Lindsey was in town and we decided to try something new, so we drove out to Warner Springs on a pretty cloudy day and went sky sailing. It ended up being a wild ride!
We celebrated Christmas in Southern California this year. We took a Hornblower Brunch Cruise, went to Coronado, and opened presents in the garage after we learned Aidan is allergic to Fat Flabby!
Captiva's 2005 Holiday Party at the Lodge at Torrey Pines. It was a good time, but sadly, we're told, the last one of its kind.
Anthony, Greg and I went to Sacramento to run the California International Marathon. It was COLD! Results weren't quite what I was looking for, but another marathon completed. It was great to see Don show up to cheer us on at the end.
I went with the UCSD club on a dive trip back to the Coronados. There were seals everywhere, hence all the fuzzy pictures of seals!
Dan, Megan and I did a couple days of diving at Casino Point at Catalina. A nice getaway, and a nice few dives in SoCal!
A group of us went camping and hiking in Idyllwild. It was a lot of fun, even though the coyotes woke us up in the middle of the night yelping over some catch.
Garnet and I went to the airshow. It was actually the first time I had been there. Despite a little rain, the crowd was good sized and it was fun. The camera battery died before I made it to the end of the show, but I managed to get some stuff.
Dave took me on a flight from Carlsbad to Camarillo. We had great views of John Wayne, LAX, Long Beach and much more. Thanks Dave!
My sis and I took a weekend to get away. We went up to New Hampshire. We toured the mountains, and ended up at the beach. We started at North Conway, went to The Flume, up one of the many gondolas up the mountains, rode The Cog, drove through Portsmouth, and eventually went to Hampton State Beach. The last 3 photos are Boston, NYC, and Philly on the flight back.
Dan, Megan, Jo-Lin, Steve, Skip and I did some diving off the DiveBliss that we chartered out of Mission Bay. It was a lot of fun, though the pictures lack a lot of color. We did see a couple sea lions that were too fast for me to get shots of, and a few moray eels.
We took Jodi out wine tasting for her birthday, a little after the fact. It was a lot of fun and a very hot day in Temecula!
This is the annual trip to Baja. It was another great trip, though the diving was quite limited due to the red tide that just would not go away this year. We had fun kayaking and camping and hanging out though!
Roee, Stacey and I took a plane out and flew to Kern Valley. The airport has a campground on the field, is surrounded by water and mountains, and provided great scenery. We walked into town and discovered we should try to do this again and go river rafting. Next time...but it was a new experience - plane camping.
I went up to San Francisco for Ricoh's 1st annual Developer's Conference. I learned a lot about their new development platform, and got to go see the Giants play the Diamondbacks at SBC Park, and got to take a boating tour of the Bay - under the Golden Gate and around Alcatraz. It was a good trip. I met some cool people from a lot of different places.
A group of 10 of us participated in the Wild Miles Death...uh, I mean Adventure Relay. It was a 193 mile, 10 person relay from Borrego Springs to Pine Valley. The temperatures started in the mid 90s and got up to about 112 degrees. It was a heat wave. Nevertheless, it took about 32 hours, but we finished! You won't see me signing up to do that one again.
A few of us set up an aid station along the coast for the runners training for the Rock and Roll Marathon, doing their longest run of the season by riding Amtrak from Solana Beach to Oceanside and running down the coast. To me, it always sounds better saying running down the coast, rather than up the coast.
This was the continuation of the trip, a few days in Thailand after Hong Kong. We flew up to Chiang Mai, and did a couple tours. In one we went up to Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep, a historical temple just outside of the city. We visited a local hilltribe near there and got to see how the local people live. We also took a tour that took us to an elephant camp to see the elephants put on a show, then we rode elephants to another hilltribe, took an ox-cart back to the starting point, then took a bamboo raft trip down the river. It was so much fun! We stopped at an orchid farm on the way back. The last couple days of the trip were spent around Bangkok. We toured some of the temples in the city, and took a tour to the ruins of Ayuthaya. The tour to Ayuthaya ended with a 3 hour boat ride back to Bangkok on the river. It was really HOT and sticky in Bangkok! An amazing trip, and a well timed and needed one.
I went with my mom out to Hong Kong for a few days. I chose Hong Kong because I got a chance to visit my friend James, who I hadn't seen in a couple years. We did a lot of the typical tourist things - shop, eat, visit Victoria Peak during the day and at night, visited a local nearby island, saw the BIG Buddha on Lantau island, and in general had a good time!
Jodi and I went up to Vancouver for a weekend. We saw Lake Tahoe on the way up. We visited Granville Island the first day. The next day we got totally drenched at the Capilano Suspension Bridge, but the park was nice. We even got a squirrel's eye view of the forest below. Afterwards, we went up into the mountains and got snowed on. Back in the city it was nice and sunny and we did some sightseeing. We did a nice run through Stanley Park then took a driving tour of the park, went out to the university, and ended up going up high to get a view of the city. Vancouver is definitely a beautiful place that I'd like to go to again sometime.
A bunch of us went out to the Anza Borrego Desert to check out the wildflowers. Since we had record rainfall, it was supposed to be one of the best wildflower years ever. The desert even had a river flowing through it!
I went out to visit Dave and Bruce in Boulder, CO. We went skiing and hiking up the FlatIrons. It was a really nice couple of days!
Roee and I decided to fly out to Palm Springs for breakfast on a day that was supposed to be clear. All was fine until we discovered on the way back all of San Diego was under overcast skies. We weren't expecting to be out looking for wildflowers that morning, but we ended up landing at the Borrego Valley Airport to wait for the clouds to blow over. We took a nice walk down the runway and into the flowers. It turned into the $300 breakfast burrito. Most people know that this trip started quite a change on the job front for me as a software developer. If you don't know the story, ask. That statement probably makes no sense at all if you don't know the story.
These are some of the pictures from Keith and Nadia's Wedding at Tom Hamm's on Harbor Island. I think I "accidentally" left out some of the pictures of me and some of the crazy stuff I did that night! Congrats Keith and Nadia!
Biff and I went to Miami to run the Miami Tropical Marathon. We ran, we collected our spinning medals, and had a good time. I did some diving in Key West. The pictures really didn't come out that good. In fact, the first day I was so discouraged I left the camera on the boat for the first dive the second day and of course that's when the big sea turtle comes up to me. So I took the camera back down the second dive and at least saw a green moray eel and a couple nurse sharks. We spent the last night out at Miami Beach. That funny looking 707 is John Travolta's plane in Phoenix. Our approach into San Diego took us right by the airport and way out over the ocean, providing some unique aerial views of the city.
Here are pictures I have from the Carlsbad Marathon. Congratulations to all the participants!
Finally got a break in the weather so Roee and I took 9488G up to Big Bear. We had to push the plane next to a pile of snow for pictures...it just had to be done.
I went to Phoenix the weekend of Rock and Roll Arizona. Matt and I took his plane and flew down to Ryan, near Tucson. After lunch, we flew over Tucson, over the Boneyard at Davis-Monthan AFB, then over Pinal before returning to Phoenix. Pinal is the triangle shaped airport with all the old commercial jets. You can even see the 747 that used to carry the Space Shuttle. I didn't actually get ANY pictures from the marathon, before, during or after. Congratulations to the participants!