Northern California – Day 1

Today was our last morning in Larkspur and we hit the road en-route eventually to Seattle!  We left our hotel by 9am and headed towards Napa Valley.  This area is BEAUTIFUL and reminded us a lot of Tuscany from our trip to Italy last summer.

We had scheduled a tour of the Robert Hunter Winery and Gardens.  The gardens and vineyard were stunning.  Sitting in the garden reminded me of the scene in Sound of Music where they dance/sing in the garden.

In a town nearby called Glen Ellen, we shopped for olive oil tasting and chocolate.  Unfortunately the olive oil place was not there anymore, but we did end up with some chocolate tasting and picking up a few treats.  We got some sugar free chocolates made with stevia…that made our low carb counterparts very happy!

We also browsed a local market, but it turned out to just be another grocery store.  Then we headed to the Marin Cheese Factory for a tasting and a production tour. The cheese was wonderful, I’m not normally a soft cheese fan, but this was good!  They had one that was strawberry flavored!  The production tour was a bit disappointing because it lasted 10 min and involved 1 room.  But I guess that is what you get for free!

We continued north and drove through Bodega Bay, then northwards on Hwy 1.  We saw lots of beautiful views of the cost along the way.  We stopped for lunch at Nick’s Cove, the setting was so quaint, it was right on the Tomales Bay, fresh fish and beautiful scenery…what more could we ask for!  They had a warm cauliflower salad that Dustin and I split, and then we also split the Crab Benedict.

After lunch we continued northward.  We stopped at many look outs as we traveled including the Point Arena Lighthouse, it was closed but we got some great pictures!

After a long day in the car, we reached our destination of Ft. Bragg, CA for the night. We checked in to the Holiday Inn Express around 8pm, then headed out for some dinner.  Thanks to Google we found a great little BBQ joint called ‘The Q’ restaurant. The boys had pork on their salads, and Sarah and I had fish on ours.  I had the blackened local Rock Fish on my salad, and it was awesome!  I highly recommend it!

We went back to the hotel to swim and relax in the hot tub for half-hour or so until it closed.  All in all it was a great day! Can’t wait to see more of this coastline!