Tricks, treats and snowy kayaks

We are now staying at my aunts in Quincy which is not far from Lake Tahoe. We have to be careful not to leave food in the car as the bears have a tendency to open them up at night for a snack as well as going through the bins. Not nearly as annoying as the Brighton gulls destroying the rubbish.

Dressed the girls up for Halloween and spun both of them out with sugar and Matilda with all the costumes. You could see the penny drop as she realized every shop in town would give her sweets and gifts at the words trick or treat. The house we are staying in is reputedly haunted but more on that after we have left!

My cousin and her partner also live up here and bought forward thanksgiving dinner for us. Best of all they looked after the kids and lent us there kayaks and drove us further into the mountains to salmon lake. We paddled around in misty silence as it snowed on crystal clear water that would kill us in a few minutes if we capsized as it is snow melt. Not another person for miles and miles, mountain lions and bears in the hills around us. It was just stunning and something we will never forget.

Tricks, Treats And Snowy Kayaks

Yosemite to Mono

Loaded up the Jollopy and headed off across the valley towards Yosemite with the intention of driving over the Tioga Pass. Unfortunately it was closed 2 days before we left following a snowstorm and is due to stay closed for the winter.

The journey was a little harrowing as Iris is deperatly trying to get her eye teeth through (both sides at the same time) so if she is not asleep in the car she is screaming. You could consider it a buddhist lesson in tolerating another beings pain and a wat to cultivate loving kindness......or you could consider why God cursed parents with babies born without teeth! Why oh why!

Yosemite is without doubt the most amazing landscape I have seen in my life. As you drive in the valley is laid out like a good peice of CGI from SCI-FI movie. Half Dome in the distance El Capitan standing as a sheer face taller than Snowdon and Yosemite Falls taller than Niagra. Makes my hair stand on end just remembering it.

The masses were absent due to it being late Autumn and we found out as we drove in that the pass had been reopened that morning so the 9500ft Tioga pass was on the menu for the late afternoon. Lucky.

As we climbed out of Yosemite Valley the temperature dropped and the snow became apparant. At the top we woke the kids up and walked across the the High Sierra meadows where the Indians lived. Too lovely.

We arrived at Mono Lake in time for sunset. After the lush greenery of Yosemite the barren and lunar landscape of Mono is a stunning and surreal contrast. The Dead Sea like Mono Lake is a saline lake surrounded by volcanic craters, snow on the mountains in the background, the high desert lit up orange by the sunset and the moon rising too. Nice.

The day finishes in Truckee in an empty ski lodge in a hot tub under the stars in the freezing cold.

Yosemite To Mono

Go Giants

We arrived in San Francisco and the heat wave left in favour of a British wet and windy autumn.
That aside San Francisco and Marin are still as lovely as the last time I was here.

My sister Petra met us from the airport and got a bit lost in downtown SF on the way home leading to a few tense moments in with me following her in a big automatic SUV and some VERY steep hills. Each of those famous hill and plateaux have a stop sign at the top and I had my foot so hard on the brake to stop our car rolling back in hurt. I moved my foot to the acclerator and felt the big dodge roll back towards the car behind who had his hand on the horn.....not really what we/I needed after a 6 hour flight on United (most pony airline in the world flying 1970's buckets that you cant move in) Airways and two kids who refused to sleep.

My family kindly looked after the girls and Caitlyn and I had the most amazing night out in the city. We rented a Vitorian apartment in Pacific Heights http://www.airbnb.com/rooms/56200?price=155 went for a massage in JapanTown with an two iron fingered girls who nearly broke us both....in a nice way.
Went to a famous San Francisco show in North Beach called Beach Blanket Babylon http://www.beachblanketbabylon.com which was camp caberet at its finest. Went into Caps bar to watch the last 20 minutes of the SF Giants making it into the World Series (great vibe but not the first clue to what was going on.....rounders with attitude it seems) and on for a great meal. One of the best nights out I have ever had.

The massive Dodge SUV from the hire company had a nail in the tire and much faux disgruntled complaining earned us the ridiculous (but fun) Chrysler 300 weapon that Caitlyn is sitting on and which we will be tooling up to Yosemite and round California for the next month.

We leave in the morning and are hoping that the Tioga pass reopens after a big snowfall so we can drive all the way across Yosemite and up to my Aunt's in the Sierra Nevada's.

Pleae check out all the pics and will report in from the mountains where there is dial up internet only. Like you must me kidding dude!

Go Giants

Hotel New Hampshire

I have had the kids to myself for the three days we have been in Portsmouth NH which has been glorious. The cliche of New england in the fall lives up to its name with the most beautiful colours in the forests that surround us.

It is a bit like living the American dream here with white picket fences and everyone in the diner knowing each other, fishing boat on the front lawn and hunting on the weekend. That said I read a lot of Stephen King books when I was young, many of which were set around Portland Maine. I cant help looking in the drains to see if a psychotic clown is peeking out (read 'It').

Caitlyn has been up at a Buddhist centre doing restoritive justice work and the kids and I have been exploring in our SUV. Iris is now fully mobile tottering about everywhere and Matilda is in thrall to her new world and growing up very fast, she is missing her friends at school a bit but cant wait to go to California.

We have sorted the kids sleep pattern out from the jet lag so its time to move time zones again to the west coast 3 hours back.

Off to our regular table at the Sunrise Grill and then coast road to the airport. More from Marin soon.

Click on the Pic for more:

Hotel New Hampshire

Manhattan Mayhem

The kids slept till 4.50 which is on its way to normality!
Breakfast at Katz Deli on the Lower East Side 'Where Harry met Sally' and as you will see from the pics Caitlyn soon got into character.
So after another healthy breakfast of sausage, french toast and syrup we made our way through Little Italy, Greenwich Village to the Rockerfella Plaza.
45 seconds and 70 floors later Matilda & Iris where trying to climb over the edge, I had a minor vertigo induced panic attack but then got used to the view of amazing New York.

All in all an exhausting day, Caitlyn starts her interviews tomorrow with a domestic violence project in Harlem and I am pondering attempting the Natural History Museum with the girls as a big storm has just broken and its due to stay for the day tomorrow.

My feet are going to melt from the distances we are walking and I am double knackered, its already 7.30 so good night from the city that never sleeps....

The Wrong End of Brooklyn

As our cab drove through Manhattan the excitment grew. The sun is shining and the city looks amazing, every sight is a memory of a movie from King Kong to Goodfellas.

Our apartment is in Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn and is on the way to gentrification.....but not there yet. Our house is one of the brownstone terraces on a quiet tree lined street, funky coffee shop on the corner where you get caught up for a half hour chatting with strangers who want to talk about your girls blue eyes and the Queen. We make for a curious site being white British and pushing a yuppie buggy in a 98% black nieghbourhood which, apart from the four blocks surrounding the subways is poor, no go for us at night but a good base none the less.

In our first two days we have got our heads around the subway. For all of the New Yorkers incredible friendliness not one person has offered to help carry the buggy up or down the stiars into the subway! I find that odd as people in London will offer in under 30 seconds and then never say a word to you in the tube. Here no one will help but wont stop nattering on the train.

First impressions are of a great and friendly city that is far far cooler than I imagined...a very exciting place.

So far we have ticked the following:-

Walked the Brooklyn Bridge

Taken the Staten Island ferry past Ms Liberty

Seen ground zero

Chilled in Central Park

Eaten amazing Italian....twice

Got up before 3am.....twice

Decided to live in NYC in our next lives.

Click on the picture to see the rest!

New York New York