Thanksgiving for us is always a time to get away! 2 years ago we visited Santa Barbara. It was beautiful and a great place to visit. I could have prepared for that trip a little better.
Last year we were not able to take our annual adventure to explore CA. We spent last year moving into our house. That was crazy!! We got the key at the last possible moment right before Thanksgiving (5 0r 6 pm the day before). We spent Thanksgiving at a local restaurant and went back to packing/unpacking into our new house.
OK, now to Thanksgiving 06... we went to the mountains. Big Bear is the equivalent of the Poconos out east. I haven't gone skiing yet, so I can't actually compare how the slopes are but the level of difficulty seems about the same. I was googling for things to do up there and found that there was a tubing place that was open and had man-made snow out already. OK, get ready... I had to pay $20/person to go tubing! Can you believe that?? I never ever remember having to pay to go tubing. If you're from Canada, you know you would never pay that amount to go tubing. But, I guess that's what Californians think if they ever go to NJ/NY to go to the beach and you have to pay for beach tags. We got our moneys worth. We arrived early around 9:30 and we tubed until 1:30. They closed at 4 pm and people were still coming (and I am assuming that they were still paying the $20!!).
We had a light lunch early but we started getting hungry at 3:00. We had reservations at 5:30 but dropped in early at the restaurant to see if they would seat us. Our girls had a wonderful turkey dinner. I broke tradition and had a wonderful cowboy cut (16 oz) prime rib. We drove back early... the girls fell asleep and when we got home (7 pm) they went straight to bed. OK, this is a family tradition that I could get used to! Su Jin and I had a relaxing evening to ourselves where we just sat and watched TV together (did you catch Survivor?!).
Where will we go next year? Joshua Tree National park, San Diego, Baja Mexico, Catalina... the possibilities are endless. Just say no to turkey! Start a new family Thanksgiving tradition!
Click on pic below to view our Thanksgiving album.
