One weekend in April, not too long ago, I decided that it would be fun to take a road trip (gluttony for punishment – given that only two months ago, we drove 1800 miles), and I packed up a carry-on bag, threw it in the back of the car, drove to Aaron’s work and KIDNAPPED him to whisk him off to Carmel-by-the-Sea and Monterey!! We had never been there before and love exploring new places.
I want to say this: I LOVE CARMEL!!!!
I want to go back there as often as I can!! The description on their website says it all:
“Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. A city in the forest. A one mile long pure white sandy beach. A cultural mecca for the performing and visual arts. Superb dining and shopping experiences. A story book setting!”
We stayed at the cutest Best Western right by Ocean Avenue in a darling little room with a fireplace. After having a lovely continental breakfast of muffins, toast, jam, eggs, bananas and juice, we grabbed the camera and set off to explore this fairy-tale city. It is jammed with high-end boutiques, art galleries galore, fine dining areas and quaint houses, little parks and shopping areas, eclectic stores, and everyone is friendly and ready to tell you stories about their city and their lives.
We set off on our discovery journey. It was the perfect weekend for this – perfect weather (not foggy), gorgeous views, people-watching at its best, and of course, the ocean! What’s not to love?? We grabbed a generous slice of a fruit tart at Patisserie Boissiere, a French Pastry shop, and walked a few blocks, found a stone bench on the corner of a street, basked in the sun while we ate and watched people walk by. Disposing of the box that held the tart, we launched ourselves into what we have dubbed “The Gallery Day”.
First Stop: Park Gallery
Owned by a lady named Tamara, who was French-Armenian and who kept saying that I had a good eye for art. Anything I stopped to look at, she would say: “Wow, you really have a good eye for art. I won’t say more.” Later she said she would be willing to work with us on payments if we saw a piece we truly liked. As we were leaving the gallery, she followed us out, closed the door behind her and walked us to another gallery she owned. After talking some more, I gave her a hug (Aaron rolls his eyes – he doesn’t understand how I hug perfect strangers :D), we left about 45 mins later.
Second Stop: Vanguard Gallery
This was an Americana vintage art collectors gallery and was filled with nudes and pin-up girls and other paraphernalia like WWII planes and paintings of Elvis & Frank Sinatra, old juke boxes, etc. The manager, finding out that I worked for a law firm, showed me a poster of the only “legal” pin-up girl – a girl in court, actually. He then proceeded to tell us how that girl reminded him of his ex wife, who took his kids and left one day, and how he used detectives to drag her back to court and she would run away again, and how he went bankrupt trying to get custody of his kids, etc. Then he tells us about his current wife and her kids and how they all have a loving relationship and get along with her ex husband, and how he still has not seen some of his biological kids for over 10 years or so. We were in there for quite a while!!
Third Stop:
Elite Gallery & California American Galleries. How did we do two at the same time?? Divide and conquer. Aaron and I decided to split us and go to two different ones in the hopes that we would not be privy to the private info of the owners again, and we could just admire the art and get away. While I wandered off with no one bothering me, Aaron on the other hand, was in deep conversation about business and private equity with the manager of his art gallery. So I walked around the gallery, coveting some lovely pieces of art that I can never afford, while he finished his conversation. These galleries had art that I could see in our home. If only!!
Taking a break from the Art Gallery stroll, we walked around the little shops and coffee houses and artist studios, and then walked down to the white sand beaches – absolutely gorgeous!!!! We then walked back and had some light refreshing sandwiches – my smoked salmon with cream cheese sandwich was delicious!
Being art galleries addicts, we decided to do one last one: The Garden Gallery of Thomas Kinkade.
Both Aaron and I like his art, and we met the manager of the place. He was fairly new but in the course of one hour, we learned about his life and his part in trying to create a Public Arts Program in Stockton, his wife being diagnosed with cancer and only having 3 months to live, them not being able to have any children, the program being canceled after working on it for two years, his wife dying 6 months ago, and how he moved to Carmel and is starting over without his darling wife (he teared up just talking about her).
Needless to say, we had a wonderful and exhausting day!! And we loved it! We came back to the hotel that night having heard life stories of four people, who until that day, we never knew. And we got to experience God’s incredible creation – Nature at its very best that day.
Our lives are rich and blessed and we often tend to forget that.
We are going back to Carmel next weekend for the Arts Festival 😀
Aaron decided he’d like to be kidnapped more often.
