Day One

After racing around for the past week cleaning the house, shopping for wedding clothes, celebrating with friends & relatives, wrapping up things up at work and arranging dogsitters for Kölle & Moroho, the morning of our departure arrived. We pulled ourselves out of bed at 3:30am, showered quickly and sent Moroho upstairs to wake up “Uncle Andrew,” who had crashed at our place in South Minneapolis overnight so that he could drive us (voluntarily) to the Lindberg Terminal of the St. Paul/Minneapolis International airport at 4:00am. Andrew is also watching Moroho for 10 days, which places him distinctly under the category of Awesome Brother.

Joe and I flew first to Houston and then to Ontario Airport in Los Angeles, where we picked up a rental car at 11:30am. The trunk of the first car offered to us, a Pontiac G5, smelled like beer and so we traded it for a brand new light blue Nissan Versa. Nice. Next we drove east on Highway 10, merged onto Highway 101, and exited on Sunset and Hollywood Boulevards to gawk at the Chinese Theatre, Hollywood Walk of Fame and the Hollywood sign briefly before escaping L.A.’s traffic.



We arrived in Santa Barbara skatting the theme song from Sideways at 2:30pm and fell in love. At the very least, I lusted after blonde highlights and a tan. The sun was shining, the temperature was 75-80 degrees, and Brophy Brothers Restaurant & Clam Bar had outdoor deck seating available along the wharf off Harbor Way.




This first day, however, was dedicated to living Joe’s Sideways dream. Still skatting the theme song from Sideways, we drove 30 miles north to Buellton to check into at the Days Inn (aka, “The Windmill Inn”) and ate dinner at The Hitching Post II, walking the same half mile stretch of Highway 246 as Miles and Jack. We bellied up to The Hitching Post’s bar after dinner to savor another bottle of their 2005 Highliner Pinot Noir after our meal.

We then walked back to our motel – giddy, buzzed and in love - and crashed in bed by 10:00pm. We feel exhausted but exhilarated, happy to be traveling together along California’s beautiful Central Coast.