Barcelona: Day 6 - They Say That All Good Things Must End Some Day

Jon still wasn't feeling 100% great, but we had quite a bit of traveling ahead of us. We left the hotel and took the subway/train back to the airport. Check-in was easy, and we lucked out with exit row seats for our flight back to New York. I spent most of the flight reading and finished off my second book of the trip.

We had a long layover at JFK, which gave us a chance to ease back in to regular life by checking e-mail and catching up with the news online. Then, it was time for the flight back to Seattle, again in the exit row.

It was pretty dark and rainy by the time we got back to Seattle, just as we had left it the week before. Although we had a great vacation, it was a nice feeling to be back at home!

Barcelona: Day 5 - Foiled By Hours Of Operation

Our plan for the day was to go up north of the city to a Dali museum. We had both read good things about it, and I was excited to see a bit more of Spain beyond Barcelona. Unfortunately, the museum is closed on Mondays, so it will just have to wait until my next trip back!

Instead, we took a train south to the seaside town of Sitges. The mood was very relaxed here as we strolled along the beach and had lunch. The weather was a bit too cool to hang out at the beach, but it was still pleasant.

Once we were back in Barcelona, we took a funicular up to Montjuic park on the south end of the city. We strolled through the botanical gardens and checked out the Olympic stadium. By the Olympic Plaza, there is a large communication tower from the 1992 Olympic Games, which was kind of neat to see.

The plan for getting back to the hotel was to take a cable car, but high winds meant we were stuck hunting for a cab instead. This turned out to be a difficult search, as many student drivers in Barcelona practice driving around this park. These student drivers were all driving yellow cars (similar to the taxis), but eventually we found a taxi to drive us down. I thought it might be fun to ask one of the student drivers for a ride, I wasn't sure if they'd know the location of our hotel.

Instead of trying out a new place for dinner (and perhaps for the first time ever in our travels), we opted to go back to the same tapas bar we had enjoyed so much on Friday. Luckily, it was just as fantastic the second time around! After that, we called it a night since we were flying out the next morning.

Barcelona: Day 4 - A Rainy Trip To The Hills

Today we took an excursion up into the mountains. The Seattle rainy weather had finally caught up with us as we took the train to Montserrat: an old monastery. The train ride was pleasant, despite the darkening skies as we reached our destination. Next, we hopped on a cable car up the mountain. It's a very steep trip up!

Despite the rain and clouds, the monastery and attached church are gorgeous. We were able to see some of the Sunday mass that was going on and smell all the incense from the service. We waited in line to see the famous statue of the Virgin Mary there along with a few other tourists.

A little bit of blue sky was just peeking out as we took the cable car back down and the train back to Barcelona, and by the time we exited the subway on the north end of the city it was another gorgeous day. We hiked up a steep hill to Parc Guell. Along with great views of the city, we saw some structures and sculptures designed by Gaudi.















It was very crowded with locals and tourists, but we had a great time walking around the quirky buildings.

That evening, we walked to a tapas bar for dinner in an area of the city called El Born. We encountered many candles that had been spread out along the street. I have no clue if it was some sort of public art exhibition or what, but it was quite a dramatic site.

Barcelona: Day 3 - Let's See What This City Has To Offer

We covered quite a bit of ground making our way through the city. Our first stop was the market for breakfast. After that, we wandered through the older section of the city, Ciutat Vella, which still maintains its stone buildings, narrow streets, and various plazas. In one of the plazas, we encountered a wedding party, and in another, a church under rehabilitation (prominently sponsored by the local telecommunications company). Eventually, we ended up at Parc De La Ciutadella.

A short stroll later, we were at the Arc De Triomf and the Placa de Catalunya, both of which were teeming with activity. Although we had an 8-course lunch coming up, I wanted to grab some caffeine, so we stopped into a small cafe for cokes. We had been warned that this touristy area would have high prices for things, but nothing prepared me for our bill of nearly 10 Euros for our two sodas!

Lunch was quite an event: we went to a fancy restaurant and had an 8-course tasting menu. Everything was very good, starting with a mussel and asparagus dish and ending with a nice almond, chocolate and macadamia nut dessert. Some highlights in between included a turbot dish and some foie gras.

