9.28.18 Vancouver and Norwegian Bliss

We joined my parents for a trip to Vancouver and a sailing from Vancouver to Los Angeles on the Norwegian Bliss plus two nights at Disneyland. 

Highlights of the trip:  

• Getting lost in Stanley Park and walking too far 
• Fantastic meals including a meal at a restaurant owned by a chef my parents met in Mexico 
• Sailing under the Vancouver and Golden Gate Bridge 
• My parents reuniting with crew members they loved from previous Norwegian cruises 
• The beautiful Norwegian Bliss with its amazing observation lounge 
• A great private tour in Victoria to all the highlights 
• An excursion to Sonoma and eating lunch at one of our favorite restaurants: El Dorado Kitchen 
• Enjoying the Disneyland Halloween party and decorations 

9.1.18 Trip to Secrets Maroma

We headed back to Mexico for Labor Day. We stayed at Secrets Maroma. 

We were surprised at all the activities available. We painted in the garden.  

Glenn played beach volleyball.

We loved the casino night, though Angie had to scold the men giving the craps dealer a hard time for not knowing the complex bets. We were playing for monopoly money. 

Glenn's favorite restaurant was the seafood restaurant.  Angie's favorite was the Italian because the service was fantastic plus they brought over a huge wheel  of cheese. 

Can't beat that. The poolside grill had grill whole fish which is one of our favorites. 

Overall, it was a great trip and we really enjoyed the resort. 

8.16.18 Work trip to Antigua

I was selected to go on a FAM trip to Antigua. On these trips, we visit resorts and attractions so that we can better match clients to these experiences 

This trip was fantastic. The other agents were great! The resorts we saw were fantastic. 

I stayed at Galley Bay. This is now one of my favorite resorts..ever. I had a beachfront room right in front of a group of coral with great snorkeling.

 I loved waking up each morning and going snorkeling. The staff was amazing. It is adults only all inclusive. Absolutely fantastic. 

My other favorite activity was heading to the Sunday night BBQ at Shirley Heights. The 40 person steel drum band was amazing. 

I also really liked Sting Ray City. I did not like the Grand Cayman experience, but this was so much better - less people, more space.

8.10.18 NCL Sun

I convinced Glenn to take a last minute cruise. We booked on Wednesday for a Friday departure. I've always wanted to do that since I moved to Florida. 

We worked Friday morning and then headed to the port. We were onboard by 2:30 pm. We booked an Oceanview cabin on the Norwegian Sun. We headed to the small buffet for a late lunch. Then it was the muster drill. We watched sail away from deck 6. Took a tour of the spa and then had a drink in the lobby. It was an open bar cruise which was fun. 

For dinner, we went to the Mexican restaurant. The food was very good and the drinks were delicious.

 We played the game This or That. I won twice "Popes or Brittany Spears songs" and "Swedish politicians or Ikea furniture'. We enjoyed the piano player. 

 

Saturday, we docked in Nassau Bahamas. We headed over to Sandals on a day pass. We enjoyed a pool/beach day. For dinner, we tried the sushi bar. Not my favorite so we had a second dinner at the buffet. We watched the newlywed game and then listened to the piano player. 

Sunday, we tendered to Great Stirrup Cay. We left early and got a clam shell on the beach. 

A big storm came in. We did have some delicious tacos before we headed back. We had a lazy afternoon. Then, we tried to hear all the musical groups on board before heading back to the Mexican restaurant for dinner. We ended the night back in the piano bar.

Disembarkation was easy. Glenn worked in the car on the way home.

7.26.19 Detroit

Thursday night we headed to Detroit, Michigan after work. 

We stayed at the DoubleTree Suites downtown. 

Friday morning, Glenn and I worked. Our friends Jon and Jackie arrived at lunch time. We headed to Grand Turk Pub where I had a delicious Turkey Reuben sandwich. 

After lunch, we went to the gorgeous Apparatus Pub at the Detroit Foundation hotel. It was gorgeous. I had a very spicy margarita and everyone else had beer. 

Our car came to pick us up and we headed to the Michigan Brewers' Guild Summer Beer Festival in Ypsilanti. The beer fest was fantastic. 1,150 beers from 150 Michigan breweries. 

