That's What Jenni Said

Suzanne reminded me of one of the best parts of our Pacific Coast Highway trip last year that I forgot to share with you readers. And it would be such a tragedy if you didn’t get to share in this joy. Presenting ducks with bad toupees. Yes, ducks with bad toupees . Or perhaps ducks with fascinators if you prefer to imagine they’re wearing little hats. These fellas lived at one of the hotels we stayed at and wandered inside our room one morning.

Almost one year ago, three of my favorite people and I flew across the country, crammed ourselves into a convertible and drove the Pacific Coast Highway from San Diego to Santa Cruz. We lifted our itinerary from my dog-eared copy of National Geographic Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 of the World’s Greatest Trips . Both the book and numerous other guides online recommend driving from south to north for the best views, so that’s just what we did. Our first night we stopped in Santa Monica to enjoy dinner with my Uncle Lucien at a seaside restaurant before settling in Santa Barbara for the evening. Traffic was pretty bad from San Diego onward but given the mess that Washington, DC metro traffic always is, it was not more than we could handle. The next morning we were up early and ready to take on the Pacific Coast. We spent a bit of time touring the Santa Barbara Mission (known as the Queen of the Missions) in the morning before heading out onto Highway 101 and it was a great little start t...

I'm caught up for the most part with work projects. This is a good thing. I really need to squeeze more time out of my schedule to pick up some more consulting clients but right now I'm just not motivated. We shall see what summer brings.     Recap for March/early April travels:     Jon and I went to Dublin, Ireland the last weekend in March with a few members of my travel meetup. Overall it was a lovely time, although I did have some personality conflicts with one of the attendees who was a bit subversive. Ireland is so very green and beautiful, even in winter. We spent two days touring Dublin proper and one day in the country seaside town of Howthe. I think we managed to see almost every key point of interest in Dublin sparing the Goal (prison) and Guinness Factory. We did try a pint of Guinness at one of the pubs and the stuff is rubbish. Sort of tastes like bitter water with cigarette droppings inside. Absolutely hideous. We managed to make it to a flyertalk dinner for mi...