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Southwestern charm and cuisine

Written by Chaz on 18 March 2012

After Christmas, my aunt, uncles, grandmother and I went exploring in both of New Mexico’s most well-known cities. First, we drove into Albuquerque and split along gender lines — my uncles and I drove just west of downtown to Petroglyph National Monument, where we took a short hike through ancient rock drawings that also afforded us a great view of the city.

Albuquerque is well-known for its annual balloon fiesta, and while I have never made it for the festival itself, we got a glimpse of what I’ve missed as we were driving away from the monument.

We drove into Albuquerque’s historic center, the Old Town. The business hub of the city moved east many years ago with the arrival of the railroad, but the square is still fun to see for the old San Felipe de Neri church. We stopped in at a nearby restaurant, the Church Street Cafe, for some chips and margaritas, which were fine but not as great as we were hoping.

My uncle was very amused by a dog on the roof of a shop, spotted as we walked back to the car. Dogs were always on roofs when I spent four weeks in a small Mexican town several years ago, but my uncle still loved it.

The next morning, my uncle whipped up some delicious huevos rancheros, a common breakfast dish, to fortify us for the day’s travels.

We drove into Santa Fe, beginning our visit at the city’s central square, which probably looks nicer in summer.

We headed over to the Georgia O’Keeffe museum, which was very cool but not that big. O’Keeffe spent much of her life in New Mexico and drew inspiration from its landscapes. We then walked over to the Loretto Chapel, famous for its miraculous spiral staircase. The church had originally been told it was not architecturally possible to build a staircase to its choir loft, until a mysterious carpenter came into town, built it, and left before he was paid. That’s a very nice story, but the staircase is nothing special, I thought. It has no visible support structure, which people think is miraculous in and of itself, but obviously staircases can be built this way or this one would fall down.

We couldn’t get into the best Mexican place in town for lunch, so we headed to a little place off the square for tortilla soup and enchiladas.

On the way back to my uncle’s house, we stopped in Madrid, N.M., for a drink at the Mine Shaft Tavern. Madrid, pop. 149, has become something of an artists’ colony, with galleries lining the small highway. The bar was actually pretty hopping.

I had to work the next day, but my grandmother and cousin spent some of the afternoon make pizzelle, which we all enjoyed.

My uncle grilled mahi mahi for tacos for our final dinner in New Mexico, with some shrimp to go with it. We had all the fixings, and I made margaritas to accompany them.

The resulting tacos were light but full of flavor. Fish tacos are one of the best things about the success of my seafood odyssey.

The next day, my uncle drove my grandmother, my other uncle and me to the airport for our flight out of town. We got one last photo together in the airport lobby to commemorate a wonderful and very memorable holiday together.

Posted in New Mexico | 2 Responses »
Tags: Ethnic eats, Family, Food, Holidays, Nature, Sightseeing

A truly South American city

Written by Emmy on 29 February 2012

After our time in the countryside, we flew north to the bustling capital metropolis of Santiago.

First order of business was — not shockingly — lunchtime. As previously mentioned, sandwiches are like a religious item in Chile. And so we headed to one of their sanctuaries, Ciudad Vieja, a tiny sidewalk cafe in the artsy part of the city well-renowned for what its able to put between two pieces of bread. The menu was widely varied and we took advantage of its many options.

Chilean Spanish has many vocabulary differences from the Spanish I know, and a large number of those differences can be found on menus. So I ordered a sandwich whose ingredients I could not quite identify, other than chicken and bread. What I got was a spicy Chilean rendition on a chicken salad sandwich filled with onions, peppers, avocado and several other veggies. It tasted a lot better than the pictures would lead one to believe.

The dishes ordered around the table incorporated a bevy of different tastes. Alix had the carnitas, seasoned beef served with corn and guacamole, and my mom had a quinoa burger. Quinoa may be the trendy food du jour in fancy New York restaurants now, but its place of origin is more or less exactly where we were sitting.

The sandwich portions, like every other dish experienced thus far in Chile, were positively enormous.

We spent the rest of our first day exploring the city and getting our bearings. Santiago is not really a museum city and is one better explored by walking. The balmy summer weather didn’t hurt the efforts.

We were staying slightly up the hills in one of the artsier neighborhoods and so we trekked down toward the more thumping city center. The neighborhoods are divided by a flowing river, which looked to contain more mud than water…

Downtown Santiago was filled with an entrancing mix of old colonial buildings, new construction and artistic rebellion. I’ve been to Buenos Aires before and was shocked by how European it felt. I’d conjured up an image of South America but felt like I was in France or Italy. Santiago, on the other hand, matched that once-conjured image. It’s quirky and artsy, with pockets of high-rise development and neighborhoods that look like they haven’t changed in centuries.

We spent the whole afternoon exploring the city’s sights and walking to rebuild an appetite. We had planned to investigate another Chilean epicurean standard for dinnertime: seafood. But what’s somewhat odd about seafood in Chile is that it breaks a cardinal rule I’ve always been taught to observe: seafood and cheese do not go together. But in Chile, it appears they do.

