Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 10: Home

7/15/17

Well, all good things must come to an end and whatnot.  We checked out early, caught our ride to the airport and flew home to Dallas.

Goodbye Mt. Rainier

Goodbye cloud and green hills and valley with winding river

Goodbye mountaintop lakes

Hello DFW Airport

Hello heat :(

AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys

Actually there's quite a lot of attractions in this area

And that wraps up our Alaskan cruise.  I'll sum up with these thoughts:  We had a great time with John and Norma and are so glad we got to go with them.  The experience of cruising up the inland passage to Alaska was great - relaxing, amazing sights, great weather, terrific excursions.  The experience the cruise line offered while on the ship was fine; it was about what I expected except for the constant pushing of merchandise.  They really went the full QVC while we were trapped on board.

Seattle was already on my list of places to go, but now that we've had a taste it's been bumped up to a higher priority.  We've agreed that we want to explore the city more, spend time outside the city enjoying nature, and road-tripping from there to Vancouver.  We'll have to make that happen soon.

I would definitely like to spend more time in Alaska as well, mainly hiking and exploring.  There's so much natural beauty there that it's hard to imagine how we would choose where to go and what to do.  When we go back we most likely will fly in instead of cruising again, giving us more time to explore on our own.  The same goes for Victoria, British Columbia.  That looked like a fun town to spend some time exploring, and we've got to spend more time at the amazing Butchart Gardens.

Wow, the destination list just keeps growing.  We'll have to balance new discoveries with revisiting favorites.

Thanks for sticking around.  Next up will be our first trip to the Grand Canyon, so I'll see you then!

Disneyland Trip 2017 - Day 5

Well, we had a really good time and this trip totally satisfied the "got to get away" urge.

We checked out and waited out in front of the hotel for about 40 minutes for our Disney bus to come to take us to LAX.  The ride back was uneventful and we still had time to kill so we hung out in the new international terminal for a bit.  Then it was back to home and hearth, rested and relaxed!

I'm ready to go...where's that damn bus?

We saw this ginormous British Airways double decker plane getting prepped for takeoff

This thing was just massive

Getting close to home.  From up here civilization just looks like a bioluminescent splotch on the Earth.

That's it for this report.  Thanks for sticking around and waiting for the finish!

Now, let me tell you about Alaska...

Universal Orlando Trip - Day 5: Going Home

All good things must come to an end, and so we had to bid farewell to Universal Orlando and the Loews Royal Pacific Resort.  It was hard too because we woke up to such a beautiful day:

Hard to leave, but it's gorgeous after days of rain and it's Saturday - crowds are sure to be out in full force.  Our timing seemed to work out perfectly.

Todd's in good spirits waiting for the shuttle to the airport

Just plane fun

Ha ha, made you laugh

Why is the window wet?  Adjust focus...

...oh crap.  What happened to the great weather?!
This looked a lot worse in person - like the hurricane had circled back around and was headed straight for us.  The plane took forever to taxi - we kept willing it to go faster.

Phew! - we beat the storm and weren't delayed.  It didn't take long to go from this...

...to this.  Then it was clear skies all the way home.

We had a great time.  Next time (next year?), we're planning on going during Halloween Horror Nights.  They were setting up some of the outdoor areas while we were there and it already looked amazing.  Can't wait!

Thanks for reading.  Coming up next:  South Dakota - so stick around, we'll be right back!  ;o)

L.A. Trip - Day 9: Going Home

Woke up, checked out, dropped the car off, flew home.

Goodbye Los Angeles

Home Again, Home Again, Hack Sniff Snort Cough

Back from Chicago and sick as a dog. Luckily it started on the last day - the rest of the trip was great. I'll post trip reports once I'm back up to at least 75%. Right now all I want to do is crawl in a hole.