San Francisco - July 2017

Hiking Bernal Heights Park

As another excuse to escape the AZ heat, we went to San Fran to visit Rak, Simran and Ria for the weekend.  Shawna was in Denver for work so she flew in from there to Oakland on Wednesday evening, having dinner with Eric (her old boss from Cigna who now is working at Kaiser) before heading into the city to Rak and Sim's house.  Once she arrived, she chatted a bit with Simran before going to bed.

Ocean Beach

On Thursday, Shawna worked from their house while Simran taught one of her cooking classes.  That evening, Simran, Shawna and Ria had dinner at Red Hill Station, a cute restaurant with good seafood dishes.  After dinner, Shawna treated Ria to ice cream at Garden Creamery where they shared mango sticky rice and ube ice cream - odd flavors but quite yummy.  We returned to the house and Keith arrived in time to have a few glasses of wine before bed.  Keith had flown into Sacramento for work and drove up to San Fran.

View of San Fran

On Friday, we both worked from the house and Simran had another day of her cooking class.  Rak arrived that afternoon after being away for work that week.  That evening, we had cheese and crackers for an appetizer and then Indian food made by Simran's mother - it was delish!  We were all quite tired so went to bed early.

Yummy Noodles

On Saturday, Keith, Simran, Shawna and Ria went over Devil's Tooth Bakery for breakfast sandwiches and then we walked along Ocean Beach - it was foggy but still pretty.  After this, we picked up Rakesh and went to a market to pick up goods for the weekend.  Needing some more walking time, we headed over to Bernal Heights Park to walk around the hill and to see views of the city.  We then had lunch at a noodle shop - Keith had the duck and Shawna had shrimp.  Of course, we had to stop for ice cream at Ice Cream Bar, this time having the caramel honey ice cream.  In the afternoon, we napped and then had happy hour at the house before heading over to Marwah's for a dinner party - Mexican themed!  Shawna made sangria and tres leches cake (which was super moist) and Rakesh made a chilled tomato soup (which was surprisingly good).  For dinner we had mole enchiladas, corn and salad.  It was great to see Marwah and to meet his new girlfriend.

Dinner at Marwah's House

On Sunday, we had an early brunch of dim sum at Koi Palace - we were definitely in the minority!  We ate too much so we then went for a hike at the Dish near Stamford.  It was nice views but it was a very hot day.  After cleaning up back at the house, we napped and then had appetizers before Shawna had to go to the airport to fly back home.  Keith stayed the night as he had to go to Santa Rosa the next day for work and then flew to Vegas before returning home.

Park City - July 2017

Silver Lake Hike

We decided to celebrate our 16th anniversary with a four day weekend in Park City.  The added advantage was that it also allowed us to escape the crazy AZ heat!

Accommodation:

Hotel Park City (a Marriott hotel) - Shawna had enough points to get us all four nights free here so we booked it!  It's a beautiful, all suite hotel, about a mile outside of town.  We were upgraded to an executive suite so had a separate bedroom from the living room/kitchen.

Hotel Park City

Activities:

We flew into Salt Lake City on the Friday night and then drove out to Park City.  The drive is only about 45 minutes and it was still light out so we could see the beautiful scenery along the way.  When we arrived at our hotel, we checked in and were greeted with a lovely bottle of rose wine that Keith had ordered in advance.  So after unpacking, we had a couple of glasses of wine before dinner.  We were too lazy to go into town for dinner so we grabbed dinner at the hotel which was surprisingly good.

Each day, we slept in, grabbed breakfast, did a morning activity, had an afternoon nap and then went out for dinner.  It was a very relaxing weekend.  Here are the activities we did:

• Park City Mountain: We hiked up Jenni Trail and down Loose Moose Trail - about a two hour hike that went up the front side of the mountain.  Most of the time we were in the shade which was nice but we did have to share the trail with mountain bikers.  

Jenni Trail Hike

• Massage at Hotel Park City - We each had an 80 minute massage which was in our top 25% of massages we've had. The spa is pretty nice with steam rooms and a whirlpool to enjoy before the massage.

• Park City Town - We walked around the town and went into a few of the galleries.  The town is very cute.

Park City

• Utah Olympic Park: This was the adrenaline portion of the trip.  We started with a tour of the park which is about an hour and we learned about the events that were held there during the olympics as well as the current use of the facility (they still use it as a training facility but make money by offering activities to the public).  Our guide is the announcer for the sledding events at the Olympics so was interesting to hear about the park from his perspective.  Keith convinced Shawna to try the Extreme Zip Line (much to her chagrin) which turned out to be quite fun.  We took a chair lift to the top and then had to wait about 45 minutes before our turn. We both went down at the same time by being strapped into a harness.  After this, we went in the bobsled (driven by a professional) down the track - about a mile in one minute!  On one of the turns, there is about 4Gs of force that come down on you so it was definitely a rough ride but also very fun!  There is not a ton of room in the sled so we were both happy to get out of it when it was over!

Bobsled Ride

One of the ski jumps

• Deer Valley: We hiked the Silver Lake Trail (which begins from the Silver Lake Village), a 2.25 mile hike that goes up the front of the mount and around the back side.  The views were amazing!  We then took the gondola down to save pressure on our knees!  We had planned on going stand up paddle boarding but opted to have a few glasses of wine at the St Regis instead - a choice we did not regret!

On Tuesday, we decided to relax at the hotel and then drove back to Salt Lake for our flight home.  It was a great weekend and we would definitely return!

Restaurants:

Ruth's Chris - Located at our hotel - we were surprised by how good the food was.  We shared the crab avocado salad, lamb, fingerling potatoes and brussel sprouts with bacon.

Legends - Had lunch here - located at the Park City Mountain resort.  We sat outside and shared the compressed melon salad with shrimp and some hummus.

Coal and Lumber - Had dinner here.  Shared the heirloom tomatoes with burrata, charcuterie board, mushrooms and rigatoni with bolognese.  The food was OK.

High West Distillery and Saloon - Had a few drinks here. Great bar/restaurant.

Fletchers - Had dinner here.  Decided to share several appetizers: biscuits with bacon jam, peach salad, tuna tartare and lobster tacos.  Also shared the warm butter cake for dessert.  Food was tasty.

Royal Street Cafe - Had lunch here - located at Deer Valley resort.  We were told we had to have the seafood tower so we shared that along with another salad.  Nice patio to sit on.

St Regis - Had a few glasses of rose on the patio overlooking the valley.  Gorgeous setting.

Riverhorse on Main - Had dinner here. Was our favorite of the restaurants.  Shared the tuna tartare trio, pear and burrata salad and trio of game.  Food was very good.