blondie

Backtrack for the Backpack

blondie — Fri, 06 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

After a quick breakfast at a local cafe and scoring some Greek Tylenol near an orange tree lined street, we jetted out of Athens in our Up! Volkswagen. I prayed our little dune buggy wouldn't fall to pieces on us as we whizzed by block after block of graffiti covered buildings, making our way out of this haphazard city.

Originally, we had planned to visit Delphi on the way up to Thessaloniki. But after seeing many different ruins within Athens and after hitting a traffic jam on the way out of Athens, we decided to skip it, and check out Mt. Olympus which was more along our path to Thessaloniki anyways.

As we sped north up the coastal highway, well out of the city limits, we began noticing a few things: 1) the road conditions were impeccable - new, smooth pavement, not a single pothole, 2) holy mother of toll booths every 5 minutes - we must have spent AT LEAST 40 Euros on tolls to get up to Thessaloniki 3) hardly any cars on the road the whole way - which helps to explain #1 and is most likely a result of #2, 4) every other house/structure was either unfinished or abandoned.

Ok let's talk more about #4. Literally at least 25-30% of the houses and structures we passed were either unfinished or abandoned. Many times a 3 story frame was built, but no windows and no interior put in, or the first two floors were finished and the third was just a frame. Other times, there were structures that looked like they may have been used but then abandoned and never leveled or re-purposed. As unsightly as it all was against the striking natural beauty of the coastline, it honestly became somewhat funny. I Googled this phenomenon when we got to our hotel in Thessaloniki, and there were some plausible explanations, the best of which was: Greek's don't have to pay property tax on unfinished structures. Seems like the Greek government may want to look into changing their tax laws? Hey, only a suggestion:)

We eventually made it to the town of Litochoro, which is a small town at the base of Mt. Olympus. The mountain was quite impressive along the drive up, with the clouds billowing over it like poly-fill and the snow dusting the top peaks, like too much powdered sugar on a Bundt cake. We wound up the switch-backs to an overlook about 10 km up the mountain to admire the ocean and the town below, and Mt. Olympus above. We took a few photos, and as the sun was setting, we hopped back into the car and made our way to the hotel, which was past Thessaloniki by the airport.

As we got out of the car, we realized we were missing something...our Camelbak packpack, which contained Kris' scarf, hat, camera pouch...and a few hours later we realized, Kris' passport. Oooopsies!! We left it at the overlook on the mountain, which was over an hour's drive away. We looked at each other in disbelief...and hunger. It was already dark, and hopefully no one would be coming up the mountain in the dark so we relaxed for a few minutes in our hotel room, which smelled faintly of smoke (even though the sign said it was a non-smoking room), and got something to eat. Around 10pm, we headed BACK to the mountain in hopes that the bag was still in the same spot. When we arrived back to the overlook in the pitch black, we found it still there - reflecting off of our VW's headlights as we approached. Whew, crisis averted!!

By the time we got back to the hotel (and almost ran out of gas on the way back - literally put putted up to the gas station) it was 2am.

I was ready for a good night's rest!

Smoke Signals

blondie — Sat, 07 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

So I'm starting to notice a trend here. The Greeks like to smoke...and they also like cologne. I'm not sure if liking cologne is independent of trying to cover up the smell of smoke or not, but the two smells create quite a nauseating effect on my sensitive nose!! One thing I look forward to in coming home to California is the strict no smoking laws in public places!

Today was a rest day. After going to bed at 2am, we slept in and ate a 'brunch'. We researched our plan of action over the next couple of days, hit the gym and face timed with our kids:) We drove in to Thessaloniki for dinner at a place called Paparouna, which got great reviews by a few bloggers. The food was awesome and the place was eclectic. The only unfortunate part was that that half the restaurant was designated as smoking. Ugh! We had a great meal there regardless, but I feel like I'm turning into an ashtray! Our rental car has only 9,000km on it, but it already reeks of smoke as well. I can't escape anywhere!!

Greekonomics

blondie — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

We woke up at the crack of dawn (actually I woke up at 2am and couldn’t go back to bed), and made a beeline down to the offensively expensive breakfast (at least compared to outside of the hotel) downstairs. We were so famished, we didn’t have the wherewithal to track down a breakfast place that took more than 2 minutes to find. After breakfast, we found a few minutes to hit the gym and then found ourselves packed in an elevator with 4 guys who had just smoked and wore way too much cologne. I think that may have negated the health effects we just reaped at the gym:/.

We then took off for the Acropolis. Sailing high above the city atop a limestone hilltop, the Parthenon is visible from almost every spot in the city. We wound our way up the stairs to the Entrance. What struck me, is not only how little actually remains of the structures at the Acropolis, but the thousands of years of history that mark this particular spot of land. We could see the whole city surrounding us, which was beautiful. As we wove through the ruins, a familiar smell kept introducing itself. I'm pretty sure it was the scent of wild onions - those tiny little ones.

It was a gorgeous day, fit for a long sleeved t-shirt and jeans, however, we were surrounded by people in heavy coats and down parkas...I spent a good deal of time wandering why people were dressed so warmly...and I live in San Diego, not Moscow!

We headed back down the Acropolis and grabbed a bite to eat in Thissio, which was relaxing and had a good view of the Acropolis.

After a rest at the hotel, we took the metro to Emou street for some window shopping and stopped at an outdoor cafe for dinner in Plaka, at the base of the Acropolis. The food there wasn't much to write home about, and the wine unfortunately tasted like motor oil. Should have consulted a book or concierge for a better place to eat I guess!

Greecing the Skids

blondie — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

As soon as we emerged through the customs doors into the unsecure side of the bustling Athens airport, the heavy scent of smoke hit me as hard as Serena Williams whacks a tennis ball. Ugh, reminiscent of the Prague airport, I thought. I liked the vibe though. People were loud and outgoing. Local time was 4:30pm, and we had been traveling for 24 hours with little sleep. We swung by Sixt and picked up our tiny Up! Volkswagen rental car. The nice Sixt lady upgraded us to a bigger car. I would have hated to see the car we were supposed to have, being that I booked the cheapest rental available :O. We deliriously made our way to our hotel (Hilton, totally western, I know) and crashed, without stopping to eat dinner.

