A Santa Barbara Weekend

     This year the California 4-H Technology Team received a $10,000 grant from Best Buy.  This grant is to help educate youth in technology fields that can jump start their interest into getting a career in that field.  We used the grant money to hold multiple state wide film production trainings.  The goal of the trainings are for the youth to learn the basics of film production from story boarding  filming, and the edition process.  The first training was help on Saturday, February 2, 2013, at the Santa Barbara County 4-H Office.  I had volunteered to be one of the members to run the training, since I was the closest.  Steven Worker (team adviser) and I had held the training, and it went real well.  Originally, I was to wake up extremely early, drive the 2 hr 30 min drive, do the training, then drive right back home.  What sounded like a good idea at first, changed into a three day trip to Santa Barbara with my parents.  They were free, and I offered for them to go up to have a good time while I was doing the training.  They were free and decided to go.  I liked the idea because I would get a change to explore Santa Barbara, which mostly I have only driving past the city in route up to Monterey, and I wouldn't have to worry about paying for gas.

     We left for Santa Barbara just after my mom got home from work.  Sadly, my sister couldn't join us this weekend because of her busy schedule.  In a way, I liked it because I got the entire back seat to myself, and in another way, I didn't like it because I wouldn't have someone closer to my age to joke around and things.  The drive up was alright.  We ran into some traffic, which made it a 3 hr drive.  We stopped in Ventura to eat dinner at an IHop. We got to Santa Barbara, and checked into our hotel (The Quality Inn).  The hotel was on the older side, but it was still nice looking.  We just stayed in the room that night.  I should of done homework, but I ended up watching Mythbusters on Netflix.  

     The next day, we had to wake up early, so I could get to the Santa Barbara 4-H Office at 9 am.  My dad pushed for us to have the hotel's continental breakfast.  I had other thoughts.  Majority of the continental breakfast is filled with pastries and muffins filled with sugar  and I didn't find that such a great breakfast.  My mom felt the same way.  They would go have breakfast somewhere after they dropped me off.  There happened to be a Starbucks across from the 4-H Office, so we stopped off there first where I got a vanilla flavored coffee and a sausage breakfast sandwich.  We got to the office, and we were a little early.  Once Steven arrived, they left, and I got to work.  The film production training went well for the first run. We had 19 people from Santa Barbara, Ventura, San Luis Obispo, and Los Angeles County attend.  Time was the biggest issue for the training.  The training was held from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm, which doesn't give enough time to fully complete a small video.  One group did succeed in their filming, but the other groups had a tough time completing.  After the training, we packed up the lab equipment, and the parents showed up to pick me up where we went off to explore the area. 

     First, we drove right down the street to a placed in Isla Vista called Del Playa Park, which was right at the ocean.  Instead of carrying my big Nikon D90, I decided to take my small point and shoot camera and just enjoy the area.  The first thing we see is a beautiful hawk just sitting there on a yucca plant on the cliff overlooking the ocean.  This is were I felt stupid.  I could have gotten a great photograph if I had brought my D90, but nope!  That is a big fail on my photography part.  We walked down the cliff path until we found stairs that took us to the beach.  It would be the beginning of the Coal Oil Point Reserve, which is apart of UC Santa Barbara.  The day was a little cool, and it was overcast skies.  It would have been very beautiful if it was fully sunny.  The sounds of the crashing waves and the smell of the ocean air brought a great sense of relaxation.  While walking along the beach, we saw a good amount of clam and scallop shells.  An occasional crab exo-skeleton.  There were some sea caves carved into the sandstone cliffs from the waves, which I had to check out.  My mom paid attention to the cliff, and about 2/3's up was a layer of clam shells, most likely fossils.  The layer continued for quite sometime.  This meant there was a major uplift of this area, taking the sea floor out of the water, and not giving the animals a chance to escape.  A prime example of the power of earthquakes.  A part of me wanted to have access to that layer, so I can take a look at those old clams up close, but there was no way of doing so.  After about an hour, we headed back, and decided to drive to the other side of UC Santa Barbara to check out the beach areas near the UCSB Lagoon.  We parked near a group of dorms, and walked on out.  Extremely loud music was being played by college students in the dorms and other housing.  Most of it inappropriate.  The music didn't bother me, for I have tons of music like that, but my mom wasn't too pleased.  I was more bothered that the music was overpowering the crashing waves of the ocean.  If I was a college student here, I would have spent more time at the beach that listening to loud music.  I consider them very luck to have dorms right at the ocean, and they didn't seem to really care.  It was beautiful.  Got to hear some frogs, and got to enjoy the protective nature area for a bit before having to turn around due to the lack of time on the parking meter.  I wanted to go forward and explore the beach more, but sadly that didn't happen.  

