With so much excitement in this city, it's easy to get caught up in the frantic of Frisco. But what's great about living here is that I have a wide variety of beautiful nature destinations at my disposal (as long as I can find someone to bum a ride with). Wine country, snowy mountains, seascape, Redwood forest, even suburbia; all within a four hour drive.
Since living here I have been on weekend trips to Tahoe (winter and summer), Napa, Big Sur, Santa Cruz, outside Yosemite, Livermore, and most recently Mendocino. The serenity of escaping to places like this is what keeps me sane.
Even though city life is filled with new and interesting activities, the general day-to-day life of anyone, no matter where you live, can get really monotonous. Working 9-5 in front of a computer all day doesn't help much, but it pays for these trips so I'm not complaining.
I went to Mendocino this weekend with some new friends. Mendocino is about 3.5 hours north of San Francisco. Beach on one side, Redwood forest on the other. You can't beat it. Redwoods can only grow in areas that are near the water because they need the moisture to survive. And Redwoods never die, they just multiply into more smaller Redwood trees that circle around the one that has "died." And there are these endangered orchid-like flowers that only grow in Redwood Forests. And 6-inch long banana slugs. This makes for some really stellar nature walks. Not to mention, Mendocino produces more marijuana that any other U.S. city. No wonder.
That being said, I highly recommend taking the time to get a good group of friends in a car with good gas mileage and escape to somewhere where you to see every bright star in the midnight sky. Camp if you can, or if you're lucky enough to have friends with property somewhere then all you need to provide is booze, food, and maybe Apples to Apples. If you do it right, you'll spend a lot less money that you would staying in the city and running your heating bill or bar hopping in the Mission.
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