New York 2019 - Day 2: Vessel

I so very badly want to type "The Vessel", but it's just "Vessel".

Today we breakfasted in the hotel (included with the room, which we didn't know in advance - a nice surprise).  I like a variety so I had small amounts of scrambled eggs, sausage, potatoes, Raisin Bran, cantaloupe, honeydew, banana, orange juice, coffee, and a chocolate pastry.

Good morning city

I can see the future, and tonight you'll look like this...

New York 2019 - Day 1

Without any intended plan, we seem to end up going to New York every 2-3 years (2011, 2014, 2016)   and always have a good time.

The impetus for this trip was my learning that a stage version of the Baz Luhrmann film Moulin Rouge! was coming to Broadway in August.  Since this is one of our favorite movies...

So in May we bought tickets to the show and started planning the trip.  Away we go!

Riding the moving walkways at DFW Airport, watching the planes line up

Poof!

We landed at LaGuardia and took a Lyft from the airport to our hotel, the Marriott Residence Inn New York Manhattan/Central Park Western Hemisphere Northeastern Above Ground On 54th Near Starbucks But What Isn't Hotel.  We didn't know it in advance, but apparently this is the tallest hotel in New York and possibly the USA.

New York 2019

We just got back from a great trip to New York to see Moulin Rouge! The Musical, so the next posts will be about that (while it's fresh) then I'll circle back to Disney World...because I can Can CAN!

Camping At Disney World 2018 - Day 5

Animal Kingdom was next on our agenda, and this would be our first time to experience Pandora - The World of Avatar.

Wildlife in the campground

Cardinal

Camping At Disney World 2018 - Day 4

The next day we went to Epcot and met our friend Jackie who lives in Orlando.  She's always gracious and spends a day with us when we come to Disney - good times!

This was the last day of the 2018 Food & Wine Festival so we spent the day eating around Epcot.  A lot.  We had done this a few years back at Disneyland's California Adventure and had a good time, so we were looking forward to it here at Disney World.

I can't find my festival passport at the moment, but even without it I can remember 2 clear standouts:  The Chateau Des Charmes Vidal Icewine, Niagara-on-the-Lake from the Canada pavilion (good), and the Croissant Doughnut with Chocolate and Marshmallows (bad).  To be fair the doughnut was probably good when it was fresh, but it was so, so stale when we ate it.

Not a lot of pictures from this day:

Todd waiting for the bus at the campgrounds

The Epcot entry plaza.  This is currently under renovation and the giant "Leave a Legacy" monoliths are being moved to open up the space more.

Camping At Disney World 2018 - Days 1-3

How this trip came about:

1. We agreed to go to Walt Disney World in 2019 with our friends Holly and Brian and their three kids (see posts from our 2013 Disney trip with them starting here).
2. Todd and I have had a lot a fun camping recently and decided that the two of us would camp at Disney World and on the drives there and back.
3. Being not sure what camping and theme-parking at the same time would be like, and not wanting to combine that first-time experience/stress with traveling with another family, we decided to do a test run in 2018.
4. We invited my mom to come along.

On our first day we got an early start for our 8.5 hour drive and picked Mom up at her house.  We already had most of her gear and had packed it in the car the night before.  We got on the road and had an pleasant enough / uneventful drive to Buccaneer State Park in Waveland, Mississippi - our camp site for the night.

A drizzle around Baton Rouge

Buccaneer State Park sits on the Gulf of Mexico.  Almost completely destroyed by hurricane Katrina in 2005, it underwent an extensive 8-year renovation.

Vegas Wedding

My brother got married in April of 2018 to a really wonderful woman, and they decided to have the ceremony at a wedding chapel in Las Vegas.  Elvis was not involved.

We flew down the morning of the wedding and came back the next day, and stayed at the Park MGM hotel on the strip.  In the evening after the wedding, we all had dinner at Nine Fine Irishmen in New York-New York, walked around the Bellagio, then on to see Cirque du Soleil's Beatles LOVE show at the Mirage.  Fun times!

Creepy hotel hallways

Universal Orlando 2017 - Halloween Horror Nights, Day 5

On the last day of our trip I got up early as usual, so I went to breakfast at 7:45 while Todd slept in.

I ate in the Islands Dining Room in our hotel and after debating with myself ordered the Tahitian French Toast.  It was amazing, and I don't even like french toast that much.

I mean, just look at it

Progress

Back in the room at 9, showered, packed and checked out.  Our shuttle arrived at 9:40 to take us to the airport, and we flew home satisfied with a great trip (and stuffed with french toast!).

