Tag: Mendocino

Tuesday night was the coldest night since I’ve been here and the cold wasn’t motivating us to get moving. The cottage doesn’t have any insulation and just two little space heaters, one of which is pretty useless. So we traipse the other one up and downstairs each night and morning.

If that’s all we’ve got to complain about I’d say we’re doing pretty good.

But the “feels like 33” part of the weather status certainly felt right to us and we waited until about 10am to head out.

We ended up back at Good Life of course, which was pretty full at this time of the morning. I’m wearing a long sleeve pullover shirt, a hoodie jacket over that, fleece lined windbreaker over that, scarf and (not shown) gloves.

We walked back up Little Lake Road and passed our turn onto Hills Road to just see what else was out there. Some pretty houses but that’s about it. We got back just before Noon. Ash had a bridge game and I took my usual spot on the deck, and Paul joined me.

I’d dozed off and heard we had company – one of the other dogs on the property who is actually very sweet….

…but today thought he could get away with stealing one of Paul’s toys. He dropped it and ran away when I yelled at him.

Paul moved, apparently deciding he needed to be in a better position to guard his territory.

About this time the wind picked up dramatically, even stronger than Monday, and that kept us in the rest of the afternoon. We’d really wanted to go out for dinner since it was my last night here and it seemed to die down enough around 4pm to make that seem reasonable.

We took a chance and just drove to the Little River Inn about 2 miles south and lucked out. We got the last 5pm seating. It was just 4:40 so we walked around a bit.

The Inn is just past Little River and the beach that forms around it. Not to be confused with Big River which is the beach we can see from our deck.

Across the street is the Little River Post Office – 95456 – which also houses a gas station, market, and restaurant. Between this and the Inn that’s about all there is in Little River. Well, except for Heritage House a bit south of here. It’s a lovely place I stayed a couple of times in the 90’s, and is where “Same Time, Next Year” (1978, Alan Alda and Ellen Burstyn, a favorite of mine) was filmed. Ash actually tried to get us in there for dinner but they’re only open to guests, which didn’t surprise me. We vowed to come back and stay there sometime.

They had a decent sized outside seating area with a strong tent to keep the winds out. We sat at that table behind that heater just left of center.

We hadn’t eaten much all day and decided on some nibbles in the “additions” section of the menu instead of “starters” and couldn’t believe how much food they brought out first. The bread would have come anyway and that would probably have been enough. That cup in the middle is warm spiced nuts – almonds, pecans, cashews – and a huge plate of garlic fries. We ate that top pile of nuts and about half the fries, then packed the rest to bring home. Which of course we left on the table as we exited.

Ash had the cioppino which was really good and very fresh, and included crab and clams in their shells.

Being St. Patrick’s day and all I decided on the corned beef, with mashed potatoes, cabbage and carrots. I like it a lot but you don’t see it on menus very often – and never seem to think to make it at home – so why not?

But the first thing I’d decided on when I saw the menu was dessert: olallieberry cobbler, still warm, with vanilla bean ice cream. If you’re not familiar with olallieberry, it’s a type of blackberry that grows best along the Northern California coast although is present in Oregon and Washington, too. We bought a big jar of preserves of it the other day in town to take home with us. It’s one of those things I don’t think about until I’m in this part of the state and then of course I reach out for it every chance I get. It has a wonderful tart flavor and a beautiful color.

I decided a second photo was in order to better capture the color.

This was our view when we came out from under the tent.

Ash had another bridge came at 6:45. I prepped the photos for this and then took another micro nap! (That’s oh about 3 for the day I think.) He wasn’t done until about 9pm and we watched Free Fall before going to bed. It’s described as a “German Brokeback Mountain” about two police cadets who fall in love. One of them is played by Max Riemelt, who I really like, something he did before Sense8. I’d seen it before but Ash had not. He enjoyed it despite, like that other movie, no happy ending in sight.

I’m going back to Sacramento today. This has been beautiful and relaxing but I can only do so much of “nothing.” And if I’m going to be doing that much of nothing, I’d rather be at home. Ash will join me in Sacramento tomorrow and then return here Monday morning for another full week. Plus it’s supposed to be raining here all day – and it looks like it will be in Sac, too – and I’d definitely rather be at home for that.

