Chico and back to Sac

Hello! We'll I've been back in Sacramento since Sunday and I haven't even blogged about Chico yet! Alex and I haven't done anything touristy yet in Sac. We have mostly just spent time with friends and family. Alex has been working on the bus. He is trying to get our dual battery system to work. It is too difficult for me to explain; I would probably tell you the wrong info anyway. Maybe he'll blog about it and then you can be filled in on exactly what he is doing on the bus. Anyways, Chico....I really liked Chico. It is mainly a college town, and I've found that in college towns there is so much more to do. It rained for the most part, but we did find time to go to a museum, see an alumni basketball game, eat out at some local restaurants, go to coffee, do laundry, attend church, and take a long walk in the famous Bidwell park. All of this in just two days! We weren't bored at all.

The museum was interesting; It was a museum in downtown Chico right down the street from the college and it had a lot of history on bee hives. The bee hive stuff didn't really interest me, but there was a small history section on the development and evolution of the town of Chico, which I enjoyed learning about. One thing I learned, which you might find kind of funny, is that Chico State University used to be named Normal College. I guess it was the normal school to go to. The original building was burned down and after the school was rebuilt it soon lost the name of Normal College.

We walked around the Chico State campus for a bit. I love the architecture. Most of the buildings are made out of brick, which reminds me of being in London. A friend of ours went to Chico State University about ten years ago, Leah Rice, and she happened to be playing an alumni basketball game while we were in Chico. We couldn't pass up the opportunity to see her play and it was free. Even if it wasn't free we still probably would have gone, it being free was just a bonus.  I really enjoyed seeing her play. She kicked butt! Most of the people she was playing against were only out of college for maybe a year and she hadn't been in the game for years before she played that day in Chico. I was impressed on how well she did. Her team didn't win, but it was a good game, and I know she had a ton of fun.

Alex and I attended Bidwell Presbyterian Church on Sunday and it was a nice church. I found out that Presbyterians don't do full immersion baptism. I'm not sure why they baptize by sprinkling water onto one's face, but I guess it works for them. I did like the church service and it seems like the church is pretty involved in the community.

After Church we went to Bidwell Park. Bidwell park is a beautiful park in Chico. It is very long. Not very wide, but very long. There is a creek that runs through the park and the bike/walking trail runs right along the stream for the most part. The sun was out and no rain. So, that was definitely a good for us. A really cool thing about Bidwell Park is that they have an outdoor pool area and the water is from the creek that runs through the park. So, it is like a creek pool. I've never seen anything like it.

We walked for at least 7 or 8 miles and we only walked lower Bidwell park. There is an upper Bidwell park, but we were too tired to walk the whole thing.

When we were done with our walk Alex asked me if I wanted to go to Auburn or if I wanted to go back to Sacramento. I thought about it and the weather said there was rain in the forecast for Auburn; Sacramento was so close and we could be sleeping in a warm bed when we got to Sac, so I opted for going back to Sac. And now we are here.

We are leaving again on Saturday and will be going south. I'm looking forward to getting on the road again. I'm ready for more adventure!

Redding, CA

Redding, California. You are probably thinking, "Who want's to hear about Redding?" Right? Well, Alex and I didn't have the greatest time our first night in Redding. Nothing bad happened, it was just really boring. Our second day was a little more eventful. First let me tell you how we got to Redding.

After leaving Arcata, we decided to go no further north because the only way over to Interstate 5 if we went any further was to go through Hwy 199, which would bring us over into Oregon and then possibly snow. So, we weren't really comfortable with the idea of being in the snow. We decided to take Hwy 299 over to I-5. The reason we needed to get over to I-5 was because we are planning on spending Thanksgiving with family in Sacramento. Both Alex and I had never driven on Hwy 299, and boy did we put a strain on Maander(our van). We were climbing up the mountains through Trinity National Forest at about 35-40mph. We were constantly having to pull over for traffic to pass us. It took us about 2 1/2 hours to get to Weaverville, CA, which is only about 90mi form Arcata. I'm so thankful that we didn't have any car problems. Thank you to everyone who is praying for us and Maander. We stayed in Weaverville for the night and that was pretty uneventful. Nice town though.

We drove to Redding on Wednesday afternoon and were hoping to spend some time with some friends of mine, the Marinello's, that I met about 10 years ago at a camp called CFO (camps farthest out), but I kind of gave them a short notice; so, we planned on going to dinner with them the next day. Redding isn't a small town, but it's not a very big town either. Alex and I had to find something to do. We hung out at the Mall for a bit and people watched. That was fun for about the first hour, then we were bored.

We looked online and tried to find a cool bar to go to or maybe a place that had live music, but no luck there. Alex and I were convinced that we are never moving to Redding because there is nothing to do there. I'm sure if we knew the town better then we could have found something to do. We meandered with Maander for a bit and stopped at the Sundial Bridge for a little while at night. That was actually a little romantic. Then we decided to park our van in the Walmart parking lot for the night, and since Walmart is open 24hrs we walked and browsed around Walmart for about an hour before going to bed. So yeah, pretty boring.

Our plan for the next day was to visit some waterfalls, but the weather forecast said it was going to rain and we didn't feel like hiking if it was going to rain. Instead we took a absolutely beautiful bike ride along the Sacramento River. The fall colors along the bike trail were amazing and it never did rain. Alex and I got a pretty good work out.

