We got a few miles out of Santa Barbara and stopped through Watsonville to visit Aaron’s aunt and cousins. His uncle was in Nepal creating democracy, so I wasn’t able to meet him. Their house was awesome! It was up on top of a huge hill way out in the woods. But their house wasn’t in a bunch of trees, it was out in a clearing on the hill. They had a pretty large vineyard, too. I thought it was awesome since I’ve never seen a vineyard before. Little did I know that I would later see acres and acres and acres of grapes! His aunt made us this super healthy smoothie for us, with fruit and vegetables and soymilk! And she gave us $20 to get lunch in Monterey.
We left and drove straight south on highway 1 (which gave us a straight view of the ocean) and made our way to Monterey. We stopped at a place called fisherman’s wharf to find lunch. After exploring a bit, we found a seafood place called Domenico’s on the Wharf. The guy out front offered us a clam chowder sample and a card for a free appetizer, so we were suckered into it. We got a table right next to the windows looking out on the pier with tons of sailboats, and a raft with about 20 sea lions sunning on it. It was entertaining to watch the seagulls, pelicans, and sea lions while we waited for out food. Some of the sea lions would jump at the seagulls and freak them out. A few of the sea lions were HUGE and we watched them try to get up on the raft by flopping up with their fins but they were too big so they fell back into the water. We got fried calamari for our appetizer and fish and chips for the main course. I don’t think I’ve ever had calamari before but it was delicious! And it came with a little fried baby octopus the size of my palm and we ate that too!
We jetted out of there quickly and pulled out the maps to figure out how to cut inland to highway 101 so that we could get to Santa Barbara the best way possible. We found a road that went straight through Carmel Valley and appeared to be the best route, so we took it! Right before we went in, we had about 80 miles left on the tank and there was a sign that said that there wouldn’t be gas for 47 miles. There was a gas station conveniently placed right after this sign, but gas was almost $5 a gallon so we decided to suck it up. We were gunning down the road through the countryside and it was beautiful and fun! The road was really windy and the valley was beautiful. However, the first half was uphill so our gas mileage kept dropping and we got a little bit scared. But then we started going downhill and our mileage actually went above 80 so I guess that was nice. There were also a ton of vineyards towards the end of the stretch. And we saw a lot of old guys driving sweet cars. Actually, that’s not exclusive to Carmel valley; there are old guys driving sweet cars all over California.
After we passed through the Valley, we drove down the 101 to Cal Poly. Aaron knows some people that go there, but he didn’t have their numbers so we just kind of drove around there for a little while. It was a nice campus, but nothing special compared to Stanford. After that, we went to Pismo beach. The day was growing late though, and we wanted to meet up with Josh (Aaron’s friend at UCSB) for dinner, so we didn’t stay for long at Pismo. We found parking after a brief 10 minute search, and went down to the beach. Aaron pointed out the spot to me where his parents had gotten engaged, and I aww’ed. We walked in the water for a little bit and pressed on to UCSB.
When we got to UCSB, we met some of Josh’s friends and then went downtown with Josh to find some food. We went to the California Pizza Kitchen (CPK) and got some tasty food, and we saw a little bit of the downtown area. Then we returned to his dorm, chilled with his friends, and decided to go see the infamous Del Playa street in Isla Vista. If you know what I’m talking about, then you know how crazy it is. Apparently, Josh said it looked pretty dead, but Aaron and I thought it was nuts and we are so glad we go to a small private Christian school were we can be sheltered and babied and have our hands held when we cross the street.
We went to bed kinda late, and slept in to 11. Aaron had paid for parking the night before, and it expired at 10 so he got a fine because they’re so stingy about it. We were all hungry so we went to find breakfast with two of Josh’s other friends. There was a huge line at the Bagel Café, so we went down the street to the Café International to get food. We ended up waiting nearly an hour and a half by the time we got our food because they lost all of our orders somehow. We got pretty mad, but it was nice weather outside so at least we got to hang out in the sun for a while. After we ate, we went to the beach and got roasted.