The internet connection here stinks and I can't upload photos right now, so hopefully over the next few days, I'll find a better connection.

3 Hours in Amsterdam

blondie — Tue, 03 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

We left San Diego in a bit of a hurry this morning. Grammy flew in last night to take care of the kiddos while we are gone for the next 10 days. This trip will be a nice break from the daily whirlwind of the little ones, but I think I underestimated how much I would already miss them in the first few hours! Tears were Welling up in the San Diego airport lounge, knowing I wouldn’t see our little buggers for another week and a half. Somehow we managed to be on the last call for boarding list, not just in San Diego, but also out of our LAX flight. Maybe my travel skills are a little rusty☺

I didn’t have much time to really plan this trip, so on our plane to Amsterdam, I cracked open the Rough Guide to Greece book. About a half hour in, I was completely overwhelmed. Sure looks like it would take months to see all the amazing places in Greece. Truth be told, we were planning on flying into Greece and then driving to Croatia, but unbeknownst to us at the time, there are simply no one way car rentals allowed coming out of Greece. Who knew? So with our flights already booked, now it’s on to plan B….uh rent the car in Greece and drop the car off in Greece. Good thing there is a lot to do in Greece☺

We landed in Amsterdam and prepared for our last leg to Athens...are we there yet??

To Bangkok or Bust...and we Busted

blondie — Thu, 14 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

The hour leading up to us missing our flight on Monday from Phuket to Bangkok should have been the worst part of this trip so far, but somehow we were able to turn it into something (kind of) fun!

Sunset from our hotel in Phuket

Our Buddha packeged up and ready to be shipped

Our new Buddha

We started the day figuring out the best way to ship our new 45kg Buddha statue that was delivered to us the night before. We knew that we would have to spend a little time figuring this out, so we had the woman at the Hilton business center help us out. Around 9:30am we popped down to the business center and she had gotten us several quotes from FedEx, All Freight, and Thai Airways. Turns out 'All Frieght' was the cheapest, so we went with them. I wrote up a good comment card for the woman's manager because she was so helpful. Kris added some additional packing materials to secure Buddha, and All Freight came to take him away. The entourage that came to pick him up was quite interesting; two little guys, a girl, and a 'Lady-man' who was extravagantly waving his hands around and thanking us profusely for coming to Phuket and Welcome to Phuket (uh even though we told him we were on our way out of Phuket). They put it in the truck and we bid farewell. It should take 20 days to get Buddha at home. I think it was around noon at that point, and we already had our stuff packed and in the car ready to go, so we took off.

For as great as i am with directions (for those of you that don't know, i am damn near a human compass and I am always our navigator) I am just as fully aware that for whatever reason I suck at military time. If I had blogged at the time of our honeymoon, i would have written about the time we missed our ferry from Ibiza to Mallorca because I bought us two tickets for 01:00 (1AM) but I had Kris and I trekking to the ferry with all of our luggage that same day at 1PM (13:00) only to find out we had missed our ferry by 12 hours. I then proceeded to lose our first class tickets so we had to sit in the lower ferry deck with no a/c and Kris almost passed out and puked. Way to go Elaine. Ok so here is lesson #2 (I'm sure there have been more incidents in between here, but none as significant as these two).

The restaurant we were dilly dallying when we realized we might miss our flight

I was sure that our flight was at 2:40pm, so on our hour drive to the airport, we decided to stop at the beach for a few minutes and get a bite to eat.

Us dilly dallying and missing our flight

We got to a cool beachside restaurant when Kris decided to double check our flight time, and we discovered our flight was at 1:40pm (13:40), which was in an hour at that point! We were still at least half hour's drive drom the airport at that point. So we quickly got up and ran back to the car and took off as fast as we (safely) could. We pulled up to arrivals and I took our bags to the counter and checked in while Kris tried to return the rental car. Well Avis proved to be extremely difficult to find and we ended up leaving the car in the arrivals lane and pleading with them to get it for us! When it was all said and done, the Avis folks seemed to be in no hurry despite our time constraint and I think we missed our flight probably by about 4 minutes. We rallied pretty quickly and were able to get another ticket on a different airline that left in a half hour. I got my bag back, but Kris' was already on its way to Bangkok.

Our new plane from Phuket to Bangkok - Bangkok Airways

Our original flight cost us $40 per ticket and our new flight cost $80, but I guess it could have been worse. We arrived in Bangkok to find Kris' lonely bag on the belt. The 30 minute cab ride cost us all of $9. I sure love how cheap this place is!!
At least we were in good spirits when we arrived and we got to the hotel just in time to still get some snack on the club floor :)

Erawan Shrine outside of the Hyatt Hotel, Bangkok

Our hotel, Hyatt Erawan, was in a pretty good central location within the city. The Erawan shrine was also right outside of our hotel. Tuesday we headed out to see a few of the famous 'wats', Buddhist temples. We really didn't take the time in Phuket to check any out from the inside, but that's probably just as well since we enjoyed the beach and water more and there is none of that in Bangkok.

The Emerald Buddha at the Grand Palace

First was the Grand Palace & Wat Phra Kaew, which houses the Emerald Buddha. The Buddha statue fell sometime in the 15th century, and its plaster cover cracked to reveal that it was made of solid jade. It was subsequently stolen by Laos invaders in the 16th and the Thais invaded Laos 200 years later to retrieve it back. The palace was built later to house the Buddha, and it's considered the country's most revered Buddha image.

Kris in the Grand Palace

This was the largest wat and very impressive! To get into this wat and some others, men need to wear pants and t-shirt at least, and women need to wear pants or a skirt and cover their shoulders. We got stopped by some scammers telling us that we could not go in because we had shorts on, and that at noon, it would be open for us to wear shorts. He offered us a tuk tuk (little motorcycle taxi thingy) ride to the nearby tourist destinations and he had a Pitt hat on and wanted to talk about Pitt.