It’ been a great 5 day mix of very relaxing and somewhat productive, accomplishing most of what I wanted to get done. The number one thing was disconnecting, which I clearly have. This is day 7 since my last day at the old job and it already feels like a month or more. I tend to be very future-focused and let go of the past quickly, and transitions like this help move that right along. So mission accomplished on that front. But time to get back to reality.

Thanks so much for coming along. I wasn’t sure how the blog would work with 5 days of not much, but I got some nice feedback which I always appreciate. I think people are beyond ready to travel again, so much so that even a little trip like this feels like a treat. Which is absolutely is.

We are definitely ready to travel again and spent a good deal of this trip talking about the next ones. Which so far include Alaska for Memorial Day weekend and two weeks in Peru in September. Ash has a million ideas about where to go when so we’ll see if those plans change (again), and of course we have to see how my new work schedule facilitates all of that. It’s still weird out there but hopefully things will return to something resembling normal soon; certainly all of the indicators are finally moving the right direction. Let’s all do our part and keep it that way. Stay safe out there and get vaccinated when you can!

All of this doing nothing makes the days really blend together. Just saying, not complaining. It was Wednesday all day in my head for some reason, but in reality only Tuesday.

I got the blog up as usual and we went out for a quick walk for Paul, to Good Life Café again for coffee. I had my usual latte and got a buttermilk blueberry muffin as well, for some reason I was starving. It was very tasty and just what I needed. We rushed back because we both had 9am calls: Ash with his personal trainer, me with the WordPress guy I hired (who, in less than an hour, fixed the main thing I wanted him to address and I was super pleased with that all day).

After our calls. Ash fixed something to eat. Very similar to the day before as seen above: eggs, potatoes, carrots, asparagus. After we ate I sat on the deck for a bit – beautiful day this day was – and noticed, again, people walking on the beach. But noted that we hadn’t seen it yet. So we went for a walk in search of it.

One of the girls staying at Ricci’s said “I’ve never been there, but I understand there are stairs behind the church that will take you there.” I showed the church in a photo taken from the hills on Sunday’s entry but we hadn’t been to it yet so we made our way. It’s literally in the corner of town by the water where BigRiver runs into the ocean so there’s nothing in front of it, therefore the back of it is what faces the street, as seen above.

This is the front of the street, which looks out into preserved land and the ocean.

Shown above is the area of land in front of the church, you can barely see the water dead center.

The sound of waves coming in is one of my favorite in the world. There weren’t many people out. There aren’t many tourists during the week and it was super cold.

Ash and Paul walking along the beach.

Pacific Coast Highway 1 going over Big River.

Since we can see the beach from our deck we wanted to see the cottage from the beach. Walk two feet in either direction from where I’m standing and the trees get in the way so it took us a minute to actually find it. But there it is, just above dead center perched on the hill.

I zoomed 10x to get this so that’s why it’s a little blurry. But this was definitely it, down to the covered entry on the left and the dead tree standing just to the left of that.

We sat on that log on the right for a bit just to listen.

From there I watched the confluence of Big River with the Pacific Ocean. The photo doesn’t do it justice, but you can see if you look carefully water flowing both from the left – the river – and the waves coming in from the right.

It was a decent walk down here, as those stairs go up just as high again – probably a higher – past Ash.

The church again from the land in front, with the stairs left of center. The local guys we encountered on our way in were still sitting there, and we could smell the pot they were smoking from here!

The one gas station in town is right next to the church.

By far the most expensive gas we’ve ever seen in this country: $6.48 for regular, $6.58 for super, $6.72 for diesel. By comparison, regular gas at Costco back home is about $3.50 last time I noticed.

Ash had a 1pm Zoom call with his recovery family and I sat here for the whole hour and probably slept some. I had a 2pm call with the woman who will be my #2 at the new job and was very happy with that way that went. After that Ash spent probably 1.5 hours on the phone talking to his mortgage broker about refinancing his house, and I continued to sit/nap right here. We finally went out again around 4:45 to get another walk in and pick up a few things at the market on the way back.

You’ve been here before but not in great weather like this. Love all the blues.

