Last weekend in Paradise

Howdy everyone.

So I am totally wiped out for some reason and am ready to call it an early night, but I know all of you are itching to learn about what I did this past weekend. Unfortunately, I don't have a whole lot of exciting details to share with you.

Saturday Susan and I spent the morning looking for hotels and beginning to plot our trip home. We've plotted out about a week so far, and tomorrow we are going to be a little bit more. This beginning part is tougher because we are stopping in a few major vacation spots and national parks. Our trip to this point looks like this:

Tuesday - Drive up Coastal Highway 1 to San Francisco
Wednesday - See the Redwoods and spend time in San Fran
Thursday - Visit Yosemite (if the fires have been put out) & spend the night in Lake Tahoe
Friday - Head to Vegas for the night
Saturday - Go to Zion National Park
Sunday - Grand Canyon National Park and then hitting the road again

So that only gets us about a 1/3 or so across the country, and it's looking pretty eventful already.

Beyond that, we played some mini golf (which we tied), and fooled around in a small arcade after. Today, we spent the morning at the beach, taking in some last rays, sand, and surf while we still can. This afternoon we ran around, take care of some errands and began cleaning the house.

While at lunch today, a TV with ESPN was on. On the screen the boys from Chula Vista, CA (30 minutes from us) celebrated after winning the Little League World Series in Williamsport, PA. As many of you know, I worked there last summer covering games and writing feature stories before going back to school. Until last summer I usually loathed those 10 days in August where ESPN is taken over by little boys playing on miniature diamonds in some town in the middle of nowhere, Pennsylvania. But last summer completely changed my outlook, and I really enjoyed my time there and watching the kids play a different brand of ball I was used to watching.

Seeing the games on ESPN this past week has reminded me of that incredible week in Williamsport and the great people I met during my time there. Being in a city which has a team contending in the Series adds perspective and showed me how important the event is to the whole community. At the Padres game last weekend, they showed highlights of the game on the jumbo screen and the fans erupted with applause and cheers when the final score of 12-0 Chula Vista flashed on the screen. While eating dinner the other night at Phils BBQ, Chula Vista staged a massive comeback, coming back to win 11-10 in extra innings after being down 10-5 in the 4th. People cheered with each run crossing home plate, and the restaurant announced over the loud speaker the final result of the game.

It was another cool piece to be a part of, and something I've never experienced before. Of course, a team from Staten Island also made it to the Series this year, but since I wasn't home I can't comment on how that was covered or paid attention to by locals. Luckily though, I happen to be in another city with a contender.

After being in Williamsport, I feel it is something every baseball fan should experience. It is a nice, quaint, small town where everyone and their grandmother turn out for Little League games. The tradition of sitting in the hill behind Lamade Stadium, or sliding down the hill on cardboard are things everyone should see and do in person, not just hear about from Orel Hershiser and Brent Musburger.

Anyway, that's my $.02 on the subject, since you asked and all.

Tomorrow we plan on hitting the beach one last time and then heading downtown for lunch at Blue Water Seafood, a place I have been dying to go to since I got here because I saw it on Dinners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. So it has to be good, right!?

I know I mentioned I have a bunch of photos waiting to go online. I'm going to do my best to get them up tomorrow so I can start with a clean slate one we hit the road.