Montreal, Canada June 29 - July 2, 2013

My trip to Canada started with lots of excitement! Thanks to my husband's blog, I got to sit in the cockpit on my Air Canada flight!! The pilots were so impressed with my husbands "questionnaire" that they invited us to the cockpit post flight. I got to wear the pilots hat and move the engines left and right. It was super fun (terrifying!) and a great way to start my vacation.

in the cockpit of my Air Canada flight!

Our Canadian adventure started in Montreal.  Montreal is a very interesting city filled with many different types of cultures and people; from the corporate downtown to the very laid back Mont Royal. Montreal may be one of the most international cities I have been to. Normally, when you go to a new city or country, its residents are from that country of origin; not in Montreal. It was so refreshing to be in such a culturally diverse and accepting place. We arrived slightly after the Pride Parade, but in the middle of the International Jazz festival; such a great mix!

view from our hotel, thousands at the International Jazz Festival

We were very fortunate that our hotel was within the jazz festival's grounds, so at night we were able to relax with a cocktail and enjoy some world renown jazz. I didn't think of jazz as a very popular genre of music, but I was proved wrong as the festival was attended by thousands of people each and every day! That evening we arrived, we relaxed and enjoyed some of the jazz festival from our hotel patio.   The next morning was a full day! We adventured up to Mont Royal, Montreal's huge outdoor park. Within the park there is a large hill/small mountain that many locals use to mountain bike ride or work out. We accepted the challenge of climbing this "mountain" in order to see the great views of the city. Mont Royal was probably one of my favorite things we did as it was different than anything we've done in a city trip. Normally, when you visit a city you don't think of hiking up a mountain! It also was so "hippy" and down to earth with local shops and eateries. At the base of our walk there were about a hundred people banging drums and enjoying some folk dancing in the middle of the park; it was extremely entertaining! We were especially pleased that after the long hike up, the view was well worth it!

the drums and dancing at Mont Royal

on the hike to the top!

view from the top of Mont Royal

As we got up early, we had plenty of time to wonder the streets of Montreal after our climb. We got to see the Notre Dame Basilica, the cobblestone streets of Old Montreal, and the Old Port. We ended the day walking down Rue St. Denis in the Latin Quarter, sipping on strong cider at a microbrewery. We had a great spot outside, perfect for people watching. The Latin Quarter is a very hipster area filled with college students. There was a live band playing in the street which was quite nice after the long day we've had. Summer in Montreal is so relaxing. We enjoyed the nice summer's evening so much, we lost track of time. The sun stays out so late, we were surprised to find that we were walking back to the hotel in complete day light at 9 pm in the evening!

Notre Dame Basilica in Old Montreal

Old Port

The next day in Montreal happened to be Canada Day, July 1st! We went down to Old Montreal to rent two bikes to explore the rest of the city on two wheels. We hopped on and followed a massive bike trail over a GINORMOUS bridge to the islands on the St. Lawrence River and the Parc Jean-Drapeau. It was so peaceful leaving the bustling city behind to bike through the park. Not only was it peaceful, but it also had great views of the city skyline.

Park Jean-Drapeau also is where the Canadian Grand Prix is held. Well, of course we had to go see it! Not only did we get to go see it, we were able to ride our bikes around the entire track! We were zipping along (unfortunately I zipped through a pack of bugs, forgetting I did not have a windscreen, gross!) racing each other along this world renown Grand Prix Track. That definitely was one of the highlights for my husband as he grew up watching the Grand Prix.

Jayda on the Grand Prix circuit

near the end of our bike path through the industrial part of Montreal

 Our Canada Day celebrations ended in the evening at the Old Port. We grabbed two crepes and parked a seat on the grass for the 20 minute firework display to celebrate Canada Day! It was so much fun! We picked the perfect time to go to Montreal. We actually didn't even realize it would be the Jazz Festival or Canada Day when we booked our trip, it was a nice surprise.

waiting for the fireworks, Happy Canada Day!

