While I had to work Christmas week, I was still able to escape up to Whistler over the four day long weekend. Tara, a good friend of mine from Bain (now en route to France to start her MBA at INSEAD) was up there with her family, and she suggested I come up and join her for a couple of days skiing. It was great to get away, even just for a couple of days, lovely to meet Tara’s family, and we were even blessed with fresh snowfalls every night. The snow was fantastic and I skied one day on Whistler and one on Blackcomb (I think I’m more of a Blackcomb fan – the terrain is more varied). And hey the apres-ski wasn’t too bad either!! It sure beats anything that Lake Tahoe has to offer!
Mum and Dad came over from Melbourne to visit me for a short stay. This is the first time they’d come back to SF since my graduation from Berkeley, so it was great to show them around my new digs.
While I was busy during the week with work, I planned a weekend trip out of the city for us to get away. We left on Saturday morning and drove up to Sonoma Valley, stopping off at Chateau St Jean for some wine tasting followed by lunch at Healdsburg.
From there we drove up to Mendocino on the coast and checked into Sea Gull Inn, a gorgeous century-old B&B in the centre of town.
We spent Sunday driving back to San Francisco along Highway 1 down the coast.
For a farewell dinner I took my parents to South, a small restaurant and wine bar in South beach serving antipodean fare.
Here are some photos that I’ve taken around the Bay Area recently…
A gorgeous dawn from my bedroom window.
One of my recent additional responsibilities at work has been to organise the Consultant Offeree Weekend. One of the events we held was lunch and a cruise around the bay. Here are a few pics of the city from it:
Home sweet home – Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower.
(L) Charlie’s Angels. (R) “Like a tiger!”
I was walking home one rainy evening and the Transamerica Building was lit up with some enormous spotlights (why I don’t know…):
The Transamerica, with Francis Ford Coppola’s Zoetrope building in contrast.