Elly and I were out doing errands today, grocery shopping, Post Office, Trader Joes, etc, . We decided to stop into a decorating store called "Hobby Lobby". We have been there before and bought the replacement knobs for our dining room hutch.
Well today at one end of the store we ran into employees stocking the store with Christmas decorations! We normally complain back in New England when the decorations come out in October. In the middle of August the store was fully stocked! Talk about jumping the gun. Christmas must be real popular out here.
The Santa Display
Tree Ornaments & Santas
Of Course, the Christmas Trees
Aisles of Tree Ornaments
The wall of wreaths
This is not a Christmas only store, it is just a decorating store. I am sure that even the Christmas Tree Shop back in New England doesn't have this amount of merchandise out yet! Of course, they also have Halloween decor for sale now also.
Some of the Halloween merchandise
We just thought this was funny and strange. They don't even get snow here! Maybe they just long for a White Christmas that they can never experience. So sad!
Yesterday we had planned to go to the Kobey's Swap Meet in San Diego with our friends Michele & Larry. We packed up and left about 9:30, it was a treat because Larry drove and he knows his way around Southern California very well!. The Kobey Swap Meet is one of the best in the area and is held every Friday, Saturday & Sunday. Parking is free and it costs only $1 (Senior Discount) to get in.
Kobey Swap Meet
It was a lot better than the one we went to at Oceanside because it seemed that the swap meet had more "antique" dealers as opposed to tee-shirt, perfume, pile of clothes, boxes of store overstock and tool dealers that seem in abundance at the lower quality swap meets (flea markets). It was a real hot day, but the ocean breeze from the shore nearby kept us comfortable. Elly bought a few things for re-sale, tried to negotiate the purchase of a "loaded" Victorian scrap book (negotiations fell through), and I scored another Sodastream machine for only $20 for Evan back home. (see my earlier posts about my sodastream).
Elly Inspecting the Merchandise
My New Sodastream
We shopped for about three hours before we packed up Larry's truck and headed out for lunch/dinner. We went to eat at Anthony's Fish Grotto. This restaurant is right on the Water in San Diego harbor, very close to the battleship Midway Aircraft Carrier. The Midway is on the must visit list for later in the year.
Front of Anthony's
Anthony's from the Pier
The seafood was excellent, we even had raw oysters and it was a pleasure to sit and chat and to cool off from the hours in the sun and watch the boats in the harbor. There was even a mock battle between two pirate ships with canon blasts right outside our window.
This is where we sat ..
View from our table
After dinner, Larry wanted to show us some of the sites of San Diego. He decided to head out to Coronado Island as we hadn't been there yet. Wow, we were in for a treat! As we crossed over the large bridge that brings you to the island, we got a real good view of the San Diego skyline.
Bridge to Coronado Island
Photo I took while we were crossing the Bridge
After a short drive around the cute little town and tourist area, we headed over to Hotel Del Coronado for a drink. Check out their website here. You can read the history of "The Del" here on wikipedia. It is one of the Grand Old Resorts much like the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, NH.
Hotel Del Coronado
This place was fabulous. There were tons of people here, but it was large enough not to seem crowded.
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Larry & Michele walking up to the Hotel
Me & Elly in front of the Hotel
We decided to take take a walk around the place, it is massive, with many bars, restaurants and shops. Everything was very pricey. Just to stay in the hotel without any special featured room will cost about $400+ per night. In addition to the rooms in the hotel itself, there were larger villas right on the beach, each with its own pool and individual jacuzzis with a glass wall surround. These rooms at the Beach Villas will run you from $800 to $3,600 per night.
How about dinner for two on your own private veranda at a beach villa!
Looking back at the hotel from the beach
There were a few "private events" happening including two weddings, one on the beach.
A Wedding happening at the beach
Me and my new car. ;)
The Pool area for Hotel Guests
After our leisurely stoll around the grounds we settled into the B&S Bar with a beach view to imbibe and chat with our friends for the evening. A very enjoyable evening!
On the way off the island and on the way home, I snapped this picture of an ice cream store that I thought was cute called "Mootime".
Mootime Creamery. I liked the art deco style sign
We had a great fun filled day shopping and dining with our friends. This might qualify for a repeat visit later in the year.
Grapes on the Vine at the Winery. Almost Harvest time
The Temecula Valley has over 40 wineries located just 15 minute from our condo. You can get more info about this area at the Wine Growers Association website. This region is starting to rival the upstate Napa Valley for its wines and as a tourist destination. Since our visit here last October, 3 new winery destinations have been built.
We visited three of them last October, but really haven't been back since until last night. Elly went out to lunch with her girl friends a few weeks ago to Thornton Winery but I didn't go with them. Each weekend evening, there is always live music (jazz, blues, etc) being played at some winery in the valley. Unless there is a headliner band, admission is free. Of course, you have to pay for the wine, wine tastings, wines and food if you choose to order. Last night we went "winery hopping". This is the Temecula Valley version of "bar hopping".
We had originally planned just to go to Miramonte Winery to see Bill Watson and his Blues Band.
Miramonte Vineyard Veranda website photo. This is where the band played
The winery had an indoor tasting room and the large outdoor veranda. Since it was over 103 degrees yesterday, they had the "water mist" spraying which cooled off the early evening under the shaded veranda. Just as we sat down at our table, the people at the next table were leaving and gave us their "tasting tickets" which still has 3 tastings left. So our first three wine samplings were free!
At 7:00 the band starting playing, they were great, Elly liked the wine and the mist kept us cool!
Billy Watson and his band. Water Mist is spraying keeping us cool.
You can watch this short video I took of the band.You can see the water mist clearly here.