Full and content, we continued our ambitious sightseeing for the day. We took in a few nearby buildings designed by Gaudi before heading up to La Sagrada Famillia. This church was designed and started by Gaudi, but it's not yet complete. The plan is to finish it before about 2019, which will be 100 years since construction began. One side is a bit whimsical, looking like melting wax, and the other side is much more traditional. It was quite an interesting site, and I'm glad we had a chance to go see it.








That evening, Jon wasn't feeling well, so while he rested at the hotel, I took a walk over to La Barceloneta, which is another coastal area not far from where we were staying. It's a very nice seaside location, and I enjoyed taking in the sights before attempting to find some food to take back to the hotel. I entered a restaurant where I was successful in ordering two ham sandwiches with my limited Spanish, but the problem came when I wanted to get them to go. I tried "to go" and "to take away" in English to no avail. Finally, I used French, explaining "you make the food here, and then I eat it at my house." To this, the waitress responded "Ah, bien sur!" (Of course!). Sandwiches in hand, I returned to the hotel where we ate and turned in for the night.

Barcelona: Day 2 - Back In Europe

We landed a bit later in the morning than scheduled in Barcelona and hit the ground running. We had read about a bus that ran from the airport to the city, but we decided to take the train instead. That way, we could easily connect to the subway and end up just a few blocks from our hotel. So, we took the train a few stops to the Sants station where we wandered over to the subway tunnels. It ended up being quite a walk to the subway platform underground because of the location of the different train lines! Still, the signs were helpful and we eventually emerged at the end of La Rambla (the main shopping street) by the coast.

Our hotel was situated at the end of a long pier, as I suspect it's set up mostly to accommodate cruise passengers. Walking down the pier was nice (it's landscaped as a park with a large cable car tower in the center)...the first time. Eventually it became a bit of a chore! Still, it was very pleasant to be down by the water.

We checked in, set our stuff down, rested for a little while, and then headed back out in search of lunch. The nearby market was our first stop, with its large hams and salted fish swinging from every booth, but we ended up at a small restaurant nearby. The food was OK, and the setting was interesting: it seemed to be a neighborhood place where locals came to hang out for a few hours. We were easily the only ones there under 50!


Our next venture out was that evening for dinner (we both indulged our jet-lag with an afternoon nap). Jon and I aimed for a tapas bar in the Eixample neighborhood. Armed with a subway map and the 3 maps I'd purchased at Metsker Maps before leaving the states, we found the place with no problem. We got off the subway a bit south of where we wanted to be so we could enjoy a walk through a different part of the city from where we were staying. Dinner turned out to be a great experience with friendly staff, a nice festive setting, and fantastic food.

Stuffed and ready to get some rest, we walked to a different subway stop. Because of subway construction, we had to take a bit of a detour, which is when we ran into a large group of rollerbladers. There had to be at least 100 of them! I was tempted to join them, but I had left my blades back at the hotel.



At right: clearly I'm violating this sign for a mandatory hula hoop zone near our hotel.

Barcelona: Day 1 - American Airlines "Knows Why We Fly"

The day began fairly early for a vacation day as Jon and I got up and headed for SeaTac. The weather had been very nice in Seattle the few days before, but now it was a little bit cold and overcast: a perfect time to escape the Pacific Northwest!

We settled into our exit row seats and stretched out for the flight to JFK. I caught a nap and got some reading done, and we landed on schedule on the east coast. One layover later, we got on our 767 bound for Barcelona. We left the gate on time, but a few minor maintenance issues kept us on the ground in New York for an extra 1.5 hours or so.

Finally, we were airborne and headed across the Atlantic. The flight wasn't too long. Maybe it only felt that way since the last time I flew internationally out of the New York area, we were headed for New Delhi!

Mexico: Day 9 - Time to go home

Time to go home and back to the real world! We took the 4:30am bus back to the airport and checked in for our flight. We joined all the other Dallas-bound folks who were chafing against the long-sleeved shirts and long pants they hadn't had to wear while in sunny Cancun.