We tried two noted specialties at dinner: clams baked with parmesan cheese (manchas a la parmesana) and a crab cake (pastel de jeriba). Now, a crab cake is a known entity to me. And that’s what the Spanish on the menu directly translated to. But this was not a baked cake; this was a cheesy, gooey casserole — closer to the crab dip that aunt makes in the Chesapeake than to crab cakes in the way we think about them normally. Mmmmm delicious.

The next morning we went on one of my most favorite kinds of adventures: a trip to the local market. This particular one — la Vega Central — is home to all the fruit in the city and there is just so much of it. Avocados and cherries are two of my favorite things, but in the winter are so expensive. The reason why? They’re imported from Chile — where they are literally sold by the wheelbarrow (and for mere pennies).

Not too far from the fragrant fruit, it starts to smell like ocean. Not because you’re near the sea per se, but because the fish market is mere blocks away and is heaping with squirmy little guys.

We also visited a flower market, but flowers are far less intriguing than a pile of octopi.

We left the markets and headed to one of the less central neighborhoods of the city. A 15-minute cab ride made a world of difference in our surroundings. Bustling graffiti-filled streets gave way to wide avenues, fancy cars and extensive greenery.

Though Santiago is not, as-previously mentioned, a museum city, one of the newer and more noteworthy landmarks is the Museo de la Moda. At first, we were all sort of suspect of a museum dedicated to fashion. But it turned out to be far more interesting than that.

Chile does not exactly have the most sunny history. It was as recent as 30 years ago that the country lived under tight political control with few personal liberties afforded to the general population. When Pinochet was overthrown in the 1980s, the entire country changed — just as the music, fashion and culture of the world was changing.

The museum was fun and lively — when’s the last time you listened to “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” while browsing an historical exhibit? The exhibits gave us a real sense of the oppression of the 1970s and the youthful liberation that followed in the 1980s. There was far more to it than a place called “Museum of Fashion” would have led you to believe.

Later that day we sat down to some more Chilean cuisine. The predominant items in all restaurants we visited were fish and wine. And so we continued to partake. We visited a restaurant called Como Agua Para Chocolate, like the book and movie (which I was exposed to in high school Spanish class).

We sampled a few different fish items (plus one meat one). My seared tuna (bottom right) was served alongside a corn-basil gratin, which was unbelievable.

Part of what was so nice about our trip to Chile — in addition to all of the delicious food – was how much time I got to spend with my family.

The next morning — our last day in Santiago — we decided to explore some of the city’s higher points. The city is dotted with hills, the highest of which are best reached by funiculars. The Chilean funicular is a little more open air than others I’ve ridden before, making both the ride and the destination filled with a beautiful view.

We walked around the Santa Lucia hilltop before seeking shade below. Coming from mid-winter New York weather, it was still hard to adjust to the balmy 90-degree days in Santiago.

Before long, it was lunchtime. We decided to take a break from our sandwiches and go for another set of traditional Chilean dishes. And in line with all the prior lunches we’d had, there was definitely a go-big-or-go-home mentality to the dishes being served.

We sampled a few lunchtime stews traditional to the region. My stew (on the left) contained chickpeas, cinnamon, onion, tomato, coriander and turkey. It was amazing and flavorful. The other stew sampled at the table contained chickpeas, white beans, corn and a series of other spices. The two dishes were incredibly different, despite their similar appearances and ingredients. Both were delicious and extremely filling, but felt a bit more healthy than the colossal sandwiches of the days prior.

The city of Santiago is unbelievably colorful, painted from top to bottom with graffiti. Some of the graffiti is overtly political in nature; others are more benign. One street has houses painted entirely in solid bright colors, each a different shade than the next. We walked the streets and played in the colorful playgrounds.

After carousing around the city for the afternoon and basking in the summer sunlight — we enjoyed a bit of pool time each afternoon — we took an evening stroll on our way to dinner. Two parallel streets near our hotel seemed to be lined each night with table after table of people out drinking. What was amusing was that the first street was filled entirely with underage drinkers out with their friends, while the second was packed with adults out with friends. It seemed that the locals just graduate from one street to the next.

We chose a dinner spot on the adult street. We started with shrimp empanadas (again, breaking the seafood-cheese “rule”).

The house special of the restaurant we chose was fish “a la lata” — fish grilled under a brick with tomato, onions and zucchini. I had pictured almost a sauce made of the vegetables (sauces are very big in Chile), but instead it was fish grilled with the actual vegetables themselves.

Our three days in Santiago were delicious, colorful and cultural. A visit well spent.

Posted in Chile | No Responses »
Tags: Family, Food, Markets, Politics, Sightseeing, Views

Happy Columbus Day!

Written by Emmy on 25 October 2011

When I was abroad, we constantly had off from school for mysterious-sounding holidays. Like my friends back at Brown, we coincidentally had no class on Columbus Day (though on neither campus did we call it that). I assumed initially that our Spanish day off was for yet another Catholic occasion, but as it turned out, we too were celebrating Columbus Day! Just from a different perspective. Unlike the American holiday, the Spanish version is tied to a particular date and so it happened to fall on the Wednesday of our stay in Barcelona. The holiday had no major effect on us, save for a large number of school children everywhere reveling in their day off.