     It was dinner time, and we all were hungry.  I wanted to have Seafood, since we are at the ocean, so we started looking around for a good seafood place.  We drove down State Street in downtown Santa Barbara to see what restaurants there was.  Didn't see many options for seafood, and thought that seafood would be closer to the ocean.  Right after we drove under the 101, my mom and I saw a restaurant with flame torches.   It was a seafood place.  We kept that place as an idea as we parked on Cabrillo Blvd and the city beach and walked to Stearns Wharf.  There were a handful of restaurants with seafood at the wharf, but they were extremely expensive or didn't get the feel of it being that great.  We decided to leave the wharf and head towards downtown.  We checked the restaurant that had the flame torches, which was called the Enterprise Fish Company, and we had decided this was the place for dinner.  The place looked busy, but we were able to be seated right away.  The food was amazing.  I ordered a Pacific Red Snapper with a basil lime sauce and pin nuts with Romano cheese mashed potatoes.  It was amazing!  If I am ever in Santa Barbara again, and looking for seafood, this will be the place.   Afterwards, we drove back to the hotel, where the parents watched TV while I did homework.  

     The next morning, we woke up earlier than expected.  Usually my dad likes to sleep in until 10:00 am, which gets real annoying on trips.  This was a nice change. Yesterday, the parents had their fun day going to the Orchid farms.  Today, we did things that I wanted to do.  We had planned to go to the California Historic Mission Santa Barbara and the Santa Barbara Zoo.  My dad wanted to start the day with the continental breakfast.  As the day before, my mom and I had other plans.  We did not share our love for the hotel's food, and we wanted to eat at a local food place.  Just down the road, we saw a restaurant called Jeanine's Restaurant and Bakery, the day before.  We hinted we would like to try the place, since it looked popular.  My dad agreed, and we headed on down for a amazing breakfast.  When we got there, we walked in to find they worked off the you order up front and then sit down.  They had some amazing options on the menu.  Strangely, I had what I normally get when having breakfast at a restaurant.  Scrambled eggs, hashbrowns/potatoes, bacon, and sourdough toast.  I wanted coffee, and when looking at the menu, I found they had latte's.  I ordered a small Vanilla Latte.  I was expecting something around the usual drink I get from Starbucks.  I was wrong.  This vanilla latte was one of the best coffee drinks I ever had.  It was huge, it was flavorful, it had a thick layer of foam, it was hot, it was jizz in your pants delicious.  The food was just as great as the coffee.  Everything is fresh and organic items from the local area.  The eggs were brown cage free eggs, the potatoes were as fresh as ever, and the bacon was orgasmic.  Way better than the hotel continental breakfast, and a great way to start out the day.  It was a very relaxing way to start the day.  Eating outside was amazing.  Didn't feel like it was the middle of winter.  


