July 24 – 31 was our family vacation to Northern California. We had been looking forward to this trip for months. When the day finally arrived, we excitedly boarded the plane and flew off to sunny San Francisco.

The first two days were mainly travel days. After landing, we picked up our rental car and headed north.

We crossed the Golden Gate Bridge . . .

. . . and then headed out to the Pacific Coast Highway.

The views were stunning.

It was a little cooler than when we left Texas!

As we drove toward our hotel in Sebastopol, we stopped to pick some of the blackberries that were growing like weeds along the side of the road. They were delicious!

The city map provided by the hotel listed a “super playground” in the city park, so the next morning we stopped on our way out of town.

After burning off a little energy, we hopped on the 101 and headed north through the vineyards, into the redwoods. Raine told us before we left that she wanted to drive through a tree, so we stopped at Drive-Thru Tree Park to fulfill that wish.

This tree was gigantic. I had to take three photos of it and then stitch them together in order to capture all of it. The sign says it is 315 feet tall by 21 feet wide with a maximum age of 2400 years.

The opening is six-feet wide by six-feet nine-inches tall. Our small SUV barely fit through the opening. Raine loved it! She stuck her hand out the window and touched the tree while we were driving through.

There were plenty of trees to climb on as we hiked around the area.

After leaving, we hopped back on the Redwood Highway and drove along the Avenue of the Giants . . . it was spectacular, but impossible to capture with a photo.