Having done a Gaudi warm-up the day before with his apartment buildings in L’Eixample, we were ready for Barcelona’s main attraction: Sagrada Familia. Sagrada Familia was intended to be Gaudi’s opus, a massive modern church for his beloved city. Construction began in 1883, but during the process Gaudi went bankrupt and died, leaving his church incomplete. Architects and historians have argued since about what the final product should look like, and though construction has been ongoing for the last decade, it is predicted that the church will not be finished until 2023. (The anticipated end date keeps getting pushed back. It’s like Barcelona’s version of the Second Avenue subway.)

Despite its cranes and scaffoldings, Sagrada Familia is the most visited site in Spain, and by 10 a.m. the line to enter stretched around the block. The inside is impressive, but the outside is really the must-see spectacle, so we walked around the block a few times, gazing up at the whimsical towers and controversial facades.

From Sagrada Familia we walked south about 10 blocks to do a drive-by of the building I lived in while I was abroad. Residencia Onix is an apartment building for students — no Spanish universities have dorms like in the U.S. — and so our hallways were filled with Americans and Spaniards alike. CASB uses a different building for its students now, but to me, Onix was home.

Just beyond Onix is one of the city’s landmarks and home to my once-upon-a-time Metro stop, the Arc de Triomf. Very similar in appearance to the Parisian arch, Barcelona’s version was built for the world exposition in 1888. As one of my books noted, the only triumph that the supposedly triumphant arch celebrated was an on-time completion.

The Arc sits at the top of one of the city’s biggest parks, Parc de la Ciutadella, home to my one-time attempt to learn to like running. Ciutadella was once the site of a military citadel — where it gets its name — but it now houses ample gardens and walking paths, a field of ping pong tables, Barcelona’s zoo and the Generalitat de Catalunya’s parliamentary building. At the center of the park is a massive fountain, decorated with traditional Roman chariots and fantastical water-spewing dragons, a testament to the mix of history and whimsy throughout the city.

Ciutadella is always crowded and was particularly so because of Wednesday’s holiday. Families lined the block to get into the zoo, runners in neon apparel filled the paths and mothers sat at the fountain-side cafe with strollers parked by the water.

We continued south of Ciutadella to the beach. Normally by October, Barcelona’s beaches are empty, but with no school and persistent 90-degree weather, bathers lined the waterfront. On our walk to the Mediterranean, we passed teenagers socializing on the boardwalk, old men playing dominos and more publicly displayed modern art than on Brown’s campus.

Clockwise from top left: Frank Gehry’s “Fish,” which overlooks the water from between the city’s two skyscrapers, Hotel Arts and the Mapfre office building; Antoni Llena’s “David i Goliath,” which was built for the 1992 Olympics; Rebecca Horn’s “Homenatge a la Barceloneta,” which was built to memorialize the oceanfront shops and restaurants destroyed for Olympics construction.

The old men playing cards under the boardwalk looked like they had been coming to the beach to do the very same thing for decades. One player saw our cameras and yelled out, in Catalan, “Take pictures! No charge!”

From the steamy beach, we walked up the Barceloneta boardwalk, a touristy strip lined with paella restaurants and parked cruise ships. Barcelona is an enormous port for passenger vessels bound for the Mediterranean’s waters; my entire flight from New York was filled with cruise passengers. The scenic beaches are broken up by industrial docks and vestiges from the 1992 Olympics, which makes parts of the waterfront less than ideal for sunbathing. Still, the mild waters provide great relief on a record-setting hot day.

We walked inland fron the shores to la Ribera, a neighborhood also known as the Born and renowned for its food and art. Both categories were on the agenda, but after our long sweeping walk, lunch would have to come first.

We paid a visit to El Xampaneyet, an example of the old world charm of tapas bars. Packed with people, the bar is a total free-for-all. You grab whatever table or inch of bar space that you can and just start pointing at food, all of which is displayed on top of the bar. We fought our way to a little table in the middle of the action and the food just started flowing: red peppers stuffed with tuna, spicy marinated olives, tortilla española, a traditional omelette made of potatoes and onions, pan con tomate, sundried tomatoes, manchego cheese and peppers stuffed with soft cheese. I washed down my tapas with a glass of cava, sparkling wine made in Spain.

Lunch was delicious, but eating at El Xampanyet was as much about the experience as the food.

After lunch, Jessica paid a visit to the Picasso museum, which is housed in a series of old houses down the street from El Xampanyet. I’ve seen the art in the native Barcelonian’s museum a few times before, so I decided to go for a walk around the Born instead.

I should have expected it because of the combination of siesta and holiday, but nearly everything was closed. But as I wove my way through the Born and circled several of the surrounding neighborhoods, it gave me a chance to people-watch and eavesdrop. Everyone in Barcelona speaks Spanish, but Catalan is the city’s lifeblood. After the Franco-era ban was lifted, locals returned to speaking their native tongue, and today, it is the language of choice among many young people. Catalan is a close relative of the other regional romance languages; as one of my friends once put it, Catalan was born the bastard child of Spanish and French, dropped on its head in an Italian hospital. It’s not quite as phonetic as Spanish, which makes the accent tricky, but when written, it bears many similarities.

