tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-66938862545325120062024-03-19T06:05:13.373-07:00Livin The DreamMarchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.comBlogger162125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-87350822760933687992014-04-06T18:29:00.000-07:002014-04-07T11:42:22.733-07:00Best Meals in North County San Diego<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So...I'm just going to pretend this blog hasn't been idle for NINE MONTHS. Everyone good with that? Excellent, moving right along...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Today, I want to focus on some of my favorite restaurants and bars in North County...and more specifically, my favorite snacks/meals at each place that I think deserve mention in the blogosphere (does a blog that sits idle for nine months still qualify as "in the blogosphere"? Or do I have to re-apply for admission?). Anyway, I feel like a lot of times you get great recommendations for restaurants to try, but you don't always get tips on <i>what</i> to order. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">That changes...now.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You will notice that two of my go-to places - Roberto's and Pizza Port - are not listed on this post, as I have given both of these establishments ample lip service on this blog over the years. But fear not, a California Burrito from 'Berto's or a half-Carlsbad, half-Monterey pizza from Port still top the list of must-haves when in North County.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">No more disclaimers...let's do this.</span><br />
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<span style="color: cyan; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>FAVORITE MEALS IN NORTH COUNTY</b></span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: cyan;">CE Burger</span> (</span><a href="http://www.cucinaenoteca.com/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Cucina Enoteca</a>)</b><br />
<i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Menu - braised short rib + fiscalini cheddar </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">+ honey mustard aioli + truffle fries</span></span></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I list this first because I went there last night and it spurred this idea. First off, if you have not been to this place yet, put it on your list. It is a very unique place, with modern (and somewhat bizarre) decor and excellent food. They pour a mean cocktail, and they have some great deals, including half off all pizzas during Happy Hour on Thursdays (I recommend the pancetta and brussels sprout leaf pizza). Anyway, this burger is outrageously rich and decadent. The short rib adds some amazing salty-goodness to this already perfectly-cooked patty, and the honey-mustard aioli gives a great zingy bite to the burger. Oh, and don't let your wife near the truffle fries. Trust me.</span>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: cyan;">Pan-Roasted Brussels Sprouts</span> (</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.prioritypublichouse.com/" target="_blank">Priority Public House</a>)</span></b><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Menu - Brussels Sprouts, Caramelized Onion, Hickory Smoked Bacon</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I know brussels are starting to be a trendy food, and I have fully embraced it. I used to think I didn't like brussels spouts until Mrs. Livin the Dream convinced me to give them a try. Since then we always look for good sprouts on a menu, and this relatively new Leucadia gastropub nails 'em. They roast and serve them in a small cast-iron skillet, and the addition of the onion and bacon just makes them insanely tasty. Yum-yum in my tum-tum.</span>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: cyan;">Pineapple Fried Rice</span> (</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.bangkok-bay.com/menu.php" target="_blank">Bangkok Bay</a>)</span></b><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i>Menu - Shrimp, chicken, pineapple, cashew nuts, mixed with egg and curry powder</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The reason this makes the list? It was so good that, without my begging, Mrs. Livin the Dream went home and tried to re-create it. While hers was good, it will never match the taste of an authentic Thai place that probably uses more oil than we'd like to know. This is one of those bites that has many different ingredients, but somehow seems like one perfect taste. If you search for them, you can find each individual flavor, but what makes this so spectacular is the perfect combination of sweet/salty, soft/crunchy, and spicy/tame. Very few dishes have the same effect on me as this perfectly balanced entree.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="color: cyan;">Cilantro <i>and</i> Chipotle Beef Medallions</span> (<a href="http://el-callejon.com/" target="_blank">El Callejon</a>)</b></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Menu - Beef medallions topped with melted cheese in a cilantro or chipotle sauce</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You will notice the odd use of italics in the name of this meal. When you order, they give you the option of the cilantro or chipotle sauce...and herein lies the secret. These two sauces are both outrageously good - packed with flavor. After waffling for what seemed like an eternity a year ago, the waiter told me I could have the plate split in half, with both sauces cut right down the middle. "I CAN?!" OMG, OMG. Yes, that meal deserves an "OMG". The beef medallions are super tender, and they bring hot tortillas and rice to make some phenomenal tacos if you prefer that route. But I would drink this sauce like a smoothie. The cilantro sauce has a tangy spiced flavor, and the chipotle sauce is creamy with a touch of heat. And if you haven't been to this place yet, you are missing one of the stiffest, tastiest margaritas in San Diego. Trust me, I'm a self-proclaimed expert.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="color: cyan;">Cheddar & Chive Biscuits</span> (<a href="http://www.eatatsolace.com/" target="_blank">Solace and the Moonlight</a>)</span></b><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Menu - Warm cheddar and chive biscuits w/Orange Honey Butter, Smoke Tomato Jam</span></i></div>
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This one excites me the most on this list. In addition to having a great cocktail menu and unique high-end entrees, Solace might have the most ridiculously addicting, mouth-watering, guilty-pleasure appetizer in North County - the cheddar biscuits. On their own, the biscuits are peal-apart perfection, with a slightly flaky outside, but an incredibly teddy-bear soft fluffy inside. But the kicker to this meal are the spreads that come with. The smoked tomato jam (which they also put on their amazing burger) is an insane combination of sweet and tart, with an overarching smoky tone. And then that sweet/salty orange honey butter is otherworldly. You know an appetizer is good when Mrs. Livin the Dream says "We're definitely getting the biscuits"...on the car ride to the restaurant.</div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: cyan;">Shrimp & Grits</span> (</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://localunion101.com/" target="_blank">Union Kitchen & Tap</a>)</span></b><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Menu - Andouille, roasted tomato, cheese grits</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My wife will tell you I love this meal a little <i>too </i>much. Obviously I love all the meals on this list, but this is one of the few meals that I always seem to have a "moment" with. We're talking all peripheral noise and nonsense vanish (which is no easy feat at a trendy place like Union). Julie knows to not even talk when I take the first bite. First off, the sausage has some great spicy heat to it. The roasted tomato really forms the main flavor profile of this dish, with the tart tomato juice cutting the meat and grits. But without question, the best part of this meal is the cheddar grits. Good grits are not a slam dunk, but Union throws them down like Lebron James. They are the right thickness, right texture, and incredibly flavorful on their own. As I type this, it may be time for date night at Union soon. But Mrs. Livin the Dream might not be invited...just me and my shrimp and grits.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="color: cyan;">Pastrami Burger</span> (<a href="http://biergardenencinitas.com/" target="_blank">Bier Garden</a>)</b></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Menu - swiss, sauerkraut, caramelized onions, BG secret sauce</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Full disclosure - I have never ordered this burger for myself, but it is my wife's favorite thing on the menu, and I think I agree with her now. The pastrami alone is fantastic and could be a stand-alone meal, but thrown on top of a burger patty with all of these other ingredients of wonderfulness...it's absurdly delicious. We're talking saliva floodgates people. Combine this with a great beer from a diverse selection, and your stomach owes you a high-five.