Heather's Day

What do you do when you have two family members coming from two totally different parts of the country?  What is a special and vacation-worthy landscape may be defined differently by both!  Good thing we have access to all types of destinations.  For Anna and Heather's first full day here, we treated Michigan-residing Heather to ocean, surfers, tide pools and butterflies.  (White, snowy mountains will hopefully come later in the week for LA-residing Anna!)

We day-tripped to the most "California" place I could think of-- Santa Cruz.  The day started with lunch at surfer-themed Pizza My Heart.

Then we went to Natural Bridges to play on the beach and check out some tide pools.  Heather tickled her first sticky anemone and did some cartwheels to celebrate the snow and single digits she left behind!

Natural Bridges is a sanctuary Monarch Butterflies migrate to from Mexico.  The path around their Eucalyptus Grove was fluttering with Monarchs.  They were all high up in the branches, but we can still say we spotted several dozen of them.
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Monarchs weren't the only wildlife we encountered either, we thought it was so cool to come upon a big flock of cooing and head-bobbing quail. 

We headed over to the cove that is popular with surfers and found a place by the  famous Tribute to Surfers statue to watch several catch their big waves.

The last thing we did in Santa Cruz was stroll down the wharf.  With the boardwalk in the background and all the lazy seals lying around, this was the perfect way to end Heather's "Epitome of California" Day!