Mission Santa Barbara

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Recent mudslides in Montecito, just south of Santa Barbara, closed Highway 101 for nearly two weeks.  Kongo tried to visit the old mission there earlier but couldn’t get through.  You literally couldn’t get to Santa Barbara from LA unless you took the train, rode a boat from Ventura, or drove about four hours through the mountains.  Even now there is a lot of construction along the freeway causing large traffic backups. Anyway, the monkey made it yesterday and he was glad he did.  Those guys at CalTrans do a great job! Mission Santa Barbara was the tenth mission built by…

Sunny Santa Barbara

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So what do you do when out of town family is starting to get bored because all the presents have been opened, you’re knee deep in legos and Princess Minnie parphenalia  and you’ve watched  Jungle Book a half dozen times and it’s still four days till New Year?  Well, you pile all the extra family into #1 son’s new Sienna van and you and Mrs. Kongo put the top down on the sports car and head for Santa Barbara in a two car caravan!  What else? Now just as an aside, Kongo is pretty sure the monkeys in Jungle Book…

Wine Country Monkey

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So much wine.  So little time.  Kongo’s monkey troop headed up to the wine country north of Santa Barbara yesterday.  Snuggled in his son’s new family van, the Kongos went adventuring as the grand girls tend to say.  Kongo’s son, a UCSB alum, knew the area well.    (Of course he did!) Perhaps too well and his detailed knowledge of the area (including back road short cuts) made Kongo wonder what was really going on during those formative college years.  Oh well that train left the station a long time ago. In the area around Santa Ynez and Los Olivos…