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="color: cyan;">Breakfast Tacos</span> (<a href="http://www.bulltaco.com/site/" target="_blank">Bull Taco</a>)</b></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Menu - Eggs, bacon, chorizo, cheddar, onion/cilantro, Tater Tots, Sriracha Sour Cream</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Oh my goodness, oh my goodness. Shout out to my boy Peter for exposing me to these tiny wonders of the world. I have eaten many-a-meal at Cardiff's hidden gem, but had never thought to try their breakfast. And breakfast tacos are actually a relatively new concept for me...but that is a thing of the past. The sriracha sour cream is intoxicating, the chorizo is outrageous, but the key are those tots. I have trouble describing this one because it's such a unique flavor for breakfast. The tacos are incredibly savory. The only down-side to this meal is that you only get two of them (I wish it was ten).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So there you have it. I may have forgot a meal or two, but hey, I gotta post <i>something</i> nine months from now, right?</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-3653008443865272522013-07-23T09:01:00.003-07:002013-07-23T09:32:06.585-07:00DAY #9 - London, Why Not?<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After watching a ton of movies on the flight from Johannesburg to London, we finally landed in Heathrow around 7:15am. We had around 8.5 hours to kill (which we scheduled on purpose), so we wasted no time getting off the plane and planning our next step. The best part was that we had checked our luggage all the way through to Los Angeles, so we didn't have to wait for a baggage carousel to spit out the bags, then go find a locker to store them. Nope, Julie thought of it all, and already had her iPad out and ready to guide us to the hub of London.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We jumped on the Heathrow Express to get into town, then we jumped on to the Tube and made our way to Westminster to see the most iconic of all London landmarks - Big Ben. As soon as we got out of the Tube station, we were hit with some warm weather (and it was still only 8:00 in the morning. We walked around the surrounding area, doing the touristy taking photos of the Parliament building, some statues and cathedrals. From there we walked down to Trafalgar Square where we went in search of Julie's favorite thing - snacks. We stopped at a local cafe chain and grabbed a pastry and some juice and walked over to the fountain in Trafalgar Square and did some people watching.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Kinda odd that the only Nelson Mandela statue we saw was in London...</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Big Ben</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Beautiful building in London</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Not wanting to waste any time, we finished our snack and started walking down the beautiful streets and alleyways that led us to the main street that looks straight down to Buckingham Palace. We angled left and walked through the park along the water, watching as people fed birds, napped on the grass and enjoyed the nice weather. The park was extremely quiet and peaceful. We followed the pathway all the way to Buckingham Palace, where there was an inordinate amount of people standing around as if they were waiting for something. We at first thought maybe the Prince and his wife Kate had their baby, but that wasn't it. We never did find out what it was, but Julie, having been there before, said it was <i>way </i>more people than she had seen last time she was there.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>What's wrong with this picture?</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Buckingham Palace</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We sat down in the neighboring park and planned our next move. Julie had done a ton of research in the lounge at Gomo Gomo before we left, and did something that I thought was incredibly smart. She knew we most likely would not have WiFi walking around the streets of London, so every Google Map or website she pulled up, she took a screenshot and saved it as an image on her iPad. She had about 25 pages of websites and maps saved, and it made it very easy for us to navigate around town. We jumped on the nearest Tube station and set out for St. Paul's Cathedral.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Being there on a Sunday, St. Paul's Cathedral was not fully accessible as there was a mass while we were there. We were able to go inside and see the intricate architecture, stained-glass and rich history seeping out of the walls. After a short tour, we walked down to Leadenhall Market, the area that supposedly served as the inspiration for Diagon Alley, the magical street in <i>Harry Potter</i>. Unfortunately, being a Sunday, it was completely deserted, and we didn't quite get the effect we were hoping for with the hustle and bustle of the local businesses.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Blue trees outside St. Paul's Cathedral</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We made a quick walk down to the water where we were able to see the London Bridge. The weather was getting increasingly hot, and the jet-lag was slowly starting to set in for me. We made the decision to ride the Tube back to the airport, go find one of the nice restaurants inside and have dinner, then wait for our flight.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Lego map of the Tube stations!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We boarded our flight with no issue, and before we knew it we were on our way back to </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Los Angeles. Julie slept a bit, and I watched another four movies to pass the 11 hours of the flight. After a long flight, some frequent trips to stand and stretch my legs, some bad airline food, and weak attempts at napping, we finally landed in Los Angeles. We made our way through customs relatively quickly, and then the moment of truth came...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Would we get our luggage?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">For those of that know our travel history, my only two international flights have resulted in the airlines losing at least one piece of our luggage. So as we sat there, watching more and more bags spit out of the baggage carousel, are suspicions began to rise. But then, as if a mirage, our two bags popped out within seconds of each other, and we had everything that belonged to us! A minor victory seems so much more important when you're jetlagged and wanting to get out of the airport.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After an uncharacteristically long shuttle ride back to our car (the airport was slammed and our driver had to make more stops), we got to our car, loaded the trunk, and settled in for the two-hour drive home. It didn't take long for the wife to fall asleep, and I would be lying if I said I didn't have to slap myself in the face a couple times on the drive to keep me awake as well. But we hit no traffic and the drive was very easy. We pulled up to our house around 10:30pm on Sunday night, after having left Gomo Gomo Saturday afternoon (and gained nine hours in the process). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was the trip of a lifetime. Neither of us would do anything different if we did it all over again. We had great food, great people and great experiences over the entire trip, and within days of being home, it didn't take Julie long to ask the question...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">"So where do we want to go next?"</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-83801070744541152742013-07-19T17:22:00.000-07:002013-07-19T17:22:38.030-07:00DAY #8 - Our Last Hurrah<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There is something very unique about that feeling when you wake up on the last day of your trip, knowing you only have a little bit more fun scheduled before you begin your long trek home. That unique feeling is amplified when the morning starts with an incredibly loud lion roar. That'll make you forget your upcoming plane flight!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After the routine stop to the lodge for tea and concrete scones, we huddled into the vehicle for one last game drive on an uncharacteristically cold and cloudy morning. We drove a while in silence, just taking in all the sights, sounds and smells as we reflected on the past few days on safari. It truly had been amazing experience, and we both had developed a huge respect for our guides and trackers and the lifestyle they lead out in the bush. We were definitely going to miss this place.