The Smith Clan: Mendocino

Again, trying to catch up :-)

So before the craziness that was our August, we decided to take a few days out and just drive up the coast to Mendocino. I had bought Jason a Groupon for a round at the Links at Bodega Bay, so we decided to start our little trip there. We checked into our room and then headed out for our day. Bodega Bay is such a cute little coastal town. We Yelped a place for lunch and decided on a little place that was lauded for their fish and chips. Delish! We sat out on the little patio and watched as the tourists and locals walked by. After lunch, we headed over to the golf course. It is absolutely gorgeous, right on the ocean! Jason went out by himself to start so we got to ride along with him for the first few holes. Duder absolute LOVED it! When it was time for the two of us to head out, he had a bit of a tantrum. Something of a norm for us these days. Whoever named it the terrible two's new the heck they were talking about!

Duder and I decided to take a little walk down the boardwalk to the ocean. Duder is such water baby. He literally just wanted to stand there forever and watch the waves. And the sand between his toes was pretty fascinating too :-)

On a mission

Love the mistiness of the northern coast.

Needless to say, Jason thoroughly enjoyed his round of golf and I enjoyed looking at the awesome houses along the course. We headed back to the hotel and hit the heated outdoor pool. The ocean had not been enough for our little water baby. I'm not exaggerating - I think this kid could live in the water if we let him. He absolutely loves it - whether it's pool, ocean, bath. He's our little Aquarius. We literally spent so much time in the pool that we missed all of the restaurants! They were all closed by the time we had gotten out and dressed. We ended up running by the Whole Foods and begging the guy to leave it open for us to run in and grab some sandwiches and salads. They were so nice and accommodating and it was almost more fun to go back to our room and picnic just the three of us while Duder gave us a dance show :-)

The next day we grabbed some breakfast at the hotel and then headed out to Mendocino. On the way, on the advice of my bestie Sarah, we stopped in the Anderson Valley for some wine tasting. Duder was sleeping, so we decided to just stop at one, and boy did we pick one!. We just happened to stop at Goldeneye, which was on Sarah's list of recommendations and it was so beautiful! The view was absolutely stunning and the tasting was delish! We were thoroughly impressed! (all of our pics are on the new DSLR we got in June, which I still have not downloaded, so those will have to wait!) You can see this video though :-)

After the tasting we continued up the coast to Mendocino. We checked into our B&B, which was so cute and quaint. We had our own little private garden patio, which was so nice! We were right up the hill from the downtown area, so we headed down to explore. There were so many cute little shops and the mainstreet overlooks the ocean. We went into the this amazing little kaleidoscope shop. They had the most beautiful and original kaleidoscope we had ever seen. After wandering some more, we stopped for dinner at the Bay View Cafe. We sat on the deck on the second floor, which had an amazing view. Luckily they had bubbles and crayons on each table because a certain little toddler was not a happy camper, which meant we didn't get to stay long, despite the great food and awesome service. We headed back to the hotel and just relaxed for the rest of the evening. Jason and I enjoyed some wine on our patio and the duder got a nice rest :-)

Hanging out watching the football game.

The next day we decided to explore Fort Bragg. We headed over to Glass beach and walked down to the shore, which is all made up of sea glass. It was pretty incredible. We took a nice walk down the boardwalk and then explored downtown where we made a stop at the Mendocino Cookie Co. (Again, thank you Sarah for the recommendation!) We then browsed some of the neat little shops downtown. My favorite was Pippi Longstockings. The entire store is just socks! The cutest funkiest socks you've ever seen!

That night we tried to go the Mendocino Hotel for dinner, but after waiting 20 minutes for someone to come to our table to even offer us water and having to go find a waiter ourselves, we decided to try someplace else. We came across Frankies ice cream and pizza and it was such a better choice!! The pizza was delicious and so fresh and original and the atmosphere was so casual and warm and they even had live musicians which was great! They also had a collection of actual questions that people had come in and asked. Examples were "How do I get to Frankies?" "Do people actually live in Mendocino?". We were cracking up. The best part by far though was dessert. They had made to order ice cream cookie sandwiches. You got to pick your own flavor cookie and then whatever flavor ice cream you wanted. They were absolutely ginormous and absolutely DELICIOUS!!! I would go back to Mendocino just for the ice cream cookie sandwich!

Duder in his headphone hat. We ordered these from this awesome girl who crochets the most adorable hats!

Checking out the scene.

I love him :-)

What have we here?

I think I'll just go ahead and take both of these....

YUM!

After dinner we took a hike on a little trail along the cliffs. So pretty!

Someone had started a bonfire on the beach so we got to watch the firemen, which was a a highlight for Duder.

After that we continued our little adventure over to Point Cabrillo to watch the sunset by the lighthouse. One of the most beautiful moments of my life!

Duder was more interested in the rocks on the driveway than the sunset ;-)

When we left town we decided to take Hwy 1 back down to Bodega. It was an INCREDIBLE drive! We used to take it up the coast to visit my Aunt Louise in Seattle, but I really don't remember it being so beautiful (probably because I was knocked out by Dramamine - which I actually could have used about halfway through).