Ojai There!

With all the hard work Ingrid put in at her new firm, she earned us two nights at the Ojai (pronounced OH-hye) Valley Inn and Spa. At this point, Ingrid had already announced that she'd be leaving the firm (more on that in a later post), but didn't want to let her hard-earned trip go to waste, and I was definitely on board for a weekend away.



We left Friday after work and arrived later that night after about an hour and a half drive. The place was quite impressive with a valet service to greet you upon arrival, and I couldn't wait to see what else the resort had to offer.



By the time we arrived, the restaurants on the resort were closed, so we decided to catch a movie in our room and turn in. We actually watched two pretty good movies... one was Knocked Up (clear foreshadowing), and the other was Superbad (less than clear foreshadowing). Well as it turned out, the only Superbad thing that night was the temperature of our room. Just before falling asleep we set the thermostat at a cozy 75 degrees (which is actually a little too warm for my taste). Surprisingly, I woke up in the middle of the night freezing and realized the vents were blowing a steady stream of cool air down onto my bed, so I got out of bed and turned up the thermostat to 80 degrees and covered myself as I dozed back to sleep... only to wake up again early the next morning with the same cool air blowing right on my face. We later found out that the heating unit was busted, which caused the air conditioner to run continuously in an effort to bring the room to the desired temperature.



The next morning, sniffly and ill, Ingrid and I had breakfast at the resort cafe. Unlike me, Ingrid had a warm, restful night and felt great.



By the time we got there, I was feeling a bit better and I knew a solid breakfast could only work in my favor.



We had breakfast out on the patio, which overlooked the resort golf course.



As I sat there, I felt so old, but so damn good at the same time with a newspaper and a hot cup of coffee, enjoying a tasty breakfast overlooking an amazing golf course. I opted for the eggs benedict, some potatos and these wonderfully delicious breakfast burritos. They were so good, in fact, I went back for a couple more, and then a couple more for the road. Mmmmm.



After breakfast, Ingrid went to her spa treatment and I hit up the complimentary driving range. After slicing countless balls with my driver, I went back to the room to shower. To my surprise, after Ingrid finished her treatment, she suggested we go back out to the driving range so that I could teach her how to play. We ended up on chipping green challenging each other with some closest-to-the-pin action. Although she didn't win, Ingrid was surprisingly talented and gave me some hope that one day, she and I can go out golfing together. Later in the afternoon, we checked out a couple of beach cruisers and rode around the neighborhood.



During our stay, we enjoyed a fantastic meal at one of the restaurants, while being entertained by a crazy bartender, or as he put it, a mixologist, who entered drink-making competitions and allegedly won a few. He was hyper and chatty, but he made a damn good martini as well as several other types of drinks. Good job getting us this weekend, pena. It was a great way to relax.