 One thing I did find quite surprising and still don't understand about the people of Montreal, is there love of poutine! Montreal was very french (obviously as it is French Canada), very modern, and a very "foodie" city. However, poutine is only french fries, gravy, and cheese curds. I tried two different kinds (I really tried to like it as I LOVE FOOD) and it was just "meh". Nothing special, but poutine was literally everywhere. I thought it was very ironic that there were so many different types of different great food available, but poutine was advertised and ate everywhere I saw! Maybe it was because of Canada and the festival? I will never figure it out, but it is something you must try while in Montreal!

street are in Mont Royal

view of downtown from the Old Port

Montreal is such a fun and exciting city. Not only was it a beautiful place, it was so clean and safe! Not once, in the entire city, did I feel unsafe. It was so clean, no homeless, no trash, I was shocked. Living in a city myself, trash and homelessness are just a daily part of life. I don't understand how such a huge city manages to keep itself so safe and clean. I truly had a blast! Montreal has history, was modern, and so culturally diverse. I still am blown away by all the different kinds of people all in one place at once, it truly was a magical experience. Montreal is a MUST on any trip to Canada! Early the next morning, we walked to the train station for the next leg of our trip, it was bye bye Montreal and hello Quebec!

bye Montreal, you will be missed!

The City of Caffeine: Seattle, Washington

May 24th - May 27th 

Seattle, Seattle, Seattle.... I was so excited to get to the capital of "Starbucks," I kind of got overwhelmed before I even arrived. My husband managed to get us two upgrades to first class.... and lets just say I did NOT act like I have been in a first class lounge before..... 7 gin and tonics later, we finally boarded our flight! 

First Class-y !

So our first full day in Seattle, sadly, became a half day! However, that slightly hung over lost and wandering stupor became my favorite day of the trip. Something about wandering aimlessly with no agenda allows for you to find the best parts of a city. We walked along the waterfront in the sun, yes the only day of sunshine, we were lucky! The Olympic Sculpture Park in Belltown was amazing.... sunshine, great pieces of art, plus great views of the Sound and the Space Needle. It was very relaxing, peaceful... and the best part, no crowds!

Olympic Sculpture Park

Olympic Sculpture Park

Olympic Sculpture Park

We also stumbled upon this amazing place called Biscuit Bitch. It was delicious, plus it was our hangover cure. I had an amazing cappuccino (yes I hate to admit it, but it was better than Starbucks) and the hubby got this egg, biscuit and gravy, sausage, spicy cheese fest.... with grits! Being a vegetarian, I couldn't eat the gravy or sausage, but they had many vegetarian options and I LOVED the grits! If you go to Seattle, you must try Biscuit Bitch! It was our little safe haven away from the crowds. We got two seats in a window and sat there for an hour just people watching and enjoying our food and espresso. It was perfect.

Biscuit Bitch aka Hangover Cure!

We attempted to hit up Pike's Place Market around 3 pm that same day and it was a nightmare! We couldn't get into the market, tried to find the first Starbucks, and could barely cross the street. On top of that, what is up with all the tourists walking around with their FREAKING iPads in the air? Who seriously does that? (well obviously a lot of people do)! I encountered this in Boston, but just thought it was a rare occasion. Nope! Don't get me wrong, iPad's are great and fun to play games on, stream movies, look at previously uploaded photos.... or at least I think so because I don't own one, but I've played on my brothers before. However, lets be honest. You are lugging around a huge piece of equipment that is giving you less that spectacular photos! Plus, you are the idiot blocking us "old school' tourists view of anything relevant with your gi-normous iPad. If you can afford an iPad, you and afford a nice camera to take with you on vacation. Plus most cameras have WiFi now and will automatically upload to your iPad. Problem solved! So iPad users, do not use them on vacation because you will look like a tool! Rant done...... sorry!

Any who.... My husband and I both love food, so we made it out mission to get up early the next day to be able to enjoy Pike Place at our own pace.

Original Starbucks!

Well, when my husband and I set off to do something, we do it! However, we may have gotten there too early, but it was amazing. I recommend getting overly excited and arriving too early. We left our hotel around 7:30 am and got to Pike's Place around 8 am. It was a ghost town, but half the stuff was open and/or the vendors were starting to prepare for their day. We went to my Mecca, the Original Starbucks, and it was empty! We got to talk to the barista's, take photos, buy one of our "you were here" Starbucks Mugs to add to our collection, and most excitingly, watch the flower shop put out their flowers and the fish markets put out there fish. WITH. NO. ONE. TO PUSH US. OUT. OF. THE WAY. WITH. AN. iPAD! It was great!

empty!