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">While taking in the setting, we stumbled across an elephant all by itself. This is incredibly rare, as they almost always travel together in a herd as protection from predators. But as soon as this elephant took a step, we could see why he was alone. He had a broken leg, hurt sometime the night before with the herd, and he was left behind. It is a very sad thing to see an animal of that size hobble around on three legs, as they have so much weight to support, with one less leg to alleviate its weight. One of our British friends was a vet, and it killed her to not go out and try and fix its leg, but H.J. told us that they had strong healing powers, and within days the leg would reset and he would find his way to the herd. When asked about predators, H.J. told us that because the elephant was still standing and eating, he had enough strength to ward off any attacks. We watched him eat and hobble for a bit, and then we slowly drove off, wondering how the poor guy would fare in the days to come.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Poor lil elephant</i> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We got a radio call from another vehicle that said they had found the lions again, so we bolted across some dirt roads back to the main paved road, where we quickly found a male and female lion laying together and spooning on the side of the road. H.J. explained they were in the process of courting and mating, and that it wouldn't be long before we saw the male try and "make his move." Sure enough, within 15 minutes, the male stood up and tried to get frisky with the lioness, but she was having none of it, and gave him a quick growl to let him know to back off. They both stood up and started walking down the paved road together, watching the slow moving vehicles as they passed by. It definitely was an odd experience watching two lions walk on a paved road...it seemed out of place (either the lions or the road). We spent a good amount of time with them before we pushed off to go find some other animals for our new guests in the vehicle.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Lion spooning</span></i></div>
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The male being unsuccessful in his mating attempts</span></i></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Taking a stroll down the paved road</i></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Love this guy</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">During the next 45 minutes we saw lots of small animals, including another stork, two warthogs, a ton of guinea fowl (football-shaped birds), and two more honey badgers. H.J. said it was rare to see the honey badgers as frequently as we'd seen them during our stay. The animals were super quick on the ground, and you could tell that, although they were small, they were not to be messed with. After we saw those little guys, we found another area for morning coffee and tea, and Julie and I took some photos, talked with H.J. and just listened as we heard the roars of the lions in the distance.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Stork </i></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Baby warthog and its mother</i></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Taking off away from the vehicle</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Guinea fowl (they look like footballs with heads)</i></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Last snack stop of the trip!</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We ended the day by going back to visit the buffalo we'd seen the day before. They were in a huge thick portion of the bush, so H.J. turned the steering wheel hard and pushed deep into the plants and grass, and within seconds Julie and I heard an all-too-familiar "pop" and "hiss" sound.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We'd popped another tire.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In the front of about 30 buffalo. Whereas the first time we got a flat, H.J. had instructed us to get out of the vehicle and stand away from the rhino...this time we were so close to the herd of buffalo that he changed the tire <i>with us in the vehicle</i>. For fear of stampede and being deep in the bush, H.J. told us to stay put and within seconds he and Caswell were pumping up the car-jack and sending us into the air. Definitely an odd experience to be in a car while it's being jacked up, and even more odd when you're in an open-air Land Rover, in front of a herd of buffalo, on safari, in the middle of Africa.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Cape Buffalo watching us change our tire</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Changing the tire took up the rest of our time on the ride, so we drove back to the lodge for breakfast. H.J. knew we were leaving the lodge around noon, so he agreed to squeeze in an early bushwalk so we could tag along. This walk was led by the other guide, Bernard, with H.J. serving as his backup rifle. We had about 12-14 people on this walk, so it was much less personal, but still fun. They went through the same set of instructions, and within minutes we were in our single file line behind our guides, headed out into the bush. We spent most of the time just walking and looking at tracks, repeating a lot of what we'd done with H.J. the day before. While out on the walk, we saw warthogs, steenbok, and some impala, while we found tracks for giraffes and jackals. It was nice to be out walking one more time, just being totally detached from the hustle and bustle of the world back home, with our biggest concern being "What if we walk into a lion?"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The fact that I even get to write that sentence makes this the coolest trip ever.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After the 45-minute bushwalk, we went back to our room to finish packing, bring our bags to the lodge, and wait for Bernard to chauffeur us back to the Hoedspruit airport. While we waited, we thanked H.J. for being such a tremendous host. I can't say enough about how much H.J. enhanced our experience at Gomo Gomo. We would have had a blast regardless of who our host was, but H.J. was the right mix of funny, responsible, macho, knowledgeable and understanding. We will always have fond memories of H.J. and the lodge, and will never forget the day we stalked a lion on foot with him. #tryandtopthat</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We somewhat gloomily loaded up the truck and set out for the airport, and we both sat in the back seat looking out the windows taking in the final scenes of the Greater Kruger National Park. We chatted with Bernard about what it was like to be a guide and his decision to enter this type of work. We then talked about all the animals we'd seen, and Julie said she wished she had seen more zebras. As if on cue, Bernard said "Well, look out to your left then, cuz this is where they normally hang out." And sure enough, within seconds we saw six zebras grazing off the side of the road, sending Julie into one last excited tizzy. Bernard kindly pulled the car over so Julie could snap a couple more photos, and with that, our journey felt complete.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Bernard dropped us off at the airport, we said our goodbyes, and waited in the small airport for about 20 minutes for our plane to arrive. We loaded up our luggage, strapped in, and as we took off, I looked over to see Julie's face pinned against the window, hoping to catch one last glance of an animal running free below us. She had a smile on her face, and I knew I did too. The trip was amazing. So amazing in fact that it made the prospect of the 30+ hours of travel home seem not so daunting.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The flight from Hoedspruit to Johannesburg was short, and then we killed a decent amount of time in the Jo'Burg airport before it was time to jump on our red-eye 10+ hour flight to London. Now, since I'd never been to London, we purposely scheduled a 9-hour layover so we could take the Tube into town (we were due to arrive around 7:00am London time) and go see some of the sights before we finished our journey home. Hey, better than spending time in an airport, right?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</span></b> - London in 5 hours, and we finally come home.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-40588839671385308162013-07-18T18:30:00.000-07:002013-07-18T18:35:20.759-07:00DAY #7 - LIONS! OMG, LIONS!<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Another night at the lodge, another morning of lion roars!