So maybe I am enjoying sharing my little world through words.\u00a0 I thought of something else to say.<\/p>\n
Our family vacation this year is to California.\u00a0 This is Rick’s pick of vacations, in honor of his high school graduation.\u00a0 Maybe this is his last family vacation.\u00a0 If he goes after this, he’ll need to chip in.\u00a0 Anyway, he decided that he wanted to see California.\u00a0 I asked what part of California did he want to see?\u00a0 He didn’t know, but it was one state he hadn’t been to.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He’s right there.\u00a0 After California (and driving through Nevada), he will have 11 states to go.\u00a0 Dare I say, we tend to travel a lot.\u00a0 That’s my fault since I’m the one with the travel bug.\u00a0 My favorite vacations are driving ones that take me across different places where I can do different things.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Here’s how my planning works:<\/p>\n
I spent the last couple of weeks reading some tour books and studying some maps.\u00a0 I’ve contacted people about the areas where I want to stay and things I might want to see.\u00a0 From there, I’ve come up with a list of things to do.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I opened my computer and Google maps.\u00a0 Starting from home, I mapped out a course that would take in the general direction of all the places I want to see.\u00a0 I selected places to stop for the night based on how many miles or hours I plan to drive.\u00a0 I figured out the timing and places, and saved my map for reference\u00a0in the rest of my planning.<\/p>\n
I came up with a start date and figured out how many days I have.\u00a0 This vacation calls for 5 days to drive there and 5 days to drive back.\u00a0 Then I figured out how many days I want to spend in each place.\u00a0 My concentration was on Yosemite National Park and Sequoia Kings Canyon National Park.\u00a0 The other locations get at least a couple of days.<\/p>\n
This weekend, I concentrated on making reservations at the national parks, hotels on the way out and back, and then concentrated on the other places.\u00a0 I still have a couple of places to figure out, but it’s coming together.<\/p>\n
My plan is drive into Northern California first.\u00a0 We have to stop by and visit Rich’s Aunt Fran.\u00a0 From there, we head to San Francisco.\u00a0 A couple of days to wonder the streets should be good.\u00a0 We have to walk out on the Golden Gate Bridge though.\u00a0 I’ll try to relive the one day I spent in San Fran wondering myself.<\/p>\n
From there, we head to\u00a0 Yosemite.\u00a0 This is a large part of our days.\u00a0 We plan to hike a lot and enjoy nature.\u00a0 No one is planning to climb El Capitan or Half Dome.\u00a0 I hope the weather is good to get some good sunrise and sunset pictures.\u00a0 I found some nice cabins just outside the park where we can enjoy our evenings, even though TV and Internet will be limited.<\/p>\n
Sequoia Kings Canyon is the next stop for a few days.\u00a0 I’ve been here before.\u00a0 I drove up while working in LA for a long weekend.\u00a0 The places was crawling with black bears.\u00a0 The hiking was great and I want to show my guys those sights.\u00a0 Of course, you can’t miss the giant redwoods all over the park.\u00a0 There is a beautiful waterfall in Kings Canyon that I didnt’ really hike and now will be my chance.<\/p>\n
From here, we head into LA. The guys have no interest in the big city.\u00a0 Other than Venice Beach, Santa Monica pier, and the LeBrea Tar Pits, they don’t care what else they see.\u00a0 We definitely have to catch up with Rich’s cousin while we are here.\u00a0 I’m thinking about driving out one day to catch up with another cousin just north of LA.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Then, it is the desert.\u00a0 I love the deserts out in California.\u00a0 Not sure why.\u00a0 I worked outside of Palm Springs for a couple of months when I first started with Motorola.\u00a0 I thought it was the coolest place.\u00a0 So I’m taking Rick out to see it.\u00a0 We are going to hike in Joshua Tree National Forest and probably ride up to Big Bear.\u00a0 A lot of those roads you see in commericals or movies are shot on the road going to Big Bear.\u00a0 I’ll have to remember to warn Rick about the scorpions.<\/p>\n
After that, we say good-bye to California and head to Las Vegas.\u00a0 This is just an overnight stay, but we definitely plan to check out the Hoover Dam.\u00a0 Red Rocks Canyon would be nice to see, if we have time. I checked with my experts on Vegas and found a cool place on the strip.\u00a0 It’ll be like doing it old style.<\/p>\n
All things must end and we will be headed home after this.\u00a0 Part of the trip will be over the roads we already traveled.\u00a0 Rich has plans to stock up on pickles from a place in Des Moines.<\/p>\n
I love to plan out a vacation.\u00a0 I pick my stops and know where I sleep.\u00a0 I also look for places to eat along the way.\u00a0 I like pub food. So looking for microbrews lets us enjoy the food and Rich can try the beers.\u00a0 These days, I check out Foodnetwork, too.\u00a0 The traveling shows pick up some good places to try.\u00a0 I prefer hole-in-wall places.\u00a0 They are way more interesting and have some of the best food.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I like a good plan, but we don’t have to stick to\u00a0a schedule.\u00a0 I figure out what to do each day, but that could change based on how we feel and how much we can cram into a day.\u00a0 I just like to have a plan.\u00a0 It’s vacation, so there’s no sitting around here. Got places to be and things to see.<\/p>\n
I guess this is just a prelude for things to come when we go on vacation in May.\u00a0 I’ve been told by a couple of my readers that I have to blog while I’m gone.\u00a0 I’ll try to do that where I have connection.\u00a0 Where I don’t, I’ll have to catch up after the fact.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I guess I underestimated my number of readers.\u00a0 I might actually have 5.\u00a0 Pretty soon, I’ll be rivaling Rose and her numerous followers.\u00a0 Now I have a goal!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
So maybe I am enjoying sharing my little world through words.\u00a0 I thought of something else to say. Our family vacation this year is to California.\u00a0 This is Rick’s pick of vacations, in honor of his high school graduation.\u00a0 Maybe this is his last family vacation.\u00a0 If he goes after this, he’ll need to chip […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurekbrau.com\/blogs\/richsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}