Anne & Laura's Ultimate Adventure: Irvine

I left a storming, rainy, hot and humid Charleston to stay here. Anne's cousin Dawn was kind enough to let two road weary - to the point of delirious - travelers rest up at her place in Irvine. Not a bad trade in my opinion. It was so lovely to arrive to fairy tale architecture and rose gardens after the long flight.

In an effort to ready myself for the trip I resorted to power naps instead of full nights of sleep in the days leading up to departure. Combine that with a cross country flight to a different timezone, altitude and humidity changes and I was fit as a fiddle to go meet one of my photographic hero's - [ b ] e c k e r .

-insert photo of Laura and [ b ] e c k e r here-

I would love to have a goofy fan photo to share with you, but alas, in my delirium I ran out without my camera, GASP! And my phone died, just before he arrived. So a cellphone picture was out too. Nice. Classic Laura.

We chatted about everything photographic, which was great, but the real value of the meeting was when he introduced me to Bacon Chocolate. Yeah, that's right. Bacon bits in chocolate. I'm not even lying: Best. Thing. Ever!

Then it was 'back to the ranch' for an awesome night of spaghetti and conversation... oh and wine, can't forget about the wine. We chatted it up with Dawn & Geoff over the most amazing and truly unique spaghetti sauce I have ever had. We talked until our batteries ran out. Anne & I powered down like robots in need of an overnight charge.

Next up: Laguna beach and then... on to Idyllwild in the mountains.