Our favorites were from Arclight. They had some delicious sours. Witch's Hat and Speciation were also tops for us. We made a big mistake at not evaluating the food options before picking a line. We ended with partially frozen hamburgers when we could have had tacos. 

At the end of the night, we brought our A game to the port-a-potty line. The people in front were not paying attention. I may have ran to the front of our line and pushed a large man into a port-a-potty so our line could move ahead of the other lines. Allegedly. It ended up being a pretty fun move as everyone then started cheering for this own line. I got an ovation when I exited the port-a-potty. Someone said I'd get a gold medal in the Port-a-potty Olympics. I humbly said I was happy to be of service. We headed back to the hotel for a night cap. We headed back to the hotel for a nightcap. I was so happy to see my favorite New Holland gin on the menu. 

Saturday, we headed to the Eastern Market in the morning. 

We tried some beers at Eastern Market Brewing. They were not our favorite. 

We also tried our luck at the Detroit City Distillery. 

I had the gin flight and it was fantastic. Glenn enjoyed his bourbon cocktail. We tried some pierogis, but they had nothing on the Polish food you can find in Northern Michigan. 

We headed up to Ferndale to sample some Mead. We stopped at Public House for a quick bite. Then we went to Schramm's Meadery. We tried all the meads on the menu. Glenn's favorite was The Rebuttal - a cherry mead aged  on cocoa nibs and Madagascar vanilla beans in a bourbon barrel. My favorite was the ginger. 

Finally, after a short nap, we headed to the baseball game. It was a gorgeous, cloudy night. We had great seats on the third base line front row. 

My favorite thing about the stadium was an awesome food court with a carousel in the middle. 

We also LOVED the chicken shawarma nachos. It was a funny moment because Glenn asked our car driver from Friday night was food was Detroit known for. He answered Mediterranean and chicken shawarma. We were skeptical. 

After the game, we went to a dive bar near our hotel - Anchor Bar. It was a great spot. Good service. Great prices. A decent ham and cheese sandwich. 

Sunday, we stopped at the Detroit Institute of Arts before heading to the airport.  We encouraged Jon and Jackie to check out the Star Wars Costume Exhibit while we wandered around the museum. They had a great baseball card exhibit. We were impressed with the museum and the exhibits. 

July weekends in Tampa

My friend Amy came to visit. We had a great time lounging by the pool, attempting an escape room, and meeting up with her friend Beth at Oxford Exchange. 

The weekend of the 21st, we went to Hop Gun Beer Fest at Tampa Theater and spent the night downtown at our favorite hotel: Le Meridian. 

7.4.18 Cancun

Glenn joined me on a research trip to Cancun, Mexico. I visited 8 resorts in four days.

We started with a stay at Grand Fiesta Americana Coral Beach. We were excited for this option because it's not exclusively all inclusive. It is European plan (no meals included) with options to add Club Level or an all inclusive plan. We chose to keep the European Plan.

We had a decent lunch out by the beach. 

We explored the three swim up bars and then had an amazing experience at the Spa. We took the tour through the hydrotherapy. It's a 2 hour process of steam rooms, saunas, hot pools, cool pools, a clay room and even an ice room. It was amazing. For dinner, on restaurant offered a Mexican buffet so we took advantage of that. I was tired so we called it an early night.

Thursday morning I had a terrible episode of vertigo. Luckily, we got it mostly under control. I basically have been slightly dizzy for the last week. The breakfast buffet was really good. Then, it was time to head out. We stopped at Live Aqua for a site inspection and lunch. We had the best dessert we've ever had.

 It was an amazing Mezcal dessert soup with sponge cake and pop rocks. YUM!

We checked in Hyatt Ziva around 3:30 pm. We took a resort tour and then headed to the micro brewery to try the beers. 

They were really good! For dinner, we went to the Asian restaurant. The food was okay. Glenn's first dish was not good so they quickly replaced with something else from the menu. After dinner, we enjoyed the latin show.

Friday, I got picked up and spent the day visiting Fiesta Americana Condesa, Azul Beach Riviera Maya, Azul Beach Riviera Cancun, UNICO 2087, and El Dorado Seaside Suites. Glenn worked from the hotel. We had a happy hour at the brewery and then went to the French restaurant for dinner. Again, one dish was not great and the others were pretty good.

