Mark and I took off for Livermore yesterday with our bikes strapped on the back of my car. We wanted to ride bikes without the wind blowing or hills to contend with…when we’d been in Livermore for wine tasting we noticed they had an extensive bike trail system through town and the vineyards. The other bonus would be the temperature would be in the 80’s! (San Francisco is cool in the summer…as the famous Mark Twain quote so accurately states: “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco”). So off we went having checked for bike routes on Mark’s “smart phone”. (We weren’t too smart or we would have printed off a route from google maps). We found the park in the middle of town where the route suggested at the starting point for the 14.7 mile loop.
By the end of our bike ride we had no idea how many miles we actually rode because we quickly realized that we were not following the route we had planed to ride. So we let serendipity lead the way. We were enjoying the beautiful scenery comprised of vineyards, flowers along the trails and watching lazy eagles riding the air currents. As Mark decided to take a right, after we found ourselves at a dead end on a trail, I was surprised to see a sign that said “Alden Lane Nursery”. “Mark, we’ve got to stop!” I yelled. I explained that I had a business card sitting on my desk from a buyer of “Alden Lane Nursery”. She had picked up a catalog at the SF Gift Show. I’d called and talked to her a few times about my cards but she had yet to buy. We got off our bikes, Mark found a bench to sit on and rest while I went in to the shop. Carole helped me and when I explained I was looking for a buyer named Cindy she said that she too did some of the buying. I must have looked strange as I had my bike helmut on along with my sunglasses as I explained who I was…an artist with a card line called “Words and Watercolors”. Thankfully she recognized both my name and the card line! She said she had my catalog on her desk because she had been wanting to order! WooHOO!! She ran to get the catalog to make sure I was, indeed, who she thought. “Yep, that’s me!” I said as she showed me last summer’s catalog. I explained that since I’ve just printed 24 new images plus the 31 from January, I’ve now got double the cards I had from last summer. She was excited to see more and promised she would order as soon as she got the new catalog. I’ll be picking those up from the printer this Wednesday just in time to head to Denver for the New Age Trade Show which begins next Saturday! I was thrilled to have made the connection and told her that serendipity is a funny thing because we never would have found her had we not gotten lost!!
While I was inside, Mark had been sitting on the bench looking at the map with his phone. He now had a good idea of where we were and where we were going to ride next. We weren’t too far from a large county park and he headed us in that direction. I was happy as I pedaled along looking at the golden hills in the distance. We wound our way through the trails of the park and as we headed out of the park we were across the street from Wente vineyards. We hadn’t planned to go wine tasting but since we found ourselves at the entrance to this lovely landscaped grounds we decided to ride in, park our bikes and do a little wine tasting! Life is good (as the t-shirts say) and serendipity is a great way to let life unfold!!