The Kalls Spring Break...a tour via cell phone picture
We visited Yvette, Anders and the kids in San Francisco. It was a great time!
They live on the other side of the Golden Gate Bride. The boys loved driving over this bridge.
Our first day we watched Alexander play basketball (he won, and came in 2nd place for the whole tournament.Way to go Alexander!!) Then we headed over to Stinson Beach. First we took a hike near the beach.
It was a beautiful, (uphill) walk with lots of really interesting trees as we got deeper into the forest.
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| Annelie and Charles checking out a hollow, fallen log |
A few miles later, we headed to the beach. The fog had rolled in and it was chilly, and misty and kind of miserable. But (most of) the kids still had fun playing in the sand. Yvette and I went to get a coffee.
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| Stinson Beach |
They were filthy and wet and sandy. They cleaned up and had a hot dog break.
The next day, it was off to Tahoe for some skiing. But first we stopped at Trader Joe's for snacks. I was very excited about this (we are getting one in Dallas, but don't have one yet).
About 4 hours later we got to Squaw Valley. We checked out the amenities (kids room here)...
Then the kids had a snowball fight in the "village". There wasn't much snow on the ground, but enough around for a fight.
This is the base of the slopes. We stayed right here in the village. Everything was walking distance. We loved that!!
The next day we skied. The kids did ski school and the adults went up the mountain. The weather was great and so was the snow. My favorite part, this ski-thru Starbucks at the top of the mountain!
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| Lunch Break, Yvette and I |
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| View from the Gondola |
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| Steve and Anders checking out the map of the mountain at lunch |
Yvette took it. The view was gorgeous!
After skiing the first day we took the kids to get hot chocolate.
That night it snowed and the wind howled ALL NIGHT. We woke up to tons of snow.
They loved playing in it!
We thought skiing would be out because most of the lifts were closed. But a few were open and my boys REALLY wanted to go. So Anders, Steve and the boys braved the wind, snow and cold and went up for a few hours. See between those two buildings below? That is the ski lift. Oh wait, you can't even see it because of the snow and wind. Yvette, Annelie and I stayed down to check out, load up the car, drink coffee and play in the snow. I won't lie, I was a nervous wreck. I was really afraid someone would get lost because the visibility was so low. They returned safe and sound and COLD. The only one who really enjoyed it that day was Joshua. BRRRR.
Annelie built some excellent snowmen while the crazies skied.
Around 3 everyone was back. We had lunch. put chains on the tires and drove home. Whew!
Snow in the Sierras means rain in the San Francisco area. The next three days it rained, Alot.
After Tahoe, the Kamperins had to go back to work and school, so we were on our own. We hit the city and ate some Thai Food at a place we found online called King of Thai Noodle House, then we drove over to Ghiradelli.
It was raining too hard to enjoy Fisherman's, so the boys got ice cream instead. Yes, 4 Huge Ice Creams, right after lunch. They each ate about 1/4 of it (except Steve)
From there we drove to Morgan Hill (south of San Jose) to visit our good friends, the Rashids, from Flower Mound. We had a great time eating and drinking with them (thanks Bob and Cheryl!!). We stayed the night there, then made plans to see Fisherman's and Alcatraz the next day. It was the only day that was not supposed to rain very hard.
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| Fisherman's with the Sea Lions |
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| Alcatraz Audio tour |
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| The view of San Francisco from Alcatraz |
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| It was windy, but no rain! |
Alcatraz was great! We got off and walked around Fisherman's and then took a drive down Lombard street so the the boys could see it before crossing back over the bridge to the Kamperin's house.
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| Lombard |
Our last full day in California was pouring down rain. We decided to check out the Jelly Belly Factory because the Rashids said it was Fun, Free and they give out free samples. Perfect!
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| Charles had no shame, he visited the "free sample bar" about 14 times. |
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| Jelly Belly Art |
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| Getting ready for the tour |
This was a great activity for a rainy day!
It was a really fun trip. Anders and Yvette put up with us for 8 days, fed us (thanks Anders!) and showed us a great time. Because of the rain, we didn't get to see Muir Woods, go to Napa or ride Bikes across the Golden Gate. We will have to come back soon!!