Kris holding up part of the Grand Palace

Luckily I remembered reading in my Lonelyplanet book about this scam and we declined. Apparently they try to take you to all the fake gem places and other garbage. I told Kris I wanted some street credit ha! So the Grand Palace was in fact open and I had a scarf for my shorts and Kris got the 'loaner' pants they have there onsite (you can see our awesome clothes in the photos). So the guy's 'noontime shorts are ok' scam was a load of crap.

Wat Phra Kaew

Palace doors at Wat Phra Kaew

Grand Palace & Wat Phra Kaew

The second wat we visited was Wat Pho, home of the reclining Buddha. This represents Buddha's passing into nirvana. It's the longest Buddha at 46 meters long and 15 meters high! Huge!

Wat Pho - not sure why it's spelled numerous ways

Lying down Buddha at Wat Pho

The third wat we went to was Wat Saket, the Golden Mount. This wat was up on a hill so that you could see around the city which was cool. By this third wat, Kris was starting to pass out from heat exhaustion, so we went back to the hotel to rest up a little.

Golden Mount, Wat Saket

Buddha on the way up the Golden Mount

Kris' foot was still hurting him, so we got the hotel's mini medical office to fix it back up again with some more steri-strips which seemed to be working well. Then we headed to the mall across the street from us to get some air conditioned food. Kris says he had his best Tom Yum soup there. I got radish cake which I loved when I was in Taiwan but somehow this wasn't as good. We've also been eating a lot of raw Thai coconuts from the street vendors and we've gotten better at bargaining for them. We were paying up to 40 Baht and we ended up with getting them for 20 Baht.
I had always wanted to try a Thai yoga massage, so I later in the day, I looked up some reputable places to get a massage. A Thai massage is a little different, where it is like a passive yoga stretching with massage and you wear clothes. We picked Health Land and Kris got a regular massage for 90 mins at 850 Baht or 28USD and I got a 2 hour Thai yoga massage for only 450Baht or only 15USD! Kris didn't like his massage much and I couldn't tell if my massage was energizing, or if I got hit by a Mac truck. It was a bit intense and I think I may have bruised a muscle or two. I woke up Wednesday morning a little sore.

Ko Phi Phi Thailand

blondie — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

I've been so blessed to be able to travel to some beautiful places in the world, but I think yesterday's trip to the islands off of Phuket just took the cake for the most beautiful place. That combined with how genuinely friendly, nice and helpful the Thais are, makes Phuket one of the best places I've traveled to ever!

I thought I could navigate us to the port so we could take a ferry to Ko Phi Phi (Islands about 42km from Phuket's East coast), but I overestimated my capabilities to figure out just exactly which port we should be heading to, and what company's ferry we were looking for. I got the departure times from the hotel and I thought I had the ferry company's name, but we ended up just stopping and and asking someone directions. Luckily the locals are super helpful and we were up early, so we had some time to spare. We ended up following a woman on a moped to Chalong port, and after talking with some folks, we ended up settling on a speed boat tour of the islands (with Anda Varee tours) which included lunch and snorkeling for 1500 baht each (about $50 USD each).

Speedboats ready to take off for the islands

A little more than I thought we would spend for our original plan to take a ferry to the islands, but this was an all day tour, and it was sooo worth it!

We left around 9:30, and it took about an hour to get to our first stop, Maya Bay, at Ko Phi Phi Lae. They filmed part of "The Beach" here, and you can see from the photos how beautiful this beach is!

Maya Bay at Ko Phi Phi Lae

Next stop was Loh Samah Bay for snorkeling. Kris went and said the water was a little cloudy and couldn't see much. I passed to stay with our belongings. We didn't plan to exactly do this tour, so we had a few cell phones we probably shouldn't have brought.

Ko Phi Phi

We went through Pilleh Cove, where the water got very shallow and was a beautiful blue green turquoise color, and then we went on to Viking cave. There is a type of bird that makes these nests I think from saliva? They are thought to have medicinal properties by the Chinese, and they are expensive. Because of this, the nests are protected, and in this Viking cave where they are plentiful, they have security guards on watch, and no tourists are allowed to visit the cave.

Monkey beach was the next stop. I really liked our guide because he was so in touch with the nature. He disapproved of feeding the Monkeys on Monkey island, because they are starting to rely only on human tourists for their food. They now bite tourists and now after generations of tourists feeding them, they are starting to have a have a hard time finding their own food. He also disapproved of feeding the fish bread, because the bread gets caught in the corals and then the fish start to attack the corals to get the bread, destroying the reefs.

We took a lunch break at Ton sai Bay on Ko Phi Phi Don, which is the largest of the Phi Phi Island group.

Drinking out of a coconut

Then we traveled about a half hour to Ko Khai Nai, which was a tiny little island. Kris grabbed a beer and I had a coconut cocktail (fresh pineapple and coconut cut up with a machete right there!) and we swam for a while in the beautiful water. The beach had some large rocks in some places, and Kris decided to climb one in particular, and was met with the force of mother nature. The rock was sharp, and Kris had a few gashes, one in particular that was gushing blood all over. Luckily our guide had some bandages and there was another person on the trip with a similar rock cut that had to be attended to. When we got back to the hotel, we got Kris fixed up a little better by the resort nurse.

Kris on the rock where he cut his foot

Kris' cut foot

Somehow we picked the perfect day to go on the island tour. It was sunny the whole time except for about 15 minutes of rain. I did get a tid bit of sunburn on my shoulders despite my SPF 30. I think I should have reapplied after all the swimming.

So today, between my slight sunburn and Kris now impaired foot, we decided to lay low. We checked out Patong beach area where we got a few souvenirs and met an Australian couple, and I had time to hit the gym. And yes, mom, another post card for you that we mailed out today :) We also met another interesting few people in the Hyatt club where we turned the hours-devours into dinner. I also finally learned how to say hello and thank-you in Thai a bit more properly.

Tonight we took delivery of the 45kg big Buddha that Kris liked at the shop in Phuket Town called Hi.So. It's too heavy, so we'll need to figure out how to ship it tomorrow before we leave for Bangkok.

Monsoon Season in Phuket

blondie — Fri, 08 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

We received our rental car bright and early this morning since we couldn't pick it up last night. Everyone is so friendly here so far - the culture is amazingly hospitable and sincere! Thailand, or at least Phuket, is nothing like I have ever experienced before. Kris and I are just baffled at all of the crazy things we have seen today. I think Kris said it best, it is a ghetto paradise. Unbelievably beautiful, but also almost third world looking.