Universal Orlando 2017 - Halloween Horror Nights, Day 4

Continuing with the theme from the previous post, here's my notes from this day.

Left hotel at 10:10am. Poseidon. Jurassic Park lunch. Cheeseburger combo with fries and choc shake. Good. Ate on balcony looking out over park. Great location. Jurassic Park ride. King Kong. Aborted due to tech diff. Butterbeer fudge. Hogwarts train. Shopping. Hotel. Finnegan holding area at 4:15. Let out at 6. Shining queue. Shining = incredible!  10 min.  wait.  Dead waters.  Neat boat. 15 min. wait.  Doughnuts. Yuck. Scared on bridge by clown with chainsaw. The Hive 15min. wait.  Not good. Blumhouse. Pretty good. Scarecrow. 50 min. Good!  Simpson’s meat pizza. American horror story. 35 min. Very good. Starbucks. Once more around park. Hotel at 12 something I think. 

This was our last full day at the park and the night that we planned to attend Halloween Horror Nights.  So excited I could hurl!

Told you

Universal Orlando 2017 - Halloween Horror Nights, Day 3

Hello, I'm back.  Let's get to it.


In the interest of catching up, I'm skipping the narrative for a bit.  Here are my notes from this day of the trip:

Left hotel 10am. Universal Studios. 

Stores. ET. Apple fritter Lard Lad. Simpson’s ride. MIB. Gringotts.  Tales of beadle the bard. Bumblebee man chicken tacos and chicken nachos. Steve. Squirrels. Ice cream earl grey lavender. Hot day. Knockturn alley. Back to hotel for 1 1/2 hours. Islands of adventure. Harry Potter. Chocolate fudge. Train. Shopping. Hoodie, hat. No japanese brochures. Hotel. Shower. Jakes American bar at hotel. Apple gimlet. B-1 bomber burger. Delicious. Sweet potato fries. 

I wanted to get a Universal Studios park map/brochure in Japanese and was surprised that they don't print them in that language.  I have no idea to whom "Steve" refers.

Hello It's Me

I'm still here.

Dropping in to say hi.  I'll check in again later.

"Water, water, every where..."

Went to Inner Space Cavern in Georgetown, Texas today with the family and came away with this nugget of advice from our tour guide:

"The water in this 3-foot hole is filtered through the limestone above and is 98% pure which is cleaner than the water you drink at home but don't drink this water because a raccoon gets down here and messes in it."

Universal Orlando 2017 - Halloween Horror Nights, Day 2

Universal is split up into two theme parks, a water park, and a shopping/dining district.  The theme parks are Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure.  The Hogwarts Express links the parks if you have a park-to-park ticket allowing you to visit both parks on the same day.

On this day Jackie, our friend from Florida, met us at Islands of Adventure at 9am.  Whenever we visit the area she's always gracious enough to spend a day at the parks with us, and we always have a great time hanging out with her.  This day was no exception, and she even got soaked with us on the river raft ride: Popeye & Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges.

I'll spare you the play-by-play description and just share some highlights.

The start of a fun day

Universal Orlando 2017 - Halloween Horror Nights, Day 1

Hello again!  Hope you're doing well.

We had decided after our last trip to Universal Orlando in 2016 that we would go back in 2017 to experience Halloween Horror Nights, and we're really glad we did.

Hurricane Irma was a concern heading into this trip since it stormed through the area just days before our scheduled arrival, but it ended up not impacting our travel.  Hurricane Hermine blew through while we were at Universal the year before, so I guess this was just par for the course.

We landed in Orlando at 4:30, checked in at the Universal desk at the airport, then 5 minutes later we were on the shuttle van to our on-site hotel.  Our shuttle driver was great (didn't get his name), and the check in clerk Nadine-Marie at the hotel was terrific; a great experience overall.

Always have to take a cloud pic

Arriving at the Loews Royal Pacific Resort - one of the on-site hotels available at Universal

Pea Soup

I'm not a big fan of peas.  They're fine in small doses like in fried rice or Mexican rice, or occasionally a spoonful of really fresh peas is ok, but that's about it.  So I surprised myself a couple of weeks ago when I bought a can of Campbell's Green Pea soup.  Let's just say I was (insert The Exorcist pea soup reference here) temporarily possessed in the Kroger soup aisle.

So here's how it went today:

Oh god, is it supposed to be solid?

I looked online and apparently this is "normal" and will dissolve once the water's added and it's stirred and heated, but I mean, come on...

