Done with the Bar! Now off to New York and Paris!

Hey guys, guess what?! I finished taking the bar yesterday! EEEEEEEEE! Now we just have to keep our fingers collectively crossed that I actually passed. So I never have to put up with another 2 months of this:

Actually I mock, but these were two of my favorite video lecturers. They were very . . . animated. They kept me from falling asleep. But still I'm excited to leave those fellas behind and, instead, spend time in NYC with some friends from college who have kindly agreed to celebrate my new freedom with me. I'm thinking coffee and croissants in the park and then maybe a tour of Mast Brothers Chocolate Factory? Followed by copious amounts of wine, of course.

Then on Saturday, I'm off to Paris with my little brother. I absolutely cannot wait to spend 15 days looking at art in the morning, having a leisurely lunch, spending afternoons reading in the parks or shopping on cobblestone streets, and then roasting veggies and finishing a bottle of wine for dinner. It sounds like absolute perfection when you've spent the last 2 months studying or (more often) feeling guilty because you weren't studying. I'll be sure to send lots and lots of updates!

All image sources: fireworks, Kaplan screenshots are my own handiwork, the City, celebratory cake, taxis, champagne, Eiffel Tower.

Guides de Paris

Bar studying is getting really intense since it is now July, and I've only got 20 some days until I attempt to become a barred attorney. But it's so hard to concentrate when my Amazon package of guides to Paris arrived! In addition to the usual travel books, I also picked up the 2 Herb Lester maps for Paris, which I am most excited about. Each Herb Lester map includes some information on well-known sites, shops, or restaurants, but it also includes information on unknown or random spots that sounds just plain awesome. I got turned onto them by Bucket List Nation, and now I think I might buy every single one! (Truly Greenwich Village is next on my list to get.)

Happy Friday (Where I Reminisce about my CA Road Trip)

Can you believe it? Yesterday was my last post about things I did on my spring break road trip. I thought I would never get around to sharing it all! Looking back it was a pretty packed trip. After starting the trip in LA with baked goods from Trails and burgers from Umamicatessen, we napped on the beach and ate seafood in Santa Barbara. We drank wine and ate Danish delicacies in Solvang. We took a wrong turn and stumbled on upon the beautifully secluded Surf Beach. We spent hours gawking at the opulence of the Hearst Castle's interior and exterior. We fell in love with the food and culture in San Luis Obispo. Then we fell in love with the wines at the near by Paso Robles vineyard, J. Lohr. We took a time out to enjoy nature at Big Sur State Park. Then we took in the sights at Monterey and Carmel by the Sea, including 17 Mile Drive. We stopped at the Winchester Mystery House on the way up to Berkely (I couldn't take pictures there, but see some sneaky phone photos here). We made an impromptu exploration of Oxbow Public Market, and we also stopped at like every vista point on the way up the coast. Whoa! I am tired just remembering it all. Good thing its the weekend. What are you up to? Have I inspired you to get out and explore this weekend?!

Ox Bow Public Market with a Chez Panisse Post Script

This is the last road trip adventure I have to share. Finally we ended the trip with what you see here: gourmet food in NorCal. I had randomly seen an article in the LA Times about Oxbow Public Market, which is in old town Napa. At first, we had no plans on going to Napa, but it was pouring so hard that we gave up on our original plans to walk around SF. So we tried wine country, which often will be sunny even when the city is cloudy, and that is how we ended up trying out Oxbow Public Market. So great! If my waist line could expand just a little more, I would have spent the whole day there! Arepas, crepes, organic ice cream, pizzas, fancy coffee, a cheese shop, an oyster bar, giant cupcakes, and the list goes on! There was so much amazing, locally-made food stuffed into this 40,000 square foot warehouse. After a large lunch, we drove through the rest of old town Napa and continued up the 29 through Yountville, St. Helena, and Calistoga. Cutest.Towns.Ever. (For more on these adorable towns, check out the NY Times's 36 Hours in Napa.) Apparently Oxbow was just the tip of the iceberg as far as awesome places to eat in wine country. I'd love to spend 2 weeks touring vineyards and trying new restaurants every night!

