Tag Archives: trip

Iceland! – Our Trip So Far

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On Friday evening Emma’s folks graciously took us to the airport, where we met up with Kate, Dan, and David, and caught a red-eye flight on IcelandAir to Keflavik airport in Iceland. The plane was recently upgraded with seat-back entertainment screens, like Jet Blue, and the flight was only four and a half hours, so even though the person in front of me insisted on leaning their seat back into my chest, the flight was good.

We arrived at around 6 AM local time, quite jet-lagged. We caught a shuttle bus to our hotel, and were luckily able to check in very early. After a few hour nap, we caught another shuttle bus to the Blue Lagoon spa. The Blue Lagoon is a geo-thermically heated giant outdoor lagoon, rich in various minerals, that you can float around in for hours. It was amazing. We could have spent days in there I think. The nap combined with the hot soak helped immensely with the jet-lag and post-plane soreness. We headed back to the city around 6 or 7 PM, grabbed dinner at a Thai place we found, and went to bed.

On Sunday, everyone except Emma and I went on a South Coast Tour. They brought back amazing pictures, but the early departure time and long time on the bus made me glad I slept in, and spent the day walking around Reykjavik, window shopping (although most shops were closed on Sunday), scoping out the restaurants and coffee shops, and taking lots of pictures of the amazing views from the city. I’ll upload the pictures once I get home, but the internet connection here is far too slow for that. We all ate dinner together at a European Italian chain restaurant, that was quite good. Emma hosted an Icelandic candy bar taste testing, where we struggled to identify the flavors of, and rate according to taste, a collection of odd Icelandic sweets. It was lots of fun and no one went into a diabetic shock.

On Monday we all rose early and took a two and a half hour tour of the greater Reykjavik area by bus with a tour guide, and several stops including some famous churches, the president’s house, the Pearl, and a haunted house where the first “let’s end the cold war” US-USSR meeting took place. It was cool see all the different areas and signifiant building, and hear about the history and culture of Iceland and Reykjavik from our tour guide. Lots of photos from this, but again, they’ll have to wait until I have a real internet connection again. We opted to be dropped off downtown, and got lunch at a little restaurant nearby. We all walked around a bit, and headed back to the hotel.

We took a cab to a nearby gym/spa called Laugar. They had geo-thermically heated outdoor hot tubs and swimming pools, and also inside the spa area an amazing underground setup. They had six or seven steam rooms and saunas, all with varying temperatures, lighting, and aroma-therapy. There was also a large sunken rock hot tub area with mineral enriched water similar to the Blue Lagoon. When you were thirsty, there was a nice bar/restaurant with free flavored ice water, and a tempting menu. There was also a relaxation room with low light, soft music, and a number of extremely comfortable recliners encircling an open fire in the middle of the room. I almost dozed off, and Emma actually fell asleep twice. It was very different from the Blue Lagoon, but was equally enjoyable, and equally different from anything I’ve seen in America.

For dinner we went to the well known Seafood Cellar, which while expensive, served some of the most amazing tasting and beautifully presented food I’ve ever had. I think we were all blown away by the food. I had a shellfish soup, and a lobster entrée. The local lobster, or langoustine, is the size of a very large shrimp, but with the soft succulent meat of a tender lobster tail. It is a delicious shellfish, and my entrée included at least 15 of them. After dinner we went for a drink at the famous Ice Bar, which was amazingly cold. I was expecting sub-freezing temperatures, but they must have had the room closer to 0 degrees Fahrenheit to lessen the sublimation of the ice. It was a fun novelty, but not a place you’d want to spend much time in.

Afterward I headed to bed early, as did David, while the rest went out to a couple of bars. It’s funny how there is two very different ways of describing the same thing:

Emma: “Kate was very responsible and made sure we were all home by 1:30″
Devon: “You mean: ‘we closed out the bar at 1, and had no where else to go’”

A good time was had by all.

Today, Tuesday, Emma and I ate brunch at a place we found that has amazing brunch platters and very good pancakes. We did some window shopping, and then Emma went to take a nap. I’m sitting in a coffee shop, using their WiFi, and having a chai.

Tulip Country

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Tulip

On Saturday I took a break from working all the time and we drove up to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival in Northwest Washington. The day started out pretty rough. Traffic was stop and go, which caused my brakes to overhead (I suspect I have bubbles in the lines or the shop put too low a grade of fluid in) and lock up after about an hour. After they cooled, we fought our way north, and finally got off the interstate. The winter has hung on out here, so there were only a couple fields of tulips which were showing color so far, although there were some amazing fields of daffodils out there as well. We saw pretty flowers. We saw local cops making a mint ticketing cars parked on the side of the road. We saw a 15′ high trebuchet in a guy’s yard. We saw cows. I mooed at them. They mooed back.

We also picked up some super fresh live clams and oysters, fresh bread (a big loaf and a Parisian style baguette), fresh farm butter (which is amazing), 3 day old goat cheese, and some extra sharp cheddar. On the way home we hit out local organic-y, fresh, grocery store, and picked up some things, including some amazingly fresh (smells like tomatoes) beefsteak tomatoes and fresh mozzarella.

