Santa Barbara, CA

Santa Barbara (State Street specifically) is one of my favorite places in the whole world! Someone recently asked me where I would live if I could live anywhere and of course I picked SB. He was like, "Oh, because you went to school there?" and I was like, "Nooo... I went to school there because it's always been my favorite place!"

I especially love State Street during the holidays. I love shopping at Paseo Nuevo during the night because of all the white Christmas lights. Ahhhhh.

So today, we were spontaneous and took a drive out to SB to do some Christmas shopping. My sister met us and we had lunch at Palazzio. I've been here a couple times before, once for my 20th birthday. I love the bread and the caesar salad. For the first time in months, I kinda took a break from being a true vegetarian. This place serves their pasta family style, so we ordered pasta with chicken and I just picked the chicken out. I'm sure I ate some tiny pieces, but oh well. Anyways, I'm not sure why I didn't eat here more often during college. It was delicious!

I love Santa Barbara. I always feel so sad whenever I have to leave. <3

Day 8

I shot up out of my bed at 3:00 a.m. after only 3 hours of sleep. I had been tossing and turning all night worried that I would sleep through my alarm clock. I tried to go back to sleep, but my heart was racing. I wanted to get started with my long journey home. I decided to go ahead and get going with my day.

I had arranged to have a taxi pick me up at 4:00 am to take me to the airport for my 7:00 am flight. But I was ready to go by 3:30 am. So I sat and waited in the dark lobby.


At 10 minutes til 4:00 am, the taxi driver dressed in a dark suit came into the lobby and loaded my things into the sleek Skoda car.

When we started driving away from the hotel, I told the driver "I'm so sad that I have to leave, I love it here." I don't think he understood what I said because he didn't respond at all.

I arrived at the airport a little early so I bought freshly squeezed orange juice and read my magazine. My first flight of the day was from Prague to Amsterdam. Our flight was 15 minutes delayed which sucked because I only had an hour between arriving in Amsterdam and departing to LA. I had a great seat next to the exit with lots of leg room. Unfortunately, this was only for my short flight.



When I landed in Amsterdam, I had to run from one end of the airport to the other. Luckily, I had printed out a map of the Amsterdam airport which I was able to study on the flight. I arrived at my departure gate just in time to board! Phew!

My flight was loooong. Ugh.

I was so happy to arrive in LA. It seemed like I couldn't get off the plane fast enough. JR picked me up. I was happy to have someone carry my luggage! We stopped in Ventura and Santa Barbara on our way home. I ended up at home around 5 p.m. and was happy to take a shower and relax for the evening.