San Francisco, April 2009 (Days 3 & 4)

For our last full day in SF together we headed out to get close(ish) to the Golden Gate Bridge. Considering I am deathly afraid of suspension bridges and my mom isn't exactly a fan of heights or bridges, walking (or driving for that matter) across the bridge was OUT. OF. THE. QUESTION. Instead we thought we would take a nice leasurely stroll to a point that would allow for me to take some fabulous pictures. No such luck on that front because it seems that the best vantage point for a good shot is on the other side of the bridge. Sooo.... here is a picture from wikipedia which didn't involve me having to hold back uncontrollable tears and niagra falls palm sweat.


Having satisfied the need to see the bridge, we took a very long, and very steep walk to Lombard Steet or the incorrectly dubbed "Crookedest Street in the World". After catching our breath and waiting for the fire in our legs to subside (there are some serious hills around there) we began the 1/4 mile descent. Traffic was back to back and people were hopping out of their cars to get a picture of their family in their car on Lombard Street. I suppose everyone there was a tourist so it didn't seem to bother most people. Although, I have to imagine living on that street gets pretty old, pretty quickly.

All this work had us heading for some caffeine and a drink - so we had an all in one drink, irish coffees! We went to The Buena Vista, the first place in American to make an Irish Coffee. It had a really interesting history, which can be found on their website: http://www.thebuenavista.com/irishcoffee.html. We stuck around for a while to enjoy a few drinks as well as watch the process of them being made. The bartenders make 20 or so at a time and somehow manage to accomodate and remember special orders.


Post drinks and all that walking around, we hopped on a trolley back to our hotel to put our feet up and turn on the tube for one last night of girl talk and "48 Hour Mystery". Due to the crazy hills, the trolly provided an excellent location for some nice pictures of the city around us.


On our last 1/2 day before heading to the airport we went to see the "Painted Ladies" on Alamo Square. Admittedly, I was most familiar with them due to my fun filled Friday nights watching Full House and developing my girl crush on Uncle Jessie. "What ever happened to predictability? The milkman, the paperboy, the evening TV..." Anyone else know this song??? Ok, so back to the houses. They were very charming to see and I wished there would have been one that was open to the public just so we could walk through it. Since we had another hour or so to kill, we headed through the park and witnessed a dog walked with no less than 10 dogs. They all seemed perfectly under control though so he must rule them Cesar Millan style and be the true pack leader.

We walked all the way to the center of the Haight-Ashbury district. Seeing as neither of us were in the market for marijuana inspired accessories/decor/pharaphanila, we instead did some serious people watching and enjoyed the last of our time together in SF.

I look forward to another trip next year with just the two of us! Where should we go??!!

San Francisco, April 2009 (Days 1 & 2)

Waaaayyy back in April, as a gift to my mom, I planned and arranged a weekend trip for the two of us to San Francisco. Neither of us had been before so we planned a full weekend of sight-seeing. After arriving and getting settled into our hotel in Union Square, we promptly set out to explore and decided to head to the relatively close Chinatown. We putzed around through the shops, watched fortune cookies being made, and enjoyed the architecture. That evening we wandered aimlessly throughout the city and eventually settled into our beds. Thus began the "48 Hour Mystery" tradition...for each of the 3 nights we curled up in our beds and watched 2 back to back episodes while munching on cookies and drinking wine. A perfect ladies night!

Saturday morning we were up and out early for the farmer's market where we bought fresh cheese, bread, and pastries for our breakfast. We then made our way to Pier 39. On the way, we happened upon this guy:
He would sit with those branches hiding him and then jump out to scare unsuspecting passerby. My mom loved this and ran up to him to grab a picture. What ensued was a hysterical conversation in which he said "If you want to take a picture of my bush, you need to pay me!"...to which my mom replied "That's what I always say!". After that, they were like long lost best friends and we spent a bit of time chatting with him. And here's the picture of my mom in his bush (which we did pay for):


Pier 39 was nothing special...aside from the sea lions, which I LOVED! We watched some turf wars, but mostly witnessed a lot of sleepy animals. We spent a bit of time on the pier and then left to make our boat trip over to Alcatraz. To be honest, I didn't know much about "The Rock" other than its lengthy list of infamous prisoners. We did the audio tour and I thought it was fascinating. I highly recommend the trip over and the full audio tour. Plus...the views are amazing.