Many people are critical of Barcelona as a study-abroad choice because of the almost secondary place of the Spanish language. But I disagree. All of my classes were conducted in Spanish and the castellano of most people in the city is fairly unaccented, as compared to people in Sevilla or South America. I had ample opportunities to practice my written and verbal comprehension of the language. Plus, as a two-for-the-price-of-one bargain, I learned Catalan. My speaking abilities are atrocious, but I was shocked at what I had retained from a comprehension perspective, thus validating the placement of “conversational Catalan” as a skill on my resume.

Jessica and I reconnected and continued our walk around the city. Down the block from the Picasso Museum is one of the city’s more beautiful churches, Santa Maria del Mar. In contrast to the church’s Gothic style, a nearby modern sculpture commemorates those who fought for the Catalan constitution in 1714. (It’s hard to let go.)

We walked down to the water in time to see the sun beginning to set over Roy Lichtenstein’s “Barcelona Head,” a fun pop art sculpture that rises above the waterfront buildings. Down the block from the “Head” is a sculpture of the man of the day, Cristóbal Colón, as he is known in Spain, pointing out to the sea.

For dinner we headed up to Gracia, the neighborhood north of L’Eixample. Gracia is quieter and more filled with locals than other parts of the city. The neighborhood is dotted with squares that are filled with bars and restaurants. One of its more well-known streets, Carrer Verdi, is tree-lined and closed to cars. The street is filled with young people, filtering in and out of restaurants of all different world cuisines.

We chose a Lebanese restaurant and sampled the muhammara, a dip made from red peppers and walnuts, a salad and musakaa, a dish of sauteed eggplant, pepper and chickpeas.

Yet another delightful, delicious day.

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Tags: Art, Beach, Food, Holiday, Language, Sightseeing, Traditions

Yet another city of angels

Written by Chaz on 2 October 2011

Lest we ever get a good, full night’s sleep, we rose on Saturday at 5:30. We had decided to take on Zion Canyon’s most challenging day hike, Angels Landing, before leaving. The 2.4-mile trail goes up dozens of switchbacks before climbing up a steep ridge to the summit, an enormous rock promontory in the middle of the canyon. The name, Angels Landing, came from a 1916 visitor who proclaimed that only an angel would ever be able to get to the summit. But the park manager of the time was undeterred, quickly building a path to the top.

Angels Landing

After making coffee, eating a light breakfast and striking camp, we checked out of the campground, moved the car to the visitor center and boarded the crowded first shuttle of the day at 6:45 to ride up into the canyon. We were on the trail by 7:15. The trail was steep right from the beginning, running parallel to the canyon for a bit before beginning to ascend the canyon’s western wall pretty dramatically.

After 21 short switchbacks through an area known as Walter’s Wiggle, we arrived at Scout Lookout, which the ranger had assured us was a perfectly respectable place to turn around. And while the view from Scout Lookout was nice, it was nothing compared to the view from the top of Angels Landing, which loomed ahead of us. I took a moment to look over the sheer drop at the edge of Scoot Lookout into the canyon below.

As we began to ascend further, it became obvious that the trail was going to get a lot more treacherous for the final portion.

But it wasn’t immediately obvious just how treacherous it was going to be.

Of course, we were more than prepared after our Half Dome experience, so we soldiered on, making it to the summit by about 9:00. The views were totally unlike any other perspective we had had on Zion Canyon. Because Angels Landing sticks right out into the middle of the canyon, you get breathtaking panoramic views in both directions. For sheer unexpected reward, I think Angels Landing may have been the best hike of our trip.

We headed back down the trail, which was like nothing compared to the nine-mile descent from Half Dome, and we had returned to Dorothy by about eleven. We drove east on the park road, winding through the hills up to a 1.1-mile tunnel, snacking on asiago cheese, tomato spread and crackers.

After driving through the tunnel, we stopped for one last taste of Zion, making the short hike out the Canyon Overlook Trail to a view back towards the canyon. Clearly visible is the winding highway up to the tunnel’s west entrance.

As we drove east out of the park, we kept passing amazing rock formations, like the Checkerboard Mesa.

Before long, we were out of the park’s splendor and back on the flat, open desert road, heading south to the Grand Canyon. Our short detour to Zion couldn’t have been more worth it.

Posted in Zion | 2 Responses »
Tags: Food, One with nature, Sightseeing, Temples, Views

Heading inland to Zion

Written by Chaz on 2 October 2011

Ambition became reality when we awoke at 3:30 a.m. to take quick showers and ready ourselves for the long drive east to Zion National Park. Everything was in the car and ready shortly afterward, and by 4:02, Dorothy was pulling away.

Los Angeles had one last chance to confuse us with its freeway system, but we were ready for it. By 5:30, we had maneuvered from the 405 to the 105 to the 605 to the 10 to the 15, making an essential stop for coffee along the highway. We watched the sun rise over the California desert.

Interstate 15 winds east from Barstow through the Mojave Desert to the Nevada border. And as we approached the Silver State, it became clear that the casinos and outlets started immediately across the border. In fact, the town of Primm, Nev. is right up against the border, positioned as a first temptation for gamblers coming from California or a last hope for those leaving Vegas.

