Trip to California

L to R: 

1. Ols being the driver for our road trip, cracking jokes

 2&3. Pulling up in the outskirts of Vegas (it was a tad bit sketchy), having ourselves a little picnic, and discussing how we may or may not might get jumped by one of the many gangsters there 

4. The two of us enjoying such a great road trip

images via google

We stayed in Oceanside for three nights and it was just b-e-a-utiful.We call it our "gem".

Enjoying ourselves some delicious pizza in Oceanside as soon as we got there! (12.5 hours to get there from Salt Lake) We were hyped up for our wonderful trip and were enjoying the night life of downtown Oceanside, CA (Some scenes from Top Gun was filmed in Oceanside. We came to figure that out after our trip)

L to R:

1&4. Ols and I in front of the beautiful flowers that were all over the architecture in CA

2. Taking the little trail that leads to the beach right behind our hotel! 

3. Seeing the harbor for the first time on the trip and listening the the seals in the background

First day on the beach! We were SO excited and ready to play! It was a bit chilly in the first part of the day, however later in the afternoon it warmed up and we ran back to hotel to get our swimming suits on and stayed there all day long. It was awesome.

While we waited for the weather to warm up a bit (it was only cloudy the first day we were there) we went to go eat. Here we are enjoying our delicious Mexican food (CA rocks the Mexican food!) that we had for lunch on the harbor. Dang it... we love those tacos! If anyone knows of an "authentic" Mexican food place that isn't really well known here in Utah and you think it is worth trying, please let me know :)

L to R:

1. Ols being a stud and rocking it on his long board

2. The wonderful beach

3. Heading to the harbor to play, watch the seals, and go to the beach! (Doesn't he look like he fits right into California?)

Loving the beach! We were there all day long and we loved it. We read books, ate delicious food, talked about our plans for life, and just played in the big waves together (our favorite). It was wonderful.

Eating at the incredible restaurant called Rosina's. I know our pictures are bad, but we didn't want to be taking pictures with our flash on. We still love to document our food (that's one of the main reasons we travel!) so we were left with not so good pictures, but the idea is still there. 

We were looking on the internet for a restaurant that was ranked high in Oceanside, and Rosina's came in at third. It offered the romantic aspect that we were looking for (seriously, what authentic Italian place with low lighting doesn't offer that :) and the food was divine.  Oli has now revamped his top dishes that he has eaten in his lifetime and put the dish that he had that night as number one. It was that good. Even Rosina herself came over to our table and chatted with us. That's when she offered her special meal to us (in her beautiful Italian accent), and Ols took her up on it :)

L to R:

1. Our appetizer of mouth watering bruschetta and stuffed peppers with meat inside

2. Ol's number one dish. It had clams, calamari, halibut, and scallops in a delectable broth with some bread on the side

3. My delicious chicken Parmesan and homemade pasta. We usually discuss/tease each other after we have eaten our meals of who had the best dish that night. Hands down, even though mine was very delicious, Ols won that night. It's in those moments that you really wish that you could just explain to the waiter that you got the wrong dish, and that you were supposed to have that specific dish that now looks better :)

4. Melt in your mouth chocolate flan. Seriously, it just melted right in our mouths.

Going to church in Oceanside. What a neat experience that was for the both of us. I had to take a picture of my favorite "coastal" flower while we were there, the bird of paradise.

We just loved how the seals were all over the harbor. You could hear them barking in the morning when you opened up your hotel door, watch them bask in the sun, and our favorite: watch a HUGE,HUGE male seal bully a young couple trying to get on their boat that was right next to his harem of women. Just in case you are wondering, the seal won.

  Ols holding a sand shark! There were many in the ocean just right under your feet-go figure! I love how fitting Ol's shirt is in this picture.

Ols discovering sand crabs :)

Exploring all the things on the beach on Sunday

On Monday after spending all day on the beach playing paddle ball, playing in the HUGE waves again (they were even bigger this time) and reading out loud to each other (we have no pictures, we were just in the moment and loving it), we ate the California classic dish of fish and chips right on the harbor for lunch. This restaurant was ranked in the top ten spots for restaurants in Oceanside, and it didn't disappoint!

We had to follow lunch up with ice cream. We ate ice cream and walked around the port hand-in-hand, enjoying the warm weather and the fact that we had to go nowhere at any given time :)

images via google

We then went and stayed in San Diego for three nights. We visited the temple, the zoo, ate in the Gaslamp District, created some great memories of entering into Chula Vista (danger zone!), driving around trying to find ANY restaurant/fast food place open at 11:30 pm.in Hotel Circle on Memorial Day, and simply enjoyed another adventure in a beautiful city.

