2015 Santa Cruz California
July 11, 2015 to July 18, 2015 : A lovely close vacation on the beach in beautiful Santa Cruz California. Instead of going to fire Island NY, Sam and Scott came out to sunny CA!
Day 1: Saturday July 11, 2015
Melissa and Jessy arrived at the Pacific Bungalow late in the evening and settled in to wait for Sam and Scott to arrive. The house is RIGHT on the beach and really cute. We have a great view of the ocean and beach access is very easy. It looks like it will be perfect.
Pacific Bungalow: Set on a private bluff overlooking California’s Monterey Bay, Pacific Bungalow offers guests a charming coastal escape, with panoramic ocean views as the centerpiece.
Day 2: Sunday July 12, 2015
Our first full day on the beach. We walked to Aldos for breakfast, right on the water. They had yummy Bloody Mary’s and a very long lazy brunch.
For dinner we went walked to a cute local place called Seabright Brewery with amazing wings.
Seabright Brewery
Super chill first day to ease our way into vacation.
Day 3: Monday July 13, 2015
We planned to stay local today. It’s Jessy and Melissa’s anniversary so they took a nice morning walk to the Walton Lighthouse.
Walton Lighthouse: Designed by Mark Mesiti-Miller and constructed by Devcon Construction, Inc., in 2002, Walton Lighthouse in Capitola stands over 41 feet tall and weighs 350,000 pounds. It sits on a manmade jetty where Atlantic Avenue ends in Santa Cruz at the harbor.
Delicious frittata for breakfast, with mimosas.
How is it? ~ Scott
Delicious! ~Sam
After that it was grocery shopping and a lazy day.
Day 4: Tuesday July 14, 2015
After we got up we went for a very long walk today. First we walked out to the boardwalk.
Santa Cruze Boardwalk: The Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk is an oceanfront amusement park in Santa Cruz, California. Founded in 1907, it is California’s oldest surviving amusement park and one of the few seaside parks on the West Coast of the United States.
Then we kept walking out on the bluff, we eventually got to the The Santa Cruz Surfing Museum. It was beautiful.
Santa Crus Surf Museum: The Santa Cruz Surfing Museum is a museum which was established in May 1986 to document the history of surfing.
By the time we walked back, we kicked back and hung out.
Beautiful Day for a walk
We then got dressed to go out for Jessy and Melissa’s 14 year anniversary. We went to a fabulous Mediterranean restaurant called Laili in downtown Santa Cruze. The food was really great and we had a lovely time. Highly recommend it!
Laili : Vegan friendly Mediterranean / Middle Eastern cuisine with an Afghan twist. Laili Restaurant is a contemporary, elegant fine dining experience. Voted one of the best restaurants in Santa Cruz. Seasonal and farmstead fresh items daily.
After that we walked to The Penny Ice Creamery and then home.
The Penny Ice Creamery : The only ice cream shop in Santa Cruz making small batches of delicious ice cream completely from scratch in house. Our flavors change with the seasons, and feature locally farmed and organic ingredients.
Day 5: Wednesday July 15, 2015
Today Melissa got up early and went down to the light house again. She say a mamma otter and a baby otter having breakfast. The mamma otter would go down and grab mussels, then crunch them and give them to the baby. Sadly she didn’t have a camera to capture it.The entire crew got dressed to go see if we too could see the otter family. Sadly they were done with breakfast, so instead we went for breakfast. Instead we had a photo shoot on the quite beach.
Selfie!
The rest of the day was lazy and we enjoyed our beautiful location. Made dinner and drank wine!
Day 6: Thursday July 16, 2015
This morning we got up early so Jessy could try to see the snacking otters. But they weren’t there, that’s ok we still saw an otter and a sea lion “doing there thing”
We went into town for brunch in down town Santa Cruz today at a place called Zachary’s Restaurant and met Gita. They had this great thing called Mike’s mess and we really enjoyed our boozy brunch!
Zachary’s Restaurant –
The favorite of locals, students, and visitors alike, our menu is built on an “everything homemade” philosophy that starts with our three styles of house-made bread (oatmeal-molasses, sour white, and dark rye) and unique home-fries; specialties include “Mike’s Mess”, one-of-a-kind sourdough pancakes (sour starter is purported to date back to the Alaskan Gold Rush –ask for the story!), coffee cakes from their bakery, and daily omelet specials.
We FINALLY made it to the Grateful Dead Archive and Scott was in his happy place.
The Grateful Dead Archive – Exhibits of Grateful Dead Archive materials are on display in the Brittingham Family Foundation’s Dead Central Gallery on the 2nd Floor of McHenry Library.
We came back to the house and hung with Gita for a little while, made some burgers and watched the sun go down.
Day 7: Friday July 17, 2015
Up and at’em for brunch at the Sea Breeze Cafe, which was amazing and def a place we would hit again!
Seabreeze Cafe – Winner Best Breakfast in Santa Cruz Good Times Reader Poll