tuesday, march 6th 2007
flying from stuttgart to london on a very early tuesday morning wasn't a problem. beautiful sunrise over stuttgart's airport. my stay in london between the flights was relaxed until i looked at my watch at 10:10am thinking it's only 9:10 in london because of the time shift. thinking about it briefly i thought: maybe doublecheck the flight monitor for departure gate info. did that with the shocking truth that my flight was already boarding for 10:20. you have never seen anyone packing and paying faster at the airports irish pub where i had breakfast. ran for about 7 minutes to the damn gate and actually made it: clueless travellers. gettin on the plane i was rewarded for my sprint and was offered 5 seats in a row for myself. felt like the corporate shuttle... that gave me a chance to actually relax before hitting san francisco tuesday afternoon 12:30 local time. went thru customs no problem, stepped outside in the sun, lit a smoke and was then picked up by j., my cousins husband. from the airport across the golden gate bridge to mill valley it was just a very surreal ride. there were so many memories in the places that passed on the way: incredible... the mill valley house is right out of a dream. with a sun deck overlooking the woods surrounding it. one would never want to leave! just chilled and worked a bit on the computer until cousin m. arrived and made great spicy pasta.
wednesday, march 7th 2007
got up at 6 to join j for a job interview in santa cruz. left mill valley around 6:40 and got there about 8:50. i walked over to SC's main road "pacific" and checked out the coffee shops for a quick breakfast. the cool skateboarding shops (o'neill and santa cruz) didn't open until ten, so i had some more time to chill and check out a border's book store. as usual (just like 5 years ago) i could not resist buying santa cruz logo shirts and hoodies... j's interview was over about 11:30, so he picked me up to drive out to the marine research center where he used to work - nice place right at the beach with several tanks that hold dolphins (weak or injured from the sea) for research. then headed to a mexican place to have lunch and then hit s couple more boarding stores. after that we checked out the surf - nice and easy waves which made me think about just renting a damn wet suit and try again as j brought 2 boards along - we postponed it for later this week. drove over to a bar and had a drink in the sunshine (yep, all red face again), met up with the mullisk and then hit the road back to SF where we had fantastic sushi at ebisu (http://www.ebisusushi.com/). back to the mill valley...
ALL PICS of the 3 week trip will be located here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/303/sets/72157594576695042/