Shortly afterward, around 8:30, we arrived in Vegas, where we stopped for gas, a bathroom stop and a good look at the casinos. It was my first time in the city, and my initial reaction was that it reminded me so much of Macau — which was ironic, since Emmy’s reaction to Macau was that it reminded her of Vegas.

Left: the Wynn casino in Las Vegas. Right: the Wynn casino in Macau.

Northeast of Vegas, I-15 cuts through the rural northwestern corner of Arizona and winds through the Virgin River Gorge, a dramatic rock formation created by the same river that made Zion.

We pulled off the highway in Washington City, Utah for a last supermarket stop and lunch at In-N-Out, which we had missed in California. From there, it was only a short drive into Zion, where we parked Dorothy at our campsite in Watchman Campground and walked back to the visitor center. To reduce congestion, you can’t drive into Zion Canyon, the heart of the park — you have to park and take one of the frequent shuttles. As a result, there aren’t any parking problems in the canyon, and the views are unspoiled by heavy automobile traffic.

Zion was given its name by Mormon farmers who discovered it and believed it to be close to paradise. I really liked the idea that the park was preserved because people saw it and said to themselves: wow, this place is close to God.

After checking in at the visitor center about our best course of action, we hopped on a shuttle and rode to the Weeping Rock stop to begin exploring. The beauty of the canyon was readily apparent.

We hiked from the shuttle stop up a steep trail toward something called Hidden Canyon. As we ascended, the views of the canyon became even more picturesque and panoramic.

The weather was visibly deteriorating, and when we got to Hidden Canyon (surprise — it was a hidden canyon), we quickly turned back around, not wanting to get stuck on the steep trail once it became wet and slippery. We took a short detour to Weeping Rock, and as it had begun to rain, the weeping was even greater than usual.

We walked back to the shuttle and rode up to the last stop, the Temple of Sinawava, where we took a soaked stroll up the paved Riverside Walk along the Virgin River. The canyon gets too narrow for the road to continue, and at the end of the path, it gets too narrow for the path to continue. But, we learned, many people rent special boots to wade through the Narrows, as the section of the river is known, starting above the canyon and hiking through the water back down. It sounded really cool, and it definitely made my next-visit list.

We had to wait a few minutes for a shuttle back to the campground, as the heavy rain had apparently caused a mudslide on a section of the road. Sure enough, we passed a park ranger directing traffic around the debris in the road. According to our shuttle driver, the rainstorm was “one for the record books,” and the subsequent mudslide was “unprecedented.” When we got back to our campsite, we took advantage of a momentary lull in the rain to set the tent up at a record pace, and fortunately, the rain mostly held off for the rest of the evening.

Our campsite at Zion was one of the nicest we stayed, with a beautiful view of the canyon. We settled in to enjoy some appetizers by the fire before dinner. Naturally, given our early wakeup, we were getting quite tired.

As the sun began to set, Emmy whipped up some apple chardonnay chicken sausage with mixed fresh vegetables.

After a round of s’mores, we were more than ready for bed.

Posted in Los Angeles, Travel, Zion | No Responses »
Tags: Apocalyptic weather, Cooking, Food, Long drives, One with nature, Sightseeing, Views

Out of the hills onto the beach

Written by Chaz on 30 September 2011

When we woke up on Wednesday to start our second day on the Pacific Coast Highway, we found that dramatic fog had rolled in, blanketing Big Sur.

We made breakfast and coffee, taking our time leaving our beautiful campsite in the hopes that weather conditions would improve with time. We took a walk around the campground and down to the beach below it. But unfortunately the fog didn’t show much sign of lifting, so we struck camp and set out south.

As we drove, we soon left the cliffs of Big Sur behind and found that we were driving in and out of very obvious shelves of cloud cover. We stopped a few times at remarkable beaches or views as we slowly made out way south. Realizing that we would need a little more fuel than we had to make it through Big Sur, we bought three gallons of gas at $5.69 per gallon, the going price on the cliffs of Big Sur. Naturally, there were tears in our eyes.

We also made a quick stop at Hearst Castle, William Randolph Hearst’s mega-mansion, and though we didn’t do any of the tours, we got a good look at his magic kingdom from the bottom of the hills.

We stopped in San Luis Obispo, the first sort-of-real city south of Big Sur, for a much-needed fuel tank fill-up, and pressed on to Pismo Beach, where we spent much of the afternoon and the night. After picking up a few supplies, we set up camp at Pismo State Beach’s North Campground, where our campsite, No. 18, was just a short walk through the dunes from the ocean.

Emmy made a delicious lunch of bean and vegetable salad and turkey, avocado, muenster and corn chip sandwiches, and we packed a beach bag and headed down to the beach for some sun and surf.

As the afternoon drew to a close, we retreated to our campsite for some appetizers and a couple rounds of Set. We took the last of the appetizers back to the beach to watch the sunset.

For dinner, Emmy pulled off one of her best camping feats, roasting chicken sausages and bell peppers over our campfire to add a smoky flavor before chopping them and throwing them over the stove to soften and stew a bit. More so than the other hot dishes we had while camping, this one relied on the quality of its ingredients and preparation, rather than its recipe, and it was delicious.

After a round or two of s’mores, we cleaned up and headed to bed.

