Visit to Escondido

In January we took a trip to Escondido where we stayed on a ranch, the Ranch at Bandy Canyon. This wonderful ranch features a 1930's adobe lodge and has several cabins with aviary names and themes. Ours was the peacock cabin and it had beautiful jewel toned blues and green coloring the space throughout.

Cousin James recommended a fantastic winery, Old Survey vineyards, to us. We drove up, and up, a dirt road until we arrived at a beautiful lookout and enjoyed some fantastic wine (and of course met canine friends). 

Mary, Dan, and the vineyard dogs

This vineyard is owned by friendly people who started the business after their home burned down. They used some of the fire insurance money to start up their wine business. Their reds especially were fantastic and the day we visited, Sunday evening, their neighbor and friend was grilling out and cooked some excellent food us all to enjoy! We enjoyed sampling the wine and eating the delicious food!

This hand painted sign is the logo on their wine bottles (not sold in stores)

After checking into our peacock cabin on the ranch we drove out to a different vineyard with a much different vibe, they have a restaurants, flush toilets, all the fancy stuff. :) We enjoyed sunset and shared a pizza before heading back for the night.

Mary and Dan overlooking the Escondido valley

The next morning I had the pleasure of taking a horseback ride along the creek bed with the ranch hand. 

 After a dip in the pool cousin James met us at the ranch and we headed out to the San Diego Safari Park where James treated me and got Dan a discounted admission - thanks, cuz! We had a great time seeing the Avian show and taking a safari ride at sunset - the animals were very active - two giraffes were even engaging in a fight for dominance to see who could bed down the lady giraffe. Their way of fighting was incredible: the giraffes would whip their necks against one another giving their opponent a neck-ache. Last one standing gets the mate (and a stiff neck).

We had such a nice time with James and hope to see him again soon (maybe even this month when cousin Meghan is in town or later in March when AliKev and baby Kieran are in town!)