Los peces (and other animals)

Once again, we woke up to the sun shining, the skies blue, and a hot breakfast awaiting us! Our hotel had a free one, so we actually had a respectable start to our morning (as the breakfast was over by 9:30am, we had to be up). Plus we wanted an earlier start than the day before because today was very exciting, today we were planning on going to one of the best aquariums in the world, the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

The MB Aquarium, is a wonderful facility that specializes in the unique eco-system that is the Monterey Bay and its super deep canyon. (Its twice the size of the grand canyon!). Our two favorite exhibits were the seahorses and the "Psychedelic Jellies" - aka jellyfish under black lights with shag-tastic '70s tunes that would make Austin Powers proud. We did our best dance grooves while keeping in spirit of the theme.

The seahorses were great because they are so freakin' cute and adorable and shy and you just want to eat them up. Both exhibits had great soundtracks to them that seems to really enhance the mood. Such a far cry from childhood museums and exhibits! I took about a hundred pics of them.

Also, the sea otters were also a big hit, once again: I want to love them and hug them and squeeze them and keep them for my very own. Perhaps name them George.

After an alright meal with an amazing view, we headed off to a vineyard. Once again, the day had sort of gotten away from us and we were nervous we weren't going to get to wine taste before all the tasting rooms closed for the day. We made it up to Ventana Vineyards and winery just outside of Monterey. These people specialized in Chardonnay and Pinot Noir This was an estate vineyard, only using the grapes they grew themselves for their wines. I'm not personally a big Chardonnay person, so I wasn't the best person to make an impression of the place, but Niina was quite taken with their blended red table wine and got one to take home to her mum.

After that it was time to head to Santa Cruz to fulfill our second rule of the day: ice cream for dinner or as I like to call it "Dice-inner" and little thrift shopping. After our ice creams and lattes, it was time to call it a day and head to today's final destination and one heck of a charming city: San Francisco. Parc55 is our basecamp, and I finagled us free internet. a bit of SNL and then it was off to sleep for us weary travelers.