I’ve held out on you for too long, dear reader…
So it is my pleasure that today I bring to you my epic surprise trip!
We woke up rather early Friday morning… well, I did; the boy slept in while I curled my hair and made breakfast.
We embarked on our journey southward, me still not knowing where we were going…
He assured me as Disneyland was coming up that that wasn’t it.
I didn’t think it was.
Finally I see we’re driving to the beach… but a beach I didn’t really know.
We parked at Newport Beach and carried our stuff to the pier.
There is a line of people excited to go somewhere; I still have not put two and two together.
Finally the boy points out the large vessel in the water.
CATALINA!!!
I was definitely surprised. It was the most thoughtful thing anyone has done for me like, ever.
We sat up top and the wind swept through our hair as we headed to the island.
After we got in, we walked hiked to our bomb hotel way up on the hill.
Worth being a little winded for this view:
The hotel was the Zane Grey Pueblo:
Former home of author Zane Grey who wrote a shit ton of books and a lot were turned into movies. (fun fact, while filming his book The Vanishing American, 14 buffalo were brought to the island and were never removed; there’s now a pretty decent sized herd living wild in Catalina)
All the rooms are named after his books.
We were in Desert Wheat.
We attempted to read the book… we read 8 pages and decided that was enough.
We had lunch at Descanso Beach:
That’s the Casino (in the Italian sense of the word, not the gambling one) in the back. I had a Caesar salad with cilantro Caesar dressing. Not too shabby.
From there we took a lovely tour of the island…
And got to pay kid’s prices!!!
Embracing our inner children, we played some mini-golf:
I got my butt kicked… but I did manage to get TWO hole-in-ones.
Yes, I am Tits McGee.
After mini-golf and a happy hour drink (quite a good margarita) we headed back up to the hotel to snap some pictures and drink champagne out on the balcony.
Man, even typing that it sounds awesome.
Mountain views…
Ocean views…
Self portrait…
I gussied myself up for dinner, but it was a little chilly so I ended up in layers.
I was told I still looked nice 
Dinner was at Avalon Grille:
We got a free appetizer for going on the tour. We opted for the spicy pork in butter lettuce wraps. Quite good.
Also tried the Jacuzzi Sangiovese.
For dinner I had seared tuna with edamame puree garnished with wasabi and sriracha.
The boy got pot roast with mac and cheese.
Full-blooded American male that one 
Some bar-hopping ensued, as well as something called “Buffalo Milk” which may or may not have led to what was probably the worst karaoke performance of my life…
I plea the 5th.
The next morning we had breakfast at the Pancake Cottage. I ate pancakes. With chocolate chips. And didn’t feel guilty or purge
After that we went to the museum at the Casino and learned ourselves some knowledge about the history of the island.
From there we embarked on my favorite part of the trip:
My first time kayaking!!!
Love this pic:
We think we went about 4 miles in an hour. Made it to this cliff face and turned back.
On the way back we saw pelicans dive bombing the water, fish, seals and some snorkelers checking out an apparent sunken ship.
Pretty baller stuff!
Last stop on the island was for lunch at the Sandtrap
Their happy hour is pretty spectacular: $1 authentic tacos!!!
And we shared a pitcher of beer
It was here that I was warned the boy wouldn’t want to leave, so I made sure to pull him away…
Even though I didn’t want to leave either.
bye bye Catalina!!!
It was seriously one of the best vacations I’ve ever been on; we managed to fit in so much awesome stuff in just two days!
Just another reason why he’s so great
Best photo of the trip goes to…