Our full day of walking and exploring had us back in our hotel early and settled in just in time for another "48 Hours" marathon.

Seatte, May 2009

During May and June, I spend a lot of time in Seattle for work. As I spent many a summer in Portland, I have quite a bit of love for the Pacific Northwest. I like the feel out there - the green, the natural beauty, the air, the people. Typically Cassidy makes a few trips and we get to spend some time exploring the city. However, this past trip my mom and sister Lindsay joined me for a girls' weekend. I am certain Lindsay left just as smitten as I am and there is talk of her going to work for Seattle Grace in the near future :)


Our weekend consisted of typical tourist things such as checking out Pike's Place Market and strolling through the slew of goods available for sale. And although I'm not really one to buy fish - the stall of the famous fish throwers had my entranced. And it wasn't the fish that had me...it was the little old guy who was standing behind the counter with a string tied to a fish. If someone came close enough, he would pull it, scare the bejesus out of someone, and snicker. If the man below ends up missing someday, rest assured I have him at my house and we are most likely having a carnation instant breakfast and toast.




We also went on a short ferry boat ride. We didn't really go to get somewhere, we just went to be out on the water. We were extremely lucky in that we had beautiful weather all weekend long. This meant unusually clear skies so I was able to get a pretty clear view of Mt. Rainier as well as other views that the fog would typically hide.








We rounded out our trip with Seattle's famous "Underground Tour" which is essentially a walk in Seattle's basement with a comedian who knows some crazy Seattle history. It is really entertaining and I highly recommend for those visiting - although I would give it a PG-13 rating. And obviously, what is a tourist trek around Seattle without a visit to the needle?




Hands down, the best part of the weekend (company aside) were the stunning sunsets. You just don't see this every day. But I certainly wish I could.

Mt. Cook National Park - Part 1, the hike

So for our second destination in New Zealand, we ventured to the Mt. Cook National Park, which is part of the Southern Alps range that runs the length of the South Island and contains the highest mountain in New Zealand - Mt. Cook. It's also interesting to note that approximately 40% of the park is made up of the 72 named glaciers that are still moving, melting, and evolving the landscape around the area. As a matter of fact, 70% of the entire country's electricity is supplied by the water running off of the glaciers! Maybe I'm a complete dork, but I thought that was fascinating.

When arriving at the park, you only have two choices of where to stay - The Hermitage, a luxury hotel or campgrounds at the base of the mountains. Now, I'm not the campy type, so this was one accomodation decision that was very easy for us! Here is a view from our window on to our balcony and beyond:


Day 1 was primarily spent on the balcony of the hotel bar, drinking local beers and playing Uno. I maintained my lead but was punished for this with my disappointing food experience. You see, I need a good bowl of mac & cheese at least once a week to keep me happy. I had yet to see one on a menu until the hotel bar pulled through with a glorius offering of fresh baked mac & cheese. The excitement that built up in that 15 minutes of waiting was nearly too much for body to handle. The disappointment that took over when they brought it out to me with chunks of ham in it was almost enough to make me leave the God forsaken country and come back to America, where we know the value of purist Mac & cheese. Anyway, they couldn't make it without the meat and I had to sustain myself on beer, salad, and fries.

