Donna and April's visit... OR - Jersey Girls!

Donna and her friend, April, came for a visit!  They arrived on Tuesday afternoon, and after they got settled in at their B&B, they came over for dinner.  It's tradition to go down to the beach, watch the sunset, and it didn't disappoint!  It was a tad bit windy and cold but a gorgeous sunset nonetheless.

On Wednesday Donna and April went to San Jose to visit the chiropractor for some adjustments.  Donna swears by this guy, and about once a year comes back to CA to visit him, and we appreciate that!  This was April's first visit and she also thought it was great.  We went over to their B&B in Miramar for a glass of wine and then went into Half Moon Bay for dinner at Sushi Main Street - another tradition!  It was wonderful, as usual.

On Thursday they had planned to go into SF and play tourist, and we tagged along!  In fact, we tagged along on all of their activities during this trip!  Thursday was a beautiful day, although cloudy, but nice and warm.  We found a great vantage spot for pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge and even people to take a picture of all of us.  From there we parked at Aquatic Park, and walked down to Pier 39, with stops along the way at Ghiraradelli Square and we all came out with chocolate!  We had lunch at Boudin's bakery - the iconic soup in a sour dough bread bowl - yum!  Both Donna and April got sour dough bread to take home.  It was lots of fun to play tourist and we managed to leave with all kinds of stuff.

From San Francisco, we were on our way to Burlingame to have dinner with Donna's sister-in-law, Diane, and Dianne's son, Joe, his wife Christine and their three children.  I used to work with Christine at Gap, and hadn't seen her since I retired, so I was looking forward to catching up.  However, our route to Burlingame took us right by AT&T park, where game 2 of the World Series was just beginning!  Needless to say, we had plenty of time to watch the Giant's fans, in orange and black, heading to the game!  BTW, in case you didn't know, the Giant's won - 9 - 0!

Dinner was wonderful!  The food was great, and so was the company!  The kids were great fun - Joe and Christine's twins are 8, and their youngest, Domenic, is 5.  They kept us entertained during dinner, especially after Auntie Donna taught them the spoon on the nose trick!

Friday we went to Calistoga and did some wine tasting!  April had wanted to visit the Vincent Arroyo winery - one of the small, obscure wineries that we had "discovered" on our last trip to Napa.  It seems that April has been ordering wine from them for awhile, and wanted to visit.  We also toured the Castello Di Amorosa, V. Sattui and the Prager winery, which specializes in port!  We had discovered Prager port on the wine train with John in July, and it was great to visit their winery - or, portery?

And then, sadly, it was Friday night and the Jersey Girls went back to their B&B, and then left for home on Saturday morning.  But, it was great to visit with them, and hopefully they will get back out this way again, soon, as we already have a "next time" list of things to do!

The sunset at Fitzgerald Marine Reserve

A bit cold and windblown!

Donna, April and Pat with the Golden Gate Bridge in the back ground.

And with Lee!

Donna and April with the seal sculpture at Pier 39

Donna and her nephew, Joe, at dinner

Lee, Domenic and Christine.  Domenic loves to have his picture taken

Auntie Donna and Domenic discuss the dessert menu. 

Domenic and his magic nose!  He walked around with the spoon on his nose, entertaining us and the other diners

Auntie Donna and Ricky, as he plays video games on Dad's cell phone

Adorable Annie!

Domenic

April and Donna at V. Sattui winery

V. Sattui

April at Vincent Arroyo.  If you are in the Napa area, be sure and visit - they are very knowledgeable and the tasting is free!

The castle - Castelo Di Amorosa

April and Donna, on the way in

The stone gate house at the entrance to the castle.

It wasn't too cold on Friday, but you can see the clouds/fog hanging in the mountains.  It was a good thing that we watched the sunset on Tuesday night, as it was the only one there was - every other night was cloudy and overcast.