My Tasha Birthday Weekend

This past weekend, Tasha flew down to celebrate my (early) birthday.

I picked her up on Friady morning from Long Beach and we drove to Santa Barbara for lunch.  We ate lunch at one of my favorite places, Paradise Cafe.

 It was a hot and beautiful drive up the coast.  But, we made it San Simeon right at check-in time at our hotel and collapsed onto our beds for naps!

Then we made our way out to the bluff right outside our door to watch this-

 This place is beautiful!  We watched the sun go down and sat on a bench and talked until dark.  The hotel had a cute restaurant on-site, so we headed there for a yummy dinner before heading back to our room for a good night's sleep.

 Saturday morning, we ventured out to check out the town.  These are scarecrows...can you tell?  They are all over the place!  Apparently, San Simeon and Cambria have a scarecrow festival.  We liked the ones in Cambria much better.  But we still had some fun with these-

 We loved our little slice of San Simeon and did not want to leave...

 We checked out at 1:00 and headed to Hearst Castle!

 I have always wanted to come here and we took the Grand Rooms tour.

 Here are just a few of the pics I took of the inside:

 After our 45 minute tour, we were let loose on the grounds to enjoy for as long as we wanted!  It was an absolutely beautiful day!

 We stayed at the Castle and Visitors Center much longer than we thought we would.  But we couldn't pass up the chance to go say hi to the Elephant Seals, before heading south for the night.

I also loved the spray that was coming off the waves... 

 And I found the Hearst Zebras!!!

 Tash bought me a delicious Birthday dinner at Robin's in Cambria.  It was heaven in my mouth!

 We drove to Oxnard that night and stayed in a nice Marriott where we crashed from our busy, yet wonderful day!

On Sunday, we headed off to the Getty!  Another place I have always wanted to see.  It was a HOT day.  So we spent as much time indoors, looking at the exhibits, as we could.  But we couldn't pass up the chance to get some great shots outside-

 We spend a couple of hours at the Getty, but we were melting!  We had some time to kill before I needed to get her to the airport.  So, we found a yummy frozen yogurt shop in Pacific Palisades and made a quick stop to check out Will Rogers State Park.  We will definitely need to return to this place, because there is so much to see!

Here's the Ranch House...

Her plane was leaving at 5:00, so I needed to have her at the Airport between 3:30-4.  We made it in perfect time and I was worried that I would be in hours of traffic the whole way home.  Luckily, there was no traffic and I was home by 5!  

I was so happy to be back home with my family, but loved the memories Tash and I made.  So far my 40th birthday celebrations have been magical!  Can't wait for more!  I am so grateful and lucky to have Tash.  Our friendship is the most precious gift!