For dinner we had raw oysters on the half-shell, caprese salad, clams steamed in a white wine/butter/garlic/onion sauce, and french bread with fresh butter. It was delicious and very European feeling.

You can see pictures from the trip here: 2008 Tulip Festival

Trip to New Mexico

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I just returned from five days spent in Albuquerque New Mexico.  My Grandmother turned 80 on Monday, and my Uncle, who lives down there as well organized a great surprise party for her on Sunday with many members of the family flying in from out of town.

Emma had never been to New Mexico, so I was eager to show her around, as well as spending time with my family.  When I was young we would go to New Mexico two weeks every year and visit my Grandparents and Great-Grandparents who lived in Albuquerque and Artisia New Mexico, so I have many fond memories of various places in and around those towns.  And of course the New Mexican food.  New Mexico has sopapillas, which are these amazing ballon-like fried dough things, that they bring out before, during, and after meals, and you bite a hole in it, pour in some honey, and devour.  They are one of my all time favorite sweet treats.  You can’t get them anywhere else, although I do make my own from time to time.

On Saturday we flew from Seattle to Salt Lake City.  Our flight was delayed leaving Seattle, so we had to run across most of the Salt Lake City airport to catch our next flight down to Albuquerque.  I didn’t know there were so many amazingly beautiful mountains by Salt Lake City.   We made it into Albuquerque on a small plane that evening, checked into our hotel, and got directions from the desk to a great local restaurant in a semi-sketchy area of town.  The food was great and the sopapillas were worth the seven year wait.  We were tired from traveling all day, so we watched The Water Horse in our hotel room (great movie).  Then I picked my father up from the airport, and took him to my uncle’s house where he was staying.

On Sunday we met up with some of my cousins at my uncle’s house, and then drove to the restaurant where the lunch-time surprise birthday party was taking place.   There ended up being 20 people there waiting for my Grandmother when she arrived.  She was so surprised and so happy, that moment alone was well worth the trip for me.  She wasn’t expecting to see her family from all over the country and so many of her friends, many of whom she hadn’t seen in years.  Lunch was great, although the waitress initially didn’t take my request for “LOTS of sopapillas, for everyone!” seriously.  You can see pictures from the luncheon here:

Gram’s 80th Birthday Party Pictures

After the party we hung out and talked and caught up with one another.

On Monday we went to Old Town, a historic area of Albuquerque for shopping and lunch.  Emma bought a beautiful turquoise necklace, and we enjoyed walking around and browsing the various shops and vendors spread out on blankets.  For lunch we used to go to La Placita, which has a giant tree growing through one of the dining rooms.  However, apparently the management had changed and it had gone downhill.  I tried to go anyway, just out of a sense of nostalgia, however the 45+ minute wait, the skill saw running in the resturant, and the fact that the dining room with the tree was closed off, let us to try a new place, the Church St. Cafe, located just behind the large church on the square.

You can see some pictures of Old Town here.

The waitress was great, and understood about sopapillas:)  She kept us well supplied.  The food was also some of the best I’ve ever had.  Service was a little slow, but it seemed there weren’t too many people working.  The food was well worth any wait.

Then we went back to my uncle’s house and my father and my cousin played music on guitars and a mandolin, and everyone talked and relaxed after the big lunch.  There was also some great chess playing, including a really fun game between one of my cousins and I, where we were very evenly matched.  You can see some pictures of that here:

Family time – music and chess.

The next day we drove out to Acoma, which is an old Native American settlement on top of a 400 foot high mesa in the desert.  They have guided tours where you learn about the history and culture (both past and current) of the Acoma people, who create some of the most amazing pottery I’ve ever seen.  It was fun to drive out into the desert and see all of the mesas and red rocks and the beautiful desert scenery.  Coming from a Seattle winter we didn’t bring sunscreen and after spending a day at over 6,000 feet in the New Mexican sun, I managed to burn pretty nicely.  Just call me Lobster Boy.

Acoma Pictures.

We bought some Acoma made bread and drove back to my Grandmother’s house, where we nibbled on bread and honey and talked with her.  Then we headed up the Sandia Peak Tram to have dinner at 10,000 feet.  The view was amazing all the way up and back.  There’s a 1.5 miles open stretch of tram cable without any towers while you pass over a 1,000 foot deep gorge below which is at once both a terrifying and awe-inspiring thing.  The pictures don’t do it justice.  The peak was very cold, but we hurried into dinner, which was quite good, and then headed back.

Sandia Peak Tram Pictures.

We visited with my Grandmother more, and then back to my uncle’s to visit with them, as we were leaving the next day.

On our last day there, we went to the zoo with one of my cousins, and then back to the Church Street Cafe for a final opportunity to stuff myself with real sopapillas, before heading to the airport.

Albuquerque Zoo Pictures.

Our flights home were un-eventful, thankfully.

I had a really great time seeing my family whom I haven’t seen in person in many years, and of course the tasty sopapillas will not soon be forgotten.  However, I was also very glad to come home, see my iguana, and bask in the humid air that doesn’t crack my lips and skin.

We will have to go back soon, as there are many more cool places I want to take Emma, like Santa Fe, Carlsbad Caverns, Chimayo, Four Corners, etc…  So until next time….