vacation – Page 3

September 2016 Highlights

October 4, 2016 by Alicia Leave a Comment

I can’t believe it’s already October. September went by in a flash. It began with warm summer weather and then in the last week, we went into Fall or Spring (I’m unsure by the amount of rain). I was out of town every other weekend in September and as fun as the travel was, I am ready to be back at home for a few weekends just working on things around here. September had so many great highlights which is why I wanted to look back at them.

It began by driving towards a hurricane and spending Labor Day weekend in Virginia.

I went apple picking with friends the next weekend.

I then headed on a work trip to Tonawanda NY and got to visit Niagara Falls on a beautiful night.

I got back from upper NY, went to work for a couple days and the ditched work for a day in NYC with my friend from Australia.

We officially headed into fall after that, at least according to the calendar date. I then got a terrible cold, but managed to work on some yoga again outside of teaching. Thankfully I recently received my oil kit from DoTERRA. Comment below or email me if you would like to learn more about essential oils.

I started going to physical therapy for my toe as I am in the healing stages from my stress fracture. After a week and a half of PT so far, I can already bend my toe more and almost smoothly flow through a vinyasa. My balance is still a little wobbly on my right side, but has improved a bunch over the last couple weeks.

Lastly, I ended the month by taking a trip to Binghamton for engagement pictures and spending a night with Brian. Though it was rainy, it cleared up for the pictures which I am hoping turned out well and I enjoyed the time with Brian.

I put over 2000 miles on my car in the month of September. Considering I don’t use my car to go to work (I walk and take the train), a usual month without road trips might only put 600 miles on my car. I had a blast going to multiple places this month, but I am happy to get back to my usual workout and weekend routine.

Do you enjoy mini road trips?

July 2016 Roadtrip: Canada

August 17, 2016 by Alicia Leave a Comment

Hey there! Today I am recapping the second part of my road trip in July. You can find the first part here.

Here’s where we went for part 2:

From Tupper Lake, NY –> Ottawa, Canada –> Toronto, Canada –> Buffalo, NY –> Penn Yan, NY –> Binghamton, NY

Friday morning July 22^nd, Brian and I left for Ottawa, Canada. For some reason I was exhausted that morning but I was better after a nap in the car and eating some snacks. The drive to Ottawa was only 2.5 hours. We met up with my friend Jenny as she was practicing her pole dance routine at her studio.

Side note: I feel like pole dancing has a negative connotation with it. Sure there are strippers, but there is also the art and dance form of pole dancing. Plus you have to have great strength to be able to lift your body and perform many tricks.

It was interesting to watch as Jenny was trying to choreograph her new routine for a competition. After she was done practicing, we headed to her house and had some lunch and then headed into the city of Ottawa. Jenny showed us around and we headed to Parliament Hill. We couldn’t get tickets for an inside tour as they were all out for the day, but we joined an outdoor tour for a bit learning some of Canada’s history.

double wheel — The only picture we got together but it’s perfect as we did this in Australia 5 years ago when we met 🙂

We walked around and watched the locks on the Rideau Canal as boats passed through. Then we walked around the market. I was amazed at all the fresh produce they had. It all looked so good. I left with a bag of tri colored carrots as I had never had them before and they were perfect for dinner.

A few hours walking in the heat and getting a brief tour of Ottawa and then it was time to head back to Jenny’s. Jenny gathered her things and Brian and I headed to a cupcake place down the street. Brian mentioned to Jenny how much I love cupcakes and we found out there were 2 cupcakes places near Jenny. It was a must to get one of course. Cupcakes for the road and then we met up with Jenny at her parent’s place about a 30 minute drive out in the country.

cupcake lounge — Maple Cinnamon (the best!) and Peanut Butter

Once we arrived, Jenny and her friends were already there. Jenny’s boyfriend brought some meat on skewers and cooked them on the grill while Jenny prepared sweet potato fries and corn on the cob. I cut up my carrots and Jenny boiled them. It was a really healthy and colorful meal. I wish I had taken a photo but it was getting late and I was hungry so I dug right in. Right as we sat down, it started to pour rain so we didn’t get to eat outside as originally planned. Instead though, we enjoyed eating inside and then played Cards Against Humanity. That was actually my first time playing I believe. It was so fun with 6 of us and around 10pm, the game finally ended and everyone headed home except me and Brian and Jenny of course.

Even though originally I was tired, somehow we stayed up talking until after midnight. I don’t think I have stayed up that late since New Years haha. Finally it was time to sleep and I only slept until 8am. I got up and spent some time journaling and eating breakfast before anyone else was up. I hung out with the cats and the dogs. During vacation I was pretty much “unplugged” from the internet minus a couple times I looked up directions or something. It is always great to be unplugged for a bit and spend time writing or reading.