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Excited to embark on the next set of adventures on our last full day at Gomo Gomo, we quickly threw on a couple layers for the cool morning and made our way to the lodge. Same routine as the morning before, with the tea-and mega-hard "rusks" waiting to be eaten. We all climbed up into the vehicle (with two less people in our Land Rover because some guests checked out), said hello to H.J., and we were off.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As soon as we left the lodge driveway, you could tell H.J. already had an idea where he was going. Apparently the lion roars we heard in the morning were quite close, and he was ready to go track the group of lions (called a "pride"). As soon as he mentioned the lions, the mood of the vehicle became quite excited, and within minutes we came across five female and two male lions lazing about the grass. As with many of our other animal encounters, it amazed me how they did not react negatively toward our beastly vehicle. Despite the loud engine, human smells, and metal frame, the lions gave us a cursory "I see you" glance, and that was it. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Similar to a house-cat, these lions sleep about 18 hours per day, so finding them in the relaxed, lazy position was no shock to H.J. The manes of the male lions were absolutely beautiful, and the front paws of those guys were mammoth.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Lioness</i></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Let the photo obsession begin!</i> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>You lookin' at me?</i></span></span> </div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Yeah, we were that close</i> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In what seemed like quite the cavalier move, H.J. drove close to the lions, then a bit closer, then he actually put the nose of the vehicle about 5-6 paces from the lion and threw it in park and turned off the engine! Well, okay then! On this particular day, Julie was sitting on the side closest to the huge male lion, and judging by her ultra-slow movements and constantly gawking mouth, she recognized the fantastic nature of this moment. It probably goes without saying that it was during <i>this </i>portion of the trip that my camera lens spent a lot of time near my face. We were <i>so </i>close that with my zoom lens, I was literally looking at the lion's eyeball. I could not wrap my head around how comfortable the lions were with us, and soon, how comfortable we were with the lions. They got up and walked a couple times, but never more than 30-40 steps in one stretch. I honestly could have sat there all day and just observed them, but H.J. had informed us that there were some other vehicles waiting to come in to see the lions, so we bid adieu to the lions and continued our morning adventure.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I</i><i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">f you look closely you can see some blood from an earlier kill</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0sgnxyuooTpCf_lDH1drllXv-Z1HZNjbe42OV5DQmmlcKNLkcAErSsgUo0RN7dEMPoGSryeDRibbP6fD_IQDkFpv0Wf5aZ08H7M7OccIxc6ASlgEZP_hVhmI_Z2stKYyvr3V3syXxOedf/s1600/IMG_7611.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0sgnxyuooTpCf_lDH1drllXv-Z1HZNjbe42OV5DQmmlcKNLkcAErSsgUo0RN7dEMPoGSryeDRibbP6fD_IQDkFpv0Wf5aZ08H7M7OccIxc6ASlgEZP_hVhmI_Z2stKYyvr3V3syXxOedf/s320/IMG_7611.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Getting up for a stretch</i></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_5cJkrLdalm82859vOIuwlelmQtoG6YNJujOdNPgFpJeSX_ppRHrWuUNpsfLmAVHvaSjk7Soc3OpOzE0DXMkqOvgZbEmQHSrYSwnHPYiUA6cMn6Enka7J5kzl1yOuKBw4CVP-auKVcKQ9/s1600/IMG_7794.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_5cJkrLdalm82859vOIuwlelmQtoG6YNJujOdNPgFpJeSX_ppRHrWuUNpsfLmAVHvaSjk7Soc3OpOzE0DXMkqOvgZbEmQHSrYSwnHPYiUA6cMn6Enka7J5kzl1yOuKBw4CVP-auKVcKQ9/s320/IMG_7794.JPG" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></div>
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<i>Bit of a mohawk</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">*SIDE NOTE*</span></b> - I really like the protections and rules the guides have built into place to protect both the animals and guests. No more than two vehicles are allowed at one "sighting" at any one time, and if you are a third vehicle, you wait far away from the sighting until you get radio confirmation that the other vehicle has left the area.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Not more than five minutes removed from having left the pride of lions, we were reunited with Julie's buddies, the wild dogs! Another vehicle had been tracking them for some time, and we joined up with them, and very quickly noted the pinned ears of the dogs, on the prowl for some animal. Similar to the day before, they took off in front of us, and this time we had a wide open valley in front of us, so we followed them as they sprinted, then stopped, smelled the air, and bolted again. This went on for about 20 minutes before they went deep into the bush and we were forced to leave their side. We would find out later that soon after we left, they would find an impala and catch it. Damn, that would've been sweet.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFn3Ly1LFTAio3agjeTaQkvzLbGdIXNvAWhIbPMmLYRaYuqMv_BCyZb3sVwwVqEv3MAPgGkBDOQQ6TDVBD4lLjwYTTCo-w6KPqo5xc27SQQOAWP6IpQvD2yllVlO5ws05IOSQnq8iH2Bpm/s1600/IMG_7656.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFn3Ly1LFTAio3agjeTaQkvzLbGdIXNvAWhIbPMmLYRaYuqMv_BCyZb3sVwwVqEv3MAPgGkBDOQQ6TDVBD4lLjwYTTCo-w6KPqo5xc27SQQOAWP6IpQvD2yllVlO5ws05IOSQnq8iH2Bpm/s320/IMG_7656.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Wild dog patrol</span></i></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As we trekked along we ran into yet another elephant, this time with one infant by its side. The adult male was very unsure of us, so H.J. kept a safe distance, probably remembering back to the day before when he had to ward off a charge from another of the elephant's brethren. While we were there, he did put on quite the show with his trunk, which I was able to get on camera. Gotta love an animal action shot!</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">He liked the camera</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Since we'd seen quite a few elephants, we moved on and had our morning coffee and snacks, Julie's daily highlight. I swear by the end of the trip I saw H.J. look at Julie every time he said "Ok, now let's stop for snacks," just to get her reaction. After a short stop, we continued on re-traced the steps of the buffalo we'd seen the night before. As they do not move quickly, we quickly caught up with them near where we'd left them earlier. H.J. kept a safe distance with them since there was a large herd and he didn't want to cause a stampede (thanks H.J.). He explained how hard the top part of their head is, and we watched as they protected their baby buffalo. It wasn't long before H.J. told us that since we had spent so much time with the lions and wild dogs, it was already time to head back to the lodge! Man, what an action-packed morning. Definitely the best overall drive of the trip.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7CWnoexp5KsELpaJRctY7zL6uaONDtj0Gzz2JEOyg5OjSMm4TRHyNtZyPD2EPUjAqHYxRN46_T7W5ME3Hd0Nap6oHTwwky1tnNEKIuhZpW0blFHNsy2qaY9ZwdsIzi7pAo0AHM3yiNthp/s1600/IMG_7677.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7CWnoexp5KsELpaJRctY7zL6uaONDtj0Gzz2JEOyg5OjSMm4TRHyNtZyPD2EPUjAqHYxRN46_T7W5ME3Hd0Nap6oHTwwky1tnNEKIuhZpW0blFHNsy2qaY9ZwdsIzi7pAo0AHM3yiNthp/s320/IMG_7677.JPG" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Cape Buffalo</i> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After being dropped back off at the lodge and having some breakfast, H.J. came over to our table and let us know we would be having a bushwalk today since the winds had subsided. And on top of that, the rest of the guests at the lodge had checked out, with the exception of us and our British friends, so we would be going on a fairly private bushwalk! He told us to meet him out front in about an hour, so Julie and I went back to the room and hung out for a bit, and then spent some time on the observing deck before it was time to head out.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The four of us got to the front of the lodge just in time to see H.J. finish loading his rifle. Right then and there, we knew we weren't messing around anymore. We asked what the plan was, and he said we were going to pick up those lions where we left them this morning...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Wait, what?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Yep, we were going to go stalk the lions on foot. In the bush. In Africa. With our trusty guide and his rifle the only thing between us and those meat-hook paws I referenced earlier.