And off we go!

We've spent the last nine days or so hanging out in Los Gatos, CA with Greg and Cesca...and it has been glorious! After weeks of moving around, it was a nice change to sleep on the same futon for a solid week and a half.

Some of you may be wondering why we stayed there for a week and a half, and why this entry isn't about Guatemala...well, good ol' Spirit Airlines decided that they would no longer fly to LAX to Guatemala City on Tuesdays, and thus we were obliged to spend some more quality time with Greg and Cesca, which ended up working out for the best anyhow. We had a blast!

Highlights include:

- Taking the dogs, Maddy and Cooper, for walks in the Redwoods daily-ish
- spending the day in San Francisco, including a hike up to Coit Tower (soooo many stairs!), browsing in the City Lights Bookshop, and a visit to the legendary Boudin bakery for sourdough bread
- Watching sea lions fight!
- watching Greg try to figure out how to use a public bathroom and giving up when he couldn't find the door (to be fair, none of us could either)

Friday night, we went to our friend Brandon Padilla's new house in Santa Cruz. There, we met up with our friends Dave and Erin, who have recently moved from Charlottesville to Berkeley. We had a great time seeing all of our friends again and hopefully Brandon can show Greg around his new campus sometime. Later in the evening, we went to a taqueria down the road and munched on some Mexican food, which is prevalent throughout the area. We awoke early the next morning because Greg and Cesca wanted to get home and check on the dogs. We immediately went back to sleep for several hours when we got home. Sometime after noon, we woke and had a lazy day. Greg had work from noon to 5 (not actually, but he had believed this was the case and so he showed up to tutor at the wrong time), so Stew and Cesca watched bad movies until Tori awoke later in the day.

We all met up with Brandon, Dave, and Erin at a place called Panther Cove, famous for a pirate who once took harbor there from the Feds with a cargo of stolen jungle cats which then escaped, smoked their former master in cruel revenge, and have been the main form of law in Santa Cruz ever since. At least, that is the legend in the parts, where various aspects seem to remain common wisdom. Specifically, it seems that everyone at the beach believed it was necessary to constantly be smoking marijuana (presumably to avoid the jungle cats known to prowl the region).

The beach looks like a post card or a beer commercial. You have to stop at an unmarked dirt parking lot along a highway, climb down a steep and rocky cliff, walk through a giant rock arch, and eventually emerge onto a gorgeous white sand beach, where people fly their kites high. Erin reported one of the kites had broken loose and run rampant along the beach before climbing above the cliffs and out of sight. We walked down the beach aways and across a land bridge to a giant rock in the middle of the cove. Brandon knew of a cave on the opposite site (looking toward the ocean) of the rock, so we climbed dangerously up to it. The climb would have been fairly easy in normal conditions, but the crashing waves and gusting wind combined with our flip flopped feet made for a treacherous venture. Despite all of our nailbiting, we got up to the cave. It was awesome and a truly fascinating place. It is the only place in the world where wind is generated from rock, so even though we were surrounded on three faces, we still were getting sand hurtled at us from all directions. It is like the mystery spot but free.

We returned to Brandon's house where we met up with Greg and Nikki (Brandon's roommate) and then went out for dinner at a local brewery. The food could not come soon enough, as we were all famished. Stew and Greg ate their food like they were preparing to play shark extras in Jaws 7: Feeding Frenzy. Dave noticed a friend from Charlottesville at the bar. Totally crazy coincidence. No one would drink Oatmeal Stouts with Stew, so he dejectedly decided to be the DD (Greg: "The only people that can drink a pitcher of an Oatmeal stout are giant bearded men. Tori and Cesca aren't going to want to share it with you.") After dinner, we went home and went to sleep early, because we had big plans for the next day.

On Sunday, we went to a party with Stew's friend from Semester at Sea: Tucker Heiner. The party was near where Greg and Cesca will be moving in San Jose (sort of ). There was a keg and a cook out, which made for a great time. Team Pollock + Tori owned all opposition in a spirited game of Bocce. Unfortuantely, we had to get home to check on the dogs before we could transfer our prowess to the other retirement style game offered: shuffle board. Surely we have missed our calling. Or maybe, we're just getting a head start on being old. Watch out Grandma: we're coming.

The next day we spent lazing around the house, preparing stuff to go, playing with the dog, and nursing back to health. Stew got an eye infection and didn't want to leave the house. Unfortunately, on Tuesday, Cesca had to go back to work. Tori woke up with an eye infection but Stew was better. We could not put off errands any more and ran around Capitola figuring out last minute logistics while Greg taught English to a 12th grader down the road. This is so weird it ought to be discussed. Greg works for "The Merit Academy" as a private tutor. One of his students receives all of her education from the academy. She does not go to any school, but she is not homeschooled either. Greg will teach all of her english for the year. But he has no material and no qualifications as full time teacher. Instead, her entire English class is writing college applications, which Greg proof reads and teaches her how to write better. Something about the idea of being homeschool tutored with no curriculum seems weird. But then again, it is incredibly practical if you think about it: The point of high school is to get into college. This will get her into college. Therefore, this fulfills the role of high school. One could contend it doesn't prepare you for college but let's be honest: no one learns to write in high school.

We woke up today (Wednesday) and got on a long boring bus to LA (again), where we met up with Randi and Chris Rose, who are friends of Tori's parents. They have been wonderful hosts and took us out to dinner and offered us an amazing bed to sleep in. We also got to play with their dog, Betty. Tomorrow we get on a plane to Guatemala. W00t