Fish Market at Pike Place

After the super cool ghost town that was Pike's Place Market started to become more pumping, we decided to leave and take the monorail directly to the Space Needle.  So, this experience was AMAZING. It was the Sunday morning of Memorial Day weekend and pretty quiet; as we're walking up to board the monorail it was like we instantly entered a time machine. We were heading back to 1962 when the monorail first opened in preparation for the World's Fair. I don't think there have been many upgrades to the monorail or the Space Needle since 1962, therefore making this a pretty awesome experience. Being one of the only ones in line at 9:30 in the morning, waiting for the first monorail to the Space Needle was pretty hilarious to us. Here we were, standing in the rain, and all of a sudden we see a space ship-esque train heading our way. It was fantastic, great fun, and best of all, a walk-free and wet-free trip to the Space Needle.

say "cheese!"... free photo before getting to the top!

As the true eager tourists we were, we also got to the Space Needle before it opened and got to enjoy its 1962 amazing-ness. Now, both of these sites are "must do's" in Seattle and are good fun, but with no one around we really got to see and imagine how extraordinary it must have been to see and be inside both of these in the 1960's during the Worlds Fair. As we were early, there was hardly anyone on top of the Space Needle.... we attempted to get some good photos, but as it was Seattle, it was a bit cloudy and "rainy" so we did our best!

View from the top of the Space Needle

The best views of downtown actually won't be from the Space Needle, but from a ferry. I really wanted to take a ferry to Vashon Island as I have a friend who grew up there, but we ended up boarding one to Bainbridge Island. After the Space Needle, we made our way back to the waterfront to see the Ferris Wheel, Aquarium, and to board a ferry. We went into the first station we saw, bought our ticket and hoped we would make it back in time for dinner! Thankfully, by late afternoon it had stopped raining and the views of downtown were phenomenal. We managed to get the skyline, Ferris Wheel, and Space Needle in the entire shot.

an iPad can't do this!

After about 35 minutes the ferry was getting ready to land in Bainbridge Island, which looked like there was absolutely nothing to do. We took one look at the huge line of people waiting to board the ferry back to Seattle, and decided to get off. Then, we hopped right back on the Ferry! We decided it was best to sit outside and enjoy the beautiful scenery and relaxing Ferry ride back to Seattle. By the time we docked, it was early evening and we had to make our way back to the hotel soon, but not without stopping and having some seafood on the waterfront. We went to Ivar's to enjoy some good old deep fried seafood.. We didn't go to the fancy-smancy indoor restaurant, we went to the outside quick part to share our food with the seagulls. I had deep friend clams, which were amazing. I LOVE clams and to deep fry them? Well, that obviously made them taste delicious!  It was a great way to end a site-filled day in Seattle!

In Downtown Seattle

view from our hotel room

Seattle, definitely is a "sleepless" city with all the Starbucks on every corner! Not only were there a million Starbucks, there were a ton of local cafe's. It is safe to say that Seattle became my Mecca and contributed to my coffee addiction. Some places I've been too I've struggled to find my coffee fix to keep me going, but not in Seattle. We only had two full days in Seattle, so we didn't get to go into a lot of the museums I wanted to or have time to do some outdoor nature hikes. However, we managed to walk, monorail, and ferry our way through the city. It is a bustling place that manages to keep everything local. I absolutely loved it. It was a big city that had a small town feel. It is best to wake up really early to see the quiet side and feel like you have the entire city to yourself. Seattle had a ton to offer, great food, great coffee, and it was beautiful! It was a nice city break and weekend vacation for anyone who has a coffee addiction!

coffee, coffee, coffee!

Boston, Massachusetts USA; February 15 - 18, 2013

Boston in February may sound crazy to some, but to the budget traveler,  it's a perfect getaway... if you can handle the cold of course! Luckily, living in California, seeing and being in the snow seemed quite romantic; almost as if I were experiencing my own historical winter wonderland.

I landed on Friday evening with  my two girlfriends and after an all day flight, we were starving!!! We flew on Southwest, AMAZING airline but no food on board!!!! After we checked into our hotel we walked straight on over to Chinatown. With so many different options to choose from, we decided on the Gourmet Dumpling House. We ordered 10 vegetarian dumplings, noodles with vegetables, an amazing sweet and spicy mango sauce with scallops and shrimp and for the non-vegetarians, Kung Pao chicken. Three girls; we ate it all. It was probably the best authentic Chinese food I have had in a long time. We walked in and the place was packed! Our waiters didn't speak much English, so we knew we were in for a treat. After a huge meal, we were ready for bed. Not an eventful first night, but definitely worth it.