Posted in Pacific Coast Highway | No Responses »
Tags: Cooking, Fog, Food, Sightseeing, Sun, Sunsets

Our brief bay stopover

Written by Chaz on 29 September 2011

Heading down the Marin peninsula to San Francisco, we made detours to two sites of great natural beauty, the Muir Woods and the Marin Headlands. The Muir Woods, one of the last untouched redwood groves near San Francisco, were named in honor of John Muir’s contributions in the creation of the national park system. We took a quick walk through the forest, admiring the trees’ majestic beauty.

We then drove down to the very tip of the peninsula to the Marin Headlands, stopping several times to take in the views across the bay. I think this was my third or fourth visit to the headlands, but they’re just as breathtaking as the first time.

Unfortunately, due to extensive construction at the headlands, we were thwarted both from taking the scenic coastal drive as well as from walking down to Point Bonita Lighthouse. We did take a nice walk toward the lighthouse, though, and had a light second lunch of the leftovers from our vineyard picnic earlier in the day as we watched seals play in the mouth of the Pacific Ocean.

We drove south over the Golden Gate Bridge through central San Francisco and picked up Gabi at her apartment in Potrero Hill for a quick jaunt over to Emeryville, where we picked up some furniture at IKEA that Gabi wasn’t able to fit into her own car, which is much more reasonably sized than our Dorothy. I was pleased that we were able to put our minivan to a legitimately productive use.

After dropping off the furniture at Gabi’s, we hopped the BART back under the bay to Oakland to meet some friends from Brown for dinner at Red Sea, an Ethiopian restaurant. I first got into Ethiopian food with my friend Ellen at Abyssinia in Stockholm, and Red Sea didn’t disappoint. We started with meat and vegetable sambusas, delicious little hot pockets with unidentified but delicious spices, and a hummus platter. We moved onto to the house combo, a whole smörgåsbord of meats and vegetables served over injera, the traditional spongy Ethiopian flatbread used instead of silverware.

We then migrated across the street to the Kingfish, a fantastic dive bar that inspired our friend Ellen (not the same Ellen as above) to dedicate her column in the East Bay Express to it. After leaving, Emmy and I parted ways as I headed back under the bay to Gabi’s apartment but she stayed at our friend Margaret’s apartment in Oakland.

We met again at eight the next morning and headed to breakfast with Gabi at Just For You, a great little place that Gabi and I had visited a couple years ago. Emmy and I both had the Greg’s scramble: eggs, spinach, parmesan, onions and chicken-apple sausage, and we split a beignet, the fried New Orleans treat that Just For You somehow also specializes in.

After dropping Gabi off and bidding farewell, we pointed Dorothy south toward Highway 1 and Los Angeles. We made a quick stop at Trader Joe’s to restock and were shortly on our way.

Posted in San Francisco | 1 Response »
Tags: Chilling with the locals, Ethnic eats, Food, Friends, One with nature, Sightseeing, Views

The scenic consequences of progress

Written by Chaz on 28 September 2011

After our ordeal on Half Dome, we felt free to allow ourselves the luxury of sleeping in until a whopping 8:30 a.m on Saturday. Though I was skeptical of our (well, my) ability to pull off any physical activity that day, we nevertheless packed our bags for a hike in the park’s less-visted Hetch Hetchy section. After a relaxed breakfast at the campsite of cereal, fruit and coffee, we threw our things into Dorothy and set off for Hetch Hetchy, the route to which requires one to exit and reenter the park, passing through private land.

Hetch Hetchy Valley is like a smaller twin to Yosemite Valley, nearly as dramatic if not on the same scale. But the steadfast march toward progress led the city of San Francisco to campaign for a dam in Hetch Hetchy to provide the city with water and power in the early 1900s. Over John Muir’s strenuous objections, the project was green-lighted, and so the first thing we saw as we descended on the winding road into the valley was the huge O’Shaughnessy Dam, which still provides water to San Francisco. The dam has since become a rallying cry for the preservation of national parks, and it’s extremely unlikely that another project like it could ever be approved. Though some people call for the restoration of Hetch Hetchy, it’s far more likely that we’ll just have to imagine what Hetch Hetchy Valley would look like were it not flooded.

We hiked a couple miles along the northern share of the manmade lake to Wapama Falls, where we stopped for lunch, our leftover tortellini. Each time we stopped and started again, my legs cried out in protest.

After we hiked back to Dorothy and bid farewell to Hetch Hetchy, we took a short driving tour up the Tioga Road, which leads to the eastern part of Yosemite. Though we had dinner reservations that prevented us from going all the way to Tuolomne Meadows, we made it as far as Tenaya Lake, stopping at Olmsted Point for a beautiful view. Though we had enjoyed blue skies all morning, storm clouds were rolling in and we got hit by heavy rain and even some violent hail as we retreated west.

We drove back to the valley through the very visible scars of a huge forest fire, beautiful in its own eerie way.

As we headed towards dinner, we took off our outdoor trekking hats and got ready for something more refined.

