San Rafael Mission, San Raphael California

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The new parish church dwarfs the original mission chapel.

When you go looking for Mission San Rafael you going to see this big beautiful church and you are going to say to yourself “Oh, the mission is so beautiful!”

AND you will be wrong because what you are seeing is not the mission because Mission San Rafael is actually this building…

This reconstructed chapel is what the original chapel would of looked like. Notice there was no bell tower.

So at this point you might be thinking. “Oh yes, that building is much simpler, that must of been the original.”

Since the original chapel was destroyed the new reconstructed chapel has a very modern feel to it.

And again you would be wrong because this chapel was built in 1949. Unfortunately, the original chapel is not at all like the original. This was mostly because when they built the new chapel they didn’t have any pictures of the old chapel. All they had were people who said they remembered what the old chapel looked like, but what they were remembering was actually a postcard from 1901 that was not even a drawing of any of the California Missions. If you think that is strange consider this…The original chapel was erected in 1831 and was completely gone by 1863, which if you do your math you will find that the new chapel has actually been standing longer than the original old chapel.

AJ really liked the kids at the mission school.

 

The three original bells are in the tiny museum/gift shop.

Mission San Rafael has all sorts of quirky things to discover. We enjoyed our time visiting. Oh and lest you think I spelled San Rafael wrong consider this, you don’t pronounce the H in Spanish and a P is pronounced “PA” (the Church is named Saint San Raphael).

 

The McRib Needs To Go Back

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Don't buy into the hype.

While traveling in Arizona this weekend I had a chance to go to McDonalds. Doesn’t sound very extraordinary but lately due to personal budget cuts I haven’t really gone out to eat much. Not that I think that I have missed much, but seeing how it was the travel budget that was paying for this meal I didn’t worry about it too much. Going back to the McRib however, I don’t really get it .

First of all, despite what the box says, it isn’t that tempting.  It comes in a very decorative paper box, but once you open it, it is very messy. They put a lot of barbecue sauce on it and it immediately gets all over your fingers. I know a lot of places advertise this as good, but to me a food should compliment a food item, not hide it. Though in this case hiding is probably a good thing because the rib part of the McRib is very odd looking. Since when did pork ribs come altogether? With it’s pink coloring it kind of reminded me of a smashed hot-dog. Add together the flimsy pickles and soggy lettuce and it looked like someone had stepped on a barbecue smothered hot-dog and was now asking be to pay $2.70 plus tax for it.

Which brings me to taste. I thought the McRib was supposed to taste like pork ribs, but to  me it tasted like a barbecue smothered hot-dog. It was different, but it was not good. Granted this may be personal bias, but I do not like barbecue sauce on my hot-dogs. Plus I have never attempted to put pickles, lettuce, and onions on one either. It didn’t even taste like a good hot-dog, it was more like those generic hot-dogs that are mushy and you pick up at the 99 cent store.

Which brings me to my last point, price. As I mentioned earlier I paid $2.70 plus tax for the McRib sandwich. That makes it about $3 dollars. For $3 dollars I expect a pretty good hot dog. For three dollars you can buy a hot dog at El Guero Canelo (I should write about that place some day) or get a Polish dog at work. Both of those hot-dogs are worth $3 dollars. The McRib is not worth $3 dollars. If I could I would ask for my money back, but I can’t so I guess I will have to just accept the fact that I wasted my money on that gelatinous goop.

Anyhow, I don’t want to dis McDonalds, I actually like McDonalds. I am neither a health food advocate and I have been known to eat a Big Mac on more than one occasion. I didn’t think the McRib was going to be the best thing ever, but the way my friends were making it sound I did expect it to at least taste decent. Sad to say however it wasn’t the least bit decent. I write only to warn you of the hype, it will get you every time.

Battle of the Dance, Anaheim, CA

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Now that we no longer have Disneyland annual passes we have what we consider a very nice weekend budget. On it’s own it allows us to a lot of fun things, but we are in general still pretty modest in what we can do on our budget. There is however a loop hole in our budget in that either one of us can supplement another budget with their own personal budget. Denise likes to buy fancier food, I like better weekend activities. What I like to do is find a really good coupon for a restaurant or show, buy it, and then use the weekend budget to supplement the babysitting costs. This is how we got to go to Battle of the Dance.

They have a lot of elaborate costumes in this show.

What Exactly is Battle of the Dance?
Battle of the Dance is a dinner show that features different dance styles from around the world. The producers of this show are the the same people that do the Camelot and Pirate dinner shows. You start the evening with a little reception where they take your picture with some of the stars and they serve you appetizers (included in the cost). You can also buy alcohol (definitely not included), but since we don’t drink alcohol it didn’t matter. Just before the show starts they have some pre-show entertainment. In our case it involved a Salsa demonstration and a skit involving an invisible man. The invisible man was kind of corney, but the Salsa demonstration was very good.

You eat facing the stage with little tables in front of you.