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">H.J. then went through a long series of rules and instructions for the bushwalk, reminding us that we no longer have the appearance of a big animal like we did in the Land Rover. Here are the rules H.J. recited:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-No talking unless I tell you it's okay to talk.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-DO NOT RUN!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-Do exactly as I say, always.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-No photos unless I tell you it's safe.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-DO NOT RUN!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-Walk in a tight, single file line directly behind me at all times.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-DO NOT RUN unless I tell you to run.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-If we get approached by an animal, do not freak out. Just do what I say.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">-If a lion charges, I will walk away from you, so he charges me, since I have the gun.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You get the picture about not running? Yeah, we did too.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With the safety sermon firmly implanted in our brains, and some hand signals to follow, we set off. We immediately collapsed into the single file line, and occasionally looked back at one another using our newly discovered hand signals, basically saying with our eyes, "ARE WE REALLY TRACKING A LION?!" H.J. moved at a brisk pace, and we all instinctively kept up, not wanting to have a gap between us. After about 15 minutes of walking downwind from where we had last seen the lions, H.J. came to a complete halt, put up the stop sign and motioned us to look forward over some tall grass. We raised our eyes to follow his gaze, and sure enough, through the reeds, there were two female lions and one male laying down in an open area. All four of us completely froze. H.J. told us we were going to try and get closer, so he told us to follow him, duck down, watch our step so as not to step on any unnecessary branches, and move very slowly. So we slinked our way behind some trees and got ourselves into a great viewing spot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">...80 meters from a male lion...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Re-read that last sentence again. Imagine standing on one end of a running track, and having an adult male lion just 80% of the way down the straightaway from you. We were totally in awe of this moment. As we all sat still, at one point the male lion looked up, glanced our way and saw us...and we collectively held our breath as he slowly turned his head away and laid back down. That single moment he looked at us was probably the most intense, heart-pounding, scary moment I've ever experienced. Julie would tell me later that it was so intense and phenomenal that she actually got emotional watching this all unfold. I can't say I blame her, cuz I was feeling the same way. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After a bit more viewing, H.J. signaled us to start backtracking and take the long way away from the lions. But of course, he said, make sure we remember to check over our shoulder every now and then to make sure the lions haven't moved (and no, he wasn't joking). We followed instruction, with me being the most frequent "over-the-shoulder" checker of the group. Ain't no lion sneakin' up on me!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fully away from the lions, and been given permission to speak, the four of us all exchanged "Oh my god's" and "Holy hell's" with one another as we were finally able to vocalize and fully recognize what we had just done. H.J. smiled and laughed as we all explained how we were scared in the beginning. You will note here that I have said nothing about photos of this experience. After I got the rules from H.J. about photos, we really didn't have much opportunity for photos, so well decided just to enjoy the moment and leave the cameras in the bags. As much as I'd love to share with you the photos of that male lion on foot, I will always have it ingrained in my memory. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We spent the rest of the walk playing "tracker", trying to identify tracks and H.J. explained how to tell the difference between the different cats, antelopes and dogs. It was a lot of fun, and made for great conversation as we trekked back to the lodge.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We spent some time watching the watering hole before and after lunch, with sightings of vultures, warthogs and vervet monkeys darting around the area. We took a short trip to the room to rest for a bit and digest everything that had happened over the morning drive and bushwalk, and before we knew it, it was 3:15pm and time to get back in the Rover for the evening game drive. Man, this schedule rocks!</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Warthogs and a vulture</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Grey vervet monkey in the tree (dead center of the photo)</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Our last evening ride of the trip started off similar to the morning's ride, with us catching up to the nearby lion pride. We had a couple new people in our vehicle, so everything was fresh and new to them (not to us seasoned veterans who just stalked lions on foot), so obviously the lions were high-profile sightings. The lions were exactly where we had left them after the bushwalk, and looked to have no intention of moving any time soon, so after snapping some photos, we pushed on.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After driving for about 30 minutes without seeing much, we turned a corner to find a rhino blocking the road! He looked quite ominous, being slightly up the hill and directly in our path. We cruised up to him and watched as he begrudgingly moved off the trail. He was standing by himself, but off to the right there were three more rhino, with one of them being a young baby. The lone bull was quite ornery, and H.J. informed us that this particular rhino was a little off his rocker and had a reputation for charging vehicles. So it didn't take long before he started getting antsy, and H.J. quickly said we had worn out our welcome, so again, we moved on.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwQcg9BcUJttPJH1HxRH1pMM8xdWGBqjzUI5XUDchY3VCR-CFm0i8THI9fm3ypIjzWvNv4EeV7DL-g2PfP25hi2NfnD-irshdpUgrOM_fYqpP9ObJXPY3HQJQHRP9Til0WZP_HYcXEwOnX/s1600/IMG_7815.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwQcg9BcUJttPJH1HxRH1pMM8xdWGBqjzUI5XUDchY3VCR-CFm0i8THI9fm3ypIjzWvNv4EeV7DL-g2PfP25hi2NfnD-irshdpUgrOM_fYqpP9ObJXPY3HQJQHRP9Til0WZP_HYcXEwOnX/s320/IMG_7815.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Thou shalt not pass!</i> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNiW_eV7a1xDUBxeKQqhqlo9FmD8HJMOhLnC6HYSddZBlEy1SFm0JE2fi0GjlxzIN55hN9zf8n9-zmxVfXp68taMZ8-tcFXO8IhvnONkUuGNtFve9NGyP5euL24grK3r74jh8ZUZJgK0o0/s1600/IMG_7831.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNiW_eV7a1xDUBxeKQqhqlo9FmD8HJMOhLnC6HYSddZBlEy1SFm0JE2fi0GjlxzIN55hN9zf8n9-zmxVfXp68taMZ8-tcFXO8IhvnONkUuGNtFve9NGyP5euL24grK3r74jh8ZUZJgK0o0/s320/IMG_7831.JPG" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The rest of the herd</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The rest of the evening we had random animal sightings, including impala, kudu, elephants and a unique antelope called nyala. The nyala is a beautiful antelope with unique markings on its face, back and legs. We never got a great view of him, but I liked him anyway.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQaIF6dtZwjsGGFVViYtMZBfXyklkMOdrlF4Zxf9gsf_QfzAKMQvNcDlOKaMwJ679vpiNRC6Jwl3bwAthyphenhyphenOwOSwhxo6nNzyy_S7_-oR1t8l9X5z7d5pxKEanfFxWS5sYxjnqS7L0R5UEyn/s1600/IMG_7848.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQaIF6dtZwjsGGFVViYtMZBfXyklkMOdrlF4Zxf9gsf_QfzAKMQvNcDlOKaMwJ679vpiNRC6Jwl3bwAthyphenhyphenOwOSwhxo6nNzyy_S7_-oR1t8l9X5z7d5pxKEanfFxWS5sYxjnqS7L0R5UEyn/s320/IMG_7848.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Beautiful Nyala</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As we looked for a spot to stop for our last round of evening snacks (Julie cheered), we came across a large watering hole where more elephants were drinking and playing in the water. We stopped on the opposite side of the water and had our snacks and drinks while we watched the big guys romp and play. Off in the distance we also saw a lone giraffe eating away at some tall trees. Yep, just another casual stop for drinks with elephants and giraffes...NBD.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikxb_bEvv8aPDY8V_rqzA-Avmg0kuee9oUs-SMnbALlqG3QIxYv0XiNbgwaj-3qkXbp3BaiA8VmG4elAEQChDVjF_p1jfreYCsYm-92wwKydj9A2f_R8e4VjU6u2u8owL83pCz3s05TiyD/s1600/IMG_7859.