2 flights and a layover at DFW later, we were back in Seattle where the weather wasn't nearly as warm or sunny as it had been in Mexico. Still, it felt nice to be home and to join the regularly-scheduled American holiday season, already in progress!

Mexico: Day 8 - Back across the peninsula

Today we had the long drive to Cancun ahead of us. Luckily, the two cities are connected by a toll road that makes for easy driving. We did some shopping on the streets of Merida in the morning, grabbed some lunch for the road, and got back in the car. The drive was pretty uneventful, except for when we were stopped by the police after a toll booth. This search was much more thorough than the last, and we had to get out of the car as the officer searched through all of our luggage and the car. Finding nothing of interest, he sent us on our way.

As we got closer to Cancun, Jon and I decided to return the rental car on our way in as opposed to waiting until the next morning. The car agency was going to be closed when we arrived for our flight, and I was a bit nervous about that. Returning it was easy, and we caught a bus to downtown Cancun, as we knew our hotel was right by the bus station. 30 minutes later we were relaxing at our hotel enjoying the last bit of our vacation.

That night, we walked to a nearby restaurant for a nice meal (upscale Mexican, of course). As usual, we were almost the only folks there. It's traditional in Mexico to eat a large meal at lunch, so dinner isn't a popular time to go out to a restaurant. We checked out the Christmas decorations at city hall after dinner and then turned in early at our hotel.

Mexico: Day 7 - Back to Merida via the ruins

We had another ambitious day planned, so we got up and went straight to the city's wall (or at least what's left of it). Apparently, Campeche had a lot of trouble with pirate attacks back in its early days. We were able to get on the wall and walk a short distance to get a great view of the historic central area as well as some of the newer areas on the outskirts.

Our first stop after leaving the city were the ruins at Edzna. Well, our first stop was at a police checkpoint where they checked my driver's license and rental contract! Luckily, there were no complications there, and we soon found ourselves in Edzna. As this site is off the beaten path a bit, it was much less crowded than the other ruins we'd see. Edzna was historically a more agricultural settlement, which was a stark contrast to the mostly military ruins we'd seen before. Jon and I had a good time walking around and climbing on the different structures. Some of the Mayan carvings here had also been preserved, so it was fun to look at those items as well.

As soon as we left the ruins, we were ready for lunch and had a long drive to our next destination. We stopped at the first "restaurant" we saw. Guadeloupe, the owner, offered a choice of 3 different meals. We understood our meat choices to be chicken, steak, or pork, but we had no clue about the preparations she mentioned. We took our chances with the chicken, and it turned out great! It was a very nice meal in a very pleasant setting. Guadeloupe was very friendly, although our communication with her was fairly limited. Still, it was a fun experience and the kind of thing I really enjoy when I travel.

Here's the "closed" sign from the place we ate lunch. Apparently, the kids are none too pleased about the lack of ice cream!


No time for a siesta for us after lunch, though, because we had miles to go before we slept! After a nice drive through the country, we arrived a Uxmal. Unfortunately, we didn't have much time before closing to explore the ruins, but we did manage to see most of the excavated site. Uxmal was more of a social settlement, and it was interesting to compare that to what we'd seen in the agricultural and military ruins. Again, I found myself in awe of the sheer enormity of the stone structures.

Back on the road, it was dark before we got back into Merida. That makes the driving a bit more stressful, but again Jon's excellent directions got us back to our hotel without much trouble. We got settled in our room, this time facing the garden. After being in the car all day, we took a nice walk over to a nearby restaurant. It was upscale, and the food was excellent! The place was decorated in blue and pink, so the decor and the food were both pretty vibrant!

After dinner, we went to go hear a performance of local Yucatacan music. This performance happens every Thursday, and the one we saw was the 2206th performance. Most of the folks in the audience were tourists, and we struck up a conversation with a guy from California who was at the end of a bus tour from Mexico City. He said he'd had a great time and was sad his vacation was coming to an end. The music was great, and they even had some local teens dancing the city's traditional dance.