After the pre-show we were seated and our orders were taken. With the Gold package we had our choice of Chicken, Fish, or Cheese Ravioli. The meal also came with shrimp or vegetable salad and a little pastry for desert. The meal was pretty good and the portions adequate. I would place it on par with most sit down restaurants I have been to (think TGI Fridays or Denny’s), then again I wasn’t really going there for the food. The meal also came with unlimited soda, which is good because as the waiter found out Denise is a heavy drinker.

I think Denise was very happy not to have to cook.

The Show revolves loosely around this story about how the Spaniards get wrecked on the coast of Ireland in the 16th century and how they must now learn to reconcile their differences. I say loosely because in this three part show there are scenes of Tango, Salsa, and Bollywood. In the breaks we saw a ventriloquist and a guy who did very impressive shadow art. My favorite part was the dance of the castanets and Denise’s favorite part was the Irish finalee. It was a good show that ended with,of course, a dance off. Followed by the dancers reconciling and dancing together.

Being only a couple of blocks from Disneyland it was very easy to find.

How Much Did This Cost?
I heard about Battle of the Dance through a United Way fundraiser that they were doing at work. Basically they were selling these little cards for $20 that gave you 6 buy-get-one tickets. A really good deal considering the tickets regularly cost $60 each. Though being the bargain hunter that I am I found a slightly better deal at a website called goldstar.com (kind of like groupon but they specialize in event tickets). With Goldstar I was was able to get two Gold package (we were in the 6th row) tickets for $73.00 ($30 for the tickets, plus a $6.50 service fee). The Gold package included the cost of our meal, seats, and unlimited soda. For an additional $30 dollars you could buy a Platinum package that included steak, lobster, and seating in the first five rows. For $30 dollars (at regular price) you could also forgo the meal and sit in the back of the theatre. Why you would do that I don’t know, but you could. The souvenir picture cost $10 and came with a program. You could also buy a DVD of the show for an additional $10. In total it cost us $120 ($73 for admission, $10 for the picture, $10 for the tip, $4 for ice cream we bought at a tastee freeze after the show, and $23 for babysitting).

The pre-show entertainment included the invisible man.

Did you enjoy it?
I enjoyed it a lot. It wasn’t what I would classify as a cheap night, but it wasn’t a very expensive one either. Between the pre-show, the show, and the after show ice cream, we got a good 4 hours + worth of entertainment. Not to mention sometimes it is just good to get out alone with your wife. I asked Denise about the show and she told me she enjoyed it but would never have let me spend $120 of the family budget on it. She said it came down to everything else she would of done with the money.
For my part I really enjoyed the dancing. The quality of the dancing was on par with any Las Vegas show I have ever heard about, with the benefit of not having to drive 4 hours to sin city. I don’t know if the dancing was 100% authentic, but I still enjoyed it a lot. My personal opinion on dancing is it is more about style and this show had a lot of style. Overall it made for a good show (otherwise why would I bother blogging about it) and would consider doing it again.

According to some of the employees I spoke to this building used to be a Toys-R-Us.

AJ the Pumpkin Bumpkin

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AJ shows off his result.

AJ got his first carved pumpkin today. It was a rather interesting experience. AJ was really excited about getting the pumpkin. Thanks to a book called the Lumpy Pumpkin AJ picked out the smallest pumpkin he could find. He was very excited to carve it so we went to Nana’s house. Funny thing was as soon as I cut into the pumpkin he got all weird on me. He really didn’t like the pumpkin guts, they scared him for some reason. After the scary pumpkin guts were out he was good though. He designed the pumpkin himself and with Papi’s help soon had a pretty good pumpkin. In case you are wondering the three teeth were AJ’s idea because HELLO he is fwee!!

Hole In One

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I don’t have much to say today but I wanted to brag about getting a hole in one at Scandia. I got some Scandia mini golf tickets through United Way and so we used them today. Anyhow, at the end of every mini golf session the 18th hole is usually a little house that you put your ball into to return your ball. In the little house is usually a impossible whole in one spot. Or, at least I thought it was impossible because today I got a hole in one in the last shot. It was fun a little light went off and a buzzer rang. I also got a ticket for a free round of mini golf.

San Juan Bautista Mission

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The main reason for the missions was to create a path in which the Spanish government could easily resupply their colonists and manage their expansive frontier from the many encroachments of other nations. Knowing this the missions were built not only with the consideration for distance, but also their tactical advantage. When building San Juan Bautista they surveyors must of thought that building on a high ridgeline must of been a good idea, boy were they wrong!

The difference in height between the mission and the trail is the fault line.

Living in California I have seen many fault lines, but this was the first time I have seen a building built on top of one. Needless to say San Juan Baustista has been built over many times. The mission would have been abandoned if it had not been for the discovery of valuable minerals in the area.

Despite it’s remoteness the mission is surprisingly popular and was bussling with people preparing for a wedding when we were there. The town of San Juan Bautista is really quaint showing off an early Californian America experience. I will talk more about this in a different post.