Day 2 started out with a hike up to the Terminal Lake of the Tasman Glacier. The hike itself was a 3 hour easy hike with a few steep climbs with a lot of photo ops. A couple of things to note when looking through these: 1) I hate bridges, 2) I didn't come with appropriate hiking clothing (mainly b/c I don't OWN appropriate hiking clothes) - so jeans and a top I wear to bed had to suffice. In the first picture I had just come over the edge of a hill and noticed what was going to be the death of me in approximately 10 minutes. Cassidy laughed and said he had noticed it quite a while ago but neglected to tell me just so he could relish the very moment when I did finally see it on my own. See how happy he is crossing the bridge? Me, not so much.









All finished with the hike! I was so happy not to have any more bridges to cross (there were 4 crossings in total) and excited to head back for a much deserved rest and some food! However, the universe had other plans in store for us... on to Part 2.

The drive to Mt. Cook

Alright, so I have not quite been on the ball when it comes to blogging - BUT WAIT! I have plenty of excuses, good excuses. You see we had the arrival of our wedding pictures (which consumed about 2 entire days of my life), Christmas festivities, winter illnesses, and my favorite part - 5 little 5 week old kittens that moved into our home temporarily and after about 2 minutes with them, into my heart permanently. I'll do a blog on those little buggers a bit later.

For now, let's just go through some highlights of our 4ish hour drive from Christchurh to Mt. Cook. Cassidy and I were both extremely excited to be heading further south and away from city life so that we could catch a glimpse of the much talked about natural beauty of the New Zealand countryside. It didn't take long before we were driving along curvy roads weaving through green hills that elevated up into snow-capped mountains. And the sheep! My God, the sheep! It's unreal how many there are. Below are some random shots we took along the way:





A highlight of the trip was Lake Tekapo. It is a lake that feeds from the glaciers and is the bluest blue that I have ever seen. The pictures below were not edited at all, this is the actual color of the water! The church in the picture is the Church of the Good Shepard. It is a teeny tiny little chapel that stands alone on a hill looking out across fields of flowers towards Lake Tekapo. We spent a while just walking along the waterfront, enjoying the views, and checking out the wildflowers that grow everywhere in New Zealand. They are beautiful! Oh, and I found a very large bumblebee and followed him around to try to get a good picture of him. It seems that Cassidy had never seen a bumblebee before because he kept telling me "that is not a bee!" due to the very large size of it. I assured him that yes, this is a bumblebee...but I don't think he ever came around to believing me.

Next post - Mt. Cook!

Christchurch, New Zealand

Our second honeymoon destination was Christchurch, New Zealand. After our midnight arrival and the discovery that the rental car company was nowhere to be found, nor was the car that we were told would be parked and ready to go - we just took a taxi to our B&B. A bit tired and sufficiently aggravated about the rental car, we were thrilled when we pulled up to the historic manor that would be our home for the next 2 nights. It was built in 1861and it was beautiful, both inside and out!

The next morning we walked through the city's Botanical Gardens, which were actually quite impressive (well, as impressive as trees and flowers can be). Granted, Cassidy and I aren't really the types to stay in the gardens for hours on end and ponder the species of trees...but every so often we do stop to smell the roses and take a picture or two. Below are pics of a black swan that lived on the river that ran through the gardens. He caught me taking his photo and came over to where I was, presumably b/c he wasn't all that into me hanging around his family. However, I got a good pic of his red bill and eyes (then ran away)!


We then headed toward Cathedral Square to see the namesake cathedral - "Christ Church". The town square was an interesting mix of older, more detailed buildings and a whole lot of buildings built in the 70's and lacking of any character. I think Cassidy and I have been spoiled by the beautiful architecture of cities like Prague, Paris, and Rome because we spent a little bit of time taking it all in but then ultimately decided our time would be better spent with a meal and some cocktails. We did end up having some of the very best Indian food we have ever tried that night. So if any of you ever go to Christchurch (I'm sure you've been inspired by my yawnfest post), go to Himalayas on Colombo street!




The next morning we picked up our rental car and started our 4 hour drive toward Mt. Cook! Stay tuned for some beautiful views like you have never seen before! Unless, of course, you have been to New Zealand.