Happy Thanksgiving

This is our first Thankgiving dinner in over two years as we have been in non-practising countries.  Americans thinks the rest of the world celebrates it too and always seem surprised that it is an American tradition.  The centrepiece of Thanksgiving is the turkey and it becomes a source of obsession for cooks - how long to cook it for, how not to over cook, not to undercook, what to do with the 20 lbs of leftovers.  Anyway, I brined mine.  It is a sure guarantee of a moist turkey. 

Basic recipe: 1 cup of salt for every gallon of water.  Stick the turkey in the saline solution for up to 24 hours.

Here is our turkey at the halfway mark.  It is looking beautiful.  Another hint, don't cover the turkey in tinfoil.

Kathryn and Tim came to visit over the holidays and helped prepare most of the dinner - that is Kathryn did.  Tim helped Fred watch the football game.  The reason they are on our bed is because the only room with tv is the bedroom.

By early afternoon our friends Bernie and family had arrived with lots of very yummy appetizers.  Here is Bernie with her sons Chad and Michael.

Kathryn, Tim and Rick enjoy champagne while Tim pretends to cook.

Bill and Sue, flanked by our faithful Molly.

Summer and Emily played with Thomas the Tankengine.  Emily was a fantastic au-pair all day and kept Summer really occupied.

The Thanksgiving table

All the yummy food.  Nick's southern candied Yams (yams with marshmallows), green beans, butternut squash, stuffing, potatoes, lamb and turkey.  Nobody is quite sure what the glowing red dish is other than it comes from Kansas.

Thanksgiving plate stuffed to the gills

And the best part is that the boys did the wash up.  Nick and Rick in the kitchen.  PS.  I haven't found most of my plates since, where did you guys put them.

Bay Area Mountain Biking

The bay area has some of the best mountain biking trails in the USA and some of them are only a couple of miles from our house. We have been training all summer for the mother of all rides - Almaden Quicksilver park to Los Gatos. Well it's not really that bad if you only do it in one direction. It must have been at least 12 miles, although disputes arose as to whether it was not longer.  If yo looks carefully at the map below you can see the trail outlined in red.  It goes through two parks and the entire ride is on dirt roads.

We started off in early morning fog and climbed from Old Almaden Park to the top of the Guadalupe mines. You can still see the ruins of the mine shafts from the quicksilver mining days.

While the top of the hill was busy, within minutes we were alone on the trail. As we crossed from Almaden Quicksilver to Sierra Azul, the trail was deserted. Here Dave and Fred take on the first hill. How come the hills never look steep in the photos.
As the early morning fog rose, we got the first glimpse of Mount Umunhum, which is at 3486 feet. Thankfully we weren't going that high, but we did hit 2500 feet at the top of the Kennedy Trail.

 OK this is what it looks like on a sunny day!

A lot of huffing and puffing, we made it to the top of Woods Road Trail. The sun had come out and most of the cloud had cleared. Fred and Dave looked very fresh, and the worst of the climbing was behind us.

You can now see how high we have come, Mount Umunhum and the Airforce Radar station are rising out of the clouds.  We still haven't met another soul.  Who says that Bay area is too crowded.

Finally we crest to the Los Gatos side of the hill and get our first view of the Silicon Valley.  Now do you believe we are at 2500 feet?

Family portriat at the top.  Did I mention that this was my new Trek Bike's first major outing.

 The good news is that we have come 9.2 miles from Hicks Road, the bad news is that we still have at least 5 more miles in front of us.

Group portriate when we hit Kennedy trail

Finally  we catch sight of Lexington Resevoir which means it is all downhill to Los Gatos and a latte and blueberry scone are waiting at the Purple Onion Cafe.

The whole ride turned out to be a lot less nasty than we were led to believe.  Of course, it might be a different thing doing the ride in reverse as it is much steeper on the Los Gatos side.  Next time, we will do the entire out and back - right Dave?