Author: Kellie

Hey y’all! We just spent a jam-packed week in the big city! San Francisco and the beautiful bay area… We were fortunate enough to be there for the 50th anniversary of the “Summer of Love” – how cool is that? The city had lots of groovy events to commemorate the occasion, including a concert in Golden Gate Park. So fun! Of course, I enjoyed just hanging out with Jerry in Haight-Ashbury (see pic). Peace & love! I was also able to take a few sound healing classes at the world-renowned, Globe Institute. I learned a lot of amazing stuff, so don’t be surprised if you find some original “meditation ” MP3s in your inbox in a few months. More on that later…

Then there’s….Wine Country!! Yes…we visited Napa and tasted some fantastic wines. Fisher’s grandmother (AKA, “Bana”) joined us for the week, so we had to go drink some wine! My favorite by far was Rombauer Vineyards. I met Colonel Rombauer at a Sea Island wine tasting back in the 90s, and he gave me a quick lesson on wine-making. I always knew I’d visit his vinyards one day. And I was not disappointed! Spectacular views, beautiful gardens and, of course, the wines were delicious. If I had it to do all over again, I think I might have been a wine-maker. Hmmm…maybe it’s not too late??

We also went to Sonoma, but not so much for wine…for NASCAR! Fisher and I had a blast watching the “road-course” race, cheering on his favorite driver, Dale Jr (he didn’t win…bummer).  We had great seats right behind the pits, so we could see all the action. And we were able to walk the track after the race. Well, it was 2 1/2 miles and very hilly, so we walked some of it. Whew!

Finally, we drove over to Berkeley to see the University of Callifornia. Fun fact… my great, great, great grand-uncles, Joseph & John LeConte were professors/founders of Cal back in the late 1800s. Joseph was a geologist and a close friend of John Muir (we visited Muir Woods, north of San Fran…gorgeous trees!) and John was a doctor, scientist and physics professor. They were both very important to the newly established university…in fact, a street in Berkeley is named after them and one of their physics buildings is named after John (see pic). Hard to believe I have such intellectual ancestry. Ha!

Next stop… northern California. This tree hugger can’t wait to see more big Redwoods!

Love, KP

 

email: kellie@kellieparr.com

website: www.kellieparr.com

instagram: kellieparrmusic

 

 

Hey everybody… We’ve been spending a lot of time on/near the ocean lately. Yay! The central coast of California is absolutely beautiful…Morro Bay, Monterey and Big Sur (check out the pic of Big Sur…stunning place). We had lots of fun kayaking in Morro Bay and Elkhorn Slough near Moss Landing with some adorable little sea otters…and those loud and lazy California sea lions (Fisher thought they were pretty rad).

We also made a day trip over to Santa Cruz (really cool surfing town, where the late, great surfing icon Jack O’Neill was from…love O’Neill’s clothing & wetsuits…have to go back there someday) and an overnight stop at Sequoia National Park (wow…those trees are huge!). Of course, you can’t go to that area of Cali without going to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We really enjoyed checking out the exhibits, touch tanks and all the cute critters…especially the otters…and learned a bunch about environmental threats to the ocean. No more plastic water bottles for us!

We capped off our visit with an awesome whale watching trip out of Moss Landing. Humpback whales were everywhere! So beautiful and graceful…but they had really bad breath (from their blow hole). Seriously! Who knew?!? Check out the animation…synchronized whale diving. Really amazing. 

Next stop… SAN FRANCISCO! My favorite big city in the USA.

Peace y’all, KP

 

 

email: kellie@kellieparr.com

website: www.kellieparr.com

instagram: kellieparrmusic

 

Hey y’all… After driving all the way across this beautiful country of ours, it sure was amazing to finally see the ocean again!! We stayed in Los Angeles for a few days and visited Venice Beach (love that funky little beach town), the Griffith Observatory & the Hollywood sign (can’t go to L.A. and miss that!) and we drove up the coast to Malibu and Santa Barbara (they have the coolest harbor… sailing, paddling and surfing all in one place).

My favorite part of this leg of the trip was our boat excursion over to the Channel Islands – Santa Cruz Island. Wow!! What an incredibly beautiful place…kinda like how I imagine Ireland looks. We hiked some trails up and down the hills and saw lots of stunning scenery…and the fog rolling in made it super spooky. But the highlight of the day was on the trip back when we were surrounded by a SUPER pod of common dolphins. So cool! There must have been 500+ dolphins playing in the boat’s wake. Check out this video…Fisher and I were freaking out!

 

Next stop…more California…it’s a BIG state. 😀

Peace, love & dolphins, KP

 

email: kellie@kellieparr.com

website: www.kellieparr.com

instagram: kellieparrmusic