Our Epic Road Trip: Santa Cruz

We have been wanting to visit our friends Story & Chris in Portland since they moved up there last year. Since our anniversary was coming up, we decided to take a road trip for a week and broke up the fifteen hour drive in two days by stopping in Santa Cruz overnight. I heard about a steam engine train ride that goes through the the redwood forest in Felton, CA so we were all over that. We waited until dusk to hit the Santa Cruz boardwalk since it was so hot and crowded. Liv had so much fun, and luckily no one was bitten by any Lost Boys!

It was only a five hour drive to Santa Cruz so we arrived fairly early. 

Next time we'll have to taste some artichokes

We couldn't tell what these workers were picking

The sweetest cats lived in the general store

Seriously, this kid is so freakin rad!

It was interesting to see how the old steam engine train operated after all these years

The redwood trees were majestic, Liv has never seen trees that tall

A storm destroyed the old train tracks.

At the top of the mountain, the train stopped so we could explore 

As soon as we got back to our hotel, we changed clothes and headed to the boardwalk. It was Retro Night so all the rides were $1.00! This made Liv very happy so we rode everything we could. Here's the problem, I was really excited to ride the Sky Glider. Anything that is mellow and I can take in a view is perfect for me. However, we left Liv's jacket in the car so Antz went to grab it and I wanted to ride the Sky Glider before the sunset so Liv and I went on together. Everything was cool until we noticed the height kept going higher and higher until we were both very scared. I tried hard to play it cool but my poor baby was in tears. I kept trying to make her laugh but my heart was pounding. Every time the bucket we were in passed a tower it would bump us so hard I internally freaked out. So I tried my best to distract Liv and take a few photos until it was over while Olivia covered her eyes. I was sure I would drop my camera but fortunately, I managed a shot of Antz happily waiting for us below. Never again will I subject us to something like that. In the end, it was worth the view but I found out I wasn't supposed to take photos while on the ride!

See, it doesn't look so high from here

We love the pirate ride

Too bad Olivia wasn't tall enough for the swing ride!

The face of fear, sort of

Poor baby, she is not enjoying it at all. I did manage to get her to smile.

Nothing some cotton candy won't fix

Who knew Totoro loves fried chicken?

These were massive doughnuts

Santa Cruz Boardwalk from sunkissis on Vimeo.

Liv drove her own bumper car. She did incredibly well!

I was hoping this Wurlitzer organ would play the same music from The Lost Boys. For the record, I watched The Lost Boys approximately 86,000 times in the eighties. 

Olivia insists we take these cheesy photos, do not blame me!