A Day in Carmel

This is the first time Noah and I have been to Carmel with out kids so we wanted to do as much as we could in what little time we had. We woke up to the smell of breakfast cooking and headed down stairs to eat. It was so nice to be served as we visited with each other and planned out our day. We decided to take a morning walk down to Carmel beach and walk along the water. We had a wonderful time walking hand in hand, people watching, and seeing the sights all around us, and enjoying our conversation together. As we walked back we took some pictures of the beautiful cottage homes in the area. We headed to the Carmel Mission only to find it packed with people for mass. We decided to come back in the late afternoon before evening mass. We decided to go on the famous 17 mile drive at Pebble Beach. We have always wanted to do this, but figured the kids would get bored with it so never have. It was a beautiful drive and was really neat to stop and check out all the fun little points along the way and learn abut them. I think our favorite stops on the 17 mile drive was seeing The Lone Cypress Tree and of course the lodge at Pebble Beach. Oh and Bird Rock was great too. It was right next to Seal Rock Picnic Area where it says you can relax and picnic here surrounded by a vibrant mix of marine life and birds. They forgot to mention how horrible the stink and stench are. After our drive we stopped in downtown Carmel to walk and window shop. It was nice to be able to look in a nice place and not have to worry about the kids touching or breaking things. We decided to go to the The Forge in the Forest Restaurant for lunch. It had great food and wonderful ambiance. We ate outside in the patio area surrounded by lush plants. They have a saying at the Forge "If you haven't been to The Forge, you haven't been to Carmel." Noah and I would agree it was great.
After a lunch we drove to the Carmel Mission where we were able to go on a self tour of the church and the mission.It was neat to see some of other building there and artifacts from that time period. We enjoyed seeing the quarters of the people who lived and worked the mission, the first library in California and the beautiful garden areas.After our time at the Mission we headed to Safeway to buy some snacks, hot chocolate, and dessert for later. We were pretty full from dinner and figured we would stay close to our place instead of going out. So we went out for a sunset walk along the beach with our hot chocolate and warm sweaters to keep us warm. What a fun day. We were sad that we would only have one day left.