Eating Thai food before heading off to the temple



The temple was an amazing experience. This has been the temple that I have always wanted to go see since I was a little girl, and it was everything I had imagined it to be. We call it the "ice castle". It seriously was so beautiful. We did both an endowment session and a sealing session. It felt like our mouths were open throughout both of the sessions that we went through. This was such a special experience for the both of us to experience together. I can now cross that off of my list of things I want to see in my lifetime.

Eating some delicious food at great restaurant (the name has slipped from me). We were out on the patio with the palm trees all lit up and a great atmosphere of people all around us. 

L to R:

1. I love the palm trees and the lights on them

2. Our appetizer

3. Steak and shrimp baby

4. Ols had lobster and shrimp "macaroni"-he might of had the better dish again this night :)

The zoo! Ols was just like a little kid when it came to the zoo. He woke up really early,woke me up, and excitedly explained that there is no sleeping in because it is zoo day and we needed all the time we could get at the zoo. It was what he had been looking so forward to on this trip :) As you can imagine, the San Diego Zoo is worth all the hype. It was incredible. We stayed there from when it opened to when it closed, and there were still so many things to see. We love animals and are really into animal documentaries, so this was a blast for us!

L to R:

1. Just entering in to the zoo

2. Pigmy hippos (they are nocturnal, so they weren't the most exciting things :)

3. Gorillas! There was a baby gorilla that would beat his chest and rough house the adults. It was so fun!

4. Flamingos and their nests. Many of them had eggs and others had little baby flamingos

L to R:

1. Ols riding a gorilla, pretending to be exploring (that, or he is embarrassed, I can't tell :)

2. Beautiful flowers

3. Elephants. What funny creatures they are. This particular one kept swaying side-to-side as if it were dancing

4. Me riding a gorilla (notice that I am not embarrassed? I am totally in my element :)

L to R:

1. Ols next to the giraffes. It looks like one of the giraffes in the background is wondering what the heck is going on, or is checking my man out

2. Kuala bears cuddling

3. Family of giraffes

4. Churros!

L to R:

1. You can't see them very well, but underneath the man-made cave, there is the capybara, the largest rodent

2. Me communicating with my friend. She was 58 years old!

L to R:

1. Beautiful male lion getting his food. He was massive!

2. Waiting patiently for his food

3. The lioness getting her food

Oli, the lioness whisperer.
Let me explain. When we first arrived to the African lions' pen, there were so many people crowded to see the lioness scratch up on the window. After she was finished with her show, she went back and laid underneath some trees, away from the people. So Ols and I were just looking at the lions when he asks me if I think he could get the lioness to come back, jokingly of course. I laughed and said something to the fact that she looked pretty comfy where she was at. Taking that as ammunition, Ols bends down to the window and was jokingly whispering to "Sarah" , this is her name she was given by Ols. He made comments like "Sarah, Sarah come to me" and other silly things. Well it didn't take more than a minute of him doing this that she stands up. I was saying "no way" the whole time she was coming over here, and then I quickly grabbed the camera to capture Oli's true calling in life. She comes right over to him, lays down, and is perfectly content. They had their little moment, Sarah and Ols, and then the people swarmed:)
Who knew that Ols had such powers? He for sure didn't. He was shaken up by the whole thing and couldn't keep his excitement in all day about "how cool that was". It made for great memories :)

L to R and then top to bottom:

1. My man with the cuddling Koala bears in the background

2. Mexican food. It is all I crave anymore

3. Holding onto a REAL elephant's tail  

4. A humongous brown bear. Something funny about this. We were coming around the corner and looking at the different animals when we heard the people before us looking into this pen saying "oh how cute" and other little comments like that. Well we thought it was going to be something all cuddly, but instead we came upon this LARGE brown bear. It just made us laugh.

5. A baby jaguar with its mother!

6. Rhinos

Eating in the Gaslamp District and celebrating our three year anniversary. This whole trip was a tribute to our three years of marriage (and our long, hard, and yet our very rewarding years of college), so we celebrated it one last night while in California.

You know when a trip is so good that you a) want to move there and b) your husband daily is saying that that by far was the best trip ever (I think we have said that about every trip :).

We really enjoyed ourselves and the time we had to get away just the two of us.