Mini Break to Monterey

So last weekend I went on a little mini trip to Monterey with the boyfriend. And had such lovely weekend. It was so nice to be able to relax and not think about work or real life. We just wandered about, went to Carmel, went to the beach though it was not warm enough to swim and ate lots of food. It was my first time to the Monterey Bay Aquarium too. Monterey is a little more than 2 hours from home but I for some reason had never gone.

Start of the trip at Trailside cafe, in which the inside feels like you are sitting outside. The ceiling has awnings, the tables are big and wooden and you get a great view of the water. Wonderful coffee as well, which was an essential start to the day.

He got some meaty breakfast burrito dish. It got soon devoured after this photo.

One of the best farmers markets I have been to in a while. All the little stands just seemed magical and I just wanted to take photos of every single thing. And the little stand owners kept saying 'Oh, take more photos! Sorry I ran out of somethings already!' which made it incredibly comfortable to take photos, because I always get those 'oh dear I'm grabbing this big camera out of my bag and distubing all these people' jitters.

The carrots!

My favorite little bouquet that was only 1 dollar.

My first lavender purchase as well. Smells so nice, I just want to  have my room filled with it.

I loved those little carrots so much. They were in the cheap box because they were the small, misshapen knobs that they probably thought no one wanted. But I loved them more than the big ones.

Abalone shells.

From a candy shop on the wharf. 

The Cheese Shop in Carmel. My heaven. The minute you walk into the door, its long, narrow and dark with cheese overflowing. Samples were encouraged and you could by as little or as much as you wanted, so we made a little snack bag for us. 5 or 6 cheeses, one of which was a triple creme brie that was so buttery soft that you needed a spoon!

Carmel shop which had about a dozen varieties of cordial candies,  one of them being Amaretto. My new favorite candy.

Him.

I need to teach him how to use my camera so I can have an actual photo of myself.

Monterey Bay Aquarium.

It was packed with screaming little kids, strollers knocking my knees and people pushing to see everything. So I sat on the floor and watched the turtles swim by me. They were my favorite.

Back to reality now, work work work. But I am saving up to buy a car, so each shift I just think 'Jeep Wrangler, Jeep Wrangler, Jeep Wrangler' and it makes it bearable.