The Look Out Tree

Human Sundial

Claude Caldwell

View from our bike ride

After our bike ride we met up with the Marinello's at their work, N Computing, in Redding and chatted with them for a bit; then made plans to go to dinner and a live music venue later in the evening. We ate at a pretty well reviewed sushi bar. It had decent sushi, but not as good as Kamon Japanese or Sushi Cafe in Sacramento. They did have a pretty cool blow-up Hello Kitty doll in front of their restaurant.

Us with Dennis and Angela Marinello

Once we were done with dinner we headed over to The Love Lounge for live music. I was actually pretty impressed. There were a ton of different musicians and the majority of the people were Christian. The place was packed. Everyone was pretty talented. There was a girl about ten years old who sang one song and she had some pretty amazing vocals. I thought, "This girl is the next Cristina Aguilera." Another girl, about my age, maybe a little younger, sang a remix of the Disney song in the movie The Little Mermaid called, "Part of this World", and that was really amazing and unique. She had a beautiful voice, sounded a little like Alicia Keys. I loved it. So, our second day in Redding was a little more enjoyable, thanks to the Marinello's and a beautiful day by the River.

Live music at The Love Lounge

A lot of people there!

We  are now in Chico, CA. So, close to home. One of the Marinello's recommended us going to The Naked Lounge for coffee in Chico. We have a Naked Lounge coffee house in Sacramento that Alex and I absolutely love. We are here now and it's not the same coffee place, but still pretty good. Alex and I are in a little section of the coffee shop right now that is kind of closed off to the rest of the place and there is a couple also in the same area totally making-out right now as I'm typing this. Kinda awkward.
When Alex and I get back to Sacramento, we plan on doing some touristy things and we are totally going to blog about it.

Eureka and a few other small towns:)

Eureka! I’ve found it!

Alex and I spent some time in Eureka and some other small towns around the vicinity. I’ve probably enjoyed our travels the most in this area. Eureka is an old logging town that is lined with beautiful elaborate Victorian homes/buildings. The Victorian architecture reminded me of home in Downtown Sacramento. Most of the Victorian homes have been turned into commercial buildings and are very well preserved, but others are slowly deteriorating; they have a lot of potential.   

Alex and I took a little amble around Old Town Eureka and walked by the famous Carson House. 

It is probably the biggest and most Victorian designed mansion in all of Eureka. It was owned by a man, named Carson, who was a big time logger back in the 1800s. He was a very well-to-do man and well liked by all his peers, but he eventually went insane. Supposedly he ranted about seeing "Big Foot" on one of his logging ventures, but no one believed him. Come on, who would believe a silly story like that? He obsessed over the idea of someday capturing "Big Foot." Everyday he would devise a new plan on how he could capture the beast, but the obsession is what eventually drove him to insanity. Carson’s wife committed him to the local mental ward where he died just two years later. His wife quickly remarried his long-time best friend and they were happily married for the next 30 years. Pretty crazy, literally. Unfortunately, the Carson House is not open to the public. It is privately owned by a "members only" club. They don’t do any tours because they are deeply offended by Mr. Carson’s wife for committing him to a mental ward. The club supposedly believes that "Big Foot" exists, too. They hope to someday capture the animal to fulfill Carson's dream. Very strange. It’s a mysteriously beautiful building.

After leaving Eureka we stayed at a friend of my parent’s home. Her name is Shelley and she lives just south of Eureka on a beautiful 5 acre farm. She has goats, horses and chickens. She was so hospitable and very good company. She shared with us a delicious enchilada dinner and homemade goat cheese served with tortilla chips. The goat cheese was phenomenal! So flavorful and creamy. I could have eaten it for days, it was that good. Seriously, I wish all of you who are reading this could have tasted this goat cheese! I think someday Alex and I are going to have to raise our own goats so that we can make goat cheese ourselves. Shelley said goats are very fun animals to have because they are sort of like your friends who produce delicious milk for you to make cheese, custards and etc. We had fresh goats milk with our cereal in the morning which was very tasty, as well. 

We made a short stop in Ferndale. It’s a very cute little town near Eureka. It is a Farm town, but also has Victorian style homes like Eureka. They aren’t as elaborate, but still very beautiful.

After leaving Ferndale we made our way up to Arcata. We didn’t spend very much time there, but I absolutely loved it! It is the home of Humboldt State University. So, it is mainly a college town, but the people there and vibe of the town is so laid back and care-free; probably because most of the town is high on some type of drug. Hey, I'm just saying.  We also saw sooo many Volkswagons, mostly Vanagons. Alex and I walked to a very unique coffee house, called Mokka Café. It serves coffee and you can spend some time in their hot tub or sauna rooms, if you feel like it. So weird, but so cool at the same time. The atmosphere was awesome and they even had their cat relaxing with the customers while they enjoyed their coffee. The cat was so chill. My sister, Deborah, and her husband would absolutely love this coffee house.  I wish they could have been there with us. They would appreciate the ambiance. The Mokka Café is by far the most interesting coffee house I have ever been to. The sauna rooms and hot tubs are so popular there that we couldn’t even try it out if we wanted to because they were all booked up for the day.

Before leaving Arcata, we took a short hike in the Arcata Community Forest. The forest was so beautiful. As I was walking through it, I felt like I was in a dream or something. It seemed so unreal. There were moss covered Redwood trees and random mushrooms sprouting up from the ground. The dirt was a beautiful rich color red and there was bright green shrubbery all around us. All I can say is, God is a magnificent artist; his creation is spectacular!

P.S. I made up the story about the Carson House, I couldn't resist. It's such a mysterious house that I had to imagine something up about it:), but it is owned by a private members only club. The club is supposedly a bunch of lawyers. I had you fooled, didn’t I? Hehe:p