TYOE: San Diego

For our first on-a-plane adventure, we decided to cross timezones and spend some time soaking up all the Vitamin D our bodies had been missing during this dreary Chicago Winter.

San Diego is Guh-or-geous. We got off the plane and I was already ready to move in. Sure, I'll live in your crappy airport, just gimme all your sunshine.

The weather was in the 50's-60's all weekend with overflowing buckets of sunshine, and people kept apologizing for this! Nearly everyone we talked to was all, "sorry its so cold. I wish you guys got better weather this weekend." Meanwhile, boyfriend and I are walking around with our tongues to the sky trying to catch sunbeams. Sure it was a little cold for shorts, but I got myself a nice bit of color and so forgave everyone for the necessity of long sleeves.

Our hotel (priceline that 'ish, y'all) was right on the Bay and since we only had about 36 hours we decided that that's where we would spend most of our time. Sometimes you want to see all of a city, sometimes you realize that its better to enjoy what is right in front of you, especially in a place that is so easy to walk around in. This meant we had a very touristy weekend, but sometimes (hipsters, I'm talking to you here) being a tourist is Just. Fine.


Where we ate:
Top of the Market - ugh, so touristy. But we were starving and craving super delicious seafood for lunch on the first day. Swordfish tacos? Awesome. Atlantic Rock Crab Club? Kind of paled in comparison to the tacos. But not bad. Bonus Points? We were right on the bay and we got to watch old men in canoes fishing while we ate.

Spike Africa - We were super indecisive about where to eat dinner on Friday night and so walked in huuuuge circles, all over the Gaslamp district and into Little Italy before ending up here. I had the Ahi Mango Poke appetizer as my meal and it. was. perfect. Easily my favorite thing I ate the whole trip. With the Red's Strawberry Sail as my boozy side piece, I was the happiest camper. Boyfriend got the Island Pork Rib Plate (I'm not sure why) and was a little disappointed, but ordering ribs in a seafood joint seems like it would be a disappointing choice. So no pity over here.

Mission Beach Coffee Break - They had acai bowls. It wasn't nearly as good as the one we had with Maimees in Hawaii. But it was an acceptable silver medal acai bowl, enjoyed with our feet in the sand.

Roberto's Taco Shop - Six years ago, Boyfriend had a drunken burrito from this joint and has been dreaming about it ever since. We made that dream a reality, sober this time, which may have been a mistake. A California burrito is serious business. Some beer to line your stomach before the grease and fat train comes to town would not be the worst idea. So delicious and yet, much like jager shots and McDonalds cheeseburgers, something my body can no longer handle in excess.

Sally's Seafood on the Water - We were not super hungry after the dumptruck of burrito, but we needed something. Sally's had overpriced sushi. We ordered two rolls. They were so delicious. We were full and happy.

Cafe 222 - It's pretty hard to screw up brunch. And Cafe 222 held up their end of the deal by serving us eggs and carbs in a timely and delicious fashion. Just a warning: their website is obnoxious. Its almost bad enough to make me take away an imaginary star.

What we did:
The USS Midway Museum - So. Bad. Ass. Give yourself so many hours here (like >5), because even if you consider yourself disinterested in military history (me), you will be drawn to all the how-life-was intricacies of this place. Go up in the island. And all the way down to the engine rooms. Then think about how you walked around for five hours non.stop and still didn't see the whole thing. Wonder how something this enormous manages to float in water. Give the concepts of buoyancy and density some high-fives.

Mission Beach - We picked it because of its proximity to the requisite burrito stand. It was a little cold (and we a little didn't have towels) for beach sitting, but there was a grassy spot with palm trees that was perfect for reading and digesting said burritos.

Seaport Village - What a vortex of time wasting. I'm cool with being touristy but this was one step away from a fanny pack.

Mission Brewery - We did the beer-then-burrito thing a little backwards which made me feel pretty wretched. The beer was super good and the building was airy and wonderful. Even though my poor little stomach was about to explode.

