ahhh, camping season, how i have missed thee! for now i shall partake again and again, to my heart's content. this weekend's trip was to lovely fort bragg, where we celebrated marla's 35th birthday in true marla style-- wine-tasting and sea glass collecting! the aim of the trip, to augment marla's sea glass collection, was to visit the odd yet beautiful glass beach. glass beach used to be a city dump in the 1940's, and over time the ocean has polished the glass remains down to become part of the not-quite-natural beauty of the place. the usual sand and pebbles of beach lore are interspersed with generous portions of polished sea glass. it is only multihued up close (see my pictures below), but it is still quite cool. as liz pointed out, it's nice to see that some of the detrimental things that humans do get washed up into something beautiful.

on our way up, we took the long way to fort bragg via 128, which takes you straight through anderson valley and boonville, birthplace of my favorite beer! the boonville brewery (ahh, boont amber) is on the main stretch of road that traverses this small town, and we had to stop in and do some tasting. we took a tour of the brewery with a tour guide who looked like we'd interrupted his latest bong hit-- but was surprisingly knowledgeable, at least most of the time. we had eight tasters, and all of us really liked their newest venture, summer solstice... so much so that we took a case home with us! (rest easy, it will soon be available in stores in the bay area-- and a good thing, too!) once past boonville, we made stops at the navarro and roederer wineries. navarro i liked, but i wasn't too into the sparkling wines at roederer... i guess i've never been much of a champagne drinker. we stopped for dinner at the north coast brewing company, where we all dined on tasty burgers, calamari, and other brew-style goodies. (at that point, most of us were ready for some non-brew beverages, though.)

we spent a windy night at the mackerricher state park just north of fort bragg, which was a decent little car-camping campground. (i'd go back.) we didn't have to deal with cooking, which was fortunate because it was quite an effort getting the campfire started (wind combined with damp wood). we finally were successful though-- as one would hope, with four one-time girl scouts in the group.

sunday we made yummy sausages and eggs for breakfast, headed back to the beach for a little while, and then made our way home. we stopped at fetzer for a little more wine-tasting, following a deli debacle where the deli counter girls forgot to put the roast beef on liz's roast beef sandwich! *sigh*

only three more weeks until lassen! i can't wait.