Author Archives: Kelsey

Today we went to Hearst Castle. We went on a tour that seemed very short. We only got to go into 4 of the 115 rooms! I wanted to see more because I love looking at fancy, old houses like that. It was so interesting seeing how they lived back then and wishing I could live there. I told Mom that if I moved in to that house she could live in the smallest of the three cottages in the backyard (it was 8000 square feet).  Here it is: We also found out that our entire house could have fit in the living room of the main house! Also, when Mr. Hearst lived there he had a zoo in his backyard. On his very huge property he had many exotic animals including zebras (they still roam there wild today) and polar bears living there so that his guests (there were always at least 12 guests staying there at a time) could see them as they drove up the long, winding road up to the castle. I thought it was funny that when Mr. Hearst wanted to start building a home he said he just wanted a 7 or 8 room bungalow that would only take two or three years to build. It ended up having 115 rooms and taking 28 years and not even being completely finished (he died). This was one of my favorite parts of the vacation so far but I wish we could have seen more inside the house.  Here are some more pictures:

There was an outdoor pool…

Later, we drove to Aunt Sue’s house. We went down to the pool that was in her neighborhood and had a nice homemade dinner at her house. It was nice to see Aunt Sue and her cats. She has two nice cats named Mulligan and Cody. But, she had a foster kitten that she was just keeping for a few weeks. Link, the kitten, didn’t understand how to use a litter box yet so she had to keep him in the bathroom but we still got to play with him. He was so adorable! Lindsey didn’t like the name Link so she just called him Little Mister. We wanted to take him home with us but of course our parents said no. 😦

This morning we went to a forest of redwood trees.  They were very big and tall.  It was fun to climb on some that had fallen down in the path.  Also, we saw a sign that said that in the gift shop they sold snacks, t-shirts, water bottles, and leather stuff.  We thought this was pretty odd and funny.  Here is a picture of us “holding up” a tree:

Next, we drove to a place to kayak.  It was really fun but we got pretty wet.  We brought a lunch and had it floating out in the middle of the slough.  We also saw lots of animals including sea otters, sea lions, seals, and pelicans.  One sea otter swam under Lindsey and Dad’s kayak and came up right in from of them.  It surprised them and Lindsey screamed.  That was one of the funniest parts of the day!  Here is a sea lion floating upside down in the water:

After kayaking and changing out of our wet clothes, we drove to our hotel right on the edge of the Pacific Ocean.  But, it was foggy and cold so we didn’t really get to enjoy the view.

Today was one of our San Francisco days.  We started off the day with an insane amount of stairs (I can’t believe my mom made us go up all 447!) just to see a tower.  Then, we had lunch at an Italian restaurant.  The pancakes there were fabulous!

Next, we went to Pier 39 and saw some sea lions.  They were really cute.  After this, we went to a Ghirardelli store and got free samples of chocolate and some ice cream.  That was a really good afternoon snack!  Next, we got to ride on a cable car into Chinatown.  In Chinatown we went to a cute, small fortune cookie factory and got free samples of the rejects (today was free sample day!).  Mmmmm! We also got some tea there to help us warm up.  It got really cool when it got cloudy!  We met up with Jessica and Jeff and had dinner with them.  It was nice to see them again!

We drove into California today and stopped to visit with my dad’s cousin and her family.  They have an almost-two-year-old boy named Elliot and a six-month-old girl named Lillian.  Both children are adorable.  We had a great time sitting in their backyard talking and having snacks.  Elliot loved showing us the lemon tree they had growing in the yard and Lillian was perfectly happy just being held and adored.

After this we stopped at Stanford University, where Unc lived last year.  His office mate showed us around and we even got to see his office!  After, we got Jamba Juice (deeelicious!).

Next, we drove to my mom’s cousin’s house.  Jessica and her husband, Jeff, made us dinner and my mom’s other cousin, Brad, was there for dinner as well.  We had fun meeting their cats and walking down to the frozen yogurt place near them after dinner (not as good as Pinkberry, but who doesn’t love frozen yogurt with delicious toppings?)