Weise's World

Throughout the summer months Christian spends most of his time swimming. We took the vacation to Idaho and he takes various field trips with his day care (some pretty good ones, like to Discovery Kingdom and Sunsplash). I always feel bad that we don’t do more and I don’t want him to regret swimming because he misses out on his vacation so after swim is over during the last week before heading back to school I try to give his summer vacation one last hurrah… In the past some last minute trips have included Circus-Circus in Reno and Discovery Kingdom.

 

This year, he had a blast his last week of vacation… It all started with grandma and grandpa on Monday taking him fishing at the pond here and then to the Sacramento Zoo followed by fishing and roller skating on Tuesday.

 

 

 

Now Wednesday I took Christian to do something I wanted him to experience --- horse riding. I wanted a true horse experience, not some pony ride. We heard about Equine Unlimited and it was perfect. A drop-in group lesson – my wishes were many to make this a complete experience, but my hopes and expectations were small. I’m glad to say that everything I was wishing this riding experience would be for Christian came true. Christian was introduced to Romeo and he was taught how to groom him before a ride and how to lead him around to the riding area. The instructors only gave instructions, they did not take charge of the horse – Christian (and the other kids) were in complete control. They quickly got on their horses, got some basic instructions on how to control the horse and then they walked around the arena. Christian did great, picked it up quickly and he moved into a larger arena where they started to teach him how to make the horse trot and stop. It was great when Christian rode his horse over toward me and I had to reach UP to hand him a drink of water while he sat proudly in the saddle. They finished the group lesson up with a short trail ride and as soon as Christian dismounted Romeo he asked if we could come back (and we have gone back already).

 

 

   

 

The fun doesn’t end on Wednesday though as on Thursday we got together with another buddy and after having Round Table for lunch we hit Surf XTreme to do some trampoline jumping, wake boarding and surfing… They had been there with their daycare and picked to return here to Surf rather than heading to Sky High. What fun!!

 

 

 
  

 

Finally we come to Friday/Saturday where we do an impromptu trip to the Santa Cruz area. It started as a Santa Cruz Beach/Beach Boardwalk trip, but Christian said he wanted to spend more time with me and didn’t want to ride a lot of rides (as noted, I’m not a rides person). So before we left we talked about changing the plans to include a shorter visit to the boardwalk and throw in a visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium… Then while driving down to Santa Cruz I realized there was another place Christian talked about wanting to visit --- the Exploratorium. In the end we hit Exploratorium on our way down. A new location, parking is atrocious, same old Exploratorium. We arrived in the early afternoon, had lunch first and then went to get tickets from the back Kiosk. I guess not a lot of people do that as the employee had trouble logging in so we could make the purchase. In the end, he said it’s not our fault he’s having troubles, stamped our hands and let us in for free. Christian enjoyed all the hands on exhibits and had fun.

 

After the Exploratorium we hit the Santa Cruz area but it was too late to do anything. Continued on to Watsonville to find a hotel and everything was booked up!! Wow, we ended up finding one room available at the Holiday Inn Express Watersonville. More than I wanted to pay, but it was a room and it worked out well (included a pretty dang good continental breakfast).  

 Saturday, after breakfast, we hit the Monterey Bay Aquarium and, again, had a great time. We were there just two years ago but it’s still a fun place to visit. This time we saw the Penguin  feeding and the Open Water feeding (check out those sardines swarming in the picture!) amongst all the other exhibits… As we left Monterey and headed back up to Santa Cruz in the afternoon the fog lifted and the sun came so we finished the day by hanging out at the Santa Cruz Beach for a couple of hours, digging up sand crabs and playing football in the water and then hit the Beach Boardwalk for rides – including Double Shot, a 125 foot crazy fast frog jumper.

 

 
 
 
 
 
 

           

 

What a great way to finish up summer vacation!!