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikxb_bEvv8aPDY8V_rqzA-Avmg0kuee9oUs-SMnbALlqG3QIxYv0XiNbgwaj-3qkXbp3BaiA8VmG4elAEQChDVjF_p1jfreYCsYm-92wwKydj9A2f_R8e4VjU6u2u8owL83pCz3s05TiyD/s320/IMG_7859.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Elephants!</i> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxBnw9X-aQxZsVClr4hKMAMEOxMObJrddwNaWK53BL2_hHHbIgsRJMqWxJwdGxLLmuS6vbrs4S_wKSr3PiCg4XWUpxyZ0dRW_6ZSxtcl2n02vEuLijGP4vKOsyePJGLX_uCOqGfudYuOjx/s1600/IMG_7894.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxBnw9X-aQxZsVClr4hKMAMEOxMObJrddwNaWK53BL2_hHHbIgsRJMqWxJwdGxLLmuS6vbrs4S_wKSr3PiCg4XWUpxyZ0dRW_6ZSxtcl2n02vEuLijGP4vKOsyePJGLX_uCOqGfudYuOjx/s320/IMG_7894.JPG" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">The lone giraffe after sunset</i></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheiG6uRg99b_YuBzt1xw9r61j3btLOUpbZYn77QQEb7iHSWpO28oBd9gwM3gnd1UETk09dUtnEiOP_mLwi01S1HbKdvrnUu1jSoqUbfGf9iYeTx4Ves46TVVF9ePG-OaTtUqRnNUoWcl8L/s1600/IMG_7906.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheiG6uRg99b_YuBzt1xw9r61j3btLOUpbZYn77QQEb7iHSWpO28oBd9gwM3gnd1UETk09dUtnEiOP_mLwi01S1HbKdvrnUu1jSoqUbfGf9iYeTx4Ves46TVVF9ePG-OaTtUqRnNUoWcl8L/s320/IMG_7906.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Last evening drinks on the game drive</i> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On our way back to the lodge, we came across the two lion cubs that were part of the pride. We had been told there were two male cubs, but had yet to see them on our trip. It was very dark out, but the car headlights illuminated them enough for us to see them playing in the grass, then move along, as they were slightly less comfortable with the large vehicle as the adult males were earlier in the day. This was the last sighting of the night, so we set out for the lodge to have one last set of drinks at the bar with our loyal guide, H.J.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After spending some more hilarious exchanges with H.J. and Bernard, and seeing a honey badger run through the lodge grounds, we trudged over to the dinner fire-circle for one last entertaining meal with the lodge staff. We shared some more stories and jokes over dinner, and just as we had the previous two nights, we grew tired. But before we could flag down H.J., one of the cook staff hurriedly approached H.J. and quickly took him away from the table to speak with him and show him something. Being the nosy, curious kids we are, we got up in time to see him pointing out a large shadowy figure across the watering hole. At first the staff had thought there was a leopard or cheetah in the camp, but it ended up being a large jackal, which quickly scurried away when H.J. shone a flashlight on him. Apparently the staff is asked to inform the guides of any large animal sightings at night, as it makes it less safe for the guests as they walk around. Always an adventure, right?!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After the jackal left, we hailed H.J. for our last escorted-stroll to our chalet. We thanked him for a great day and said we were excited for our last game drive in the morning before we checked out to head home. Before crashing to sleep, we packed up our bags and got everything ready, as the upcoming day would be packed with game drives and lots of travel.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</span></b> - Mating lions, a wounded elephant, our goodbye to Gomo Gomo, and the start of a <i>long</i> trip back home...</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-54271102824387095252013-07-17T20:21:00.000-07:002013-07-17T20:25:01.859-07:00DAY #6 - What Animal DIDN'T We See?<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
I couldn't sleep!<br />
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Just the thought of getting to go on another drive kept me antsy and rarin' to go for the next morning. At about 5:00pm both of us were awake enough to hear a lion moan not far from camp. Now <i>that </i>is a way to start your morning! Thirty minutes later we got the courtesy knock on our door from the guides to let us know it was time to get up and get ready for the morning drive (it was still dark at this point).<br />
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We made our way to the main lodge (we were allowed to walk alone in the morning, albeit cautiously since we had just heard a <i>lion</i>). They had set up some "tea and rusks" for all the guests, which we soon learned were really, really hard, crunchy scone/cake type things. We're talking put it on the side of your mouth and crunch down, hoping you don't break a tooth. But, it was snacks, so Julie was happy. All the other guests slowly filed into the room, and as we waited for the guides to load up the vehicles, we all chatted about the sounds we heard during the night and early morning, including the lion roar.<br />
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The same group of nine people jumped into our vehicle, and with that we were out on our second game drive, this time before the sun had even risen! One thing I forgot to mention in the last post was that within minutes of being on our first game drive, Julie immediately compared it to being on the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland. It flung us around side-to-side, there were animals all around, and it felt like we were on some odd, rickety track the whole time. As much as I hated to agree with her Disneyland-Africa analogy, she was right.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxjBc6wu7vOArB2bFVwYL-gzyIlYIr_TWK5LCdU01D2D8Ku3WFwULKB_u8nWu-pkxuBzLIFP1bk852d73d5nTqcoPzh-mEx68AWFdfh5nw9I9vNfMZLgpD86R0UFB-m0IYuyQISaAFxdo3/s1600/IMG_7410.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxjBc6wu7vOArB2bFVwYL-gzyIlYIr_TWK5LCdU01D2D8Ku3WFwULKB_u8nWu-pkxuBzLIFP1bk852d73d5nTqcoPzh-mEx68AWFdfh5nw9I9vNfMZLgpD86R0UFB-m0IYuyQISaAFxdo3/s320/IMG_7410.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Julie ready for action!</i></div>
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Anyway, the morning air was cool as the wind hit our faces when we sped up, but with jackets and hats, we were totally fine. The weather the whole trip was comfortable and easy to dress for (no extreme heat or cold). Similar to the day before, it didn't take long before we came to our first animal sighting of the day. We came to a clearing where a couple elephants from the herd we saw the night before were eating some trees, and they had a small baby calf with them as well. H.J. daringly drove us up close to the elephants for some amazing photos, but it didn't take long for the big bull of the group to get fidgety about our distance. He faced us directly, and as he pawed the ground as if to charge (we would find out later he was about to "mock charge"), H.J. smacked his hand loudly against the side of our vehicle and yelled "HEY!" at the elephant. As if scolded by his mommy, the elephant stopped his hissy-fit, and went back to eating trees. We almost had an elephant charge us, but he didn't. Why? Because H.J. is a badass.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Sunrise with the elephants</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">This is the one that thought about charging us</i> </div>
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Since we'd spent a lot of our time thus far with elephants, H.J. convinced us to move on to see what else we could find. So we drove on, and we went from my favorite animals of the trip (elephants), to seeing Julie's favorite animal...wild dogs! Wild dogs are a unique breed, with similar attributes to hyenas and wolves, but with the biggest ears I've ever seen on a dog! They have incredible hearing, and have beautiful markings on their bodies, and especially their legs. We followed them for a bit, and before we knew it, all of their ears went down and it was obvious they had caught scent of an impala, and they tore off as a group out into the distance. Julie was about to say she was gonna miss those guys, but before she could even think it, H.J. revved the engine and gunned it into the bush to follow them! This was one of the most exhilarating moments of the trip, as we powered over bushes and small trees pursuing the dogs, and the other vehicles on the radios said they were on the other side watching the impala run. After a valiant effort, H.J. finally lost the dogs in some thick bushes, and we parted ways with our hunting friends.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Here come the dogs!</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Check out those ears!</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">On the prowl</i></div>