Another nice shot of the town, this time including the church. You can really see from this perspective how off in the corner it is.

One of the things we picked up from the market was a baguette, seen above with some roasted garlic which we’d brought with us. The chicken and the pasta were leftovers from 2 different previous meals, and the carrots were fresh. That was dinner, with a piece of cheesecake from the restaurant the night before which we’d taken to go. We shared it and agreed it was maybe the best cheesecake we’ve ever had.

We watched Nomadland on Hulu from my laptop in the evening and that was our day. Exciting stuff! But lovely.

The days are going by very slowly in the best way. Friday, my last day in the old job (feels weird to say that), seems like weeks ago. This entry is just for Monday. That’s the surest sign for me that I’ve disconnected and am staying in the moment.

I don’t remember what time I got up yesterday, but it was early like usual (4am-ish) and time enough to have coffee and get the blog posted before Ash got up.

He fixed breakfast, as seen above: eggs, asparagus, portabella mushroom, fingerling potatoes – all stuff one of us had brought from home.

The rain had passed and we were in for a lovely day as far as sun goes, but the forecast was winds around 25mph all day and it stayed true to that. We had a lazy morning of writing, emails, etc., and went out about 11am to walk some before our lunch date and left Paul behind.

We stopped in the Visitor Center on Main Street, which also served as the town center for Cabot Cove in Murder She Wrote, as seen below. The bright splash of color in the middle is Ash’s mask!, otherwise you might miss him.

We learned from Ash’s conversation with the volunteer working there that Mendocino’s building codes have kept out all chains of any kind – food, hotels, etc. Everything is locally owned. I’m embarrassed to say I didn’t know that and hadn’t consciously noticed that there’s not a Starbuck’s, Subway or Marriott, etc. to be found. It’s what makes it so uniquely charming.

We met Ash’s friend Matthew at the Mendocino Café on Lansing just up from Main Street. This is the guy who referred Ash to Ricci’s farm. When he and his husband first moved here last year from San Francsisco, they stayed at the property next to it for 4 months before they bought a house just outside of town.

Two levels of outside seating, the stairs on the far left leading down to the other.

I continued our quest to find clam chowder that’s as good as Barbara’s Fishtrap in Half Moon Bay. The flavor here was great but it wasn’t quite thick enough. That is, of course, a matter of preference.

I had the fish tacos above; Ash had a crab cake salad, below. Both quite good.

I had a 1:30pm call with an old friend from USAA; we hadn’t seen each other in 10 years probably so it was great to catch up a little. I, for one, love that video calls have become the norm now since the pandemic; that’s been my default for years now. I sat on the deck for most of that call then went in so she could meet Ash and also because the wind made it hard to hear. But when we were done I went back on the deck – it was warm in the direct sun despite the temperature being 48 degrees.

And apparently I fell asleep. Ash took this through the window of the cottage.

We had a big dinner planned so went out again about 3pm for a longer walk to get some steps in. We took Little Lake Road to the end and then walked the footpath along the cliffs of the headlands, a windy path that eventually led us back to town. Several times I just stopped to watch the magnificent waves. It was So Windy, and the motion of the ocean was spectacular. Photos above and below don’t do it justice.

So I tried a video instead. This is the first time I’ve uploaded a video directly into the blog so we’ll see if it works. I had a longer one that was too big for the WordPress limit, but this one is the more dramatic of the two anyway.

We made it back a little after 4pm and had just enough time for showers before heading to an early dinner. At the recommendation of our friends Greg & Robert, Ash made reservations at the restaurant at Albion River Inn a few miles north of here, as a birthday celebration for me. That’s actually today, but they are only open Thursday from Monday so we took what we could get.

We started with some celebratory cider that was Very Vinegary. I liked it more than Ash did.

I walked to the outside of the tent to get this shot.

Brussel sprouts is also a standard for us, so we had to get it in a restaurant like this. They were covered in planko so this dish required two photos!

The inside was a creamy mushroom sauce with bacon and onions. If this isn’t the best Brussel sprout dish we’ve had yet, it’s at least top 3.

