. That bench turned into my favorite place to relax.
Pretty landscaping.
The front of the house. Cute, huh?
Pretty flowers that were growing next to the driveway
I like how this picture came out. So much so I might print and hang it somewhere in my house :)
After we relaxed at the house for a little while we went on a short walk and then ventured out to find something to eat. We had a late lunch at a hawaiian barbecue restaurant and wandered around some little shops in Capitola. Later that evening we found our way into Santa Cruz and had Marianne's ice cream (OMG YUM!!) and then tried Uppercrust Pizza for dinner (also very yummy)
The next morning we tried another pizza place for brunch that their take out menu that was in the house said they served breakfast all day. They didn't indicate that that was only on the weekends (it was a Tuesday when we were there). So we had "brunch" and headed over to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Most of the rides and vendors were closed (unknown if it was because the season hadn't started yet or if it was because of the economy...or both). We wandered around for a while and Cami and I rode the roller coaster. We got some frozen yogurt, played some arcade games, bought a souvenir for our niece and headed out.
Tim and I as we were making our way back to the car.
Cami and I after surviving the roller coaster
Before heading to Santa Cruz, Jer and Cami made reservations at a nice restaurant called Shadowbrook for the four of us. After the boardwalk we came home and showered and got ourselves "gussied up" for dinner. Walking toward the restaurant we had a choice to either walk down a bunch of stairs through a garden or to take a cute little trolley down to the main level. We decided to take the trolley. It was so small and cute.
Here is the track we came down on :)
These are the stairs and the garden we could have walked through.
We were seated pretty promptly and ordered drinks. Jer took this nice picture of Tim and I
After reviewing the menu and asking our waiter what he recommended, we ordered and enjoyed the ambiance. We got fresh from the oven chibatta (sp) bread while we waited for the rest of our order. We ordered some mushrooms as an appetizer that we all expected to be swimming in butter, but they weren't! They were simply grilled, sliced and lightly seasoned, but they were so yummy! Jer and Cami ordered crab cakes for an appetizer. Let me tell you...DELICIOUS! I had never had good crab cakes before. These were...oh my goodness...good! They were served on top of bed of fruit (pineapple, mangoes and something else) that complimented the crab surprisingly well. Tim also ordered clam chowder along with his dinner. We were impressed with how big the pieces of clam were and he said he knew they were real because it was gritty as he chewed :)
Our dinner came out shortly after Tim finished the last little bit of his chowder. Tim ordered the filet Mignon. He said it was the best steak he has ever had. It came on top of mushrooms and was served with scalloped potatoes.
I ordered the Alaskan Halibut that was served atop farro. It was DELICOUS! (it was supposed to have arugula salad on top, but I opted out)
Cami ordered lamb and Jer had a NY strip. After dinner we waited for our trolley to the parking lot. While we waited (and others used it) we snapped a few pictures.
Here are Cami and I. She and I have been friends for a long time and have very few pictures together. I am so glad we made sure to take some this time :)
After dinner we grabbed some snacks at a Rite Aid and rented a movie from Redbox. Then we just went back to the house and relaxed.
Wednesday morning we headed into Santa Cruz again and found a beach to play on for a little while. It was pretty breezy, so we didn't stay long (Cami was cold) but we snapped some pictures before we left. Cami told me to make a duck face...
Then I insisted we had a nice picture too
And I made sure to take a picture of Tim and Jer. They have known each other their whole lives. I don't think the words best friends quite describes their relationship right. Brothers...that's a better word. :)
Then here's the four of us.
We found a few other places to wander around in Santa Cruz before heading back to the house to pack up the car and head home. We tried to go to the Mystery Spot, but discovered that they were closed (luckily before making our way all the way there). On the way home we stopped at a Chili's for dinner and then found our way back to Elk Grove and to our babies.
It was such a nice, relaxing time with our good friends. We talked about trying to do something like this every year or so, just the four of us. I can't wait for our next trip! :)
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