A Visit to California

Not long after we returned from our Bahamas cruise we got this email from our friends James & Ellen (the ones we'd traveled with):

Hi guys,

I hear you've been back at Port A for a couple of weeks now, after what sounds like an adventure filled trip north. Just think of the memories....

What are you up to for the summer? Your facebook page suggests you'll be heading to Colorado in September. Any chance you'll be making an extension to Southern California for a visit? We have a couple of trips planned, but we'll be here during September. The house we're renting is a) gorgeous and b) has an actual guestroom and a full bath just across the hall. I'm attaching some pictures of the place.

Ellen and I have been doing our respective things here. She's riding pretty regularly, and I've been doing a lot of work with the camera. We've also done some neato walks in the mountains, which is where we live, and we managed to get to the desert for some camping before it got too ungodly hot. One of my favorite walks takes me to Garnet Peak, at around 6200', which is at the edge of the escarpment overlooking the desert. The terrain drops about 3500' in under 2 miles of horizontal distance. On an average day you can see past the Salton Sea to the Chocolate mountains in the east, a distance of about 70 miles. On a clear day you can see forever. Oh, excuse me, someone already said that.

If you want to see the area where we live, either of Google maps or Google Earth, just put in Lake Cuyamaca, California.

Do let us know what you're up to.

Cheers,

James, Ellen and Cruiser the landlubber Dog

Here's the front of their house:

The living room:
And the view from the loft:
(For the record, the house was completely furnished in this overly-sweet country theme, not their taste. In fact, every time I've visited the home of a sailor who'd moved ashore, the decor - whatever the style, traditional or modern or eclectic or southwestern or whatever, was very minimalist and uncluttered. I've never seen an exception.)

Ellen had had surgery a month or so ago, and we didn't make it to Colorado in September, but we found some cheap tickets online and headed to California last week. Dan had never set foot in the state, and I my only exposure had been to San Francisco for a meeting in the early 1980s, and the original Disneyland when I was about 12 (which I hardly remember) so we were ready for an adventure.