big sur / by vanessa

I'm back from my ladies weekend in Big Sur. Holy cow I love that place. There's zero cell reception. The only way they could possibly make the place cooler is if I didn't have to take out a small loan in order to eat. Here's the rundown:

Friday morning we left LA. Nearly ran out of gas on the way up which was kinda funny because we stopped at a visitor's center where the information booth hostess invited us to tour the museum instead of driving six miles up the road to the gas station. We politely declined.

Nicole brought along a game called Scruples which basically exposed each of us for the illogical hypocrites that we are. Tiring of that after about twenty rounds, we settled on a good ole fashioned game of I Never. In the car. Because we're apparently a bunch of twelve year olds. Whatever - it was so much fun and we knew that once we met up with Joslyn she'd be so bummed that she missed out. We were right.

Eventually all of us made it to Lucia Lodge, hung out for a little while, then went to dinner at the lodge restaurant. Food, eh; service, yeah. We definitely outstayed our welcome. We finally all went to bed after much cajoling -- okay banging on the walls -- from our neighbors.

Reader, I slept. It was glorious. It's been weeks since I've gotten a full night's rest and I totally needed it. Eventually we got up, rolled our mats out and practiced against the backdrop of the Pacific ocean. Chanel *graced* us w/ her Forrest abs series. Thanks. Then we went on a 6-but-feels-like-50 mile hike which was awesome until we ran into some newborn rodents who had fallen out of their nest and we're crying the saddest, boldest squeaks I've ever heard. We couldn't really help them which felt even worse. And it's weird how nature has its extremes: indescribable beauty juxtaposed with impartial law. You can't have one without the other and yet I prefer only to remember the breathtaking vistas and call that "nature. The truth is I can't pick and choose. The extremes are inseparable.

A-n-y-w-a-y... we drove home and what follows is one of the reasons why Chanel rocks. We were sooo hungry. As Joslyn said, "Man I'm starving. All I've had was a gnat and that was like three hours ago." We finally got back to the lodge only to the find that the restaurant with the bad, but our only choice, food, was closed. I jumped in the shower as did Leslie, Joslyn, and Nicole, and by the time we got out (separately, I mean), in walks Chanel with 5 grilled cheese-avocado-tomato sandwiches. Hell yeah. Nevermind that the restaurant had been closed for an hour or that the sandwiches weren't even on the menu if it HAD been open. She gets stuff done, that one.

So I'll round it out with saying that we drove home yesterday, stopping for a really great yoga class (Eddie Ellner) in Santa Barbara. Leslie and I stayed up til 2 something talking and I'm totally exhausted right now, so things are pretty much back to normal.

Here's a picture of us in order from left to right. Joslyn, Nicole, Chanel, me, Leslie.