From the snow to the sun! A few days after I got home from Aspen, I flew down to Monterey, CA (the first of two trips here this year) to visit my brother who was living there at the time. One of the nice things about Monterey is that no matter what time of year it is, the weather is always perfect. It could be 90 degrees just 20 minutes north or south, but in the sheltered harbor where Monterey is located, it’s sunny and 70 degrees year round.

On the first day, we had breakfast at this charming little spot on one of the piers.

Then we walked around the town, stopping to take lots of pictures, of course. We passed by the waterfront and Fishermans Wharf.

We saw seals! (Side note: Monterey Bay is supposed to have amazing diving. I’m still sad that I didn’t make it under the water on either trip. Guess I’ll just have to go back again!)

This guy just killed me.

We walked down Cannery Row (the setting for John Steinbeck’s novel ‘Cannery Row’).

And around some of the old buildings leftover from its Spanish and Mexican past.

This is the view from my brother’s front door. People pay millions for a view like this!

That’s my brother on the left, and his apartment is the last window all the way to the right.

The next day we took the bus down to Carmel-By-The-Sea for some shopping and to see all the fun fairy tale houses.

Aren’t they just perfect?

We also walked down to the beach with a view of Pebble Beach Golf Course.

Speaking of Pebble Beach, on day 3, we had planned to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium, but the line to get in was literally around the block, so we decided to rent bikes instead and take in the views along 17 Mile Drive…all the way to the golf course!

It was fairly easy and flat for the most part, wandering in and out along the coast.

We stopped to take pictures of The Lone Cypress, which is apparently the most photographed tree in North America (who even comes up with statistics like this, and where do they get their data?).

Finally, we made it to Pebble Beach! This place is truly stunning. Someday, when I’m independently wealthy, I hope to be able to play this course. Green fees were $500 at the time we were there (for reference, to play around Seattle, I usually pay between $20 and $50). By the time I can afford it, they’ll probably be $1000. But it’s easy to see why people pay those prices. I could look at this view all day.

Speaking of views, this is a picture of sunset from my brother’s front door. I haven’t edited it at all, it actually looked like this. Gorgeous!

We took the shorter route inland back home and my brother, my brother, made from scratch a pizza for dinner. Who knew he could even do that! I was impressed, even though he had a little help from Trader Joe’s.

My last day of the trip we went up to Santa Cruz. It’s sort of on the way to the airport and we had time to kill before my flight that evening, so we decided to check out the boardwalk and have lunch.

OMG the seals!

Underneath the pier was so cool!

We also stopped by The Mystery Spot to see if we could check out the funky houses and optical illusions, but the next tour time available was after we needed to be on our way back to the airport, so we just walked around the gift shop before heading back to San Jose to drop me off to go home! It was such a fun trip, and the exciting part is that I got to go back for round 2 in the fall! But before that, I went to Denver to visit my friend Emma who had just moved there. More on that trip next week!