At 8:30, the band went on a 1/2 break, so we decided to try another winery. First we stopped at the Europa Village Winery because they had a "Live Music" sign out. They had "Sean & Donna" playing. The place was nice, they had music in their outdoor veranda, but we weren't totally enthralled with the band, so we left to find Lorimar Winery because they were supposed to have another good band playing.
Well, the Lorimar wine country location is brand new and it isn't on my Google Maps on my Xoom's GPS, so we didn't find it in the darkness. But just a little ways further we saw this concert happening at the Monte De Oro Winerywith a full stage, lights etc. It turned out that the band "Steel Magnolia" was playing. We parked, walked in and enjoyed the remainder of the concert, about an hour more.
Steel Magnolia On Stage at Monte De Oro Winery
The band was great, we both enjoyed their mix of Country Rock music. We left for home after the band finished. After we got home we discovered that this was part of the Monte De Oro's summer concert series and tickets were $45 each. Another freebie! We plan to do more winery hopping in the near future as it was cheap and we had a blast!
One thing we noticed tonight was the prevalence of outdoor dining areas in Southern California. It seems that every restaurant and bar has an outdoor seating area. Most of the winery seating is on verandas or on patios. To cool it down, they all use a misting system which spays a fine mist of cool water into the air. You don't get wet because it seems to mostly evaporate before reaching you, but it does cool down the air especially when it over 100 degrees. Keep remembering that its a dry heat! We are not used to outdoor dining because this could never happen in New England!
First, the New England weather is so unstable that it would not be feasible to have an permanent outdoor dining area, especially during the winter and raining days. It only rained a few times since May out here so the outdoor seating at the bistros and the outdoor veranda at the wineries work well.
Secondly, can you imagine watching a concert on an outdoor veranda or stage with the lights. Think of all the moths that would be swarming around all the lights. Not to mention the mosquitoes that would be carrying you away unless you had "bug zappers" keeping time with the music. Look at the pictures above. There are NO bugs here. It is really a different climate out here. We are really starting to enjoy the differences that Southern California has with the New England climate. But it is hot!
Every Thursday night the town of Oceanside has their Sunset Market Festival. It just like the Village Fest in Palm Springs (you can check my earlier blog entry from October), except that its bigger. We left the house around 2:30PM to avoid any rush hour traffic on our way. As we were leaving the driveway it looked like the La Cresta fire was starting again as the afternoon wind was starting to pick up. The same black smoke was rising from the hills and all the fire engines were racing up the hill and the 'copters were flying again. Hope its not as big this time.
Oceanside Pier
We got to Oceanside a little early for the Festival so we decided to take a walk on the pier. It is the longest wooden pier on the west coast. You can read about it here.
Here's another YouTube video of him actually doing one of these paintings:
Oceanside Beach
After a real enjoyable walk on the pier we headed over to find a place to get a few drinks. We found Davina's Cabo Grill & Cantinaand went to the upstairs bar.
To our surprise they were having a 2-for-1 Happy Hour. You order 1 drink and you get two! The people next to us got these huge margaritas with a bottle of Corona Beer stuck in it. Its called the "Poncho Rita". . They drank two of these. Looks like a lot of alcohol!
The "Poncho Rita"
Then they ordered the Strawberry Banana Colada. Looks Yummy.
Strawberry Banana Colada
We didn't see them leave, we wondered how they could walk after drinking these drinks. After we had our beers we went to the festival to eat and listen to the music.
There were a lot of food vendors with a lot of different cuisines. We like the Argentinean food the best, the spiedie sandwich from Annel & Drew's Kitchenwas a close second.
The crowd at the Sunset Market
After we had our fill of food, and the band took a break after their second set, we decided to head home. We did it at the right time because people were starting to leave and the traffic was getting heavy from the crowds leaving the Festival. We will return, this is a great event, too bad there wasn't stuff like this every week back in New England.
It now looks like the fire was accidentally set by brush clearing equipment. See this link: Murrieta Fire.
Map of where the fire was in relation to where we live
These helicopters were buzzing our house all day long, because ...
they were filing up right down the street in our community!
Took a ride up there this morning. The fire made it all the way to the main road and scorched some of the Santa Rosa Ecological Preserve.
Santa Rosa Preserve in foreground, burned hills in background. I think this is where the fire started by someone clearing brush by the road right here.
Burned hills with the houses that survived the blaze
This is my video that shows the hills that burned.
The Santa Rosa Preserve was closed due to fire hazard today. Here's another video shot by a homeowner in the area.
I heard fire truck sirens this morning, but that is not unusual since the fire station is just up the road. I also smelled smoke and heard helicopters flying overhead. So, I went outside to see what was going on. This is what I saw from the end of my driveway.
Looks like there's a fire up in La Cresta (taken from my driveway)
More of the smoke from my driveway
1:00PM Update: Now it's on the TV. Over 100 acres burned, and it out of control.
More updates: Over 200 acres burned, Houses threatened!
Its a big fire!
Really close to houses
6:00PM Update:
The fire is almost out, only 1 house was destroyed. Helicopters and airplanes were buzzing our house all day long picking up water nearby and dropping on the fire. They are still flying and still dumping water & retardant at 6:00PM. It was big news on all the news stations. No word yet on what caused it.
This house escaped damage thanks to the firemen on the ground
These planes were buzzing our house all day long.
Overview of the fire
This was up in the Santa Rosa Palteau, La Cresta, Tenaja and De Luz area of Murrieta. It was near where the road drops off the Plateau. See my earlier blog entries about this area. I will take a ride up there probably tomorrow to see the damage. Thank goodness the fire was contained and we didn't have the winds that we usually get at 4:00PM to spread the fire down the hill to our community.
