June Lake 09

Katie and I once again headed north to June Lake for a week of camping and relaxing with the Kaesers. This first picture was taken just outside of Bishop where apparently there were 27 fires burning in the Sierras due to lightning strikes. Crazy.

Got to camp and started setting up. Mike is the one you want to have with you anytime you go camping. He has everything from knot tying skills to carports purchased at Costco to provide shade and a nice dining room for dinner. Setting up went great and below you will see Katie and I's tent. The one thing I love about being up there is the peacefulness and sheer beauty of the Sierras.

What I will not have pictures of is the one night in which we had quite the wind storm accompanied by short but strong rain storms. Our little tent held up well through the night and we didn't get one drop of water in our tent!

One of the hundred or so pictures that we have like this.

We decided to go on a short hike/arrowhead hunt at the base of Walker Pass, just up the road from the campground on the second day. We tested out my new toy that Mike gave me and headed out on a hike off the trail through the bushes and trees. (We all have the scratches on our shins to show for all the off the trail hiking we did. Max and I got to sit together and enjoyed each others company on the ride over to the trailhead.

Had to cross over a river on a fallen tree. Max crossed like a champion.

This was taken as I was tracking us back to the fallen tree. If you look in the distance and see the open spot in the forest, yea, we went there. I think the hike was about 3 miles or so, not too tough, but very beautiful and full of adventure. Unfortunately no one found any arrowheads.

Max found the river, walked right in and laid down in the stream, didn't realize that it has a pretty strong current and started to slide down the stream. All was ok, but quite entertaining.

The ride home, both Max and I got a little nap.

Fast forward to Wednesday, We took a short trip down the Rock Creek, I highly recommend this hike. It has amazing views, and at least four lakes on the trail. I wont try to explain it, just go for yourself, or enjoy the next couple pictures sans commentary.

Max and I were buddies on this trip, I was trying to teach him some manners because every time a dog walks by us on the trail, he went nuts. This hike was about 5 miles roundtrip, next time we go up there I want to find out what is past this lake that is in the background.

Good times were had by all!

Told you there were a lot of these.

This is a video I took on the hike in Rock Creek, the video doesn't do the actual scenery justice.

That's it till next time.

Fourth Of July Weekend/Birthday Festivities

I was going to do another post with our wedding pictures, but decided since I took pictures of our weekend I would post some pictures from our very busy 4th of July weekend with our friends.

Friday was a birthday celebration for, according to the cake, Brandon, Amelia, and Dave.

Singing a very well sung Happy Birthday to everyone. It is at this point I would like to thank the hosts for the evening Amelia and JJ. I am not sure who supplied the pizza for the night, but a warm thank you is in order. After enjoying a tasty beverage or two before our departure to the final destination of the evening The Double Deuce. A bar in downtown San Diego where which where I was told there would be a mechanical bull on which many from our group of friends would attempt to ride.

Before we get the the bull, I must mention an awesome part of the evening. Deciding how to get a group of at least 13 people from Little Italy to downtown is a little difficult at times and a little pricey. As we headed out of the building trying to hail 3 cabs at 9:30 on a Friday night was proving to be a little more difficult than anticipated. We crossed the street and as I turned to see a big shuttle bus driving down the road. In an attempt at what would seem impossible, I attempted to hail the shuttle down along with a number of other members of our group. The shuttle passed us.... brake lights lit up about 50 yards down the road.... reverse lights turn on!!! We've done it! Everyone threw is some cash and we asked the driver to drop us off in front of the bar and he agreed. See below our spacious party shuttle ride down to the club!

Ok, as mentioned above, we were headed to a country western themed bar in downtown SD. I was interested to find out how this would compare to the good ol' days of Incahoots. Katie and Jamie decided they were going to give the mechanical bull a try and signed up minutes after walking into the bar. Jamie rode first and due to a technical malfunction, I recorded the video of Jamie riding the bull the wrong direction and cannot figure out how to rotate the video. Here is the picture of Katie, who is still sore from doing this.

I must give props to Katie for hanging on there for so long. I would have been off in a second, and Katie held of for a good 30 or so seconds. Had a great time the rest of the night dancing to a mixture of country, hip hop, and classic rock jams.

Saturday, the fourth, I was so good the morning of and charged my battery, transfered my pictures over to my laptop, erased the old pictures from the camera, and did I remember to take the battery out of the charger? Nope.

So we continued the weekend festivities at Adam's house just down the road from our place. Props to Trish and Dave for preparing a great bbq and multiple side dishes. We spend the entire afternoon hanging out by the pool, doing back flips and all the fun pool games. We then walked to the beach and watched some fireworks in the distance. On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd give them about a 4. After experiencing the 101 KGB Sky Show at Qualcomm, no firework show will ever live up to the awsomeness of the Sky Show.

Once again, I failed at taking more pictures on Sunday as John and Marisa came over for dinner and a trip to the fair. Oh, funny story, so I locked my keys in the car on Saturday night and didn't want to hassle with calling AAA at night, so I call Sunday morning, and as the tow truck driver is opening my truck, I mentioned to him that we were thinking about going to the fair. Long story short, he gave me some tickets to the fair for free! We went to the fair, checked out some pig races, at some fried food, walked through the "As Seen On TV" exhibit, and attempted to beat one of the many impossible fair games.

Overall, good weekend with friends. I'm guessing my next post will be from my cousin, Ben and Katie's wedding which is this Saturday.

Stay Classy San Diego.

Technical Issues

Well as you can probably see, there are no longer pictures at the top of our blog nor are there any on the post I previously did, so I deleted it. I will try to get it back up and running after this weekend. We have a big weekend ahead of us and will be trying to remember to take pictures.

Happy 4th of July!