Last Day of Vacay

In my post about tips for vacationing with a baby, I mentioned that we recommend keeping the first and last day pretty on track with your normal home routines. This way on your final day you can ease baby back into their normal schedule. Because of this we decided to keep our final vacation day pretty low key and make sure Forest was able to take his usual naps in his pack n play instead of on the go. 

On Thursday morning, Jonathan left early to drive his Jeep on the Old Coast Road near Big Sur. I figured Forest isn’t quite ready for rugged off road trail driving just yet and I get mega car sick so the two of us stayed behind for a relaxing morning of seal spotting and strolling along the bay. 

Jon's morning:

 Forest and Momma's morning:

Jonathan returned to the cottage before the end of baby boy’s morning nap and when Forest woke up we headed down to Monterey to explore Cannery Row (of John Steinbeck fame). The area is pretty touristy, but a great place to grab some coffee or ice cream and people watch. Plus it’s right by the aquarium so it’s an easy outing to tag onto a trip there. 

We mainly wanted to explore Cannery Row because I had seen an advertisement for a Bubba Gump Shrimp. Of course we had to stop by to get some Forrest Gump photo ops with our little Forest. When I saw they had a replica bench it was even more perfect. 

After stopping and taking no less than 70 pictures, we headed back toward to cottage for an afternoon nap. We had ordered take out or cooked in every night that we were in Pacific Grove due to Forest’s 7 pm bedtime. However, there is a restaurant at Lover’s Point called The Beach House that offers a discount if you order before 6 pm so we decided to take advantage  of our early bird status and go out for a nice meal on our final night.  

As always, Forest was full of charm and well behaved for our outing. 

I tried the local Sand Dabs while Jonathan couldn’t resist the temptation of bacon wrapped pork chops. Forest enjoyed puréed sweet potatoes and turkey. Everyone was pretty happy with their meal. We made it back home just in time to get Forest tucked in to bed and we spent our final night drinking wine and watching True Blood, breathing a sigh of relief that our vacation actually went remarkably well! 

The next morning we packed up our things, said goodbye to our cottage, and drove back to San Ramon in time for Forest to catch his morning nap on the ride home. 

Our next trip will involve a flight to New Orleans to visit family and friends in Louisiana. I know the flight will be short relative to our journey from Aberdeen to San Fran, but I am still nervous. First off, our baby is mobile now. Second off, Jon’s company isn’t buying baby a separate seat so he’ll be a lap baby this time around. Any tips for flying with a very active 9 month old???? 

P.S. Y'all, in case my recent blog posts haven't yet convinced you, you just HAVE to visit Monterey Bay if you get the chance. I know Napa and San Fran and Hollywood and San Diego and Yosemite and Lake Tahoe and all those other high-falutin' locales get all the hype, but the Central Coast is worth your time as well. It was one of our favorite trips of all time, and it's sad to think that if we hadn't lived 2 hours away, we might not have ever thought to visit. 

So now you know that Monterey and Big Sur should for sure be on your bucket list. You should also take every single vacation in your life to the state of California. Seriously. It is overwhelming how many things there are to see and do here! I felt the same way when we first moved to Scotland. I feel like while we lived in Europe all we did was travel and sight see and yet we didn't even accomplish half of what we wanted to do. A baby definitely slows us down but we are still determined to see as much of this beautiful state as we can. 

What are your favorite Cali destinations?