Medium traffic in Phuket - not raining though!

Driving is definitely an interesting experience. First of all, yes, they drive on the left hand side of the road. And Kris has been challenged with not only that, but also driving a stick with his left hand. We keep making 'wind shield wiper' left had turns because the turn signal is also on the other side. Driving anywhere definitely takes a while because the roads are very narrow and we are sharing them with scooters, tuk-tuks (little taxi truck thingies), elephants, cars, buses, people, you name it. It's really not that crowded, it's just a lot of things going on, plus pouring down rain here and there. But without a car, it would be difficult to see a lot of things in the short time that we have here.

Random elephant on the road

Coast off of southern Phuket

Since it is monsoon season, it has been rainy on and off all day - and like 100% humidity. This is truly a jungle!! But that didn't stop us from getting out today.
Here is a snapshot from our hotel room. It is so humid that the camera fogged up as soon as we stepped outside.

View from our hotel room and foggy camera

Big Buddha on Ko Phuket

We headed to the Big Buddha, which everyone said we had to see. No matter where you go around Phuket, even out at sea, you can see the Big Buddha from high up on the hill. We got there in just enough time to see Big Buddha, make a tile donation since he is still in progress, and we even got some fresh made coconut ice cream, all before it started pouring down rain.

Kris in Phuket Town - I liked the tiles :)

We drove a little farther on the east side of the Island to Phuket Town and walked around the town a bit. We grabbed lunch at the a place called Kopitiam where we got some tom yum soup, more coconut ice cream, and the best ever fresh almond milk.

South tip of Phuket - best place to watch the sunset

To watch the sunset, we drove to the southern tip of Phuket to a vista point. We hiked to the bottom of the rocks, where we spent a few hours watching the sun set, even though it was very cloudy and ready to rain again!

South tip of Phuket - Laem Phromthep

Buddha shrine at the south tip of Phuket

There was also a Buddha shrine nearby. It's amazing how there are just random Buddhist displays everywhere with little trinkets, offerings and incense. Sometimes there are beautiful elaborate displays in front of the most run-down looking buildings.

We finished off the night eating pad thai at the Pad Thai Place for 120 Baht, which is $4 USD. The operation was totally outside, and very basic - eg the dishwasher was a person 30 feet away using a bucket and a sponge. Although the food was good, I truly wondered how in the world they weren't losing money on two pad thai dinners with two drinks all for that price... and then my mind started to wonder if we were going to have stomach or other issues in the morning :)
I guess we'll find out.

Seoul Long Korea, Hello Thailand

blondie — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

Wednesday Kris had to do some work and decided to chill out at the hotel and go for a swim. We have been very good and have both hit the fabulous gym here every day so far! We were thinking of playing racquet ball or tennis but they wanted like $60 to rent the court and equipment so we passed on that. I decided to head out and do a little sight seeing and some shopping. I didn't buy anything, but I had fun people watching. Wednesday was South Korea's memorial day, so it was PACKED everywhere.

Gyeongbok Palace

I checked out Gyeongbok Palace which was enormous and very cool. It is very typical construction of most palaces in Korea.

Gyeongbok Palace

Outside of Gyongbok Palace

Crazy shoe arcade

I also thought this photo of the 'shoe arcade' was worthy of posting. I saw this from the street corner and decided not to walk thru the mayhem. I also checked out Dotta in Dongdaemun and Myeong-dong.

We decided to head out that night and went to Hongdae area to find a bar. It was such a cool area, the University area, where lots of young people are hanging out. We grabbed a quick pizza there too. Then we ended up going to a bar underneath Mute in Itaewon. Wow so impressed with the 'mixologist' bar tenders there. They were lighting drinks on fire and making layered drinks and all kinds of interesting things.

Thursday we slept in a little (finally!), hit the gym and relaxed until our flight that early evening. Thailand here we come!

We landed in Thailand around 11pm and found a fixed price cab to take us on the hour trek to our hotel in Karon Beach Phuket. My first impression was that Thailand was a little sketchy, but hey it was late at night and the airport wasn't exactly state of the art. The people seem to be insanely hospitable, and the Hilton Arcadia hotel is insanely awesome! We got the hotel on Hilton points and a few extra dollars. I've never been much of a resort person or so I thought, but this is really a resort, and I definitely love it! Can't wait for Thailand adventure to start.

DMZ = wid life sanctuary, hope, and unification - at least that's what I am told

blondie — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

Tuesday Kris and Ryan left for work early, and I headed on an early morning tour to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which is a 4km area surrounding the border between North and South Korea. I was a bit disappointed because I wanted to get on the Joint Security Area (JSA) tour where you can actually go to the boarder line in the conference room where the two sides meet, but I needed to reserve that tour a few days in Advance because of security concerns. Regardless, the tour I headed on was really very interesting and kind of creepy. We took a bus an hour North of Seoul, and as we got closer to the DMZ, there was very little traffic and a lot of barbed wire alongside the road. Our tour guide was really hard to understand, but very knowledgeable and very eager to explain all about the divide and how one day the two countries will reconcile again. I know this sounds awfully simplistic, but I couldn't help but think how the thought of a line drawn and a DMZ created reminded me of my two brothers sharing a room when they were younger. They would tape a line on the floor and tell each other they couldn't cross it! Anyways, yes that was much less drama I guess than this high tension area of the world.

Pinwheels in Imjingak

We first went to this little tourist resort called Imjingak, which was supposed to symbolize unity. Located just South of the DMZ, I thought it was such an odd location to be housing a carnival/amusement park (which was strangely non-operational at the moment I was there, and I wondered if it ever operated). I couldn't imagine a family randomly going to this resort for the carnival located here. I think the pinwheels in this photo are to symbolize happiness, unity and hope.