     After breakfast, we headed to Mission Santa Barbara.  I had been here before, but I was too young to remember.  I really enjoy visiting the Historic Spanish Missions of California.  The history, the environment, the buildings, the gardens, eta.  This mission was beautiful, just like many of the others.  This mission was also different then the others.  We paid a $5.00 entry fee to go on a self guided tour.  As we started, I had learned two things.  First, we would not be able to see the Church itself because of Sunday Mass.  About have of the entire mission is still in use today, and is off limits to those visiting.  One big shock I found was that the mission had an retreat area where groups can rent out to use.  One of my favorite things about the missions are their gardens.  Especially their water fountains.  While my parents were watching a video display about the mission, I walked outside to enjoy the environment.  It was peaceful.  The clear blue skies, with the cool ocean air refreshed my lungs.  The birds singing away entertained my ears along with the water sounds of the sacred garden fountain.  Things seemed perfect.  I would of loved to stay there for a few hours to just relax and enjoy this environment, but we wanted to do other things in the city.  One of the last things we did was to walk through the cemetery.  Only one person I knew of that was laid to rest there. Juana Maria.  An Native American Indian woman who got left behind on St. Nicholas Island on the Channel Islands, and lived alone for 18 years before being rescued by missionaries.  The story, "Island of the Blue Dolphins", was write based off this woman.  I remember reading the book in school, I believe 4th grade, when learning about California history.  

     As we got in the car, my parents had an interest to see other historical places in the city, and I didn't mind.  We went downtown to the El Presidio de Santa Barbara State Historic Park.  Here was what was left of the military outpost that was founded by Father Serra.  Only one wall, the back wall, remained with the church, and they were currently working on building more structures to replicate the old presidio more.  It was quite interesting to see, but less exciting than the mission.  There seemed to be archaeological dig sites at the presidio still, and other places where they were still working on restoring the old buildings.  It was still nice to see.  Afterwards, we took a walk just a few blocks down to Casa de Guerra, which was an house of the fifth commander of the Presidio.  It was cool to see.  Good amount of Spanish heritage items.  As we were walking back, I noticed a super car just parked on the side of the road.  It was a new McLaren MP4-12C.  

     With the end of our historical adventure of Santa Barbara, it was time to head to the Santa Barbara Zoo.  With going to the San Diego Zoo thousands of times, going to other zoos at times can be a little iffy.  The zoo in Santa Barbara did not disappoint.  The zoo was nicely landscaped, you can see all the animals, and it wasn't too big or too small.  It was just the right sized.  Unlike other smaller zoos, I was surprised to see certain animals.  I was surprised to see lions and snow leopards.  They even had animals I have never seen before.  The very rare Channel Islands Fox was one of them.  It was a very enjoyable place to visit, and I highly recommend this zoo to anyone who is visiting the area.  Took us about 2 1/2 hours to see everything.  Well, almost everything.  A few exhibits were closed because of construction of a new facility.

     After the zoo, we had decided it was time for us to leave Santa Barbara and head on home.  My mom and I were getting hungry, and we decided we would stop somewhere on the way home.  We ended up stopping at Ventura Harbor.  A few years ago, while on a work trip, I had met my old State 4-H Ambassador Adviser for lunch at a seafood place at the Harbor.  My parents were open to the idea.  I had us stop at some buildings that looked just the same as I thought in my memory.  It was the Ventura Harbor Village.  We walked around, and things didn't seem to look the same.  We got to the end of the village, and I realized that the restaurant was still a few blocks down.  Instead of getting back into the car, we decided to choose to eat around the village.  We were walking between two buildings when cannon fire shock us up from ahead.  A civil war reenactment was happening that day, and it would be from soldiers from the land to old tall ships in the harbor.  My parents waiting for the first few shots to stop, then they wanted to continue on.  Me on the other hand, wanted to stay for more action.  Cannon fire is kick ass!  I made them stay for a little bit longer, then we headed towards the place we decided to eat at.  We ate at a Mexican restaurant that was on the second floor of a building, and it was called Margaritaville.  It had a good view of the harbor, the ocean, and the civil war battles happening.  Most people inside didn't give a shit about the civil war stuff, because they were glued to the tv screens for the Super Bowl.  I hate football.  I really don't understand those who love it too much.  Only thing I watched during dinner was the half time show.  

     After dinner, it was time to end this great weekend.  I real quick ran over closer to the ocean to get some photos of the sunset, then we all headed to the car and headed home.  It was a nice weekend, and was greatly needed since I would have 4 exams the next week and a half.  Having this calm before the storm really helped.