Obnoxious Abundance of Nature

          Now that Ben has a car (Yayyy!!! mobility!) we can travel a little further outside of the Bay. This weekend, we went to Muir Woods, a place that I'd heard a lot about and had wanted to visit for a long time. It was on my Bay-Area Bucket List. It's in Marin County, so north of the Bay by 10 or 15 miles. It's also on Hwy 1, the most scenic highway in the country. It's also the wiggliest, with the most hairpin turns.   

The Festiva has arrived in Berkeley!

View of downtown Oakland and Bay Bridge from Marin County

We Kansans aren't used to this sort of thing. 

           It was a good thing we arrived early, because the parking lots were already full and people were parking on the side of the road - we ended up walking about half a mile to get to the main entrance. Inside the park, under the trees, it was kind of chilly – I was glad that I had my two jackets and gloves. It was also spectacular. The trees were so tall and so old – hundreds of years old. I felt bad for Ben because I had to keep stopping to take pictures! We also did a lot of ambling, which he is NOT a fan of.

Baby redwood!

This is a dogtooth violet.  I read "My Side of the Mountain" in 5th grade
and they referenced it, and somehow I retained that knowledge for 11 years
so that I could regurgitate it on demand.  You're welcome.

 

           We decided to take a trail that had the term “ocean view” in it, which I was excited by. It was pretty steep, and I realized just how out-of-shape I am when I had to stop and rest after an embarrassingly low number of steps. But once we hit the top, it was a pretty great view. We could see over the tops of the trees all the way to the ocean! It was also really warm at the top, and not just because I was sweating like a really sweaty person. It was sunny and 65-70 degrees, a rare warm day in the area.

Yuck.  Sweaty.  

         The hike was supposed to lead us back around into the woods. Unfortunately, something happened and we ended up taking a long hike around some sunny, grassy hills overlooking the Muir Woods canyon. I guess there are worse things in life.

         We had seen some signs for Stinson Beach on the way in, and while I've never heard of Stinson Beach, I do love me some beaches. So I convinced Ben to take another wiggly-squiggly drive up the coast so that we could go to the beach! It was pretty cool – a lot less windy than Ocean View, but a lot more people. Probably because it was so nice out. I scampered around in the waves a bit, but they were SUPER cold, so I had to hop around on one leg until it went numb, then switch to the other. Probably looked pretty silly.

View from the coastal highway.  Gorgeous.

So c-c-c-old!!!!

       Sunday was spent traveling to church. The Richmond-Fremont line was delayed, so we had to spend way too long sitting in a BART station. Because we were late to church, we missed “Come Thou Font,” which was SO SAD, because no one can sing that hymn like a Mennonite congregation can. Afterwards, I went to the park with Hannah, Alyssa, Jonathan, Emma, and Greta and enjoyed the continued nice weather. There was also a 49ers game. Conversation with Alyssa regarding said game:

       Alyssa - “The 49ers are playing today!”

       Me - “OMG I KNOW!!!”

       Alyssa - “Are you going to watch?”

       Me - “No”

       Alyssa - “But you were so excited that they were playing...?”

       Me - “No, I was excited because I knew that they were playing, not because they were actually playing!”

Oh, and the 49ers won, which is cool because it means that they get to play in the Super Bowl!  I might actually watch it for reasons other than the commercials... And if they win, SF can lay claim to TWO nationwide championship title-things, because the Giants won the World Series a couple months back.  Nifty.  Look at me, all up-to-date on my sports knowledge!  

         Today was pretty laid-back. I switched my clinic hours to Thursdays, so now Mondays are wide open. The only noteworthy thing that happened (other than trying and sort-of succeeding at fixing my bike brakes) was skyping with my friend Zach, who is in Austria right now, just chillin' out and enjoying the life of a German-speaker in Tirol. It was really good to catch up with him. I actually had very little idea of what he was doing, because Facebook is dumb and doesn't show me stuff from people I don't click on, and since he took a leave of absence from Facebook, he was automatically shuttled to the bottom of my list, right under a group of Bethel football players from 2009. But now, thanks to his blog, and our 2-hour conversation, I am 100% up to speed!