Santa Cruz mini vacation

It all started with my former work place starting to plan a reunion.  I haven’t seen some of the people in a very long time so I was totally down for the idea.  Things were planned, dates were set and Rob and I secured the time off of work.  Long story short, the dates kept changing and it got to the point where I didn’t trust that we could purchase non refundable airfare.  Since most of the people in the Reunion still lived in Phoenix it was easier for them to adapt to the changing dates, but for us, we needed a locked in date so we could fly in and get hotels.

Finally I said screw it, we can’t wait to book airfare but I don’t feel comfortable plunking down a wad of cash on tickets since the dates kept changing.   Rob and I opted out of the reunion.

Since we still had the days off of work approved we began to plan a trip to Six Flags Magic Mountain.  Well, when the PT Cruiser(our reliable car) died right before the trip, that kind of put an end to that.

Enter, Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk.  We’d gone there a year and a half ago and had a fun time.  We figured what the heck, why not?  It also worked out nicely that my friend Michaelle had scheduled her C-section in Santa Cruz the day before we were going to be there so I would get to see her and the new baby.

Woke up on Wednesday morning, took the dog for a long walk and then finished packing.  By eleven we had dropped the dog off at the vets to board him and were on the road.  Santa Cruz is only about an hour to an hour a half away so it didn’t take long to get us there.

Our first stop was Dominican Hospital to see the new bundle of joy.

He was so adorable and cute I can’t even say enough about it.  Sooooo tiny.  Look at his little feet!!

After a short visit we left.  She had a lot of family there and I didn’t want to hog her and the baby so it was off to our hotel.

We chose the Ocean Pacific Lodge for our hotel.  It was the same hotel we stayed in the last time we were in Santa Cruz because we liked it so much the last stay and the location was within walking distance of everything that we would need.

We arrived about an hour too early for check in so we decided to hike over to the beach and see about getting some lunch.  I went down to the beach for a second to take some pictures because I could.  🙂

The last pic is the restaurant/bar that we decided to have lunch at.  We ambled inside and waited for about ten minutes before we even got menus.  Then once we had the menus we didn’t see anything particularly good and the waitress was taking forever to come over to even take a drink order.  End result?  We left and hit up this little deli/pizza place on the way back to the hotel.  It ended up being pretty darn good.

After we were done eating it was time to go check into the hotel.  The last time we stayed here we had a jacuzzi suite that we didn’t ask for or pay for so I knew it wouldn’t be quite as good but it was still nice.

We chilled in the room for a while, swam in the freezing cold pool and hung out in the hot tub before heading out to get our dinner at the same mexican food place we ate the last time we were here.

The next day we woke up and got ready.  For some reason we both thought the boardwalk opened at eleven but we were wrong.  So we got there a tad too early and had to wait around for about 45 minutes for things to open.  We were hoping that since it was May there would be more rides open this time than the last time we came in the month of January and we were disappointed.

In the long run it was okay though.  We still had tons of fun, Rob got his roller coaster fix and I didn’t eat any of the many bad food treats presented before me.

After we had our fill of fun at the boardwalk we decided to hit the bowling alley for some lunch and to see if the Wii had helped at all with our bowling games…it hadn’t.

With Rob establishing himself as the champion after two games(I totally beat him all the time on Wii) it was time to head back to the hotel.  We stopped at the corner store to get some soda and chips and then I decided last minute that I would rather get another sandwich from the place we ate at on our first day than have leftover mexican food so I sent Rob off to the hotel and waited around for the sandwich.

Once back at the hotel we chilled in the room, swam a bit and hit the hot tub.  It was dark out and I packed a bit but I still felt like the vacation wasn’t complete.  I asked Rob if he would mind taking a walk to the beach.  We had talked about it briefly the night before about just sitting on the beach watching the waves and him playing guitar.  It sounded like the perfect end to the vacation so off we went.

It was so nice and peaceful sitting there on the sand watching the ocean while he played his acoustic guitar.  It really was the perfect end to the vacation.

As we were getting ready to leave we were approached by a young man wearing only shorts and a tank top(it was pretty cold at that point) asking if he could borrow a cell phone.  Rob said no, but he’d be happy to dial a number for him and put it on speakerphone.  The guy agreed eagerly.  I guess he had been out for a run earlier in the day and at some point his house key had fallen out of his pocket.  He had been looking for it ever since and had been having no luck.  Since it was dark he was using the light of his Ipod as a flashlight.  So Rob dialed up the guy’s fiance who apparently lived three hours away and we listened to him beg her to come down and let him into the house(I can only assume that she had a key to the house as well), she agreed but let him know that it would be three hours before she got there.

When he was done, we chatted a little bit more and Rob gave the guy his sweatshirt.  He also gave him his card and said that if he wanted to return it, he could.  Otherwise he could pass it on to another sad soul in a similar situation.  The guy was very grateful and said he was going to go to his house and see if any of his neighbors would let him in to stay for the next three hours.

Feeling a little like we helped out, we headed back to the hotel where we ate dinner and went to the bed.

The trip home was uneventful and once we unloaded the car I headed down to the vets office to pick up our baby boy.  They love him so much there I swear, it was like a celebrity was leaving the building.  As the brought him out all of the staff was yelling: “Come here Pappy!!  Come say goodbye to me!” and giving him lots of loving.  The lady behind the desk leaned in and told me: “He really is a very special dog.”  It was very cute.

At any rate, it was a very successful trip.  Lots of fun was had and our batteries were recharged.  And we still have the rest of the weekend to relax.  Not bad at all.