Here's one of the translated signs from one of the ruins. I'm pretty sure somebody mis-translated the word "alien" in here :)

Mexico: Day 6 - Celestun and Campeche

We had another long travel day planned, so we got up early and got our "gift" of breakfast at the hotel. Neither of us were able to finish the rather large portions, and as we left we both became concerned that the hotelier would require us to finish what we hadn't eaten when we got back to Merida the next night!

The trip to Celestun took quite a while, and we encountered more topes than we had expected along the way. We even managed to see a crew building a new one! All of the travel was worth it, though, because we took a boat out to see the flamingoes. They were hanging out eating young shrimp and crabs (which is how they get their pink color). We shared a boat with a tourist from France, and the boat driver only spoke Spanish, so we had an interesting time communicating. The tour included a walk through the mangrove trees in the area which gave us a chance to spot some other local wildlife.














Next we headed into town for a nice seafood lunch. Unfortunately, the gas station marked on my map in Celestun didn't really exist, but we had just enough left in the Attitude's tank to reach the next closest one.

We drove down to Campeche and got there just in time to see the great sunset over the water. Afterwards, we walked through the walled city to a restaurant where we enjoyed some Mexican food and watched some children play in the public square. The main plaza was decorated for Christmas, so we stopped on our walk back to the hotel to check it out.

Mexico: Day 5 - Chichen Itza and Merida

We got to an earlier-than-usual start and said good bye to our hotel in Tulum. We had a lot of driving to do, and I wanted to make sure we minimized the amount of driving after dark. The first leg of the drive was the same road we'd taken to Coba, but after that stretch the road conditions changed dramatically! The road was narrow with many potholes and large buses passing by, but I got behind another car who knew when to swerve to avoid the potholes and slow down for the topes.

In late morning, we reached Chichen Itza. We had beaten most of the tour buses there, so it wasn't too crowded as we admired the large central pyramid and surrounding buildings. Again, the enormity of these buildings is striking: with no CAD software available, the Mayans were able to build all of this and have it last for thousands of years!

We had lunch in the nearby town of Piste and enjoyed some local specialties which were very good. I was surprised as food near large tourist sites doesn't tend to stand out.

We also visited a local cenote (limestone sinkhole).





Then, it was back to the large toll road to Merida: our stop for the night. The drive to our hotel was fairly easy, and the numbered streets made it easy to find.

The B and B we were staying in was quite unusual, and the rooms are all unique with different layouts. We had reserved one of the nicer rooms for the night on the top floor with its own balcony. When we checked it, we were asked to sign a contract promising, among other things, that we wouldn't smoke anywhere in the hotel. One rather peculiar paragraph encouraged us not to think of breakfast as "included" but rather as a gift from the hotel staff that would provide us enough nourishment to have a good start to our day! Jon and I exchanged puzzled looks, but we signed anyway.

It had been a very long day, but we took advantage of the City of Merida's free cultural program after dinner and went to hear a local community band play 1940s Big Band music. The playing was ok, but the real attraction were the folks dancing. Many people were showing off their moves in the town square, and I really enjoyed watching the people dancing and enjoying themselves.

Tired from a long day, we went back to the hotel and turned in for the evening.

Mexico: Day 4 - Tulum Ruins

Another sunny day greeted us as we ate breakfast in the garden of our hotel. On our last full day in Tulum, we visited the Mayan ruins at the other end of town. This was the only site built on the water, and it was definitely set up as a center of defense. A fortified wall surrounds all the important buildings, and there are only 4 entrances to the interior. This site was much more crowded than yesterday's excursion to Coba, but we were able to enjoy the nice view of the water from the high points above the shore.

We spent part of the afternoon searching downtown Tulum for a set of speakers to plug into Jon's Zune. Our rental car radio did not work, and with many kilometers of driving ahead of us, we would need some entertainment. After checking in all the cell phone stores, we finally found one merchant who had a pair of speakers to sell. They weren't great, but they'd do the job.

That night we had drinks at one restaurant and picked up a small dinner at a taco stand we had been trying to eat at during our entire visit. We relaxed at the hotel in the evening, and I finished off the first book I had brought with me. Even though we enjoyed taking it easy in Tulum, we were anxious to get moving and embark on the next leg of our adventure.

