After the week’s drama of arranging things for our son, my heart stress test, and something I’m dying to talk about but just can’t… yet, Cristy and I decided we needed to hit the road.  Even if just for a day.  Bodega Bay was the destination of the day.

Normally it’s about a 2.5 hour drive from our home but we had to drop off a CD that Cristy sold to someone near Sacramento, and then we would drive from there out to Bodega Bay.  This pretty much turned it into a 4 hour drive but what the hey, we’re together, eating snacks and listening to music on Spotify.  Despite the traffic it’s pure bliss.

We ended up pulling into Santa Rosa at about 1pm.  We were going to try to make it for lunch in Bodega Bay but Cristy was getting hungry and we both needed a bathroom break.  Cristy checked her iPhone and found a place called The Naked Pig.  They sell all natural, organic, farm-direct-to-table food.  The greens for the salad were picked that morning on their farm, and the pig for the pork sanwiches was slaughtered the night before and smoked all night and morning.  You may feel sorry for the pig but he (or she) was delicious!

I had the Naked Pig Sandwich…yep that pig was alive the day before.   The freshly smoked pork was DEE-licious!

Cristy got a salad… yep those plants were alive that morning.

I’m not a big salad guy but this salad really was delicious.  I’ve never tasted greens that taste so good!

We both got some strawberry-cream sodas made fresh to order.

The wait staff was extremely friendly and courteous.  I can tell you we’ll definately be back!

After a few burps and some lingering at the table we hopped back into my trusty mini-van and once again pointed our noses to Bodega Bay.  About 45 minutes later we were driving along the coast looking for a beach at which to waste some time before we had dinner.  We ended up pulling off at North Salmon Creek Beach.  We walked past these very fragrant flowering bushes being guarded by a very laid-back sparrow.

The very short trail leads down some steps to the beach.  We spent about an hour walking along the beach and enjoying the sound of the ocean, talking, and watching the surfers.

That’s about what the beaches usually look like on the northern California coast.  Bring a sweater.  It actually wasn’t that cold this day, it was almost 70 degrees but the sun never came out.

Some beach-goers have constructed windbreaks from driftwood.  You’ll find them all up and down the beach.  Some of them can be quite large and elaborate.

We headed back up to the van and watched the ocean from the cliff for a while. The small creek you see is where Salmon Creek empties into the Pacific.  It was a very peaceful place to take a snooze.

We decided to head back to the town of Bodega Bay and take a look around.  Highway 1 is very cramped through here and parking is at a premium.  We decided to just head to the touristy Tides Warf and Restaurant.  They have a gift shop and a fish market and best of all, a large mostly-empty parking lot.  We looked through the touristy gift shop and bought a few more snacks for the ride home at the fish market.  We decided to have an early dinner before heading back home.  You should couldn’t beat the view.

We started the long drive back home and decided to just follow Highway 12 the whole way so we could miss the traffic on 101 and I-80.  This was a good call as it took us through wine country in Santa Rosa and Sonoma.   We’re not wine drinkers but if we were, this would be paradise.  The scenery was beautiful.

This isn’t my photo, I stole it from Google Maps to give you an idea of what we saw.  We have to remember to take more pictures.

We finally arrived home at 10pm.  We were kind of worn out from the travel but it was a good worn out.  It was a great way to waste a Saturday.