Monday, November 26, 2007

Weekend trip to Santa Barbara

For my birthday present we decided to take a weekend family trip to Santa Barbara. Jeff had Thursday and Friday off, so it was a long weekend for him. We celebrated Thanksgiving on Thursday, and left for our trip early Friday morning. Santa Barbara is about 90 miles away from LA, so it was a pretty short 1.5 hour drive (we were lucky not to encounter any serious traffic both ways.)
We stayed in Motel 6 (not the best motel, but served our needs of sleeping) in Carpinteria, which is about 8 miles east of Santa Barbara. We really enjoyed our scenic drives, as 101 runs right by the ocean. On Friday we checked in to our hotel and went to the zoo. Andre really liked it there, we didn't take too many pictures, as they all turn out about the same no matter which zoo you go to. Later that day we walked up and down the State street in Santa Barbara (they have a bunch of stores along it) and just window shopped and had pizza for dinner.
The next day wedrove about 30 miles northwest to a cute little town called Solvang. It was settled by danish 100 years or so ago. It is very cute, and truly reminds you of little european towns. We spent our day there, visiting numerous gift shops, devouring on danish pastries and food. We also met up with the same couple we had over for Thanksgiving dinner there, as theyalso planned a daytrip to Solvang the same Saturday.
On Sunday we went to one hour of Church, and then spent half a day by the beach in Santa Barbara. We had a nice stroll along the beach, where they had an art fair. We had fish and chips dinner in Stearn Wharf and then headed home in the afternoon.
Anyway, here are some pictures documenting our trip:

At the zoo, Andre really like the macaws
Watching macaws
This picture speaks for itself
One of the street in Solvang
At the Danish bakery, about ready to eat our breakfast. Yum!
Another street

Andre petted almost every single dog walking the streets of Solvang that day. This owner even gave him the leash, I'm not sureI would trust him with it.
Being nice to the doggie

Cute guys

Jeff purchased a hat there, as it was quite hot and he didn't want to get burned. Here Andre is trying to steal it from Jeff. We took a nice break for lunch on the grass and had our leftover turkey and roll sandwiches.


We had our dinner here, they had different kind os sausages with roaster potatoes and sauerkraut and red cabbage. As I don't like sausages, I settled for a very danishcobb salad. :)
Here Sveta and I are eating aebleskivers, the jam-draped, powdered sugar-dusted Danish pancake balls. Yummy
Cool clock tower
At the Stearn Wharf
What a pretty view

Stearns Wharf
Harbor
Ready to go back home (sigh)

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Hey there! Glad to hear that you had a good time at Thanksgiving and in Santa Barbara. Happy Belated Birthday to you Masha! I should have told you to make sure to go to Woody's Barbecue in Santa Barbara. They have the best ribs - well, they did when I was a kid; I don't even know if there still around.

Masha, I haven't said it before but have been meaning to, that your haircut is so cute. It is really flattering on you. And you don't even look pregnant! What are you, 20 weeks now? Unbelieveable.

I can't believe how blond Andre is. Never would have seen that coming with the hair colors you two have.

Looking forward to seeing you at Christmas!