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We slipped back on to the one paved road in the park to get to another dirt road H.J. wanted to hit, and as we drove we passed another vehicle stopped on the side of the road, with all the guests looking at the base of a tree. As soon as we pulled up, we saw why. A large leopard was laying down and stalking a family of warthogs nestled under a tree. We watched as the leopard lay motionless for a while, and then, with no warning sign, bolted out of his stance and darted for the warthog den. The family darted out, with a huge pile of dust kicked into the air. But the leopard was quick enough to snag one of the baby warthogs in his mouth, and in one motion retreated back into the bush to go enjoy his kill in solitude. <i>That </i>was pretty intense.<br />
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After the kill, we found a nice place to set up for morning coffee in the bush. H.J. and Caswell once again brought out coffee, tea, and hot chocolate, as well as some excellent muffins for a morning snack. I know you're already thinking it, so I'll say it: Yes, Julie loved the snacks.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Julie loves snacks!</i></div>
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The rest of the morning drive was spent observing less active animals who let us watch them as long as we liked, including a giraffe, some more impalas, kudu and a saddleback stork. As we rode animal to animal, we got to know our vehicle-mates a bit better, including a British couple our age who were on the honeymoon. We ended up spending most of our meals seated with them, and we enjoyed their company the entire time, as they stayed at the lodge the same days we did. After watching all these animals and driving around, it was time to head in for breakfast, so we drove back to the lodge at about 9:00am. We spent some time out at the observing deck, with a now routine sighting of the resident crocodile (he rarely moved from 9:00am-4:00pm), and then were hailed by the bongo drums to come in and eat our morning eggs and bacon.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Kudu female</i></div>
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During breakfast, H.J. came by and informed us that, because of the high winds, there would be no guided bushwalk today. With the lion pride so close to camp, it was unsafe to go out when the winds could quickly send our scent their way. We were pretty bummed about this, as we were excited to walk into the bush and find tracks and follow animals. But we made the most of the day, enjoying our time on the observing deck, taking some naps, and just relaxing. In addition to the crocodile, we also saw impala, terrapins (turtles) and vultures make visits to the watering hole. We also had very frequent sightings of the southern red-billed hornbill, the bird who Julie and I referred to as "Zazu" from the Lion King. Now this bird was black and white, and Zazu was very blue, but it was obvious the Disney character was adapted from this bird. Geez, two Disney references in one post...what's happening to me?! Everywhere we went, be it to our room, on the deck, in the vehicles...a Zazu was there.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Zazu!</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">Zazu photo shoot!</i></div>
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After another light lunch at 2:00pm, Julie and I went back to the room to rest up before the afternoon drive. This was when I walked into the bathroom to find a scorpion in the sink. I made the mistake of telling my wife, who spent the rest of the trip looking everywhere before she took a step. I also made the mistake of rinsing him down the sink, instead of killing him...so Julie was equally paranoid that he would just crawl right back up the drain. My bad Julie, my bad.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Impala at the watering hole</i></div>
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As quickly as it probably seems in this blog post, we looked at our watched and were surprised that it was already time for the afternoon game drive. Now savvy safari veterans, we packed up the essentials and headed to our vehicle to meet our friends for another round of animal adventures. We were greeted by H.J., who introduced us to our new tracker, Caswell. We drove around a while to start this drive before we spotted anything. It was actually quite fun going on these drives, as we became obsessed with trying to spot the next animal before H.J. or Caswell did. We rarely did, but it was still fun to try.<br />
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After about twenty minutes of driving, we came to a screeching halt as Caswell pointed to the ground. He immediately jumped off the hood of the car, got down to the ground and called H.J. out of the car to look as well. They spoke in Afrikaans, so we had no idea what they were saying. And then H.J. walked back to the car, grabbed his rifle, and said "We will be back in 10 minutes." And with that, they disappeared into the bush, leaving the nine of us sitting there, with no idea where they went or what they were looking for. We sat and chatted, looked at birds, killed time the best we could. After about 15 minutes they came back, saying they didn't find anything, so we moved on. We think they saw some cheetah prints.<br />
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<i><span style="color: red;">Caswell and H.J.</span></i></div>
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After our guides momentarily abandoned us, we came across a single rhino in the bush, all by himself. We stopped and watched him for about five minutes, when all of a sudden, we saw Caswell motioning for us to direct our eyes to the ground. We looked down to see a uniquely spotted, mid-size cat burrowed under a tree and some bushes. H.J. told us it was an African Civet Cat, and it was <i>extremely </i>rare to see them in the daytime. He said it was the first time since he'd worked there (four years) that he'd seen one in the light. And then, as if on cue, the cat got nervous and bolted away from us, spooking the rhino as well, so we drove on.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">African civet cat</i></div>
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Very soon after this we spotted a pack of 5-6 huge rhinos, including a young one. We kept a safe distance from them (20-25 meters), and we saw them change their formation upon our arrival, pushing their butts together and forming a defensive circle so they could see all angles. It was great to see them from inside the vehicle, as opposed to our flat-tire adventure the day before. We spent a long time watching them, and had some beautiful light as the sun began to set during this sighting.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Rhino circle</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">The guard</i></div>
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We finally pushed along, and decided to stop for evening drinks in an open meadow with some impala off in the distance. With another beer and some snacks to hold us over until dinner, we were ready to embark on the last hour of our evening drive. We saw an incredibly large kudu with beautiful horns, and then as it got dark, we got a call on the radio that there was a huge herd of buffalo making its way through a valley near where the elephant herd was the night before. We high-tailed it over there in time to catch glimpses of their dark bodies in the moonlight. They were incredibly loud and clumsy creatures, with every step being audible to anything with ears. Those suckers weren't about to sneak up on <i>anyone</i>.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Beautiful kudu</i></div>
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As dinner time approached, we angled our way back to the lodge, taking one last detour to chase down a hyena. He was very dark and slinky, and was definitely a fast animal. We tracked him for a while, with his beady eyes flashing in the headlights every now and then. He finally darted deep into the bush, and we did not pursue due to lack of light. We drove back to the lodge around 6:30 and H.J. said we had about thirty minutes before dinner time. Our entire vehicle bypassed the trip to the rooms and headed straight for the outdoor bar, where H.J. and the other vehicle guide, Bernard, doubled as our bartenders. We knocked back a couple drinks, told some stories, traded barbs with H.J., and had a great time talking with all the guests. I will remember the time at the bar as well as any other part of the trip. H.J. was an incredible host to us during our stay, and we owe him a lot for making it such an incredibly enjoyable experience.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">The bar</i></div>
