Southern California Trip

We ended the year with a Thanksgiving trip to Orange County, Los Angeles, and Santa Barbara, CA.

We spent the first few days (including Thanksgiving) in Dana Point and Laguna Beach, and then headed up the coast to Santa Barbara. We stayed at a friends home near the ocean and enjoyed a few days visiting wineries in Santa Ynez, including Sanford, Melville, Foxen, Foley Estates, and Sunstone. Sanford, Foxen, Foley and Sunstone were old favorites of mine from when I lived in Santa Barbara. Melville was a new winery for us that became instantly a favorite.

Sideways had just been released and everywhere we went in the valley there were posters advertising the movie. We hadn't yet seen the movie so it was fun to watch it after we returned home from our trip.

Traveling south back to Los Angeles, we spent a few more nights at a friends home in West Hollywood, had lunch on the Sony Pictures lot (where they were filming Zathura) and attended a screening of Christmas with the Kranks on the lot. Needless to say, we were pleased we did not actually pay to see the movie.

No dining highlights on this trip, but we did visit an interesting bar in West Hollywood with fabulous martinis called The Abbey.