Around noon we were back at Jenny’s apartment and we walked over to the other cupcake place. Cupcakes for lunch? Yes please.

the cake shop — chocolate caramel, blueberry vanilla, peach mango

Both cupcake places were good but I would have to say The Cupcake Lounge was the best of the two.

After that, we headed on the road to Toronto. Originally we were going there to see Jenny perform in a pole competition but she had to drop out last minute. Since I already had tickets and Jenny still wanted to watch, we headed there and drove Jenny since she wasn’t up for the 4 hour drive. She met her dad there so that worked well.

On our drive to Toronto, I learned that Canada Tim Horton’s doesn’t have iced tea and that was highly disappointing. We snacked through the car ride which was pretty much lunch and the cupcakes.

By the time we arrived in Toronto, we checked into our Airbnb and figured out a place to eat. This was my first time using Airbnb and being one night in Toronto I picked a fairly cheap place and I soon discovered parking would be a challenge as I could not get a permit for the street overnight. Luckily I planned for the Airbnb to be within walking distance to the venue for the pole dance competition and it was only $10 to park there for 24 hours. Now I know for next time.

We didn’t have much time before the show but we found a Japanese restaurant and I enjoyed some pad thai with tofu for dinner. I can’t remember the name of the place but it was a cute hole in the wall type restaurant and the service was quick and the food was delicious. From there, we headed to the venue for the 2016 Canadian Pole Fitness Championship. Yep, I am officially the best fiancé bringing him to the championship. I swear the smile never left his face. I was enjoying the show too though. Here are a few of the pictures I took. There was even a men’s section.

Afterward, we headed back to our Airbnb for the night and went to bed. We left around 9am on Sunday morning. I never met our hostess for the Airbnb. The place was definitely cheap, but good enough for 1 night. I stopped at Impact Kitchen, a place recommended to me by Davida. I got a cookie and toast and chia jam for some breakfast. I really should have tried one of their smoothies. I guess I will have to make it back to Toronto sometime.

I have to say of all our driving, Toronto really did have the worst traffic, even on a Sunday morning. It then took us a good 40 minutes to cross the border back into the US. Mostly there was a big line of cars. I then turned on my cell phone after it was off for 5 days. I wasn’t fully ready to catch up though. I like having it put away from time to time.

We made our way into Buffalo and stopped at Duffs for wings, because that’s what you do in Buffalo. I then contacted another friend last minute and we stopped by her house and got a tour and learned about everything they have been fixing up in the house. It was also her due date for her first baby (which she ended up having 4 days later), so it was fun to talk and catch up with her. It had been 3 years since I last saw her.

We ended up chatting for a couple hours, clearly in no hurry, but finally had to get back on the road as we still had about 4 hours of driving left. I finally got my Tim Horton’s ICED Tea in our super large American cups. Oh yeah I learned that a large is more like a medium to us Americans if you are in Canada. That is not too surprising though. Our larges are quite large and there is still that XL.

Buffalo July 2016 — Buffalo fixings – wings and Tim Hortons

Next stop was in Penn Yan, NY to visit with another friend and her husband. She was just over halfway through her pregnancy and I was dropping off her baby shower gift as I wasn’t able to make it. We enjoyed chatting on the porch for a while. The boys talked and the girls talked lol. It worked out well. It made me wish we lived closer though. It would be great to get together with other couples.

Finally we were on the last leg of the journey to Binghamton and made it back around 10pm. Basically we got out of Toronto around 10am…so 12 hours of travel, but we made long stops to chat and that made it fun.

Sunday night it was time to catch up on some sleep and then Monday morning we went to breakfast and it was time for my drive back to Philadelphia. I wouldn’t say the week went by really fast, but I didn’t want it to end. I loved that I got to catch up with other friends unexpectedly too. Though usually I am a planner with needing certain times to be somewhere, it was freeing to go on this vacation and plan as we went and not be rushed for our next stop either.

By the time I got home after a quick trip to the store, it was time to meal prep, do laundry and check my work email to sort out a few things before going into the office. I didn’t know how much overtime and meetings I was coming back to, but I would take this trip again in a heartbeat.

Do you like road trips?

Have you ever been to Tim Horton’s?

July 2016 Roadtrip: New York State

August 10, 2016 by Alicia Leave a Comment

A couple weeks ago I went on a road trip with Brian. In this first recap, I am covering the places we went in New York State. Here’s where we went:

From Binghamton, NY –> Clayton –> Alexandria Bay –> Ogdensburg –> Tupper Lake –>Lake Placid, NY

I drove from Philadelphia to Binghamton and worked remotely for a day before we headed on our road trip. Our first stop on Tuesday July 19 was Clayton, NY. We arrived at noon which was perfect to find a place for lunch where I had a delicious burger. Then we headed to the Antique Boat Museum for a couple hours through the afternoon. I think the most interesting thing to me was the speed boats and how fast the records are. I can’t imagine riding on a boat traveling over 100 mph, let alone 200 mph.