That night, Josh had a funk combo performance. He played the hell out of his alto sax and his group of college friends plus Aaron and me cheered loudly for him after his solo. Their group was overall way better than the two groups before them, too. It made me remember the ol’ days of freshman year of high school when I was last in jazz band.
We all left (except for Josh) at the intermission because Josh was done playing, but he stayed behind to watch the other groups perform. Aaron and I went back to the dorm room and I started compiling and editing all of the video footage that we had gotten so far on our trip. We’re a little bit disappointed that we totally forgot to get videos of some places we went, but as it is the whole video will probably be over 30 minutes. That sounds super long, but we personally guarantee that it will keep you entertained and you won’t be left disappointed! I’m using iMovie and it’s turning out really well. And everyone in the video is really good looking and funny so it will be worth watching. And I don’t want to give any spoilers, but there are scenes where my shirt comes off. And Aaron’s shirt. And there are a ton of scenes of me eating food. It’s kind of gross actually…
Anyways, when Josh got back from his concert, us three guys went to Starbucks to get coffee and hang out. Aaron has been getting me hooked on coffee! What an expensive habit. And it might stain my teeth! I’ll probably stop drinking it in the summer when Aaron won’t be around to influence me. It was fun hanging out at Starbucks though; we had a good time.
The next morning, Aaron and I headed out. His Aunt lives in Santa Barbara, so we stopped by her workplace so that she could take us out to brunch. Aaron’s mom gave us this little ugly frog thing to hide in his Aunt’s things so that she would find it without her seeing us plant it. When they were kids, they started a thing of swapping the frog back and forth and so we were like secret agents. We planted the frog in her office somewhere before she arrived, and then we went to the beach to get brunch somewhere when she got to the office.
I’m just gonna say right now that I love Aaron’s family. I’ve definitely met a greater part of his relatives by this point in the trip, if you haven’t noticed. They’re all so nice and they buy us food all the time, it’s great!
His Aunt went back to work, and Aaron and I lay on the beach right near where we had brunch. We only lay there for a little while though, because his great Aunt wanted to meet up with us in San Luis Obispo for lunch or coffee. Before we got on the highway though, we went through the neighborhood of Montecito where a lot of rich people supposedly live. We saw a lot of nice houses, but the really huge ones were hidden deep in the woods behind big gates and walls. Boring. We also drove through Westmont college, which is tiny and not terribly impressive, but still in a beautiful location.
We got kind of lost in that area, but somehow found our way back to Santa Barbara, and we drove right by the Mission, which is an awesome building. We got gas, then gunned it up the 101 to Atascadero where we met up with Aaron’s cousin and great aunt. We got Starbucks and then went to In-N-Out where his great aunt bought us food! Go figure. Once again, I was impressed by the awesomeness of Aaron’s relatives, and we returned to the road.
After a little while, we stopped for the bathroom, and when we got back on the road we heard a strange noise. Aaron guessed that his bumper had started to fall off, so we pulled off to the side to check it out. He was right, but it was easy to snap it back on because it was just the plastic part. We got to Santa Cruz by dinnertime and had a happy reunion with Caitlin and Elisabeth.
The four of us went downtown to a cheap taco bar, which made amazing tacos and had free chips. It was really tasty. We then walked around downtown a little bit and went in a big candy store and a frozen yogurt place, where we had a bunch of samples. We went back to Caitlin’s house and watched “While You Were Sleeping”, which is an old chick flick with Sandra Bullock. It was pretty funny.
Today we are going to go the beach, and do other hang out stuffs! Tomorrow we are going back to Placerville, then Thursday we are going to go to Aaron’s family’s house on Tahoe. Friday is his birthday, which will be pretty low-key. Then Saturday I fly home!
BONUS: Elisabeth's funny Joke
How many Andrew Ryders does it take to make a bro?
just one.
JAHAHHAHAHAHHA
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