Good Afternoon -Well, "good evening" is actually more appropriate since it's 7 p.m., more than 12 hours later than I usually send you these little stories of mine.
Today was travel and recover day, complete with a 4 a.m. wake-up call - but that's a story for tonight's Virgen and tomorrow's blog.
Let's look at the Virgen from yesterday - on the background is a map of Coronado, with a wine label over that and a shell at her feet. Yes - we spent our last day at the beach.
We started with breakfast at Big Kitchen with some friends who live in the neighborhood. Another friend had told us about it and how the food is great and if we were lucky, we'd meet the owner Judy the Beauty (on duty). We were lucky enough to meet her and she lived up to the tales of warmth and general delightedness that we had heard. Apparently, she is trained as a social worker, but gave that up to start her restaurant 20+ years ago. Our friend suggested that she continues to do her social work, only now it's through omelets and pancakes, rather than bus passes and case plans.
After breakfast, our friends drove us over the giant Coronado bridge (one of the "I wonder what that does in an earthquake?" structures) so we could see a bit of the "island" (it's attached by a thin strand, so technically, it's not an island). When we had taken the ferry over here earlier in the week, we had stayed on the bay side, but seeing the Pacific side made us change our plans for the day - the beach was that beautiful.
Originally, originally the plan for the day was to take the 11:15 coaster train up to Oceanside and spend the day at that beach. Then we read a review that said to think "bail bonds, cops and donut shops" when thinking of Oceanside, so we altered the plan so that we'd get off a stop or two before in Carlsbad.
After the previous relaxing day of the zoo, good Italian, and fireworks though, we decided we'd keep it more local, forget the Coaster train and just do the trolley/bus combo back to Pacific beach. We knew we wanted beach because it's not anything we can get close to here in southern AZ (water, waves, cool breezes, water, water, water, etc., etc., etc.).
That was the plan until seeing Coronado beach. Too beautiful and closer, which meant more time on it and less in transit.
After our friends dropped us back at our hotel, we wandered around the farmer's market in Little Italy where we got some peaches, plums, asparagus and a couple of cucumbers. While I love supporting the local growers, the prices at this market were high and, once more, had me strengthening my resolve to get to a place where we really could grow more of our own (without the voodoo magic needed here).
From there, it was a stop at Mona Lisa's for some sandwiches and then the ferry to Coronado. When we had told our friend that our intent for the day was to be at the beach, his reply was, "Yeah, you and 50 million other people." Seeing the ferry line, I was concerned that his comment would be true, but once we got off and walked the 12 blocks across to the Pacific side, there were big spots of open beach.
We ate our sandwiches, enjoyed the waves and took a good nap under the warm-but-not-as-wicked-as-Tucson sun. The waves and undertow were much stronger here than at Pacific beach, which made for the adventure of getting knocked on one's ass with each wave that broke. Fantastic.
We only stayed a few hours, and then were ready to enjoy our last quiet night in the city. Back at the hotel, I took the time to do a quick load of laundry because everything I had was profoundly stinky by then, and then it was a shower and more great Italian back at Buon Appetito. This time I had the swordfish, calamari, and shrimp in a red tomato sauce and my partner had shrimp, clams, and mussels over linguine. Magnificent.
The wine label on this Virgen is actually from the bottle we shared the night before at this place, but I had forgotten to put it on and it was a delicious bottle of wine, so it's here now (Barbera d'Alba Vigneto Boscato).
Okay, basta. It's time for some dinner and then maybe a raspado to wind down before it's back to work tomorrow. Here's good food and smooth wine to all.
Oh - but first - here's the June Virgens group photo I promised. Even at this size, you can pick out some of the days.
No comments:
Post a Comment