I had a creamy asparagus soup, above, and below is Ash’s César salad with grilled shrimp. He asked for extra anchovy, which we’d just been joking about at lunch was a bit of a test to see how authentic the dressing is. The waiter here quickly said “of course.” I took a bite as well – with an anchovy for sure – and it was the best I’ve had in a long time.

For the mains I got grilled shrimp in this lime-ginger sauce that was the star of the plate, incredible flavor, with rice and a vegetable medley. Ash got an Indian curry chicken dish, below, with cauliflower and rice.

Pacific Coast Highway 1 going over the Albion River.

Ash had planned the time hoping that we’d see the sunset over dinner but forgot about the time change. Good thing probably because as the sun started dropping it got colder and colder.

The key point of this of course is “feels like 39” and the gale warning still in effect. No amount of outdoor heaters is enough to make that super comfortable.

The waiter worked diligently to ensure that the candle for my birthday wouldn’t blow out in all that wind, and had the patience to stand there with the glass over it so I could get this shot! Never mind that the mousse was for Ash, it was the thought that counts!

And you wouldn’t have been able to put a candle in this that easily. A banana coconut cream pie. So Good. By far the best bite of the meal for me.

New relationship, new job, beautiful setting, amazing food. Who knew 58 would feel this good? Incredibly grateful.

We didn’t do really much today except a short morning walk and one meal out due to the weather, so I won’t be offended if you skip this one! I always say I write for my own memories and this is definitely one of those.

I got up about 5am and thought “wow, I actually slept 8 hours!” Until I realized it was the night we “sprang forward” and it was really only 7 hours. But that’s a lot for me, especially here lately, so I’ll take it. I went downstairs to make coffee and got the blog up by about 6:30am. Ash started to get up around then and we got ready to take Paul out for his walk.

The farm where we are staying is just off of Little Lake Road. This is nearing the end of it after walking through the town. The wind picked up quite a bit here so we turned back towards town to get coffee.

Good Life Café and Bakery is on Lansing St. There’s a nice patio through that archway left of center which you’ll see shortly.

This is the view across the street. The white building is currently the Savings Bank of Mendocino County, but it was built in the 1860s as the local Masonic lodge. The local Masons still have use of a meeting room upstairs.

“The sculpture at the top was carved from a log of redwood by Erick Jensen Albertson, a local Mason and lumber mill employee, who also did most of the work building the lodge. There is some controversy as to whether it was proper to set up this statuary display of sacred [Masonic] symbols in such a prominent and public place.” (from Roadsideamerica.com) It’s call Time and the Maiden and apparently full of symbolism that only the Masons understand.

A nice sitting area that filled up as we sat there. It was about 8:30am (this place doesn’t open until 8) and the weather forecast had nothing but rain in it from about 11am on, so we figured now was the time to do something if we were going to. So we decided to go out for brunch.

Noyo Harbor is the port and docking area in Fort Bragg, about 10 miles north, at the edge of the Noyo River. We went to the restaurant of the Noyo Harbor Inn which had a nice heated deck and views of the river, above and below. This isn’t the main harbor which I didn’t get any photos of.

You can barely see Ash sitting at our table left of center, with the blue hat on.

We split a bowl of salmon chowder for starters.

Ash had the bagel and salmon.

I ordered polenta cake covered with fresh veggies, a poached egg, and hollandaise sauce, with a salad on the side. Everything about this was really good.

We got back to the farm around 10:30 probably and I took a few photos while I was thinking about it and the weather was decent. The sign at the entrance says Ricci’s Art Farm: Love Grows Here!

That’s the main house where Ricci lives. After much discussion the last couple of days, we finally determined that this IS the house that was saw in the hills from our walk on the headlands the day before. Notice the view of the ocean on the far left center.

The chickens I mentioned yesterday, along the drive before you reach the buildings.

On the left is the edge of the main house, and the building here is the cottage where we are staying. From this view it’s clear this is the back of it!, solving my question from the day before.

That’s Ash’s BMW, my Toyota; later there were a couple of more cars here but we don’t know who they belonged to. Ricci’s daughter is here and she had some friends over so probably them.

Art studio. What else would have you have on an Art Farm?

Another house to the right of the cottage.

For some reason I was really tired when we got back even though I’d only been up about 6 hours. Paul joined me on the couch.

