The other day I rode to the beach– what else is new, right? :) This time I rode with Charissa and she took me on a route I’d never been on before! Normally, I ride up Alliance, over Spear and then cross over to Upper Bay Road. But since Charissa hadn’t been on a bike in over a year she was terrified of riding through that much city traffic, so we went straight through 11th to Jane’s Road.

There were lots of sights to see that I didn’t even know existed. Most notably this very creepy ‘abandoned’ Victorian home. There was a good deal of crusty looking furniture, plus a guitar and Casio keyboard hooked up in the living room. We assumed someone had turned it into a college house.

I wanted to take loads more photos of the place, but my imagination started going wild and I became very creeped out, very fast! Everytime I held the viewfinder to my eye I thought I’d see some decrepit zombie-woman with a widow’s peak and dusty old 17th century dress peering out of the window.

One thing I love about riding out to the Bottoms is how most everything is so time-ravaged. I’m sad that, being a girl, I went through the typical “take photos of your feet” phase while all the boys were taking their cameras through the “explore abandoned buildings” phase. I’m trying to make up for lost time, but I am a total, utter chicken, so it will be a long time before I get shots of anything remotely interior!

When we finally got to the beach we locked our bikes up to some sign posts. I’ve been leaving my shoes in the basket of my bike and relying on good faith that no one will steal them. Charissa, on the other hand, looped her bike lock through her shoes! In her defense, they were extremely cute.

I’m not sure how long we were at the beach, but it was definitely long enough for me to get some color on my legs! I should’ve worn shorter shorts, though, because my jean bermudas left a line that makes me look like I’m wearing sunburn-colored knee highs. VERY classy, hah!

It was a pretty leisurely afternoon, digging our feet into the sand and watching the tide come in. Charissa played some tunes on her ukelele and I took photos of everything in sight (natch). We certainly enjoyed ourselves– and others, as it was pretty crowded. To be expected on such a gorgeous day! There was also this bee that wouldn’t leave us alone. It wasn’t a mean bee, though, and Charissa seemed to develop quite the friendship with it!

When it was time to go home we swung by the boat dock to use the restrooms. I talked to a guy who was letting his dogs run up and down the ramp into the river– he had a golden retriever that was 110 lbs! Incredibly huge pup. Unfortunately, they were too excited by the prospect of guzzling river water and getting their owner drenched to get any good shots of them.

And, if you can believe it, I actually toned this post down a bit. There are at least eleventy million other photos of this particular bike adventure at my Flickr!

The mountain range, that is. Granted, this is a photo of the East, when we belong to the West, but it still gets me excited about going home.

Today is finally the day where we attempt to make that treacherous drive through the mountain passes so we can relax for at least a couple of weeks before classes start again.

This is my last winter break and, although I’ll miss breaking from school and zipping over here for holiday frenzy, I can’t wait to get back to Arcata. There’s so much I want to do before the 22nd! Paint, record music, read books… Get a library card! Process photos on my own computer.

We’ve already stayed much longer than we had planned due to some nasty storms that were undoubtedly much nastier up in the mountains. The thought of driving through blizzards and black ice didn’t sound very nurturing to me… Especially on a car ride that is already quite dangerous even in the best of weather.

At the moment, the tinkling of wind chimes tells me it’s at least a bit windy outside. The pecking at the windows tells me it’s back to raining yet again. And the CalTrans traffic cam tells me that Trinity County is absolutely covered in snow! I won’t lie– I’m a bit excited. Living in California, it’s not too often I get to experience snow. However, if you don’t hear back from me in a timely manner, I’m probably crawling up the side of the Alps!

One of my favorite things about going home is the amount of downtime I have to relax and do all the things I never normally allot any time for doing. Sadly, going for strolls on sunny days is one of those things.

The day after Thanksgiving I corrected this error and walked around the preservation with Chris and Lindy. It was a combination of warm and windy, which made for some great photos! On our way back I actually started to miss Redding a bit and its mountainous horizon. Thankfully all I ever need is five minutes in the sun and I’m reminded why I moved away in the first place.

More photos of the trip at Flickr, of course!

Good grief! I’ve been editing and deleting and organizing all the photos from my 10 day vacation all night, and yet my Flickr is only up to day three of the trip! This may take longer than I thought…

Here’s a bit of what I’ve managed to get together so far:

Driving! It’s about a 3 hour drive from Arcata to Redding if you straight shoot it. We usually make a necessary pit stop in Weaverville to grab snacks at Tops.

When we finally got home it was pretty quiet. Sue and Charlie were still in Mexico, so we hung out with Larry for the weekend, played games and cooked a lot of stir fry dinners.

Tom was a jerk the entire 10 days. I wouldn’t expect anything less from him!

Ed was looking healthier than I’ve ever seen him! He usually is very stressed out and missing patches of fur on his hind legs (for this, we used to nickname him ‘Chaps’).

Being the first trip home since I purchased my 50mm lens, I had to photograph everything in sight, of course!

This is one of my favorite walking paths, simply because it’s so utterly engulfed in frail looking trees, flowers and of course, the staple redwoods.