Took public transit - The fastest way to my heart is an easy to use public transit system. The light rail and the buses were efficient and cheap and got us to exactly where we needed to go. Bonus points? We got to eavesdrop on some guy put out a hit on someone while on the bus. We felt dangerous, but safe.

Despite some crazy-expensive food and getting hosed in the hotel room department (no balcony?! weak), it was the perfect escape-from-Chicago-winter weekend. AND, it was my first time on the west coast! Ever (with the exception of some extended airport layovers)! Which means we got to fly over big Rocky Mountains and crazy flat Nevada! The East Coast will always be my number one boo, but I am diggin' on the rest of this fine land pretty hard these days.

Party time in Reykjavik (Days 3 & 4)

I slept the most of any of the nights on that first one.  Mostly because I hadn't slept in two days.  But after that, no more than 6 hours.  Because while it is pretty weird going to bed when its bright as day outside, its way weirder to wake up, thinking, based on where the sun is in the sky, its 9 or 10 AM and having it actually be 5 or 5:15 AM.  So not so much with the sleeping, which is fine because there was plenty to do.

First things first, be interviewed on Icelandic Public Radio.  My Admiral Ackbar radar went off when the guy asked us questions about what we were excited to see, but I tried to answer honestly and not say too many Icelandic words because that's where I was going to embarrass myself.  Anyway, I have not heard anything about the three stupid, American girls who humiliated themselves on the radio.

The up the bell tower we went, so that we could see the city from a tall building.  Which is always fun.  Even though all cities kind of look the same from the tops of tall buildings.

After bell tower time it was pancake time.  I had heard a lot about Icelandic food but no one mentioned the pancakes and no one mentioned the rye bread (which I will get to later).  So we went to C is for Cookie for a pancake, slathered in chocolate and then piled high with perfectly, homemade (trust me, I know) whipped cream.  It was so sad when it was over.

We ate a LOT of food in Reykjavik.  Which was good, because we basically stopped eating once we got on the Ring Road.  All the food was delicious, but this was probably the most delightful.  Light and perfect.  Icelandic pancakes are by far the best of all pancakes.

And then it was off to the Icelandic History Museum.  Which was educational and awesome.  Why?  The kids section!  I feel like the kids section of most National museums is lacking, because they feel like they need to make the whole museum kid-friendly.  This of course, backfires because kids hate reading and you can only extrapolate so much from a poorly animated movie.  So instead, the Iceland Museum is a grown-up museum chock-full of knowledge but it had a room full of awesome kid things.

Like Dress Ups.

And Viking Props.

Other stuff too, but this was the best.

After learning it was time for more outside stuff.  And more eating.  We had our first Icelandic Hot Dog which was just as amazing as promised.  So amazing that we continued to eat one a day for the rest of the trip (no seriously, we did).  Then a bowl of rye bread ice cream at Cafe Loki.  Rye bread ice cream seems to only exist at Cafe Loki.  And its worth the cost of the plane ticket for a bowl or two. 

We went out for a late dinner. We had seriously problems getting a grip on what time it was ever, which made us really late for nearly anything we did after 6 PM.  The fact that we didn't have dusk to signify that the "day" was ending, so we better wrap things up like functional, polite humans was a serious problem, and to all the guesthouse owners who had to let us in at 11 PM or later, I most sincerely apologize.

Dinner at Cafe Paris, who was the only place that would seat us (at exactly 11 PM, which is when we sat down for dinner...while it was still light out) so we dined and then went on search of drunken adventure.

Here's the thing about being old crotchety ladies in our late 20's.  Our tolerance for loud noise and rude young people is very, very low.  So first we ended up at The Dubliner, which looks exactly like every Fado I've ever seen.  There was a special - 1000 ISK (so about $10) for a shot of Opal OR Topaz and then a cheap, terrible Icelandic beer.  Courtney managed to talk me into it.  And it was a terrible decision.  Opal or Topaz, which ever we ended up with (I'm honestly not sure) tasted like Jagermeister's skanky younger cousin that wears thigh-high boots to Christmas dinner.  The beer tasted like water that someone had left a nickel in.

