Archive for the ‘travel’ Category

Colorado Beer Road Trip – Boulder, Fort Collins, and Denver

Tuesday, September 8th, 2009
Beautiful Colorado Rockies

Beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains

MARCH – 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 there, so this was all new [...]

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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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Take the train from Casablanca going south …

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

I came across this video today. Brings back memories for when I was planning my Spain and Morocco trip. I had really wanted to ride on the Marrakesh Express, but sadly though I made it into Morocco, didn’t make it down to Marrakesh. Oh well, next time. Until then, enjoy a live video of Crosby and Nash rockin’ it, well rockin’ it 70s style.

Day trip to Gibraltar from Spain

Sunday, June 14th, 2009
View of Rock of Gibraltar from Spain

View of Rock of Gibraltar from Spain

After a relaxing two days in Tarifa, (well mostly relaxing, with the exception of my day trip to Tangier), I had one last day and night before an early morning flight out of Málaga. All along I had really been hoping to make it to Gibraltar, but I wasn’t sure how it would work out. But of course as so often happens in travel, everything fell into place perfectly for me to make the run over into Gibraltar on my way out.

I woke up early and caught one of the first buses out of Tarifa. I am writing this a while after the trip, if I recall I think I took the wrong bus. The idea was to catch a bus going direct to La Linea de la Concepcion, but I’m [...]

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Two days in Tarifa, Spain

Friday, May 8th, 2009
View from top of hotel, looking across Strait of Gibraltar towards Morocco, Africa and Atlas Mountains

View from top of hotel, looking acrossStrait of Gibraltar towards Morocco, Africaand Atlas Mountains

I woke up early after a couple of days in Granada, hopped the bus to the bus station for one Euro, where I then bought a ticket to Algeciras. This is where I thought my trip would get confusing, but it turns out it went quite smoothly. I think it was about 2 hours to Algeciras, and I was a bit nervous since I’d heard that city is nothing but a port city, with a fair amount of shady characters hanging around. But as it turns out it was ok, and I was able to then get an ongoing to to Tarifa — only a short 30 minute bus ride away. Somehow [...]

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Some vacation memories before my next one

Thursday, March 5th, 2009

I have been pretty slow in posting the photos and write ups from my vacation last fall, and since it won’t happen this weekend since I’ll be in Colorado, I’ll leave you with a couple photos. See Cordoba, Spain and Tangier, Morocco below!

Inside the Mezquita – Cordoba, Spain
Mezquita, Cordoba, Spain

Cordoba, Spain

Near Petit Socco in Medina – Tangier, Morocco
Near Petit Socco in Medina, Tangier, Morocco

Tangier, Morocco

Graffiti with Strait of Gibraltar and Morocco in the distance

Friday, February 27th, 2009

I have recently posted some photos (here, here, and here) I took of graffiti while in Spain (which seem to be very popular according to Google Images), so here is yet another. This one was taken in Tarifa, Spain, which is at the southern tip of the country. From the location where this photo was taken, you can see Morocco and Africa in the distance across the Strait of Gibraltar, and to the west is the Atlantic Ocean, and to the east is Mediterranean. The graffiti isn’t what makes this picture for me, it is really the location that makes this one special. Both of these photos were taken around the same time, but with different camera settings.

See more photos of Tarifa here

Graffiti, Tarifa, Spain – looking towards Morocco
Graffiti Tarifa Spain
Graffiti, Tarifa, Spain – looking towards Morocco

 

Graffiti, Tarifa, Spain – taken in sunset mode
Graffiti Tarifa Spain Sunset
Graffiti, Tarifa, Spain – taken in sunset mode

See more photos of Tarifa here