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Tags: Apocalyptic weather, Historical memory, One with nature, Sightseeing, Views

Our biggest challenge yet

Written by Chaz on 28 September 2011

We awoke on Friday at 4:15 a.m. sharp, immediately jumping out of our sleeping bags excitedly (yeah, right) to strike camp, pack the car and brew a much-needed pot of coffee. Our plan was to spend two nights in Wawona, in the south of the park, and two more in Crane Flat, in the northwest, closer to our eventual destination of San Francisco. Unfortunate scheduling meant that this change of camp coincided with our day on Half Dome. But even so, we were out of Wawona by shortly after five, and as I drove us back into Yosemite Valley, Emmy served a light continental breakfast and began packing our backpacks.

All told, by the time we arrived at the parking lot at Curry Village where we left our car, our two packs contained no less than:

Six Clif bars
Two bags cashews (assorted)
One bag Annie’s Cheddar Bunnies, a snacking essential
Two apples
Two peanut butter sandwiches
Two tuna sandwiches
Eight Oreos
Two packs chewing gum
Two containers chicken sausage and vegetables, leftover from dinner
Eight water bottles
Two raincoats
Two sunblocks
One hat
One extra shirt
Two lip balms
Baby wipes, without which the checkpoint does not leave home
Wallets
Phones
Flashlight
Toilet paper

Shortly after leaving the parking lot, we realized that we had made a huge mistake. There was a parking lot closer to the trailhead than the one in which we had left Dorothy, adding a total of about three-quarters of a mile to our day’s already-long journey. But we soldiered on, walking through the forest to the actual trailhead at Happy Isles and setting foot onto the trail at 6:35 a.m. Not too bad.

The first part of the hike took us up the John Muir Trail, an alternative to the thousands of stone steps we had descended the day before on the Mist Trail. Though slightly longer, we figured switchbacks were a much better way to ascend than stairs. By 8:30, when the sun really started hitting Yosemite Valley, we had already gained thousands of feet and had a beautiful view across to Nevada Fall.

We veered off our route from the previous day onto the trail up to Half Dome, taking a short detour through a backpacker camp that enabled us to make the hike, usually almost entirely out and back, into a tiny bit more of a loop. As it turned out, hiking is a pretty tiring business, and long before we made it to the summit, we were more than ready for lunch. Or, at least, round one of lunch. We stopped for our tuna sandwiches (never have I had such a delicious tuna sandwich experience) as we gained even more elevation.

The trail grew ever steeper as we approached Sub Dome, Half Dome’s much smaller sibling which sits immediately north of it and looks like a little bubble growing out of its side. At this point, the hike, which had seemed to be flying by in the first couple hours after we left Curry Village, began to drag. But at long last — about 11:30 a.m. — we arrived at the permit checkpoint, and chose to mark this joyous occasion with a frank discussion with the two rangers of the various ways in which we could die on Half Dome. “Honestly, most of the rescues we do are actually body recoveries,” one told us. (Just before we left on our trip out west, the New York Times ran an article about the growing death count within Yosemite’s bounds. This article, along with our previous day’s warning about lightning-caused death, really set the tone for our ascent.)

We began climbing the steep, winding granite stairs up the side of Sub Dome, and after a few exertion-filled minutes, arrived at its narrow but flat summit. Already, the views off to the north were spectacular.

Soon after, we found ourselves face-to-face with what we had been dreading all morning: the infamous Half Dome cables.

The cables stretch up an extremely steep granite face to cover the final 400 feet of Half Dome’s immense height. I had trouble picturing what the cables were going to look like, but that was because we were missing a key fact: The cables are connected to steel poles which are bored into the granite, and above each set of poles is attached a wooden two-by-four. As you pull yourself up to each set of poles, you can balance yourself, and nearly stand, on each two-by-four as you wait for the person in front of you to clear the next two-by-four. These pieces of wood totally answered my question. You’re never actually hanging off the side of the mountain by a little cable; you’re pulling yourself up to the next place where you can pause a second. And when traffic is heavy, you can expect to wait quite a while at each two-by-four.

As we starting ascending Sub Dome, Emmy started freaking out a bit about what was to come, and while I remained more stoic at that point, I too start to lose my calm as we picked out gloves from the enormous pile at the bottom of the cable and began to make our ascent. It was, in short, terrifying, not least because of the continued lengthy waits as people above us climbed, which we spent perched on the side of the rock clutching on for dear life. Not to even mention that it was becoming quite clear that the advertised storms were somewhere in the area, though it was still blue skies over Half Dome.

But once we got to the top, and heaved ourselves off the ascent onto Half Dome’s flat 13-acre surface, I forgot all my fears and all the effort we had expended as I took in the amazing view.

We stopped for a quick picnic of our leftover chicken sausage, which we’d like to think is among the more gourmet of meals served on top of Half Dome, and for pictures. But we could see storm clouds rolling in off in the distance, and we were reminded that the cables act as lightning rods during a storm. (Is that not the scariest thing you’ve ever heard?) So, after a brief celebration of what we had accomplished, we headed back to the cables. I think both of us were almost more worried about descending, even though it would clearly be physically easier, but I realized as soon as we started that it was really no problem. Again, the two-by-fours were the key to the whole system.

We ended up making it off the twin domes safely, and sure enough, it started raining about half an hour after we reached tree cover, though very little rain fell on us. (Fortunately, we had packed our raincoats — see above.) The nine-mile slog back to our car was arguably more difficult than the ascent since we were so exhausted. Simply the pain in my feet was more than enough of a reason to stop. We opted for the Mist Trail again, so thousands of stairs and a few miles after that later, we made it back to Dorothy, who was truly a site for sore eyes.