The rain didn’t start until about 12:30pm and rained solid until about 6pm.

Weather like this is made for staying in. And that Gale Warning is about today. We’ll see what that does to our dinner plans tonight since of course it’s outdoor seating.

This was pretty much Paul’s state all day.

I’d made a list of things I wanted to do this week and made good headway on it in the afternoon. This included some journaling, and preparing a “personal paragraph” for the announcement my new boss will be making to the whole organization today at One Community Health about my arrival on 3/22. I got a bunch of documents ready for my tax guy and also hired a guy to do some technical work on the backend of my blog. So a productive day amidst all the laziness. Somewhere in there I took another nap, too. Ash did some laundry, worked on his writing, and played bridge (online).

The rain had stopped about 6pm and we went to the Safeway in Fort Bragg to pick up a roasted chicken for dinner. The sun was trying to break through when we got back and we were hoping for a nice sunset but nope, the clouds got heavy and dark again.

As we were driving up I’d caught a glimpse of the church in town through the trees and realized that this could be the house we’d seen the day before. (A better question is: why didn’t we just ask Ricci?) I walked back along the deck of the main house to get this shot and confirm it. That land in the middle of the photo is where we’d walked on Saturday, looking back into the hills wondering if this is the house we were staying at. You can’t see the cottage from there at all which is to the far right of where I’m standing so that’s why we were a little confused.

Dinner was chicken of course, with a fig balsamic sauce Ash had brought, leftover cauliflower from the night before, fresh carrots which I’d brought, and the last of that Austrian sunflower bread we’d bought at the French café on Saturday. It was a huge loaf and we’d given half of it to Ricci.

Ash hooked his laptop up to the TV after dinner. We finished watching “It’s a Sin” on HBO Max and started “Generation” which was incredibly fun (albeit not for everyone).

Today is pretty full in comparison. I have a couple of video calls scheduled with friends and we have plans for lunch with friends and dinner out as well. We’ll see if the weather cooperates.

This is my week off between jobs. My last day at Disability Rights California after being HR Director there for 6 years was Friday, 3/12; I’ll start as Chief HR Officer for One Community Health on 3/22. I’m super excited about that for many reasons – least of which it’s essentially across the street from my house. Before any of that was even in the works, Ash had made arrangements to spend all of March at a retreat cottage in Mendocino. He’d been wanting to spend some time developing a writing concept and a friend of his connected him to Ricci’s Art Farm. Ricci has a place that she likes to rent to artistic types and the during-the-week rates were ridiculously low. Ash took it for the whole month and rented out his space in San Francisco to a guy who needed a place to stay for awhile. So, without any planning, I have a place already set up to enjoy the week in between jobs (a requirement in my book). It also gives me another entry for my Life in Northern California blog. Everybody wins.

This is my 5th time to Mendocino I believe, although the most I’ve ever stayed before was 2-3 nights, and this is the first time I’ll blog about it. The first time I did it in a day trip. It’s a 3.5 hour drive in good traffic so i Do Not Recommend that. Yesterday I left my house about 6:45am, made a couple of stops along the way and got here just at 11am. The first stop was Costco in Cordelia – one of my favorite places to get gas, this stop has become almost required going either in or out of the Bay Area. It’s easy freeway access off of Green Valley Road, and has a Starbucks in the same shopping center so that’s become part of the tradition. Fill up, empty out, fill up. Perfect.

Ash requested that I stop at a coffee shop in Cloverdale, called Plank, on my way up to pick up pecan sticky buns for him. It had a nice selection so why not – $54 later I had a box full of treats that would last a bit, including dog biscuits for Paul.

I’d gotten there probably around 9:00am, and stayed awhile to enjoy a latte and a pastry. That’s my box of goodies on the table on the far left.

Getting to Cloverdale is pretty easy: 80 to 37 to 101. From there on, the drive slows quite a bit – 65 miles of windy, hilly roads on 128. But a beautiful drive; I pulled over to get a shot of a vineyard just so I’d remember to mention it!