We then hopped back on our bus and headed to Dorasan Station. This station was build particularly to connect South Korea with Pyeongyang, but only operated once. It is a brand new train station that has been indefinitely closed. Again, hopes are that it will not stay this way. I never thought about it, but my tour guide asserted that South Korea is essentially an island. On a map it is a peninsula, but with the border to North Korea closed, he was correct, South Korea is essentially an island. You cannot reach any other country except by air. I thought this map of the would-be train routes was very interesting. This train station was supposed to connect South Korea with other parts of Asia and Europe.

Dorasan Station

Dorasan Station -map connecting Asia and Europe

Without getting into a history lesson, South Korea has discovered a number of tunnels built by North Korea in a probable attempt to attack Seoul from under ground. They believe that there are many more tunnels that have been built or are being built that they do not yet know about. The third tunnel that was discovered was opened for tourism, and part of our tour was this Third Tunnel. There was a very steep incline to get down to the tunnel and we were able to walk a fair way into the tunnel, which was very wet and only about 4 feet high in some places. I don't think I will ever forget the smell in the tunnel. The literature said that 30,000 North Korean troops could have fit through that tunnel in 1 hour. Most of the tour was limited photo-ops due to security concerns, so I don't have any photos.

North Korean Flag

We then headed to the Unification Observatory where I could actually see into North Korea. This photo here is the North Korean flag at the DMZ, which they built higher than South Korea's flag.

After the tour, I was glad to be back in Seoul. It's crazy to think that all of this is actually going on. But the most interesting part to me was how optimistic all of the South Korans were (at least on the tour) that one day very soon that the two countries would reunite or at least open the border back up. Everything about the DMZ was positive somehow in their eyes. The DMZ is a happy wild life sanctuary, nature preserve and all of the unification activities and tourism surrounding it were all just signs of a happy ending to come soon.

I had met a guy from New York and a girl from France on my DMZ tour, so we decided to grab some late lunch after we got dropped off. It was nice to meet a few new people since Kris had been at work the whole day and wasn't able to come with me. Once Kris got back from work, we headed out to eat at a Bulgarian place in Itaewon.

Seoul Searching

blondie — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

We took off at 8am on 2 June from Orlando to Seoul - too early! Pretty good flight though, not a long layover in Detroit, and then straight to Seoul. Delta lost one of Kris' bags so we got that a few hours later (not bad actually). The Grand Hyatt Seoul is pretty nice, there is a huge gym that we have already hit up twice over the last few mornings. Normally I don't have much jet lag, but for some reason, I just couldn't stay up on Sunday when we arrived and we ended up sleeping from 5pm - 1am. Soooo now I am way off! We've been going to the gym around 3am! Yesterday, we woke up (super-early yes) and had a great breakfast in the Hyatt (club floor :)) We headed to the concierge to get some city info (awesome girl named Sonnie). Ryan is on business travel with Kris, so he accompanied us on the first day's adventures.

Kris and Elaine at the Hike Midpoint on the way to the Needle

Sporting our gym shoes, we took a cab to the bottom of the trail leading up to the Seoul Tower (Needle), and we hiked up the hill, maybe about a half hour to the base of the Tower. We were so early, we had to wait for them to open! Kris was going to show me the tile he made me a year or so ago, but they had taken it down apparently.

Kris and Ryan Winded After the Hike to the Needle

The Seoul Tower is pretty cool and the theme is all about love. Love for every culture and everyone.

Seoul Tower (Needle)

View from the Needle

Mom and Dad's Post Card Sent from the Top of the Needle

I sent mom a postcard from the top :)

Our Lock on the Lock Tree Outside of the Needle

Keeping in tradition with our locks when we travel, we added a lock to the lock tree outside of the Needle. Kris insisted on climbing all the way to the top of the highest tree and 'installing' our lock there

After we left the Needle, we went to Itaewon by the hotel for some traditional Korean lunch, but we were so early that we had to grab a beer before any places opened for lunch! After a quick lunch, we headed to the art district,Insa-dong. There were tons of streets with handicrafts and hand made art, ranging from utensils to jewelry and herbs to candles. Everything is so colorful and 'happy' here in Korea. Tons of anime characters and tasteful graffiti is everywhere. People just love to write all over the walls on the streets and markets and even inside the restaurants. We grabbed a coffee and some cake at a coffee shop where Kris had written some graffiti himself last year. Check out the photo, we added another date to it :)

Love Note at Between Pages Coffee Shop

Kris and Ryan at Between Pages Coffee Shop, Seoul

After leaving Insa-dong, we headed to the fashion district, Myeong-dong in search of my favorite Singapore store, bYSI. After searching where the concierge said it would be, we were informed that it had closed. BUMMER, because I love that store! Well maybe I'll come back to this section of town to check out some other things :).
We were pretty tired, so we headed back to the hotel for some shut eye at like 5pm! Damn jet-lag!

Pest-ivus for the Rest-of-us

blondie — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 00:00:00 GMT

OMG! This morning Kris woke up at 6am (pretty much broad daylight) to some Hungarian thug stealing my bike!! Uh, a bright yellow, with pink T-mobile sticker bike - totally not cool to be trolling around on if you're a local I'm sure. Our window was wide open on the fourth floor, so he heard some commotion on the alley below, and sure enough, my bike was already gone and the guy was ready to snip the lock on Kris' bike. Luckily, Kris yelled out the window and scared the guy off...and probably woke up all of the Cosmo Hotel in the process. Our hotel felt pretty bad about it. Kris tried to file a police report. The police came in jeans and sweatshirts with reflective vests, and Kris told the story, but they never wrote anything down except Kris' info. They told Kris to send in a photo of the bike and a description of what happened and they would file the report then. We talked to our hotel receptionist and asked what the ramifications were and he shook his head, nothing you can do, and it's just the way it is. He had called the bike rental place and said they would come pick up the other bike, and that seemed like the end of it. We figured we would lose our 10,000 ft. deposit (like 50 bucks) and that would be the end of it.... 10 missed calls later from the Hungarian police, we realized that apparently that's not the end of it! We had to go back to the bike shop and negotiate a settlement price for the bike. The bike shop guy was actually a really nice guy and we ended up (after Kris negotiated free parking from the hotel, and our deposit and next day's rental taken into account) only about $45 down. Not too shabby I guess, thinking they might have stopped us at the Hungarian airport on the way out if we hadn't settled up :)

In the meantime, we slept through breakfast because of all the commotion so early on, then we had to switch hotels to Ibis Centrum because we had changed our itinerary to add a day in Budapest and Cosmo was booked solid. Finally we headed out for sightseeing to Gellert Hill, which is the taller peak overlooking the Danube. We saw the Liberty Monument, Citadella and St. Gellert statue then hiked down to Memento Park.

