Feb. 7th, 2014 Planes, Trains and Automobiles is the start of our 2014Adventure

We are on our way to Santa Rosa for a month.  We are house-sitting for this couple who live on this little farm in Sonoma county, and have a rental cottage on the property.   We stayed in the rental unit last year, and in talking to them, we negotiated to pay them a minimal fee to stay in their house so they can take a vacation from their house duties and go away.   The house duties include taking care of their animals, which include the dog Murphy, some chickens, goats and sheep, as well as overseeing the rental unit.     So really, this blog should be entitled, "Farmer Dan and Farmer Pat take on Sonoma". Wine Country Cottage
 We left the cold, snowy Northern Michigan early this morning.  
We are talking about 202 inches of snow in Leelanau County  Snow fall in January in Michigan

I barely slept last night, knowing I'd have to get up early, plus being excited.  Salt Lake City is our first stop, so we can see Matt, Rachel, and Isaac, then rent a car from to drive out to Sonoma.
We got to the Traverse City airport, and they had oversold the plane, so we offered to be bumped.  This would get us to Salt Lake City two hours later.  it was easy, except we had to take a transport van to Grand Rapids, fly to Mnpls,, then fly to SLC.   Well, we are intrepid travelers and decided to do this.
It actually all went well, and we arrived safe and sound.  We took the light rail train downtown to pick up our rental car, a Chevy Spark.   The crew at Enterprise left something to be desired, as the guy who picked us up was probably 90, and was not able to help us with our luggage.  But he was a sweet old guy who knew Michigan because he had motorcyled across the U.P. I did ask him when that was as his motorcycle days must have been long ago.  But he was a nice old guy.   The other guy couldn't figure out how to lower the shelf in the hatch back, which was essential to getting all our luggage in.  We finally figured it out and took off.
We ended up meeting Matt for dinner, as Isaac was sick, and so was Rachel.  Disappointing, but we will see them tomorrow and get some good Isaac time.

So, farmers Pat and Dan begin a new adventure. Pat