Michelle

- Venetian-style Montauk Club - quick donut stop at Dough - Neo-Gothic Old First Reformed Church - Tallest live-stone steeple in Brooklyn - Flowery mural on an unoccupied house - Romanesque Church of Virgin Mary started by Christian Syrians and Lebanese in 1911 - Obama's brownstone residence - Litchfield Villa for Parks and Rec - Golden hour Prospect Park stroll - huge YMCA armory building

- Monterey Cypress and Monterey pine trees filled this reserve - orange algae protect the cypress trees from pests - saw harbor seals from afar sleeping on Seal Cove - walked around Moss beach trying to find sea animals in the tide pools but just a few snails

- relatively flat hike - greener than I expected - huge waves at the beach at the end - signs of flooding risk

- open marsh at the beginning from Mill Valley to Downtown Sausalito - lunch stop at a deli in Sausalito, waited a bit for our "Grandpa" and cubano - Saturday crowd in downtown Sausalito, much more diverse crowd than Mill Valley - lots of hill climbs and downhill, SF style - at bike only traffic circle, did a detour to the other side of Mill Valley - golden hour on the way back, beautiful weather and scenery

- so many stairs - cold spell lifted as we climbed up the stairs - mostly retired ppl on the stairs

- Lunar New Year's Day 2 is much more like LA typical weather - came here during golden hour so very nice lighting - rattlesnake sign but thankfully no rattlesnakes - wrentit sightings along the trail - gigantic mountains to the right and lake to the left - a few people with fishing poles along the lake - surrey and kayak rentals on weekends only

- in need ot exercise so decided to walk in San Gabriel where most ppl drive - Walked to a Vincent Lugo Park and everybody was quite friendly saying hi - great community of older Asians exercising using park's equipment and doing Tai Chi - nice trail along the "river" resulted from yesterday's rain - Merlin ID app detected a lot of birds - Started raining again as we headed back

-first bike ride of the year ended up in Hollywood, Fl - most bike rental shops are closed on Sundays for some reason - got bikes on the Broadwalk but no helmets - busy bike traffic along the beach with all kinds of bikes rented from the same shop "The Bike Shack" - electric bikes and fat tires were common sightings - realized fat tires are for beach sand - so many cars with Quebec license plates in the parking lot - crossed the bridge to get to Anne Kolb Nature Center - some rocky mountain biking 🥵 - went through West Lake Park to go into the quiet streets of Hollywood Lakes - signs of banning short term vacation rentals - fulfilled the dream of biking on Hollywood Blvd - crossed another bridge back, many people walking on it with beach gear, smart no need to pay for parking - less crowded on the other side of the broadwalk

-chilly morning with fleece on - so much uphills, fleece is no longer needed - Peralada was still waking up when we passed by - got over some medium hills to get to Garriguella - nice break with cortados on the main street of Garriguella - bar filled with locals eating breakfast mostly a sandwich with ham or egg ( francesa) - ready for another climb - restaurant in Mollet De Peralada is still closed, doesn't open till 12:45pm - stopped by a winery started by young people - lots of cars with "E" parked in the lot - peeked inside and saw groups doing wine tasting - today is a Saturday so mostly young people doing the wine tour - we got a white and red grape juice bottled on site - lunch in Cabanes was quite adventurous with no written menu so we got by with our limited Spanish - most ride today was on the road so a lot more road bikers passing by at higher speed - traffic increased as we approached Figueres, Dali's hometown