For dinner we went to an awesome place called Klassz.

I'll Take Buda for $1000 Alex

blondie — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 00:00:00 GMT

Well I'm trying to catch up with this travel blog right now. I came down with a small cold that has left me a little tired over the last few days, complete with stuffy sinuses and a running nose. I think it's the cold weather?

Regardless, on Thursday we made it to a number of really cool sites. We took off for Buda's Castle Hill via the underground. On our walk through a park, we discovered an interesting 'lock tree' and thought it was so cute! We walked across the Szechenyi bridge, which has beautiful architecture. It leads directly to Buda's Castle Hill. We took the Siklo up to the top, which is like an incline. The Pittsburgh incline has a better view I'd say though ;)

On Castle Hill, we saw the Royal Palace, which is huge. On the opposite of the Pest side, we could see the Buda Hills, which were beautiful. I believe the ruins on the top were Buda Castle ruins, but I should actually confirm that before I write it! There was a cute little town on the top of the hill as well. We walked to the Matthias Church, Holy Trinity Statue, St Stephen's Statue and through the awesome vista of Fisherma's Bastion, which looked like a new age castle fortress wall along the cliff over the Danube River. The vista was directly across from the massive Parlaiment Building, which is on the Pest side of the River. Castle Hill was definitely worth the time, but I would skip the Siklo if I were to do it again.

We grabbed a vegan lunch at a placed called Eden then took the metro back. We had passed the interesting 'lock tree' in the morning, so we decided to get our own lock at a place on Vaci Utca, which had been open since 1856 so we could put a lock on the tree too. We rented a couple of bikes later in the afternoon. We rode bikes to dinner at a place called Bio Garden then also to a bar across the river on the Buda side called Cafe Rio, which turned out to be completely empty on a Thursday (HUGE bar too)! Kris was able to tether a pair of heels to my bike rack on the back of my bike:) We rode through the Raday Utca district to hopefully find something a little more happening, but to no avail. I guess the Hungarians go to bed early on Thursdays?

We started Friday by getting our lock engraved at the same place we bought it. Check out the photo :). Apparently it's just a random odd Hungarian thing to put a lock on the tree to symbolize your love, so after the engraving, we rode our bikes to the tree and put our lock on the tree:)
We pretty much rode our rental bikes around the rest of town all day, discovering much of the city we hadn't seen yet on foot or metro. We saw St. Stephens Basilica close up, but we should have gone inside, since I read later on how beautiful it was inside! Lunch was at Fruccola, a local working lunch place with super fresh food and of course fried cheese. I think I've eaten a little too much fried cheese by now though, I swear it is in ever dish! We checked out some local art stores too. I was a little tired from my cold, but we stuck through it pretty well though. We had dinner at the Soul Cafe - food was great!

Later that night, we went to an island in the Danube called Hajogyar (Oduba) Island, which has 9 different bars on it, kind of a party island, with all different types of themes and music at each bar. We had decided to ride our bikes there since cabs were a little expensive and the trams stop at midnight. The island was about 5 miles away, and I think we underestimated how far 5 miles actually is! It seemed like forever and it was dark and COLD! So on the way back we found a taxi van that fit both of our bikes in there for us!

Buda or Pest?

blondie — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 00:00:00 GMT

Holy cow, the Hungarians definitely contrast the Viennese! A little more rambunctious crowd and noticeably larger stature. Last night's bar crowd was a little rowdy, knocking things over and getting wild. The underground here is functional and packed with people, but definitely not new and pretty! But we like Budapest the best so far, what a great cultural city, with a little grit :) We like it so much we decided to stay an extra day and a half, and fly back through Paris w/ a night's layover by the Eiffel tower! We got 30,000 miles back for changing our flight!

Budapest feels a little more foreign than the other part of our travels so far. Most people in Czech spoke English, and we squeaked by in pinches in Austria with my German, and I could read menus and signs etc ok enough. But in Budapest, English is definitely a little harder to come by. Some things are in German, which helps, but most every public sign etc...is really only in Magyar (Hungarian). People are the most friendly here though it seems so far, which is nice. The restaurant service is usually really great.

Hero's Square

Today we checked out Vaci Utca which is the shopping street our hotel is located on. We also walked up Andrassy Utca which leads up to Hosok Tere (Hero's Square) where there is a huge monument to commemorate the Magyar conquest of the Carpathian Baisn.

Beyond that, in the city park, is the Vajdahunyad Castle which was also very cool.

Vajdahunyad Castle Entrance

Vajdahunyad Castle

City Park

Vajdahunyad Castle

We took the M1 underground on the way back, which is the oldest underground line in Budapest and I think the second oldest underground line to be built in Europe...which would explain why our train got stuck between stops, eeking a few feet every minute or so to the next stop. Then, in Hungarian, we were all told to get off the train because something was wrong with it... a girl beside us politely told us we had to get off, since we obviously did not understand the instructions, and for some reason, some part of us thought maybe it would still be ok to rid to the next stop, what were we thinking?

Hungarian State Opera House

We also saw the beautiful Opera House on Andrassy Utca and St. Stephen's Bascilica further south. It was a little more of a relaxing day with some breaks at the cafes. It is nice to have the Danube flowing right through the city center, because it helps with orientation especially when coming up from the underground station.

So it's still cold here and I'm running out of clothes...hopefully it warms up tomorrow!

To Bratislava and Beyond

blondie — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 00:00:00 GMT

Museums Quartier in the Rain

Rain, rain and more rain!! It rained all day today, over 3 countries!
After breakfast, we made the decision to spend a little more time in Vienna because we felt like there was so much more to see that we didn't get a chance to experience yet. I think you could spend a week in Vienna and feel like that though. Luckily, we were able to stash our luggage in the hotel luggage room.

