Wherever You Go, There You Are

09 Mar Wherever You Go, There You Are

The last two days have been a bit hard to get my mind around. Colleen and I are at El Capitan Canyon, north of Santa Barbara. We left around 3:30 Sunday afternoon. I drove from home to one of our favorite produce stands in Somis. Colleen drove from there.

Throughout this physical challenge, I haven’t felt confident enough to drive much distance. That’s a bummer since driving, especially longer distances, is one of my favorite things to do in all the world! I was hoping to make this drive, but the stomach said otherwise.

I highly recommend the place we are staying. Click the link above to check it out for yourself. It is very unique. We stayed here one night in August 2008 as a surprise getaway during vacation (stay-cation at the time) in one of their “tent cabins”. It was great fun and very romantic.

On Sunday evening, we had unloaded our stuff from the van and Colleen moved it to the parking lot (they don’t allow vehicles parked next to their cabins, whether tent or regular). On her way back, she took a slight detour to soak in the atmosphere and see where the road would lead. That little excursion turned into a mountain lion sighting! She was thrilled!

This morning, before we left to come to the Santa Barbara area we were enjoying the sights of multiple woodpeckers and robins around our cabin. Just outside our front door, beyond our own picnic table and firepit, is a creek that is rushing by with water from our recent rainstorms. At night, the frogs are so loud, they can almost keep you awake!

Unfortunately, El Capitan Canyon is very pricey. However, I get emails from them regularly, and last August, they offered an incredible rate if you booked for nights between January 1 and March 31 and paid in full back then.

So, I’ve had this planned for months. We usually retreat ourselves away somewhere for our anniversary (March 15), so I thought this would be perfect timing. It probably still is, regardless of how I am feeling physically.

A number of folks we’ve shared about our trip with mentioned, “Oh, you must be feeling better”. Well, sorry to say, not really. Colleen even suggested changing the dates, but her schedule would not allow it until well after March 31.

So I decided, “I can feel miserable at home, or I can feel miserable in the woods alone with my incredible wife.” We are glad to be able to say we really are best friends, and share a relationship that we both readily admit to others that we love to be with each other.

That trivia-minded, “get to know you”, question …. “If you were stranded on a remote island and could have only one person with you, who would it be?” …. Colleen, without a doubt. We just enjoy being together just the two of us.

What’s hard to get my mind around is being in such a gorgeous location and just not feeling quite up to wandering around and exploring the surroundings. Colleen loves to hike, but my current condition finds me unable to walk much distance without needing to settle down and rest. I am thankful that she seems to not mind.

Actually, right now, I’m sitting in a Borders café while she is out and about making her way through the local thrift stores. We both love the Santa Barbara area, and the thrift stores are one of her favorite things to do when we’re here.

Since I can’t do much walking, she suggested dropping me here (if you know me, you know I was NOT opposed to that suggestion!) while she wandered the thrift stores. I perused the newly released book aisles and the biographies and memoirs section, and have been catching up on some reading, both offline and online. That’s a good day for me!

Tomorrow (Wednesday), we’ll head home in time for my 3:45 pm doctor’s appointment where we will get the results of my recent detailed liver blood work and the two tests I went through last week. I am hoping for some answers. We’ll see. I will most likely post tomorrow evening sometime with those results.