Then we ended up at the English Pub.  You might think us xenophobic, but honestly they were the first two bars we came across that didn't have techno-dance-vom-bom music bursting through the closed doors.  In the English Pub, random strangers handed us beers and because we have never seen a Lifetime Movie, we happily took them.  This ended up being a totally fine choice, though probably not one we would have made in any other country (Icelanders have a rep for being really nice and not total sketch balls, and they totally live up to it).

Things get fuzzy from here on out.  All I know is that I spent most of the night dancing around as the band played covers of all the songs my parents used to list to, wearing the scarf I pilfered from our table at the Dubliner.  Occasionally I would strike up conversations with random strangers (and sometimes my two friends, when we weren't yelling at the single one to go make out with tall nordic lads, sorry McKim).  It was a lovely hazy blur.  And when we stumbled onto the street at the ripe hour of 3 AM, it looked like it was 6:30 at night.  It was still weird.

On the way home, in the vain hope of finding a clean bathroom, we ended up on a side street that had my favorite piece of street art ever.

In normal places, it would have been dark, so I would have never seen this.  But in Iceland it was just the perfect light for a picture.

 

I know you don't think I took these pictures at 3 AM.  But, trust me.  I did.

The next morning we got a late start as we realized our little respite was coming to an end and the real adventure was beginning.  First we took this bus to pick up our rental car.

If you know me, you know exactly why this was awesome and exactly why we took the bus when we could have easily walked the half mile to where we were going.

After we picked up the car, we went to the flea market, which reminded me of the Aloha Swap Meet on Oahu.  So many things about Iceland felt like Hawai'i.  These two very proud cultures living on crazy volcano islands that are gorgeous, but are also literally ticking time bombs just waiting to spew hot magma and ruin all your fun.  After a lunch at the extra kitschy Viking restaurant it was time for a ROAD TRIP.

On our road trip, we went clockwise at the island.  Starting at about 7:00 or so - (if you think of Iceland as a clock with the north of it being 12:00 - obviously) our first stop was Barnafoss and Hraunfossar.  This was the first time I knew that we were no longer in Kansas.  Gorgeous waterfalls steps from the high way with hilarious and amazing backstories.  Awesome.

Arnastapi (so 8:45 or so?) was our final destination.  On the way there, I fell in love with Iceland even more that I had before.  I totally got the best straw, in that my friends did all the driving while I sat in the back and took pretty pictures.  We stopped and drove up some random person's drive way because they had a waterfall in their backyard.  That was the first time I lost my marbles about how awesome everything was that day.

The second time was when I had the best lamb chop I had ever had.  Ever.  At dinner.  It was over priced and it took about an hour longer than it should have, but it was perfect.  Mmm. Lamb chops.  This was the last big fancy meal we had before the end of the trip and it was the best send off to a life of sandwiches and ramen I could have asked for.

Then, because it was 9 PM and still looked like this outside -

 

We went on a hike between Arnastapi and Hellnar that was basically a very easy and fully oxengenated hike on a mossy moon.

This was number three awesome sauce thing. As we collapsed into bed with the snoring man on the other side of the wall (lame sauce thing one) with the sun shining down on us we knew we were in for an adventure.

Night of Day 9 - and day 10. Train people and Paris.

So as I mentioned - one of the major flaws of Milan was when we got there they told us that our sleeper car was not female only as we thought we had been promised. So I spent a lot of the panicking about what sort of whackado Europeans we would be spending ten hours with. That paired with the fact that when we were in the Police station (confirming that we were not going to get deported because we didn't have Italian stamps in our passports - which we didn't) - we saw a woman who was really, really upset and had no things, so we are assuming had all her things stolen, which was super scary.

Naturally the first thing that happened was we realized that our car was Alllll the way at the end of the very, very long train - I had read multiple times that occasionally trains leave the station very quickly so I insisted we RUN to our car with our 50 lb. bags. Bear was not amused.