Samuel Adams Brewery

Round 3 of taste testing!

When we woke up in the morning, my husband had arrived after his overnight red eye flight. What could possibly be the best way to stay awake? Drink of course! We went straight to the Samuel Adams Brewing Company to learn all about the Boston Lager. The Guinness Brewery in Dublin was much larger and I felt that I learnt more there, however the Samuel Adams Brewery is still pretty awesome. It's a lot smaller because they don't do any mass production. It's where they create the seasonal brews, taste testing  them until they're just right. We tried 3 different brews, but my favorite was the Single Hop Cascade. Sadly, it's not even out yet and it may not ever come out! It was a light tasting beer, but cloudy like a Belgian beer. I hope it gets the stamp of approval and becomes the summer seasonal as it was delicious!

Massachusetts State House

After the brewery tour we started the Freedom Trail. It is an easy way to explore Boston because all you have to do is follow a red painted line on the ground. It makes sight seeing super easy, plus it's free. We started at the beautiful Boston Commons at the foot of the Massachusetts State House. It was gorgeous with the big huge golden dome! We followed the trail over to my favorite site, the Granary Burying Ground. I know that sounds morbid, walking around old tombstones, but it actually was inspiring.  I saw the tombs of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Mother Goose, & Samuel Adams. So much history! It was especially amazing seeing the tombstones of four of the signers of the Declaration of Independence: Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, Samuel Adams and Robert Treat Paine. After attempting to find the oldest of the tombstones, some dating as far back as the 1700's, we carried on following the red "brick" road to the Old State House.

Old Granary Burying Ground

Tomb of Benjamin Franklin

Old State Building and Boston Massacre Site

The Boston Massacre Site is at the bottom of the Old State House. A marker on the ground shows where the Boston Massacre happened; we couldn't even fathom how horrible that must have been. After having a quiet moment,  we carried on with the Freedom Trail all the way up to the North End where the home of Paul Revere lies. There is just so much history in Boston, it blew my mind. It was like walking through my beloved history books. My friends were good sports listening to me lecture on the importance and the start of the slogan "no taxation without representation" and how the free thinkers of Boston truly were the creators of America by starting the rebellion against the crown. It also was particularly entertaining that my husband happens to be English, which led to many "red coat" jokes.

Harvard Square

On our last full day we woke up in a blizzard! It was very blusterous outside, but we decided to grin and bear it. We took the subway to Harvard to wander around and pretend we were some of the worlds most genius people. We were blown around Harvard Square, which was a feat in itself with the 25 degree weather and 5 degree wind chill! Even though it was cold, it was gorgeous. It was everything you would expect the University to be. Quotes were all over the walls of the buildings, some by my favorite Ralph Waldo Emerson. The old buildings, students trekking in the snow, and thoughtful quotes made it a truly magical experience. We managed to make our way from Harvard to the waterfront to take pictures of the city's skyline before the sun went down. We only lasted about 20 minutes at the harbor as the wind made it too cold to be outside, but it was worth it. We ended our night like the true locals we were pretending to be; a Bah-Stan lager, pizza, and the Bruins game!

On our final day we crammed in the remainder of the Freedom Trail, making our way to the Bunker Hill Memorial. The sheer height of the memorial was outstanding. We wanted to climb to the top, but it was too icy and dangerous so it was closed to the public. With that disappointing news, we decided to train it over to Fenway Park. Boston is a city extremely passionate about it's sports; so no Boston trip would have been complete without visiting Fenway Park. Before heading to the airport, we made it to Fenway. Even though it wasn't baseball season, you could just imagine how the place could come alive with the fans crowding the streets, hoping the Red Sox make it to the next world series!

Bunker Hill Monument

Fenway Park

Boston truly was an amazing city bursting with history and culture. I love history, but Boston is so diverse. If you like sports, there are the Bruins, Red Sox, Celtics, and many more with the university rivalries. The theater is popular and had many different forms of art displayed at the museums and the universities.  I personally thought Boston was an adventure in the winter. Not only were flights cheap, but I felt that we had the city to ourselves. Fighting the winds, stomping in the snow, and popping into bars and restaurants to warm up was a lot of fun. Boston is such an interesting city and I felt that I could go back again and again to have a completely different experience. Maybe one day I will as three days simply were not enough to do it all. Even though my time here was short, the memories I made and the experience of being surrounded by some of America's most important parts of history, will stay with me forever.

Bye, Bye, Boston