We Missed the Schatzkammer :(

We decided to head to the Schatzkammer where the crown jewels, a thorn from Jesus' crown and other cool things are on display, so we walked past the Museums Quartier in the pouring down rain to the Hofburg only to find that they were closed on Tuesdays! I guess I should have learned my lesson by now to look online to figure things like this out first, but Tuesday?? Who is closed on a Tuesday?

Kaisergruft - Maria Theresa's Tomb

We were disappointed to say the least, and with soaking wet shoes, walked over to the Kaizergruft (under a church), which houses the coffins of many past Habsburg elite. Wow. The coffins were very elaborate! Very worth it at about 4 Euro, even in the freezing rain.

I definitely underestimated the weather here, I brought mostly tank tops and shorts etc. but it has been hovering around 55 degrees or less for the last few days. I desperately need some boots!!

Bio-Bar Cafe

We ate lunch at a super awesome organic vegetarian place (which took the cab driver like 15 minutes and 10 Euros to find even though it was 1km away - but hey it was pouring rain and freezing cold) called the Bio-Bar. We had fresh squeezed pomegranate juice and a great lunch. Was definitely a good Google find, local and lots of character.
As soon as we metro'd it back to the hotel, we packed up the VDubs and booked it out of Vienna, we'd spent way too many Euros the past few days!

Block Housing

We debated on going to Bratislava or go straight to Budapest. We figured we would probably never plan a vacation to Slovakia, so we decided to go for it. We got there in about an hour, and like the other boarder crossings, did not get stopped. It had been pouring the entire drive to Bratislava, as we entered the city, there was a very 'industrial' feel to it most markedly, the functionalistic, block style apartment buildings.

Space Craft 'New Bridge'

We drove around the city for a little while, seeing the odd, space craft like bridge, which in our opinion looked a little ill-constructed (the windows may have been blown out at the top?), and the Bratislava Castle. It was still raining and the wind was whipping, so admittedly we never actually got out of the car, except for gas and Kris pulling over to re-shut the hatch, so maybe we didn't give it a fair shot. In any case, it was still interesting to compare the cities we had been to with Slovakia's less progressive feel.

Finally, we took off for Budapest, and I have to give Kris props here for being such an awesome little VDubs driver in pouring down rain and high winds, with all of the road construction and trucks between Bratislava and Budapest. I can't believe we didn't get sucked under a semi with the way the wind was blowing. The one thing we saw a lot of when we got close to Budapest were the miles and miles of Sunflower fields! The would have been so pretty if the sun was shining.

Cosmo Hotel

We checked in to the Cosmo Hotel, which seems to be in a nice shopping/tourist area. We are right next to the Danube river and close to most of the tourist attractions, and the hotel (oddly pink and purple color scheme) is fabulous! We went to a Greek place around the corner for dinner which was really good and great service. Then we headed to a bar that was recommended by the manager at the Greek place. We took the metro (same 15 minute learning curve we experience at every metro) and made it to the bar, had a few drinks and then finally time to rest!

Vienna - Wir bleiben in Vienna

blondie — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 00:00:00 GMT

I planned out an itinerary for us last night, so this morning, we hit the ground running. Breakfast was surprisingly nice, given the ratty condition of the room we are staying in, so that was a unexpected plus. It was even colder this morning, and it was raining with a forecast to rain ALL day, so we abandoned our plan to rent bicycles, in favor of all day U-bahn/Strassebahn passes. Agata and John gave us their umbrella when they left Prague so we made good use of that - thx guys!

Our first stop was the Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien (MUMOK) which is the largest museum for modern and contemporary art in Central Europe, and coincidentally located directly across the street from the hotel, in the Museums Quartier.

Museum's Quartier - MUMOK Museum

MUMOK Museum Piece

Always prepared, our student ID's got us a discount of 5 Euros total. We saw exhibits from Mladen Miljanovic (really cool car themed exhibit), Malerei's 'Prozess und Expansion' (just all around interesting installations and very wierd things), and Internationally renowned Austrian artist, Brigitte Kowanz's 'Now I See' (exhibit about communication through light). All the exhibits were super cool and well worth the time and ticket price.

Schloss Belvedere - Home of 'Der Kuss'

We took the U-bahn and Strassebahn (although it took a few mistakes in reading the maps and lines) to Schloss Belvedere (Belvedere Palace) to see the gardens and the Upper Belvedere Collection. The most notable piece here is Gustav Klimt's 'Der Kuss' (The Kiss) of which we were not allowed to photograph. Price was a little steep at 9 Euro each, with no student discount since we were too old!

From the Belvedere, we took another U-bahn/Strassebahn combo to the Kunst Haus Wein - Museum Hundertwasser, which was designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser and houses a lot of his works - admission is half price on Mondays, so a random plus for us at only 4.5 Euro per person.

Kunst Hause Wein

Outside the Kunst Haus Wien

This exhibit was definitely extraordinary and my favorite of the day. The floors were wavy and his works, including wall art and architecture were colorful and extremely creative, all with an eco-environmental emphasis. One exhibit was a model architectural plan of an eco community where the houses were build into the landscaping. Soooo worth the out-of-the-way locale!!

We headed back (yes, on the bahn) to the hotel area to do some sightseeing of the neighborhood we were in, including a popular shopping street, then took some R&R before heading out to dinner.

We went back into the Inner Stadt for dinner at a veggie-friendly place called Wrenkh, which was a great pick by our LonelyPlanet book. The food totally hit the mark, my mango-paprika-quinoa was great, and Kris' fish dish was equally unique and tasty.

Rhiz Bar - Under the Metro Station

After dinner, we walked around a bit, but Monday nights apparently are not very happening in the Inner Stadt. We hopped the bahn to JosephPlatz to a lesser known bar with a location actually underneath the bahn trusses. Odd but interesting place w/ definitely a locals crowd! Wow what a jam packed day!

To Vienna - Wir gehen zu Osterreich!

blondie — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 00:00:00 GMT

Grand Cafe Orient

This morning, we got off to a little of a slow start. We ate breakfast at Grand Cafe Orient, which is at the top of the Czech Cubism Museum building (we should have gone to the Museum too). There was a band marching on the street below, and enough bees again surrounding our food outside to kill an elephant, so we stepped back inside after a bit.

