Stone Brewery in Escondido

OK, so it's not really camping or hiking but it's beer and I love beer so there. Anyway, it was a glorious end to our family camp out so I will go ahead and put our visit to the Stone brewery in here.

When you first enter the path from the parking lot you enter a cool tunnel with large rocks on all sides and vines growing over. In fact, there were big stones everywhere...all around the gardens, in the center of tables and even in the bathrooms which must have been thematic in some way but I am still trying to figure that out.







Maddie and Easton going down the "Stone Tunnel" towards the brewery.










Once inside, the working brewery is to the left and the restaurant/bar to the right. It has an Asian-industrial feel and the gardens outside are breathtaking. Two bars keep your beer in hand and families can be served in the dining area or order food from the bar and eat in or around the gardens. The bartenders are quite helpful and love talking beer. After I ordered my Oaked Arrogand bastard the bartender said it was his favorite of the 7 main stone beers. I asked him what his favorite overall Stone brew was and he introduced me to the Sawyers Triple. This is a charity beer with 100% of the proceeds go to helping kids with ALD, a neurological disorder. Our server told us to "drink all you can guys, cause, its for the kids."

Lunch fare is varied and colorful with lots of choices for all palates.

I chose the Tilapia Cheviche...

Bill liked his wild boar ribs...
And Heather with her wieners.

After lunch we all took the free tour of the brewery and after wards they serve everyone free samples of beer...for free. Four different samples of beer, free.


Some pictures of the inside of the brewery.



If you go out there let me know about your experience and definitely try the Sawyer's Triple.

Don't forget the free beer.

Family Camp

Easton and Hannah in the DIY hammock, San Diego Family Camp










So... I took the weekend to tryout some of the backpacking items I have been working on, namely the hammock that I made using the instructions from this website. I bought the ripstop nylon at Joanns for about 11 dollars and the webbing for the straps - tree huggers- cost $1 at the REI leftover bin. I used the Hennessy lashing system to attach the hammock to the trees. Because I suck at sewing and our sewing machines don't work, I took the nylon (I think it is 70 denier ripstop) to my school, Cypress HS, and asked our Home Economics teacher Mrs. K to help me hem the edges. She did a perfect roll hem in about 15 minutes! I took the fabric and whip stitched the ends with nylon cord to gather the ends of the fabric.

The whip stitch gather at the ends of the hammock

I used some cord from REI to attach the hammock to the trees and some leftover cord as a ridgeline to adjust the sag of the hammock. In all I spent about 20 dollars and it worked out pretty well. It easily held 200 lbs. of weight and the whole system was quite comfortable.















Toby in the hammock testing the comfort and durability.




I used a ground pad underneath me for insulation and my mummy bag (unzipped) as a quilt. Warm and toasty I fell asleep in less than 10 minutes and woke up only once because I shifted down forcing my neck too far forward. I put some slack in the ridgeline and faced the other direction which put me in a more level position. In about 20 minutes I forgot about the crazed maniac lurking around the campground that was going to stab me, and I fell asleep for the rest of the night.

I plan to use the hammock up in Deep creek for the family backpacking trip this summer...Hopefully it will be as comfortable as it was in San Diego (No Ron Burgundy commentary, please).





Me testing out the DIY hammock at Family Camp 2010