Posts Tagged ‘travel’

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Bicycle trip from San Diego to Phoenix (NEW)

Friday, June 18th, 2010
Riding along the US / Mexico border

Riding along the US / Mexico border

Day 1 – San Diego to Alpine We left at about 9:30am from Crystal Pier in Pacific Beach after a few goodbyes, and were riding a high heading out of the city. We made some good progress, stopped for a pizza lunch, then hit the road again. Our last 20 miles were a serious uphill battle, and around the time our weary and not yet road accustomed legs nearly gave out, we had completed 50 miles and reached the Ma Tar Awa RV Park just east of the Viejas Casino. We were too late to check in, as the office had already closed, but we saw someone cleaning who let us slip in on the agreement that we would pay our dues in the morning. It wasn’t quite dark yet, [...]

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A Whirlwind weekend. SAN-BDL: CT, MA, RI

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

5/26 – Online flight check in. Arrive airport 12 noon. Washington DC 9PM. Hartford’s Bradley International Airport at 11:30PM. Hertz rental car at midnight. 90 degrees outside. Heavy winds. Get car and head to mom’s house. Heavy rains, crazy thunderstorm. Temperature now 65. Power out at mom’s. Sleep @ 1:30AM.

5/27 – Wake up, breakfast, visit with mom. 2:30PM hit the road, head to Boston. Arrive Boston @ 4. Check into Copley Square Hotel. Relax {briefly}. 5PM Complimentary wine in lobby. Walk down Boylston to Boston Common. Follow Freedom Trail to Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market. Bowl of clam chowder and our first quahog. Hop on the T, head to Newbury and the Back Bay for dinner at The Other Side Cafe. Down the street to The Pour House. 11:30 PM to bed.

5/28 – 11AM Farmer’s Market Copley Square. Hop the T again, lunch at America’s Oldest Restaurant, Union Oyster [...]

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Arrival in Bangkok, Khao San, and Grand Palace

Sunday, February 21st, 2010

Entry #2 from Thailand Trip (see entry #1)

Bangkok syline at night from hotel roof

Bangkok syline at night from hotel roof

We finally made it out of Guangzhou, had an uneventful but comfortable flight from there to Bangkok, and successfully made it to the Lamphu Tree House Hotel where we had reservations for the first night. Even though we had been in transit for over 24 hours, and had only slept for a few hour increments on the planes, we didn’t want to waste our first night in Thailand. The hotel was really nice and had a lovely rooftop patio, but we really were itching to get out into Bangkok. The hotel was supposedly a 10 minute walk from Khao San Road, and knowing that it has been called the Backpacker Center of the Universe, we figured what better place to go for our first [...]

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Stuck in Guangzhou Airport without our passports

Saturday, January 23rd, 2010

Entry #1 from Thailand trip (see entry #2)

First view of China from the sky

First view of China from the sky

We were sitting there in Guangzhou Airport without our passports. It wasn’t exactly how we wanted our trip to Thailand to start. Up until a few hours ago, things were fine. There were no problems boarding the plane in Los Angeles, and the flight to Guangzhou went off without a problem. We knew we’d be in the Guangzhou airport for 7 hours before our next flight, and though typically there is no red tape to navigate nor Visa concerns as long as you plan to stay in the terminal, from my research it looked China had some extra tight restrictions for American citizens arriving there, so I put in a call to the embassy prior to leaving to be certain that we would [...]

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Back to semi-reality from Thailand

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

I spent the past 14 days in Thailand (with a 5 hour stint in Narita, Japan). My New Year was spent on the beach at the Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan, and then I spent some time in the Krabi area, including Krabi Town, Koh Phi Phi and Ao Nang. So needless to say it will take me a few days to get back to reality. If I can get my ass in gear, over the next few weeks I will try to post some photos and some of my journal entries from the trip.

Hope all is well with all of you, and that you had a holiday as good as I did!

Looking down into town on Koh Phi Phi from viewpoint

Looking down to Koh Phi Phi from viewpoint

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Colorado Road Trip – Boulder, Fort Collins, and Denver

Tuesday, September 8th, 2009

Memories from Colorado trip earlier this year…

Beautiful Colorado Rockies

Beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains

After descending over the Rocky Mountains on one of the more bumpy flights I’ve ever had, we arrived in Denver on Friday morning. The plan was to check out the major cities of Colorado over the next four and a half days, and while we were at to sample a lot of the great breweries and pubs in the area as well. It turned out to be a sort of impromtu beer tour, but that worked just fine because it gave us direction and motivation to keep moving along. So to get started, we picked up the rental car and then headed straight to Boulder, which was the place I was looking most forward to seeing. I had only driven through Colorado, without ever having spent any time [...]

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Lunch in Tecate, Mexico

Sunday, August 16th, 2009
Main plaza in Tecate Mexico

Main plaza in Tecate Mexico

Today we decided to take a day trip down to Tecate, Mexico. Though it is a border city, it is a much smaller and better representation of Mexico than Tijuana. It’s also within an hour of San Diego. I had been once before, but today I went down with my girlfriend. We drove to the border, parked, walked across, and within 15 minutes we were sitting in the central plaza sipping beers and eating chips.

Prior to my first trip there, I had heard that it was a nice place to visit, but I wanted to check it out for myself. At the time I couldn’t find much consistent information about it online, but if you’re interested in visiting, it’s a simple day trip. No border lines, no stress, and [...]

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Baja California Trip Memories

Friday, July 31st, 2009
A few hours south of the US/Mexico border

A few hours south of the US/Mexico border

The place we were to be going in Mexico was called Punto San Jacinto, and it’s located on the Pacific coast, and if I recall it is somewhere around 150 miles south of the US/Mexico border, definitely a good several hour drive. Getting there is pretty easy, you just head south towards Tijuana, cross the border, and head to the toll road going south. Once you get out of Tijuana it’s a straight shot on the winding highway. There was only one checkpoint, and the fact that my girlfriend is pretty fluent with Spanish made it easy.

At the time we took this trip, the Tijuana area was getting a pretty bad rap in the news because of murders and kidnappings, but we had no problems. We left after dark [...]

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