Coastline
After Mount Tam we took an unplanned detour and found some gorgeous coastline behind the mountain overlooking the Pacific. We plan to go back to this area soon to spend some time at the beach which is nearby here and we are told is a good area to spot wild Elk and even whales, depending on time of the year.
View over Marin County and the town of Sausilito.
Pacific coastline behind mount Tam:
Muir Woods / Mount Tamalpais
Last weekend we took advantage of the sunshine and visited Mount Tamalpais which is about 30 minutes from our house on the pacific shoreline. Its a beautiful area, a big national park with lots of hiking trails, camping, and a big redwood forest, which I had always wanted to experience. We went there at 9:30 AM and the car park was already full, when we left a little after noon the cars were parked probably almost a mile from the entrance to the park, its THAT popular! Karina loved it there as did we - exploring the forest and looking at the stream/river (which we were told often has a lot of salmon, especially in spawning season). There'd been a recent hatch of butterflies and the entire carpark and ranger station areas were swarming with small red butterflies, we even got one to sit on Karinas hand, but of course she refused to simply sit still and watch it so that experience lasted all of five seconds!
Theres a boardwalk right through one part of the forest so anyone can visit - strollers, young kids, disabled or old people are all catered for and of course it protects the forest by keeping people on a determined path. Theres hiking trails too for the more adventurous / mobile visitors, and that definately didn't apply to us! Check out the beautiful scenery:
Karina found a "wild animal" to ride on:
...And we found a "wild animal" of our own!
Some misc picture updates
A few assorted photo updates.... nothing special but some good images to share...
One of Karinas many new friends in our area, playing in the playground at the top of our street. Natalie has met a really good bunch of mums in the area and Karina has a lot of good friends. The mothes and kids have regular get togethers which is awesome and by far one of the best circles of friends we had since leaving the UK...
BUMP! Yes, we heard that one evening recently - Karina fell asleep on our bed during stories. We left her there a while to get into a sound sleep and we heard a crash. Went to investigate and this is what we found. Perfectly unharmed and fast asleep!
Ballet class. Karina was going to ballet in the community centre beside our house up until she started school (both occur on a Thursady, unfortunately). She had a great time there and is always "practicing" around the house! Hopefully one day we'll get her back into another class on a non-school day.
Proud sister! Making one of her "smile, you're on camera" daft faces which have runined many an otherwise lovely family snap!
Kyle is growing fast!
Just a small update - Kyle is gaining strength and growing well. He seems amazingly ahead of what we remember karina being at this stage, in terms of his mobility, size, general awareness. He was smiling from pretty much day 1, and we mean real smiles not just face shapes that approximated a smile. And he is laughing out loud regularly now to all stimulus (tickling, funny faces, Karina being... Karina!). Here he is already holding his head up and this was taken probably a month ago now...
School has started
So last Thursday was Karinas first day in school. Its basically a pre-school / day care, the equivalent of the start of infant school in the UK I guess, or similar anyway. She is going two days a week (its damned expensive, and we get it half price as its here at my work!) and theres definately mixed feelings about it all. She had built it up in her head as the ultimate place for her to go - she really took part in buying new clothes, lunch box, everything - but once she discovered we had to leave her alone there, it wasnt so good. And on each day she has been really upset when we leave her - full on tears - OK after that, upset again by lunch time (day 1 I brought her out for 20 mins to see me but she almost refused to go back), then at 6PM she refused to leave! Then by the time we got home she was back to saying she didnt want to go there again. Its an emotional rollercoaster!!!!!!!
Update: Here she is looking proud in her school outfit :)
Wild animals
Look at these cheeky little blighters...
They wandered along our path last night (yeah, in the rain), sauntered around by the windows (our window are full, floor to ceiling style), took a look in to see what we were up to, then wandered into our garden. They're big too... I guess even the wildlife is fed up with the rain, they looked pretty miserable. Probably they came for a snack on our ant infestation.
Bloody rain!
Damn it - first we have California frost now we have California monsoon. Wheres that big ball of fire in the sky I heard so much about over here? I kid you not its rained for 3 days SOLID. No let up. And we're told theres 2 more days to come - AND... that "this is nothing - one of the dryest winters in memory". HUH? How can people winge on so much about the UK being rainy all the time? Oh - and don't get me started about our recent electricity bill or the ant invasion we encountered last night. Both of which are, we're told, "normal". I think we'd have less things to worry about in the jungles of Borneo. Certainly the electricity bill anywway.
Heres some pics from the various city webcams - this is the weather as I write:
GARBAGE!
Yesterday was an interesting day at the office. We are working on a level which requires a lot of "junk" and litter, and we decided to go on a field trip to the local "recycling centre" which is basically a posh term for the city dump. There are 2 main areas: one is the traditional public dump where people unload fridges, sofas, etc etc. This gave some decent reference of pipes, electronics, rusted metals. Then we moved into the main garbage area which is best described as a stinky aircrat hanger full of rotting matter. Seriously - its the central hub for the household waste from the entire city. The trucks dump it into an entrance, its bulldozed into the main "pit", its watered down, compressed, scooped into bigger trucks and then landfilled. Man, was that disgusting! Its so foul they constantly spray the entire room (it really is like a hanger) with a mixture of water (to keep the dust down) and air freshner - no kidding! I think the worst part was the thousands of seagulls swooping in through the entrance and picking at the crap. An interesting experience for sure!
Now - bear in mind the trip was less than 9 miles each way and we were there about an hour - the round trip took from 11:30 until 3PM. Traffic. Its always bad in the city but the QM2 (see below) brought everything to a complete standstill. Its just a ship guys!!! :-)
Queen Mary 2 arrives in San Fran
A little bit of England arrived in port here in San Francisco - the Queen Mary 2 is on its maiden voyage around the world and it arrived in San Fran on Sunday to much fanfare! It stayed over night and left again on Monday and caused stunning traffic mayhem city wide (I know - I was stuck in it on Monday - read the next post!) Still - an incredible sight!
Theres a nice video here of the arrival: http://youtube.com/watch?v=6prEaKOvHDg
Not a lot happening
No updates again but this time its simply becuase - we aren't doing anything! Well, working of course... but thats about it. Boring huh? Oh we booked tickets to fly back to the UK for a couple of weeks in March to feast on beer, pub grub and Greggs pasties :) We'll try to fit in some family stuff while we're there I guess....
