What do you have when you mix sand, sea air, good friends and a little wine?  A great weekend getaway to Northern California.  We took a long weekend last week to the San Francisco area and Stinson Beach, California, with our good friends Heather and Troy.  We took the advice of our friend, Mike, who has lived in Northern California for years, and decided to stay at Stinson Beach, which is a quiet little beach town on the other side of the mountains.

Front door of our beach cottage

Stinson Beach is extremely small, to say the least. There is no gas station, hospital or chain restaurants.  There is a small grocery store, a bar, and a couple little restaurants.  At first, Rhonda was extremely skeptical, especially after riding through winding curves on Highway 1 and almost losing her lunch a couple of times. By the end of the weekend we were singing the praises of this sleepy little town.

What did we do while there?  Muir woods was only about 20 minutes away, so one day we spent a few hours at Muir Woods.  If you don’t know much about Muir Woods, it is part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, and protects 554 acres of old growth coast redwood. The redwoods are not the giant sequoias that are pictured with a tunnel cars can drive through, but these trees are a remarkable beauty. The woods is definitely something to visit if you are in the Bay area.

The beauty of the woods is awe inspiring.  The tree stump pictured below shows the tree dating back to the time of the Aztecs.  It is spiritual to walk among living beings that have been on the earth for centuries.

After hiking around in a bunch of tall trees, what do you do?  Drive to Larkspur, CA for a trip to Posie ice cream shop. Don’t just take our word for it, but this ice cream was pretty tasty!  Not to mention the shop was nestled in the cute little town of Larkspur.

We packed much more fun into the weekend, later we will share  what we did when we headed North.  Have you taken any fun trips lately?  We would love to hear about it.  Have a great weekend!