PS: That night we somehow found room to eat more, which is good because I had made reservations at the upstairs dining room at Chez Panisse, which is famous for allegedly creating California cuisine. Panisse was really good, and I'm glad we went since it's so famous. But to be totally honest, the moderately priced food and casual atmosphere at Oxbow made a much bigger impression. But I would be remiss in my blogger duties if I did not at least mention the garlic souffle included with the second plate below. It was the highlight of the meal!

A Misty Hike in Big Sur to Pfeiffer Falls

The day I visited Big Sur State Park was overcast and damp. It felt pretty much exactly how the Twilight movie looks. But the misty weather wasn't all bad. The woods take on kind of mysterious feel in the mist, which I like even if it means there's not much of a view. Plus you have the trails pretty much to yourself on rainy days, except for particularly cute & gross (grute?) children with banana slugs apparently. I don't think you could pay me enough money to touch a slug, but this little girl was so proud of her slug and so excited to share it with us that she managed to make holding a slug look kind of adorable (even if I was scared to get too close)!

We found parking and the trail head at Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park (not to be confused with Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park or USFS Pheiffer Beach). Entrance to the lot cost $10 for a day pass. From the parking lot we hiked to Pheiffer falls. The falls were not as robust as they can be, but waterfalls are always fun to see. On our way back we detoured to the Valley View Point. The vista was mostly fog, but the rain had brought all of the wild flowers to make up for it.

I wish I could say more, but after the hike, we were off to our next activity. So I only spent a few hours in the park. But that is just all the more reason to come back and actually stay inside of the park! I've got my eye on these awesome looking yurts. After Yosemite, I would shy away from anything remotely tent like, but these yurts made Conde Nast Traveler's list for glamping. So they must be good!

Quick Highlights from Monterey & Carmel

Over spring break, I spent very little time in Monterey (probably for the best) and even less time in Carmel (definitely a missed opportunity). Although Monterey is kind of "meh," one highlight was this really tasty restaurant that we ate at the first night: the Montrio Bistro. A lot of the other restaurants in Monterey are over-priced, tourist-targeting seafood houses. You can definitely skip them despite the high ratings on Yelp. Check out Montrio Bistro instead. It's got an interesting menu and equally interesting decor. The other highlight of Monterey was the sea lions. Do sea lions ever get old? They're just so adorably chubby! I was especially fond of the one in the far right corner who is resting his head on his own back. That is flexibility.

The highlights of Carmel, on the other hand, are just about everything. Such good shopping for art and home goods and clothes. Such cute inns to stay at. And such great pizza! I grabbed a butternut squash pizza pie to go from La Bicyclette on our way out of town. It was so good that it was almost gone by the time we got back on the highway (which was only about 5 minutes down the road). Carmel is now on my mental list of places that I absolutely have to come back to. I can send the boyfriend off to golf all day while I browse the boutiques and wander down alleys!

17 Mile Drive

You wouldn't know I live in Los Angeles with all my adventures to other parts of California these days. Here's yet another. Over spring break, my travel buddy and I did the 17 Mile Drive through Pebble Beach. Parts were stunning, parts were kind of boring, and all of it was very, very cold. I'm not sure if I would recommend it in March, maybe wait for balmier weather? Not that the bitter wind stopped anyone from golfing! The highlight was all of the the sea lions and seals. We actually got really close to a few seals swimming by the beach (see terrible picture above)!

Just a note: there's a $10 fee to access the road. (We did no research and did not know this.) But if you eat at any of the golf clubs (and by "any" I mean the 2 that are open to the public), they will take the $10 off of your lunch. We ate at the Inn & Links at Spanish Bay. There's 2 restaurants there, and luckily one is a not-totally-outrageously-priced sports bar. If that is not baller enough for you, feel free to continue to the last stop, the Lodge at Pebble Beach, instead.