Anyway, we get to our car - here were our train roomies:

1- A bitchy french woman (is there any other kind?) - she doesn't understand that she is on the bottom bunk, and then insists its broken and tells the conductor she wants a switch - naturally he fixes it in about 30 seconds which I think pissed her off more. She ALSO had like an absurd amount of bags. WHY? Do you not understand how small the train car is? Where do you think that is going to go, because if you think it is invading my personal space you are SORELY mistaken.

2&3 - A pair of 50 or 60 year-old Italian men. They seemed to be backpackers of the real serious variety. They were far fitter than I could ever dream of being - their backpacks looked so light and sensible. I am sure that a peek inside would have proven that they did not bring a formal shirt, jic. Once they established that we didn't really speak Italian at all they took charge - they got our bunks all set up, put the dumb french lady's bags up and out of everyone's way. Even though one of them snored for most of the night - it was forgiven because they made us feel safe.

4- At the very last minute a gentleman walked into the cabin - he was probably in his late 30's and looked like your stereotypical french man. He was dressed in what looked like a fairly expensive three piece suit and white button up with what had to have been four-figure boots on his feet. He promptly took off his jacket and fell asleep. I was mesmerized by his clothing. How do you sleep in a suit that costs more than my rent? I don't think he said anything the whole trip.

Anyway - the train trip itself was pretty uneventful. I discovered that the rolling of the train does not put me to sleep so much as it keeps me awake. But it was a pleasant awake.

When we got into Paris - we arrived at the Bercy station. I wanted to see if we could get some information about going to Giverny so I walked up to a person sitting behind a desk that said information. In my exhaustion the first words that came out of my mouth were in English. You could see her immediately shut down and get bitchy. She shook her head in disinterest in what I was saying.

I sighed. Of Course everyone was right about the French. So I tried another line and this time attempted some weak French. This girl rolled her eyes and repeated what I had said in a disdainful way. I realized my error and tried to correct myself but the damage was done. She was never going to help me. So I gave up.

We got on the train and went directly to J's. J went to college with my Mom on her first go-round at university. He is tres American but has been living in Paris for a couple years and has had quite the adventure. I would tell you about it, but it would ruin the fantastic book he is going to write in a few years. He was a perfect tour guide and after a quick croissant breakfast he took us right out to experience the Bastille Market.

The Bastille Market is a HUGE farmer's market that has every food I could ever think of. I so desperately wanted to take pictures of all the fish and the piles of tomatoes and perfect pieces of cheese. But there was not that much elbow room to begin with, and the people at this market were not there for photo opps, they were there to buy groceries. So I kept my camera in my bag, mostly because I am afraid of the French.

After a quick coffee J. got us our first Velib. Velib is my most favorite part of Paris. So we tooled around and got a wonderful bike tour (Notre Dame, Louvre, fancy bridges) until we got to the Eiffel Tower and it started to rain.


Please note - this picture is in color - it was just that gray. This was one of the two days of bad weather we had and it was actually a nice respite from the 85 and Sunny of the rest of the trip.

Then there was lunch and then the Hunting Museum. The hunting museum (or Maison de la Chasse et de la Nature) is probably in my top 5 of best Museums ever. For a few reasons.
1- Its a huge old house from back in the day - and it still looks like a house for the most part.

2- the ceiling made of owls.


It was hard to take a picture of but - seriously the ceiling of this (rather small) room, was covered in owl pelts. Many of the other ceiling had antlers and such on them. These paired with the classy chandeliers was pretty much my dream decor.

3 - This guy.


Polar Bears are consistently on the short list for my favorite animal and to get to stand this close to a real (albeit dead) one, was pretty amazing. They are much taller than you think. For reference, I am 5'2.

And many more things (the videos that teach you how guns work, the boar in the hall and the deer in the salon, the pictures of puppies in the touring exhibit) - the bad news? The gift shop was terrible? It didn't even have any good postcards. Just books and books do not do the place justice. I left empty handed and disappointed - try harder Hunting Museum.

Then it was home for dinner (Bear's first duck! So delicious) and game planning for the first full day in Paris.