We packed up and headed to Vienna via Brno. Either by mistake or on purpose, (Tom Tom's maps had not been updated in 3 years) we ended up on about 60 Miles of backroads outside of Vienna which took us through a few small towns with some very beautiful views (way to go Tom Tom).

We checked in to our hotel, Viennart Hotel, right across the street from the Museums Quartier. We are right on the outskirts of the city center which is nice, but the tram runs right past our window, the room is not really very nice and there is no A/C - thank goodness it's cold outside. Somehow this place got a 4 star rating, which boggles my mind because it's worthy of no more than 2 stars - well except for the bathroom, which is somehow pretty nice. I guess for the price it's all ok. We found free parking for the night on the street outside, but the spot was ubertight. I MAYBE gave the van in front of us a little bumper love, but both cars looked good as new after the job was done and about 10 inches to spare on either end. Thanks dad for teaching me to park a stick on a hill :)

We grabbed something something to eat and then headed to the Museums Quartier, which was a supercool layout of art buildings and major hangout.

Stephens Dom

We passed through the Hofburg, Leopold's Museum and Kunsthistorisches Museum and into the city center to see Stephensdom and a lot of other gorgeous sights. There was no shortage of street entertainment, but all of the shops and buildings were closed since it was Sunday evening.

The Hofburg

But none of that detracted from the breathtaking architecture. Seems like we had a whirlwind day, so we stopped at a cafe for tea for me and dinner for Kris, then got some ice cream and went back to the hotel to chill out a little. We almost went to the bar, but decided to save our Euros for tomorrow. I also took the opportunity to move the car a few feet back since the car behind us had left:)

PS - Frau Schuller, eat your heart out, because I still know my German!

Poland and More Prague

blondie — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 00:00:00 GMT

On Thursday, we headed out to Wodzislaw Slaski, Poland to see John, Agata, and her family. We drove around the one way streets of Prague for about 45 minutes getting lost and looking for coffee to-go, not necessarily in that order. Once we got out of the city and drove though a McDonald's McCafe, we were on our way to Poland! The landscapes were beautiful throughout the whole drive. The VW Polo had a little of a rough time in the hills though, and I learned the hard way that you don't have to prepay for gas in Czech!

Kris' Polish Birthday Cake

We arrived in Agata's town that afternoon - about a 4.5 hour drive from Prague. Her family was so great! We rode bikes and saw her town square, church and school. It was so cool to see where she grew up!

Her dad brews his own beer and makes his own wine and vodka, so we had a lot of his homemade libations that night and great food! They also had a super delicious cake for Kris' birthday! Her family grows a lot of fruit and vegetables in the yard, and we had fresh free-roaming happy Chicken eggs for breakfast in the morning - best eggs we have ever tasted in our lives, no joke!!

Prague Castle and Charles Bridge

We left on Friday to go back to Prague - all four of us in the Polo. Definitely a tight fit, and a little more stress on the poor little VDub's engine, but we made it just fine.

Prague Castle and Charles Bridge - John and Agata

We stayed at the Ibis Hotel in Old Town this time which a GREAT location and was much closer to all the attractions.

We ate typical Czech food at a really great Brewery called Pivovarsky Dum and then walked back over Charles Bridge and through Old Town Square. Later we checked out a bar called Fragola.

Saturday, Agata and John had to leave back to Poland, so I walked with them to the train station and they took the 4 hour train back :( Sad to see them leave, but I'll see them back in the U.S in another week!

Kris and I walked around to some of the city we hadn't seen yet, including Wenceslas Square, and we ate dinner at a great cheap Thai noodle bar called Modry Zub, or the "Blue Tooth". I walked to see Prague Castle lit up later in the night. Prague certainly is a whole new city at night, with all of the bars lining the cobblestone streets opening up and different types of tourists out!

Prague Part 1

blondie — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 00:00:00 GMT

We set out from Orlando on the 24th and arrived this morning in Prague. The JFK to Prague leg was horrific - for some reason I couldn't get any sleep. Oh yeah, part of it was due to the two dip-dods sitting in front of us who decided to smoke in the lavatory - twice! I never cease to be amazed at what people will do. The flight attendant gave him a kindergarten slap on the risk, tsk, tsk... isn't that a felony? Well that just prepared us to land in Prague I guess. In the less than 24 hours we've been here, we have both smoked a second hand pack of cigarettes here, holy cow!

We checked into the Mamaison Residence Belgicka, which is in the expat part of town, really nice little gem of a hotel - the room does smell a bit like smoke - uh not surprised though.

No naps! We took the above ground tram to Prague Castle, which was an enormous complex. We got lost getting there and met someone from Estonia, and between the 3 of us, we ended up finding it just fine. The land is so hilly, it's easy to lose sight of the landmarks and get turned around. Kris could not pass up some authentic Prague Castle goulash.

We also checked out the local Wenceslas Vinyard where we had a carafe of local Czech wine...which we shared with the many bees that seem to populate the entire Castle area. Then we walked down the shopping street of Malostranska and crossed the Charles Bridge into Old Town. Old Town was packed with tourists and shops, and we met someone else from Pittsburgh looking at Russian style stacking Steelers dolls, go figure!

We checked out Tyn Church on the way back to the metro then headed to Radost FX Cafe for dinner, which was an awesome eclectic little bar/restaurant with great food.

Going to bed now- finally:)

Chriffie's (and America's) Birthday

blondie — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 00:00:00 GMT

Uncle Bill's

Chriffie liked to think he was a team player in sharing his birthday with America haha. We headed to Manhattan Beach for the day and stopped at Uncle Bill's for an extravagant outdoor breakfast. When you order an omelet there, it comes with potatoes and two pancakes, so much food for one person! The french toast was fantastically fried and I'm sure bad for you but oh so good. We needed some good solid food after Hermosa Pier the night before. After Uncle Bill's, we spent the day at Manhattan and Hermosa Beaches to celebrate the 4th. Everyone was in 4th of July spirits, complete with flag bathing suits and even some flag man speedos, eek!