Our next stop was Alexandria Bay. We walked around a bit but we decided we liked Clayton more. When I realized how close we were to Ogdensburg though, I decided to call my friend to see if she could meet for dinner. Luckily she was able to meet so we had a last minute dinner with my friend and her almost 3 year old son. I actually realized I have been able to see her once a year since graduation in 2012. In 2013, I made a trip to Buffalo for her baby shower, 2014 I was in town for a wedding and met up with her, 2015 I had a work trip in Buffalo and she was in town and since she has moved closer to Ogdensburg and I was able to see her there this year.

wheel pose yoga — a little yoga at a scenic view after Alexandria Bay

After dinner, we made our way to our final stop for the night, Tupper Lake. It took us nearly 12 hours to arrive to Tupper, which would have been a 5 hour drive without all our stops, but that was the fun of the road trip and planning as we went. It made the driving not seem so long as our longest part was 2.5 hours. This moon made the drive worth it too!

full moon — Full moon view on the way to Tupper Lake

The first night we headed right to bed and then we had a full day ahead around Tupper.

Wednesday morning was spent on Saranac Lake, getting a bit of the history of the camps (houses) on the lake by a family friend and then taking their boat out ourselves for a couple hours. We couldn’t believe how fast the morning went. We then went to find some lunch and ate at the park before heading to the Wild Center for a couple hours. The last time I had been to Tupper was back in 2010 and the Wild Center added a cool giant Tree House walk.

Thursday we spent the day in Lake Placid. We grabbed some lunch at the Green Goddess market which had delicious salads. There happened to be a cupcake place in the same plaza so that was a must to stop there. Their cupcakes were delicious but I think I loved the cookie dough cake pop the best.

We then did the Olympic tour as the winter Olympics were held in Lake Placid in 1932 and 1980. We started at the Ski jumps riding up to the top for the beautiful views.

Then we drove to the lunge track. We took a tour up to the top of the combined track which is known as the most dangerous lunge track so people from all over the world come to train on it for the winter Olympics. Obviously if you can conquer the most dangerous track, you are more prepared for the Olympics. Since the track isn’t in use until September/October, we were able to walk down the track which was pretty neat.

Of course I stopped to do some yoga on the track.

Next step was little Whiteface used for skiing in the winter. We took a gondola ride up there and it was quite a long ride, but great views up at the top. We waved over to the big Whiteface mountain where we were headed next.

Back down the gondola and we headed to drive up to Whiteface. Whiteface mountain is neat because you have the option to hike or drive up the mountain and then hike 1/5^th of a mile or take an elevator. Even though we were pretty tired, I wanted to do the 1/5^th of a mile hike. We had visited Whiteface 6 years ago and I was not in great shape back then so I remember the tiny hike seeming like forever. This time was much different as I was running ahead of Brian. Now, if the hike was longer, like over a mile, I probably would not have been leaping ahead, but when you see the top, you get excited!!

It was beautiful up there. Since it was like 90 degrees at ground level. It was around 60 degrees at the top of the mountain and it felt great.

whiteface mountain — A little flashback to 2010 and now, Whiteface even changed their sign lol

Side note: If you are a newer follower to my blog, I named it after starting to do wheel (what I called bridge) pose everywhere in 2011, hence all the wheel pictures.

After all the tours and fun, we headed to meet Brian’s parents at an event in Lake Placid. But before we arrived there, as we were driving down the mountain, there were 2 girls trying to get a ride. Brian decided to stop and ask how far they were headed and they parked at the bottom of the mountain and realized the climb was a bit too much for them so they needed a ride back down. It was quite the adventure, picking up 2 girls from Montreal and chatting about Canada and travel and languages as we were discussing French.

I love how much we just planned as we went through vacation. Thursday evening we decided to drive to Canada Friday instead of Saturday. We had a late dinner Thursday night with Brian’s parents and then headed back to Tupper to sleep.

Friday morning it was time to cross the border to Canada which will come in my next vacation recap post.

Have you ever been to upstate NY?

Do you like to plan vacations as you go?

Universal Studios and the Orlando Eye

February 24, 2016 by Alicia Leave a Comment

On our Florida vacation, we spent two days at Disney World which you can read about here:

Magic Kingdom Day 1

Epcot Day 2

We also spent 2 days at Universal Studios Orlando. Our first day, there was a big rain storm headed our way so we actually left the park in the early afternoon, which is why I will recap both days in one post.

On Thursday (Feb 4), we were able to set our own schedule since we were heading to Universal Studios and we planned to take Uber to and from the park. Our condo had a bus time but only one and we wanted to get there earlier. It actually ended up being $2 cheaper round trip taking Uber and was much nicer to have our own schedule.