These little idols were kind of like early Californian action figures. Some of them had moveable limbs and each had their own special accessory.

We all enjoyed the mission, but we each had our own different reasons. AJ really enjoyed chasing the chickens, Denise liked seeing the setup for the wedding, my mom liked the arched rose garden, and liked walking along the mission trail (only mission where you can still see a part of the original trail).

Mission Soledad “The Loneliest Mission”

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In the scope of missions there are big missions and small missions, Soledad fits into that small category. Going to Mission Soledad it was funny how close it was to the 101 highway, but how far you had to drive to get there.

In the picture you can see the door main chapel door is very small, it is barely taller than I am.

Like many missions, it has been reconstructed. If you go to the back of the building you can see the remains of the old mission.

When I first walked into the chapel I thought I was going to get into trouble because you enter through the altar (normally your not supposed to approach the altar unless invited). After looking arround though I saw there was no other doors (and no one told me not to), so I figured it was ok. A very small chapel, but considering the rest of the mission was small it fit.


My favorite part of this mission was walking behind it and looking at the ruins of the old workshop. It was kind of like being on a archaelogical expedition.

Mission (Almost Impossible to Get to) San Antonio de Padua, Jolon, California

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When you first get off highway 101 to go to Mission San Antonio de Padua  there are signs, but you start to wonder if you are heading in the right direction (wouldn’t be the first time that a sign steered me in the wrong direction). First thing you pass is a big lake and you think “oh, there is a mission beside a lake,” but there is no mission beside a lake so you keep on going. Then you see a big tank and a sign that says Fort Hunter Liggett Training Base and you think “the road must go arround that,” but the road doesn’t go arround the base. In fact, it heads right onto the base. So there you are at a military checkpoint and you have to decide if you are going to go on. On the one hand the is no guard at the checkpoint and the sign says “go on,” but on the other hand the idea of accidently trespassing in an area with 50 caliber ammunition rounds sounds like a potentially bad idea. The GPS however tells you to get to the mission you must go on and so with a bit of intrepidation you move on. Then after a few miles you finally find the mission.

A mission out in the middle of nowhere, further isolated being right in the middle of a Army fort, you really start to get the what it must of been like for the first settlers. Kind of boring really, how they ever survived without a blog is beyond me.

Anyhow, the mission is very nice and very quiet. If that is your thing for about $200 a night you can actually stay overnight at Mission San Antonio de Padua (that would make for one heck of a 4th grade report story).
I didn’t have $200 dollars, so I just settled looking at the courtyard and chapel.

In front of the chapel there is a sign that points out the first Catholic  marriage in California. The sign in the first marriage but I happen to know there were marriages going on long before that (to each their own history).  It was done in May of 1773, that was by no means the only marriage performed at Mission San Antonio De Padua. The percentage of married people in the early years of the mission is unbelievable. I was reading up on the history of the mission I found out that the Padres there made it their personal mission to make sure every eligible person was married.

Mission San Antonio De Padua was definitely an interesting mission. I am not sure if I will ever go back, but I had fun while I was there.

Looking at the Little Houses

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Lately I have had this dream of owning a home. Not to own a mortgage, to own a home. I think if I were to truly analyze my dream it would be to totally debt free. I am not sure if that is possible in the United States but that is a different question altogether.

I figure the only way I am ever going to own a home outright is if I go small, really small. So that is how I found out about Little Home on the Trailer in Petaluma, CA.

For about $50-$60 thousand dollars they will build you your own tiny house. Since the homes are on trailers they They build more than just homes. They also build offices, studios, and other types of extra rooms.We had a lot of fun looking through all the models.

San Miguel Mission “The Crumbly One”

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The chapel has been well perserved, but the rest of the structures are definitely showing wear and tear.

If I had to give San Miguel a name it would have to be that of “The Crumbly One.” The sounds bad but it actually makes San Miguel rather unique. Unlike all of the other California 21 missions, San Miguel mission is the only mission not to have been restored. Due to this fact the mission you see today is pretty much the same as it would of looked back when it was founded in 1797 (ok, perhaps a bit later, they did have to build the mission first).

I love how as soon as you get off the highway you see the mission, was by far the easiest to find. If you don’t find it right away you are on the wrong off-ramp.

San Miguel to me was also interesting because it has been so far the closest mission to the 101 (also known as El Camino Real) highway. As soon as you got off the exit you were there. It was a very easy mission for on and off again highway access.

The eye really stands out more than the saint does.

Due to the fact that this mission is not restored in any way, it was very interesting looking at the altar. The first thing that struck me was that the colors were very pastel. I wondered if this was due to the fact that they were washed out or if that was the way they would of looked originally. Also instead of seeing a saint in the center there was this big painted eye. The eye is to represent God the Father, which I am assuming was meant to be a warning to all the worshipers, but all it did for me was want to look at a US dollar bill.

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