Love and bicycles, California style!!!

 

August 27th, 2011

 

 

Our last big adventure for the summer of 2011 was a road trip to San Francisco, we loaded our bikes into our little Jetta and headed down to our favorite city (after Seattle of course) to celebrate the wedding of one of our favorite couples; Greg Riessen and Brooke DuBose. Our first stop was Tahoe for Greg's bachelor party. I wasn't officially there and tried my best to "hid" upstairs for most of the weekend. The bachelor party was a success, and I even managed to get some studying in. Ian and I stayed a couple extra nights at the Riessen's place in Tahoe after the bachelor and the rest of the party headed back to the city for an amazing few days of road and mountain biking and some wonderful meals right on hidden lake.

 

We road biked from Lake Tahoe to the top of Mt. Rose, all 8900ft.

The next day we rented full suspension mountain bikes and this time drove to the top of Mt. Rose and rode down along the Flume trail which had the most amazing views of Lake Tahoe and then back up.

 

 

 

After a long day of biking we headed down to Lake Tahoe, I was shocked by how beautiful the water was, aqua blue and crystal clear!!!

 

 

It was my first time being in Tahoe in the summer, and this bumper sticker pretty much says it all ;)

I wanna be a local!!!

 

From there it was on to San Francisco. Our good friends Stephanie and Kyle Larson were travelling in Europe and we were sad to miss them while we were in town, but lucky enough to stay at their fabulous apartment in the Marina district. It is a great location that allowed up to walk around the city and meet up with the always energetic Berling brother, Seth and Parker and have a chance run in with the beautiful Julia Riessen and her adorable boyfriend Christian for a wonderful dinner in the city followed by drinks (of which I can't say I remember all of ;) The next day we fit in a bike ride leaving from the Marina over the Golden Gate bridge to the top of Mt. Tam and back through Marin to end in Tiburon.

View from the top of Mt Tam

 

We made a pit stop at the best bakery in all of San Fran; Caffe Acri which is owned and operated by Jerry Riessen's beautiful sister Katherine, where we had a sneak tasting of the wedding cake and some fabulous coffee.

Perfect post-bike treat :)

We jumped on the ferry to head back to San Fran, but not before grabbing some fresh bread and stinky cheese for the ferry ride back.

Sorry fellow ferry rides for the stinky cheese, at least it covers up the smell of the stinky bike riders ;)

We got all cleaned up and headed to a truly wonderful rehearsal dinner hosted by long time family friend of the Riessen's, Greg's godfather, Simon Snellgrove. It was a great reunion with old friends and a chance to make new ones. I always love weddings and the events surrounding them, getting the opportunity to spend time with the people that are so special in your friends lives is so rewarding and so often Ian and I find that the people who are special in our lives have the most amazing friends and we are lucky to have an ever expanding circle of friends because of that.

The day of the wedding Ian and I were tasked with picking up the desserts; cupcakes from Cups and Cakes and chocolate pôts de crème from Bi-Rite Creamery. I decided that after six years either the Riessen family doesn't know me at all or they trust Ian implicitly to allow me anywhere near the desserts and expect them to arrive unsampled to the wedding (my guess is the later ;). As part of our dessert pick up we made a pit stop at the every famous Tartine Bakery. Ian couldn't find parking so he sat in the car for 45min while I waited in line to be rewarded with amazing coffee, sandwiches and pastries. Its been over a year since we had these wonderful treats so I don't remember the details but I do know that I would happily wait for another 45min to try them again!

The desserts made it to the Marin Headlands safe and sound for the wedding. The wedding itself was magical, the ceremony was outside on the grounds of the old army barracks converted into an artists residence. Everything about the day was so perfectly personalized to Brook and Greg, from the family dog Chance's inclusion in the ceremony to the family style meal and heart filled toasts throughout the evening that brought laughter, tears and joy to everyone in the room. Ian gave a fabulous toast truly from the heart. We danced the night away but still made it to brunch the next morning at Servino's resturant in Tiburon to once again toast the wonderful couple and say our goodbye's to new and old friends before starting our drive back to Seattle.

The adorable bride and groom!!!

Fun wedding photobooth


We split the drive home into two days, stopping in Mt Sahsta for a night of camping at Lake Siskiyou in our 1-year-anniversary present to ourselves; a vacation home...aka a tent! We ended up at this awesome camp site, it had a huge waterfront with inflatable water toys (which Ian said I was to old for...), deer everywhere (which I kept trying to feed...) and an outdoor movie!!! We had our absolute favorite picnic meal of bread, cheese and wine under the stars before spending our first night in our vacation home.

Chasing deer!!!

Lake Siskiyou in Mt. Shasta

The drive back to Seattle marked the end of an amazing summer for Ian and I and the beginning of my second year of medical school.

Much love
xo
I&K