We arrived at universal shortly after opening and started at the Universal studios park. Brian hopped on a roller coaster twice as I studied the map of the park. The roller coaster only had a 5 min wait when we got in the park.

Brian checked out a couple more rides and we learned that so many of the rides aren’t really roller coasters but just simulations which we also learned was worse for me and him when we rode on the Simpsons ride (slight motion sickness 🙁 ). Prior to that we enjoyed the ET ride. That was nice and slow at least.

By the time we finished the Simpsons ride, which had a short line that took forever, it was 11:30. We decided to get the giant Simpsons pink donut. I think it could feed at least 6 people and I wasn’t feeling great after the ride so I didn’t know how we would eat it but we took our time and somehow managed to finish it. I then drank tons of water to wash down the sugar but yes it was tasty. I actually felt better after eating it. My blood sugar must have been low or I was dehydrated which wouldn’t be hard to believe.

We finally made our way over to Diagon Alley in Harry Potter. Going behind that wall really did feel like I was in the movie and Harry for the first time seeing everything. We explored the wand shop taking a photo with a wand (because I didn’t want to buy one).

We decided to go to the Leaky Cauldron for fish and chips for lunch. Our cheapest lunch yet! Lol. It was definitely a fun experience. We tried to meet up with my friend from UB who happened to be in the park vacationing just like us but our timing didn’t work out 🙁 .

We took the Hogwarts Express over to the other park which I did enjoy.

We decided to hit up the water rides before the rain came in. We started with Jurassic Park and didn’t get too wet. Then we headed into Popeye land of some sort and that water ride got us soaking on the first go. Since there was no line we stayed for a second time. It was pretty awesome that there wasn’t much of a line anywhere. Harry Potter, of course, was swarming with people but still overall wasn’t bad. We were surprised how fast we were seated at the restaurant at noon.

Being that we were soaking, we started to exit the park. As we were walking towards the exit, a quick scattered shower came through and everyone ran for cover, except for us, I mean we were already soaked so didn’t really matter.

That rain quickly passed and we got our Uber ride. We got back around 3. I ate a snack, went on my computer a bit and then sat outside on the patio while Brian napped. It was nice to spend half of Thursday in the room, but I did head out to a 6pm Vinyasa yoga class near by as well which was so challenging and fun.

On Friday (Feb 5), we were slow moving. We arrived at Universal at about 9:45am and being that it was a Friday and bus loads of people were dropped off, it took FOREVER to get into the park. You have to have your bags checked first and Brian didn’t have any so he went into the park and it took me about 30 minutes to get in. While Brian waited for me he ended up getting a meal plan for the day for signing up for a credit card so our meals and snacks were free (kinda funny how lunch started out pricey and slowly got cheaper throughout our stay).

We decided to start in the Islands of Adventure park since we didn’t spend as much time there the day before. We headed straight to the Harry Potter part and rode the little rollar coaster that was about a 10 second ride. Then Brian went on the large roller coaster and I waited. I was worried I missed him coming off as it must have been a longer wait but luckily he found me eventually. I had his phone and everything so couldn’t call him to see where he was.

Then it was out of Harry Potter world, we headed to Seuss land for another short coaster ride. Then made our way back around. We decided to eat lunch in comic book land (marvel land?). After lunch we were going to go on a ride in Jurassic park but the wait time was like 45 min so instead we walked through the tree house obstacle area for a while and enjoyed some time by the pond.

Eventually it was time to head over on the Hogwarts Express to the other park. It was cool riding from the other side as it had a different story line going back which was fun.

Brian went to go ride some roller coasters and I went into Diagon Alley to check out the behind the scenes Olivander wands tour. Then I purchased some chocolate peppermint toads and a pretzel wand.

I continued to walk around the park as I waited for Brian and I got a picture with Scooby Doo and his gang. They said Daphne was out shopping lol.

Then I met up with Brian for the Horror Make up show. After that show we headed to Fear Factor which was disgusting and I could never do some of those things but fun to watch.

The show was done at 4:30 and we were grabbing snacks and planning to leave when the parade started at 5. So we stayed for the short parade and made our way out with a bunch of other people and unfortunately got caught in rush hour traffic back to the hotel.

A quick check in at the hotel and laying our things down, we headed to dinner at Joes a Crab shack. We planned to go to the Orlando Eye but after we got there we realized it was closed for a private event. We did get there the next morning before spending the day in Daytona Beach with my grandma. I didn’t take any pictures in Daytona as it was rainy, but the morning was nice for the Orlando Eye.

That concludes our vacation. It was definitely a busy one and it would have been nice to have a day or two of relaxing after but it was back to work for me. I am glad I was finally able to go to Disney world and Universal as an adult though. We think we will go back in another 10 years, maybe with some little ones ;).

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