We drove north out of the valley to Crane Flat Campground, where we hastily set up camp and fixed an appetizers course of chips, hummus, guacamole and a few well-earned cocktails. Emmy once again mastered the camp stove to produce a delicious dish of pesto-filled tortellini and roasted eggplant in marinara sauce.

Though we had long lost the light required for photography, here’s the dish in its lunch reincarnation.

Despite being essentially on the ground, I don’t think I’d ever fallen asleep so quickly.

Posted in Yosemite | 3 Responses »
Tags: Apocalyptic weather, Exhaustion, Food, Getting a real workout, One with nature, Sightseeing, SO MANY PEOPLE, Views

The grandest of all special temples of Nature

Written by Chaz on 28 September 2011

We woke up early on our second day in Yosemite, around 6:30, marking the beginning of a long, productive and somewhat unpleasant trend of our beginning our days between 4 and 7 a.m. We hopped in Dorothy and headed down to the Wawona Hotel to “borrow” their wireless Internet for a pressing need: securing permits for the trail up Yosemite’s famous Half Dome. Though most are reserved months in advance, the Park Service releases a few each morning at seven for use the next day, and so by 7:02, we were back in Dorothy, permits successfully reserved.

After two attempts, I was able to make us coffee using our camping stove and percolator (both worked flawlessly for the rest of the trip). We stopped by the campground’s amphitheater to ask some questions a park ranger about our plan for the day. Her coffee setup put ours to shame.

At the ranger’s advice, we hurried into Yosemite Valley to leave Dorothy and catch a bus back to Glacier Point, where we would begin hiking back down into the valley via the Panorama Trail and the Mist Trail. Unfortunately, by the time we got to Yosemite Lodge, the bus was completely full. We pled our case to the very friendly bus driver and before long, we were on our way to Glacier Point in the most comfortable seats on the bus: two white towels in the center aisle.

The bus driver, Charles, kept us entertained on the drive with a very interesting narration of the park’s history, botany and geology. By the time we arrived, we were already hungry again, so we fueled up with some Clif bars before heading down the trail to begin our nearly nine-mile hike.

The hike took us around the edge of Yosemite Valley to Illilouette Fall, the first of three huge waterfalls we saw on our hike, with sweeping views of Yosemite Valley, Half Dome and the other two waterfalls along the way.

John Muir, who fought to preserve and protect Yosemite as a national park, called Yosemite Valley “the grandest of all special temples of Nature.” As we began to explore, I started to see what impressed him so much.

We stopped at a beautiful overlook just past the waterfall for our packed lunch: turkey, muenster and avocado sandwiches on whole wheat bread.

After a couple more miles across the valley ridge, we stopped at the top at Nevada Fall, where just a few hundred feet before the fall’s precipitous drop is a calm pool, ideal for a quick foot bath in the middle of a long hike. We stopped and had a snack and relaxed our feet. At this point, we were nearly directly in Half Dome’s shadow, though the trail to the summit winds around through the forest to ascend one of its hidden sides.

From Nevada Fall, we began descending back into the valley, passing Vernal Fall on our way. Vernal Fall is a very popular destination if you’re going to do just one hike out of the valley, so the trail began to get significantly more crowded. The views remained spectacular.

We wound down the Mist Trail’s thousands of stone steps back into the valley, through the mist from the fall that gives the trail its name.

We made it back to the valley in one tired piece, and after picking up a couple things at the general store in the valley, we headed to the visitor center to get advice about our hike up Half Dome. The ranger in the campground had told us to start the 18-mile hike at sunrise or earlier, and we were hoping to get a few more tips. As we walked up to the counter, we saw that the weather board indicated a 30 percent chance of thunderstorms for the next day. I pointed this out to the volunteer on duty and told her we had Half Dome permits.

“Well, if there is lightning, do not go on Half Dome,” she deadpanned. “You will die.”

Scared but not deterred, we decided to get as early a start as possible the next day to maximize our chances of a death-free experience. As we left the valley, we stopped at Tunnel View, a scenic overlook named for the long highway tunnel to which it is adjacent and owes its construction. A fellow tourist took a wonderful picture of us in front of the valley’s splendor.

We hopped back in Dorothy and hightailed it to the Mariposa Grove, a grove of enormous giant sequoia trees. We were only able to spend a few minutes there because we were quickly losing daylight, but we got a good glimpse, included one fallen sequoia that has been there for centuries, preserved by the trees’ natural composition.

We drove back to Wawona and kicked off dinner with an appetizer of hummus and carrots, before Emmy whipped up some chicken sausage and vegetables on our trusty stove. After our long hike, it tasted just about heavenly. I made a fire, and we roasted marshmallows for s’mores.

After dinner, we began preparing our extensive supplies for the next day’s voyage, and we went to bed under the stars before long.

Posted in Yosemite | 3 Responses »
Tags: Cooking, Food, Friendly natives, Hiking, One with nature, Sightseeing, Transportation, Views

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Our biggest challenge yet

The grandest of all special temples of Nature