Saturday was a great day by the pool. We tried the ceviche and tacos restaurant. 

It was so good!! The seafood was delicious. We enjoyed the afternoon by the swim up bar. Saturday night we tried the Italian restaurant. The antipasto buffet as delicious. My eggplant parm was really good. Glenn didn't like his lasagna. We watched the show and headed to bed early. 

Sunday it was time to go home.  

6.30.18 Versailles

Saturday was Versailles day! We pre-booked a bus transfer. We took an Uber to an office near Eiffel Tower. It was an easy transfer after the bus driver figured out where to go.

We stood in line for an hour to get in to the Palace. The Palace was very crowded so we slowly worked our way through. 

Then we headed out to the Gardens. Turns out I bought tickets for the wrong day. The ticket taker laughed at me a little. My sister and mom gave me a look.  I asked where to buy tickets. She took pity on me and called over the supervisor who let us in. So sweet. 

We headed immediately to the golf cart rental. No way are we walking in 80 degree heat all over this huge estate. My sister drove and did a great job. It was cool because they had a set route you had to take. It was one way and didn’t interfere with the walking paths. 

We headed to the back of the property to the Trianon – two palaces added after Louis XIV. 

Then we ate lunch at the café near the Grand Canal. They had good gluten free options.

We returned the golf cart and got in place for the fountains to turn on. It was neat to see the fountains on. It was so hot so we went to the café and got cold drinks. At check out, the server asked if my sister and I were twins. We stood next to each other and he says, “NO!” Then he asked if we were Americans. We said yes and asked how he knew. He answered – I can tell. It was so funny. 

We took the bus back and then tried to find a place for dinner. I found a place near the Champs Elysees. We took an Uber there. It was closed. Grrrr. So we decided to head to the Disney Store on the Champs Elysees. When we came out of the store – horns were blaring! France had won their World Cup match. People were driving up and down the street with flags, hanging out windows, revving motorcycles and honking horns. It was great. We found a cute café that had gluten free options and had a nice dinner. 

Then we walked back toward the hotel. We decided to have dessert a restaurant we had passed earlier in the week – Indiana. It was basically the Applebee’s of Paris. I had a Kir Royale. We enjoyed sitting in the window. A great end to our trip.

Our flight went well back to Indianapolis. Our transfer to the airport was a little stressful because a triathlon closed down most of the city. We made it.  Sara’s family came to greet us at the airport. My niece was pretty excited to take over my suitcase. I was pretty excited to let her. 

Overall a great trip!

6.29.18 Hop On Hop Off Bus

I think we’d all say one of the highlights of today was the gluten free waffle place. It was awesome.

We had a late start leaving the hotel around 10 am. We walked up to the Arc D’Triomphe to hop on the Big Bus hop on hop off bus. I picked Big Bus because the reviews of other bus companies commented how frequently they saw the Big Bus. 

We took the Big Bus to Notre Dame. It was about an hour and a half ride from the Arc to Notre Dame. It was impressive to see how much of the city we’d already covered via boat.  The stop at Notre Dame is ridiculous. You pass Notre Dame, fight 10 – 15 minutes of traffic and then get dropped off.

We walked to the waffle place with a brief stop at McDonalds to check out the menu.

The 100% gluten free waffle – Yummy and Guilt Free – had all kinds of waffles – savory and sweet. It was a great stop. 

Then we decided to bypass the Hop on bus and took an Uber to pick up the blue route on Hop On/Hop Off. The goal of the Blue route was to see Sacre Coeur. Well, here’s my best pic of the famous Sacre Coeur.

Big disappointment. It was good to see a new neighborhood. After this, we decided to hop back to the Notre Dame neighborhood. The bus was packed so we were stuck in the hottest part on the bottom in the back. It was pure joy getting off that bus.

We headed to Saint Chapelle – a basilica. It was very exciting going through security. The guard LOVED me. He gave me a big high five and would not let go of my hand. He kept saying Yay America. My sister asked what I said that triggered that. My only explanation was he likes a tall drink of water. The basilica was amazing. 

Right next door is the prison where they held Marie Antoinette for 76 days. You could probably skip it.

After all the excitement of the hop on/hop off bus, I couldn’t make any more decisions so we headed back to Little Nonna for dinner. It was delicious.