Once Tracie fell it seems we were both a little unbalanced. I never finished our trip blog and have already nearly completed another trip. More on that later…

We left our hotel to walk to the Santa Cruz Mission. We passed a great old tree, climbed the stairs and the mission was visible.

We had a lovely conversation with the woman inside the mission. She’s the second person to note that many of the displayed historical items were not specific to this mission. Instead they represent the missions in general. Many of them had been rebuilt due to varying degrees of destruction due to fire, battles, Mother Nature and more. Each item rescued was repaired when needed and distributed appropriately. It makes sense since each mission is an important part of the California history.

Here is an easy read on the history of the missions.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.history.com/.amp/topics/religion/california-missions

Next for our day was to check out shopping, coffee and lunch in downtown Santa Cruz. My favorite coffee shop was Verve, which I’ve been to on a previous visit. I bought a new cup which I’m using right now as I type this post…

Tracie and I both enjoyed our two days in Santa Cruz. We found a cute store with CA made products that seemed to be where we spent most of our time and money!

Since we had my car, we hoped to drive all the way home in one day. Two stops – Stef and family and Sonoma to visit the inside of the Mission – and then home. Nearly 16 hours later I dropped Tracie off and pulled into my driveway and shut the engine off.

It was an interesting two weeks. I’m glad it’s finished which I don’t usually say about a trip. I think it was the pavement walks that I didn’t enjoy too much. I’m grateful I was able to make the trip and enjoyed many parts of it, but this is a walk that might be best taken in November or Early winter when the weather would be cooler. For me it was the combination of hot pavement, long days and did I mention the weather? Ok I know I did but the combination of heat and pavement gave me blisters. I don’t get blisters on any other hike, and they are not fun!

Tracie says we should finish the CA Mission trail via bicycle. We won’t get back to it for a couple years so we have time to discuss and plan.

#CAmission