Ok, so it did eventually turn into soup.  Unfortunately it turned into pea soup which I now know is disgusting.  To say it tasted as good as it looked would be a kind assessment.  After two spoonfuls I chucked the lot down the drain and started lunch over with baked tilapia.

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 5

It's a pre-Christmas miracle - I'm back at my blog after a 3-month hiatus for no reason other than I couldn't get motivated to write/caption/post.  Now to pick up where we left off at the Grand Canyon...

For the 5th day of our Grand Canyon road trip, Todd and I decided to hike down Bright Angel Trail.  We caught the shuttle into the park and once there took another shuttle, the blue line, to the trailhead. We started the hike around 9am, which in hindsight was way too late, but we did it anyway.

Our original destination was "1 1/2 Mile Resthouse" which is exactly that - a rest house 1 1/2 miles down the canyon.  Beyond that, the next point on the trail is the 3 Mile Resthouse.  Todd really wanted to do the 3 mile one, which means 3 miles down, then a 3-mile continuous climb back up for a total of 6 miles.  I thought this would be way too much, but we did it anyway.

The physical exertion and heat was extremely rough even though we had food and plenty of water.  Looking back, the one note I made while on the trail was "Dying."

Looking back up the trail while just starting out on the way down.  Think of this and worse, in the sun, for 3 miles.

A very good place to start

Pardon The Interruption

Just got back from a trip to Universal Orlando for Halloween Horror Nights.  Really fun and creepy!

I'll finish up the Grand Canyon posts after I recover.  See you then.

Soon

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 4

A road trip within our road trip today.  We breakfasted at the hotel at 7:00am then at 8:30 left for Sedona.  It's about a 2 hour drive from Tusayan and instead of going all the way down to I40 then over to Flagstaff, we split off at the Flintstones place and took 180 to Flagstaff.  I'm glad we did, as that drive was much more interesting.

180 took us through peaks, ski areas and forest (not right here obviously)

Red Mountain.  That's its name.  There were a lot of hiking and exploring options along this corridor, including a mile long lava tube.  We'll have to spend more time when we come back.

Approaching Sedona.  The drive down 89A from Flagstaff offers some great views once you get closer.  I was reminded several times of Custer State Park in South Dakota.

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 3, Part 2: The Plane

After our hike we got back to the hotel at 2:45pm and had just enough time to catch our breath before meeting up with everyone at 3:00pm.  We then drove 1/2 mile over to the Grand Canyon Airport for a flight over and around the Grand Canyon in a Cessna Caravan single engine plane.  This was another idea of Mom's, and it was a great one - definitely a highlight of the trip!  She made the arrangements that morning before we split off for our hike.

We arrived at the airport, checked in for our flight with Grand Canyon Airlines, paid, and had a short wait before our pilot came to walk us out onto the tarmac.  We put on our headphones, had a quick safety lecture, then we were off.  Music and narration was piped in over the headphones, and the pilot periodically cut in with his own observations.

Shirley and Walt in the airport terminal

All aboard

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 3, Part 1: The Hike

I'm breaking this one up into 2 posts, a.m. and p.m., because I'm terrible at self-editing and have included a lot of photos.

Like this panorama I took later in the day

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 2

Taken on the road at 75mph (I love my iPhone 7+)

Day 2 started with breakfast at our hotel at 7am, then we hit the road at 8:30.  On the way we gained another hour and reached Flagstaff at 12:30 local time.  We turned North off of I40 at Williams and drove 50 miles to our hotel (Holiday Inn Express again) in Tusuyan, AZ.

Grand Canyon 2017 - Day 1

Hello again!

Todd and I just returned from a road trip to the Grand Canyon with my mom, aunt Shirley, and my aunt's beau Walt.  We had such a great time - seeing the Grand Canyon in photos or on tv doesn't compare with seeing it in person.

The first day we were on the road at 7:30am and drove from Dallas to Albuquerque, NM  We took 2 cars and stopped in Bowie, TX to meet up with the other vehicle.  Mom transferred from Shirley's car to ours and we were on our way.  We stopped around 1:00 for lunch in Amarillo at Red Robin and were back on the road at 2pm.

Windmills near Electra, TX

Maybe don't let your kids play in the playsnakeground at this rest stop near Quanah, TX

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!

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 9: Seattle

July 14, 2017, our last morning on board the ship.  We stayed in Seattle for the day and left for home the next morning.

4am:  Edmonds, WA

5:15am:  Seattle