Tioh and Furvan posed for some photo and video fursuit shots at the Ryan rock. Lot's of fun and hiliarity. We then went to Keys Point view, admiring the view in the sunshine, and proceeded to the Barker Dam trail. The lake was dry, but a bit of water still at the reservoir. The dragons were climbing on the rocks and the dam, the rest of us shooting photos, of course.
After a nice breakfast on the bench outside the RV in T-shirt we took off for California 1. A lot of fog, but I finally got to see Big Sur at day. And we saw elephant seals. Very impressive animals, and we got really close to see them.
Zlatko arrived at 6:50 this morning to pick us up. We, that are F_u_r_v_a_n, Kayjay, Lynard_, mendra, Tioh, zefirodragon, and myself. My crew, dubbed Early Birds for a reason, quickly finished breakfast and I called the Fire Dragons (Kayjay, Mendra and Zefiro) on the phone to get their behinds out of bed... We got the two RVs and hit the road at 10 am. On the agenda for today: Monterey. After visiting the Wharf we had lunch in an Italian restaurant and went to the aquarium afterwards. It's quite expensive, but worth every cent. Unfortunately I left my photo camera in the RV and was only recording video. Hence, no pictures for this journal.
Despite ice and snow and all the media reports about the supposedly dangerous weather my train arrived in time at Frankfurt. Lynard joined me in Würzburg, Furvan and Tioh were already at the Gate, and we met the others in front of the United check-in desk. Boarding started on time, however we had to wait half an hour for delayed or re-booked passengers and another hour for a slot to take off. The flight itself was quite pleasant, immigration and customs friendly as always (that's what I like about SFO). We arrived at the hotel around 7 pm, checked in and went off for a ride to Fisherman's Wharf with the cable car. Unfortunately, we spent too much time shopping and Lori's Diner was already closed for the day. Instead, we grabbed a burger at In'n'Out. We went to bed at 11 pm.
I'm back from Suhlvester. It was a very nice party, I met several people I never met in person before, Andre was dancing on the counter, Uncle Kage mixing drinks at the bar, the other hotel guests being very nice, the food excellent, the fireworks impressive... A great way to welcome the new year!
Personally, this year wasn't bad for me. In fact, I had a lot of fun: a great California roadtrip, Megaplex and Florida, Eurofurence, and numerous other great events. However, it was a hard year for many of my friends, which made the year much less enjoyable as it should have been. I'll depart to Suhlvester soon, to kick this weird year and decade out of the door. Have a safe New Year's Eve everyone!
And this year the dream comes true, at least on Christmas Eve at my parent's place:
Many thanks to Lynard and TaniDaReal for inviting everyone to their birthday party. I had a blast!