Ash has been here since March 1. All he would really say about it was that it was “rustic” and would complain about the cold. (I always knew Sacramento was much hotter than San Francisco. I never realized it’s also much colder until I met Ash – unless of course you’re on Twin Peaks at 1am in September, but that’s another story. Literally.) He’d sent a few photos but they didn’t really prepare me for what I was about to step into. And I mean that in a good way.

The “farm” is literally that – with chickens and everything. At some point I’ll take photos of some of the rest but for now I focused on the cottage. This is the view of the outside as I’d approached. He’d sent me a video of the ocean with that hammock in it but somehow in my mind it was much farther away – I didn’t realize it was just steps from the place.

It’s essentially one decent-sized room that’s living/kitchen/dining and a small bathroom in the corner to my left, and a bedroom in the loft.

Lots of natural light!

This is the view from the bedroom.

Is this the back of the cottage of the front? Not sure, but it gives you a decent perspective on the size.

This was taken from that chair in the shot before. This is where I sat later in the afternoon getting the photos uploaded here.

I unpacked, Ash completed some writing he was working on, we visited with Ricci a bit and gave her some of the goodies I’d brought, then headed into town about 12:30 to find lunch.

The town is maybe a 10 minute walk from the cottage down Little Lake Road. These were the first houses we saw and, while most don’t have this much yard, this is typical of the style you see here. And many of them are from the late 1800’s.

Mendocino Community Center

We went to Café Beaujolais for lunch, a Mendocino staple. Everything still in pandemic mode, you order at that window there on the right where those 2 women are standing…

…and eat in the lovely garden in the back. That’s our table in the foreground with the iced teas. Center of the photo is Ash with Paul, who had to socialize with the other dogs before he’d settle down.

Ash got French lentil soup which was light and savory. I got the carrot ginger soup which was rich and creamy, with that teeny bit of spice you can only get with fresh ginger.

We split a pepperoni and artichoke pizza.

There’s a lovely path along the headlands that is the point of Mendocino for me, and Ash hadn’t done it yet so we headed there after lunch for a slow stroll with amazing views everywhere you look. I deleted more photos than I posted.

This used to be a harbor – along the path you could see the huge chain links that used to moor the ships. So they’d dock here and use the stair to get out.

I couldn’t get over how blue and clean the water is.

There’s my ice plant at the bottom, one of my favorite things about the Northern California coast.

OK, you get it, it’s pretty.

I have to say I’m pretty happy with this photo – a classic shot of the town along the cliffs, with people walking along the beach far right bottom, and along the unpaved cliff path left center.

One of the things Mendocino is famous for is it served as the filming location for Murder, She Wrote (Angela Lansbury, 1984-1996), set in the fictional town of Cabot Cove, Maine. Blair House, a bed and breakfast (one of Many in this town) served as the house of Angela’s character, Jessica Fletcher.

We got back to the cottage and just hung out the rest of the day. Although we’d sort of planned to go out for dinner, we hadn’t made reservations yet, and after a Ash called a few places it was clear that wasn’t going to happen. But we were pretty stocked here anyway, I was certainly feeling very lazy so it all worked.

Ash asked if I wanted some cheese and crackers before we eat and this is what he puts in front of me. “This could be dinner” I say. That’s a white English cheddar, a very sharp Stilton (is that redundant?), gouda, and some pecans.

Spaghetti and shrimp using a jar sauce, cauliflower roasted with mint and honey, garlic bread made from the loaf of Austrian sunflower bread we picked up at Café Beaujolais. And that’s just what we had in the house. Ash likes to eat and cook, can you tell?

All made from a tiny kitchen.

Cookies I’d gotten from Plank that morning for dessert: Butterscotch chocolate chip, walnut chocolate chip.

A required selfie at the end of the day since I realized when I was almost done with the photos for the blog that we weren’t in any of them.

Ash put the cookies in the oven for a bit to warm them and got the chocolate to melt the perfect amount.

Did you remember to change your time? Thankfully most clock-items I rely on (phone, computer) change automatically. What I first thought was 8 hours of sleep was only 7, but that’s still a lot for me so not complaining.

It is supposed to start raining today around 9am and not stop the rest of the day. We’ll see how that impacts our day but it might literally just be a retreat and we never leave. Which would be OK with me. So I may or may not write an update for today, Sunday. We’ll see how that goes.