Summer Travels: June, Part 1

To say June has been busy for us would be an understatement!

June 4-8 we flew to San Francisco and spent a nice, long, relaxing, fun weekend with our good friends Nancee and Marc Revere in Novato, California.

Grape vines at the Gloria Ferrar Winery in Sonoma, California

Talk about spoiling!! The Reveres are quite the hosts!! Their house is stunning with a large patio area in the front, completely fenced for privacy. The accommodations and hospitality were fabulous; food was quite yummy and gourmet, both at their house and out; wine was flowing, as we went wine tasting in Sonoma and Napa; sightseeing was awesome as they picked us up from SFO, drove us down Lombard Street, then to Fisherman's Wharf in SF, all around Novato, Sonoma, Napa and from Napa over to River's End where the Russian River flows into the Pacific, along the Coast, and then back to the Reveres.
The highlight for us was sailing all around San Francisco Bay in their 42' Hunter Passage Sailboat on a beautiful clear day!! If they owned a "Bed and Breakfast" theirs would definitely be FIVE STARS in every category!

Thanks Nancee and Marc for a truly superb weekend!

To see our pictures go to: http://www.flickr.com/photos/72308330@N00/sets/72157619798417520/

Home for a day and then we were off again!

June 10-14 we flew to New York City where we had a whirlwind, fun weekend!! It was Nick's first visit to the Big Apple (I visited NYC for a weekend with my friend, Jeanette back in the 90's). We took a bus to Grand Central Station and then took the Metro Train North to Poughkeepsie (pronounced PU-KIP-SIE)New York to surprise our niece,

Breanna, at her college graduation from

the Culinary Institute of America,

where she earned her Bachelor's Degree!
(Congratulations Breanna-we are all so proud of you!!!)

We met her parents there, Nick's younger brother Joe and his wife Laurel, their other daughter, Marissa, Laurel's sister, Barbara, and Nicole, David and Gigi for a great luncheon following the graduation and dinner later that night.

On Friday morning we took the train back to New York City and spent the rest of our time taking in the sights: the Empire State Building, Times Square, Battery Park,

the Statue of Liberty, of course,

Ellis Island, Central Park, the MET, Ground Zero, and

the Subway, which was fun and at times challenging!! Each one of the letters and colors represent a different route on the Subway-navigating wasn't the easiest thing to do at times, but Nick did a great job reading the maps and figuring which line we needed to take to get around Manhattan.

Nicole, Gigi and I enjoying riding the subway !!

We saw a great musical "On Broadway" called "In the Heights" about the Latino community in Manhattan Heights, and had a late night dinner at the famous "Junior's Delicatessan." Of course, we couldn't leave New York before taking a ride in a "Yellow Cab," which truly was an experience--if we'd had more time we might have tried taking the train and then subway to JFK instead!

That's just half the month of June. More to follow soon!!