Mexico: Day 3 - Coba

You know you're in vacation mode when you can go to bed early and still manage to sleep in the next day! Breakfast was provided at the hotel, and every day the owners served a different pastry. This first morning we enjoyed croissants along with our fresh fruit and coffee. We climbed into the car and drove the 45 km to nearby Coba for our first set of Mayan ruins. The drive was pretty easy, and I finally figured out my strategy: follow a local! Most of them know where the topes are and when to slow down for them.

More bright sunshine (and sunscreen!) were waiting for us in Coba as we had a great day for exploring the settlement. Because the buildings are all spread out, you can rent bicycles to get to the different groups of structures. We grabbed a couple and set off into the jungle! Most of Coba is still unexcavated, which is amazing to think about. The highlight for me was a pyramid that tourists are still allowed to climb (unlike Chichen Itza), and the view above the treeline at the top is certainly worth the climb!

Afterwards, we headed back to Tulum for lunch. A few times on the trip, I think we were trying to eat while most people were taking a siesta, so our lunch options were sometimes limited. We relaxed the afternoon away at the hotel before heading down to the beach for dinner. We had heard about a restaurant there that was run by two Italian chefs, and the food did not disappoint! Jon had a nice homemade pasta dish, and I enjoyed some red snapper. Drowsy and well-fed, we went back to our hotel for the night.

Mexico: Day 2 - Cancun to Tulum

Today we took it easy. Our ultimate goal was to drive down to Tulum, but since this was our only real day in Cancun, we headed for the beach! Cancun has a narrow strip of land jutting out towards the Caribbean Sea, and every inch of it is covered with hotels, shops and restaurants. Not being beach people, we wouldn't have chosen to spend our vacation out there, but it was nice to see. It feels a lot like the Vegas strip in this Hotel Zone with all the giant hotels in one place.

We parked the car, put on some sunblock, and ventured over to one of the public beach accesses. It was very warm (probably in the high 80s), so it felt nice to stroll along the beach for a while, checking out the light blue water.

Our drive to Tulum was about 130 km, and the road down the coast was in pretty good condition. We encountered many speed bumps (topes) along the way, as we'd read about before we left. I guess I just wasn't expecting there to be so many of them! After a while, I had decided to count all the ones we went over and then surprise Jon with the number when we returned the rental car. I realized after I got to about 52 on day 2 that I'd rather not think about how many there were and stopped counting :)

We got to Tulum in the afternoon and had lunch at a taco stand along the main drag in town. As we were examining the place, a couple of American vouched for the good food. They were from Anchorage and were spending a week on the beach trying to soak up as much sun as possible. Not a bad idea!

The next stop was our hotel for the next three nights: Don Diego de la Selva. It was just outside of town, so it would be a bit quieter and a nice place to get into the vacation mindset. It is run by people from France, so I was able to speak to the receptionist in French, as I know more of that than I do of Spanish. The room was very nice, and we even had our own hammock out on the porch.

That evening, we walked into town for margaritas at one of the local restaurants. They were very good but probably a little stronger than we had anticipated! We stumbled back to the hotel a short while later and had a great meal at the restaurant there. We read a bit after dinner and settled in for our few days in Tulum.

Mexico: Day 1 - Cancun

Another November: another international adventure! After a great Thanksgiving in Seattle with friends, Jon and I were off again to explore a new place. We woke up on Friday morning to a call from an actual person at American telling us that our first flight from SEA to DFW was delayed, which would mean a missed connection in Dallas. Luckily, American was able to put us on an Alaska Air flight to DFW that would allow us to make our second flight to Cancun. The adventure was on!

7 hours later our plane landed in Cancun. We could feel the warm weather as soon as we stepped off the plane; it was a nice change from the winter we had left behind back in Seattle. We breezed through customs and made our way to pick up our rental car. The process was relatively painless, except for the long sales pitch we got while waiting for our car to be cleaned. Soon, though, we had the keys to our red Dodge Attitude and were off to the city.

