September Summering

Vacationing in September rocks. My entire life (minus two years for my mission and last year) has been dictated by the schoolyear, so this fall has been particularly pleasant. Saturday was my birthday, so we went north to Santa Cruz.




MYSTERIOUS
Our first stop was at the Mystery Spot where we got sufficiently dizzified by optical illusions (Michael). Our tour guide was glib, adolescent, and wielded a handy pocket level, which she loaned to Jonah towards the end of the tour because he was so cute (but really so he'd shut up so she could finish her spiel). After our mysterious experience we loitered a while, finishing up lunch and letting Jonah scamper about the gift shop and surrounding areas. The forest was lovely, the hot dogs were tasty, and the bathrooms smelled of freshly-cut lumber.

SANTA CRUZ BEACH BOARDWALK
The beach boardwalk of Santa Cruz was our main attraction for the day. First we found an adequately sunny spot upon which to lay our beach mats and set up camp. The ensuing activities allowed sufficient quantities of sand to ingratiate themselves in unmentionable places, which is where they stayed for the duration of the day due to a lack of adequately private showering facilities. BEACH! Jonah, of course, loves sand and water and rocks and before long had become the baby/sand equivalent of a snickerdoodle. Why bother with sunscreen when the child builds up such a protective coat on his own? He even had sand in his eyelashes.

As evening approached, it became necessary to search out victuals. So we packed up and moved out to scope the options along the boardwalk. After ascertaining there were no proper restaurants to be had, we settled upon an establishment that proffered BBQ chicken sandwich, hamburger, and corndog. So that's what we got, along with a side of fries.

After dinner we turned our attention to the various rides and immediately ruled out every one we actually wanted to go on due to the monkey on our backs (and sometimes in the stroller). We settled upon a dragon ride which inspired vehement vocalizations from said monkey. It was a go-in-a-circle-and-pull-the-lever-to-move-up-and-down ride that one of us could accompany him on. So James set off to procure tickets and returned having scored a deal off a departing patron of the park who was trying to unload his surplus. Sweet. I took Jonah, then we all went on the ferris wheel, and due to a lack of rides that all of us could enjoy together, James took Jonah on the aforementioned dragon ride once more.

To top off the evening, we stood in line for approximately 57 minutes to buy my birthday cake of the funnel variety. We ate the crispy outside nodes, and when James had the unhappy experience of biting into one that exploded fry oil all in his mouth and down his throat, we wrapped up and tossed the remains.

Back to the car and a sandy ride home brought our day to a close.