We made a few wrong turns on our way into Cancun, but Jon's excellent navigation got us close to our hotel pretty easily. Our guide book had the incorrect location for the hotel, so we spent a little while driving around the neighborhood before finding the place and checking in. After a quick walk to a nice taco dinner, it was time for bed!

Amsterdam: Day 7 -- Time to hit the road

And so it was time to head back to the US! After a very nice breakfast at the hotel, we made our way back to Centraal Station and took the quick train ride back out to the airport. We made it through security with no problem and took off on our 9 hour flight back to Seattle.

It was a great trip, and Amsterdam was a lovely city to visit!

Amsterdam: Day 6 -- Flower Time!

Today we decided to go see some flowers. The first order of business was catching an early bus to a flower auction in a nearby suburb. It was going to be an hour-long ride, but our bus scraped up against a double-parked delivery truck, so we were forced to go to the next bus stop and await the following bus. Since we'd been in the area the day before, we were able to find the next stop, and about 10 minutes later, we were back on our way!

The flower auction is held in the largest commercial building in the world, so we didn't need to look too hard to determine which bus stop was ours! After going inside, we saw millions of flowers waiting to be purchased and hauled away. I took a video of the action:


In the middle of all of this were several bidding rooms where people were buying all different kinds of flowers. It was very interesting to see how all these flowers get sold!

Back on the road, we took another bus back to a bus terminal where we switched to a bus that was supposed to take us to another bus terminal near the airport. However, this bus stopped just shy of the airport, so we had to hop out and jump on a different bus to take us the rest of the way. Once we got there, we saw the bus we needed to get to the Keukenhof (a large flower exhibition).


Finally, we arrived at the Keukenhof. The flower displays were very nice, and we certainly got a chance to see all the tulips we had been missing during the earlier part of the trip! Not counting kids being dragged there by their parents, I'd say we were the youngest people there by about 30 years! Gangs of wheelchairs clogged most of the pathways as we tried to make our way around.

After seeing our fill of flowers, we took another couple of buses back to the city and walked back to our hotel.

Amsterdam: Day 5 -- Back to the big city

Today was a leisurely day: we stayed at our hotel in the country until check-out time and enjoyed a nice walk around as well as breakfast on the front terrace.

Taking the bus back to the train station, we arrived and ran up to a train leaving for Amsterdam, but it started moving before we could hop on. Then, the same thing happened with another train! Now out of trains to chase, we had to cool our heels in the station for next train to Amsterdam...which was in about 25 minutes :)

Back in the city, we dropped off our bags at our new hotel along the Singel canal. It was a very nice setting, but our room, number 13, was 4 windy, narrow, and steep flights up from the ground level!

We spent quite a bit of time wandering around the city, this time going down to the Museum park, which was being prepped for Queen's Day.

Amsterdam: Day 4 -- Off to the countryside

We got up early, bid farewell to the houseboat and took our last ferry ride across to Centraal Station. Out front, we discovered the bike parking garage featured on the last season of The Amazing Race! We purchased tickets for our train ride to Arnhem and enjoyed a smooth one hour trip in a non-smoking car.

From the station, we took a quick 15 minute bus trip up to our hotel, which resembled a country manor house straight out of Wuthering Heights (minus the foggy moors and a sulking Heathcliff). We dropped off our luggage and set off on foot for the Hoge Veluwe National Park. Since it was such a nice day, the 4km walk was a nice stroll. At the gates of the park, we picked up our free white bicycles that are for general use by all park visitors.

It was about a 12km ride to the park's visitor's center where we took a break to grab a snack and check out the park information. Then we went to the art museum located in the middle of the park. There was a very nice sculpture garden, so we strolled around the grounds before heading inside.
There was quite an impressive collection of Van Gogh paintings, as well as other famous artists. Then we hopped back on our bikes for another leisurely ride to the park gates.

That night, we had dinner at the hotel's gourmet restaurant. I had a very tasty duck dish, while Jon opted for the roast beef. Our table at the front of the restaurant had a lovely view to the well-manicured back lawn, and it was nice to be able to sit there as the sun set.