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For sake of brevity and avoiding repetition, I will just say that we once again had an entertaining dinner listening to the funny cook-staff, talked some more with H.J. and our new British friends, and after dessert, we once again felt the weight of our eyelids growing by the second. We hailed H.J. for our nightly escort to our room, dragged our feet to our chalet, and got ready for bed. We were still on a high from our first full day on safari, and we couldn't wait for the next day, with our fingers crossed we could go on a bushwalk!<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</span></b> - Two more game drives, stalking a lion, and learning to read animal tracks!</div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-43227633109845469282013-07-16T21:39:00.006-07:002013-07-16T21:39:55.041-07:00DAY #5 (July 3) - Elephants!!!<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
After one of those nights of sleep where you know you have to wake up early and are afraid to sleep through the alarm clock so you don't really sleep at all, I was relieved to see the clock finally hit 4:15am so we could get up and be on our way to the airport. We had checked out and packed the night before, so we just woke up, threw on some clothes and set off to return the rental car and go check in for our nest set of flights. I have to admit, after four days of driving on the opposite side of the road, I did not hide my enthusiasm in returning our Chevy Cruz. No more driving the rest of the trip...no accidents...WOOHOO!<br />
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Our 6:15am flight from Cape Town to Johannesburg was on time, but unfortunately our connecting flight from Jo'Burg to the small Hoedspruit airport near Kruger National Park was delayed. We were scheduled to have a two hour layover, but the flight was delayed another 2 hours, so we didn't end up taking off until close to 12:00pm. Spending time in an airport for longer than expected is never fun, but we can look back on it now and breathe a sigh of relief that this flight was the only one that was significantly delayed for our entire trip. Luckily the flight was very short (45 minutes), and before we knew it, we were landing on a deserted landing strip, with random animals running around just off the airport road.<br />
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We walked off the plane (the only one at the airport) on the runway, and were greeted by a warm breeze in our face, with temperatures somewhere in the high-80's. On our way to pick up our luggage, we saw a shuttle driver with a sign that read "Gomo Gomo", the name of our lodge. Our driver, Riann (pronounced REE-on), was actually one of the three main guides at the <a href="http://www.gomogomo.co.za/" target="_blank">Gomo Gomo Game Lodge</a>, and he had driven from the lodge to pick us up and bring us back to the lodge. After insisting he take the luggage ("You're on vacation now," he said), we jumped into an old beater van and made our way down the two-lane road through Kruger National Park en route to the lodge. The drive took about 40 minutes, and we could not have cared it it lasted two hours, because we were surrounded by thick trees and plants ("the bush") and every 5-10 minutes we would have a new animal sighting. As we got excited for each animal we saw (mainly birds and impalas), Riann would tell us what it was and a little bit about it. Fortunately for us, he didn't need to explain much when we saw <i>zebras </i>on the side of the road! As soon as we saw those guys, Julie suffered from complete sensory-overload, and didn't shake a smile off her face until we left three days later.<br />
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We pulled up to the lodge right around 2:00pm, and as soon as set foot inside, the smirks we gave each other said it all..."Yep, <i>this</i> is what we're talkin' about!" The lodge had a rustic feeling to it, with brick walls and thatched roofs enclosing the main lounge and dining area. Directly ahead of us were large glass walls and sliding doors that led out to the observing deck that overlooked a large watering hole. There were lounge chairs and other comfortable chair surrounding the deck facing the water, where current guests were seated and looking at the different animals coming to feed at the site. I immediately feel in love with this deck, and knew I would be spending a ton of time with my camera and binoculars scanning the area for all sorts of wildlife. As we took in the view, another guide named H.J. came out and brought us a fruit punch drink to welcome us. He told us we were just in time for lunch, and that afterward we would go over the paperwork and he would take us to our chalet.<br />
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For my full review of Gomo Gomo, <a href="http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g471857-d471911-r166800001-Gomo_Gomo_Game_Lodge-Klaserie_Private_Game_Reserve_Kruger_National_Park.html" target="_blank">click here for the review I posted on TripAdvisor</a>.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">The view back at the lodge from the observing deck</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">View from the lodge doors</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Lounge area overlooking the watering hole</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">The dining area</i></div>
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After a quick lunch with the other guests (there were 16 people in the entire place), H.J. led us down a dirt path to our completely isolated chalet surrounded by trees and plants. The room was perfectly sized, with an incredibly large bathroom, and most importantly, a deck that looked out into the trees. Our bed had a beautiful white mosquito net draped down over it (for show only, we never needed it), and we had a cool thatched roof as well. The accommodations were perfect. H.J. told us we had about an hour before the evening drive started, so we freshened up a bit and got our cameras and binoculars ready for our first excursion in the bush!<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">*SIDE NOTE*</span></b> - It was very tough for me to decide how much to post about each game drive, as we saw countless animals, many of which we saw multiple times. I didn't want to say, "And then we saw a lion, And then we saw a rhino" (which I could easily do). Regardless of what I type, it will not do justice to the incredible sights and sounds we were exposed to during the six game drives we enjoyed over our three days at Gomo Gomo. So I will do my best just to give you unique highlights of each drive, while also letting you know what animals we saw. Just know there is <i>plenty </i>more where this came from if you want more stories.<br />
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When it was time to head out on the game drive (3:30pm), we all hopped into the topless Land Rover, equipped with three rows of seats (3 seats across), with each row being higher than the one in front of it. We found out that H.J. would be our driver/guide for the entirety of the trip, and before we rolled out, he gave us the basic instructions, including not standing up in the car (it attracts animals to you), watch out for thorny bushes, and basically don't be an idiot. We were introduced to our tracker, Niathi, who would be sitting on a small chair on the hood of the car, looking down at the dirt looking for tracks to follow. With that, we left the lodge and jumped on to a series of dirt roads that weaved in and out of the bush with hopes of seeing anything that moved.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU7qPsUxJvcZ1OU6TTOTudEwCJYqsU6eNY3IFY66LJYZmlPVmqpzPDEa-DuDLPVNe4mohpBD-1nfOJKkBUBUaM5-87nHh3BCfBpRCiTcPglJn2Vxjknnbt0cCRvT9Gjz125QsXdQ6ejSdZ/s1600/IMG_7257.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU7qPsUxJvcZ1OU6TTOTudEwCJYqsU6eNY3IFY66LJYZmlPVmqpzPDEa-DuDLPVNe4mohpBD-1nfOJKkBUBUaM5-87nHh3BCfBpRCiTcPglJn2Vxjknnbt0cCRvT9Gjz125QsXdQ6ejSdZ/s320/IMG_7257.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Niathi, our tracker</i></div>
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Within 15-20 minutes, we were driving through an opening when we saw a giant rhino through the bushes. With a quick turn of the wheel, H.J. drove off the road and charged straight over bushes toward the rhino and then...<br />
<br />We got a flat tire.<br />
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In front of a rhino.<br />
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H.J. cursed in Afrikaans, then told us to get out of the vehicle and stay on the opposite side of the vehicle as the rhino in the distance. Uh, ok! With one eye we watched as H.J. and Niathi jacked up the car and replaced the mammoth tire, while the other eye stayed firmly fixed on Mr. Big Horn in the bushes. He kept a watchful eye on us, but made no aggressive moves, and before we knew it, we were back in the Land Rover.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdY0pTiJPhpz0tI-lwma2M_LQDi1X8qilQ5eyeu4byL7rqgQ5C5V_z3Hlf0Z7zfQ2bQCJRRw-FTzYSGh_lA4kDwiUx_z0GQVQiQZPiI1Imf9i5c0H9klSUVtCQMWNc_L1VnNowKWqxObQA/s1600/IMG_7263.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdY0pTiJPhpz0tI-lwma2M_LQDi1X8qilQ5eyeu4byL7rqgQ5C5V_z3Hlf0Z7zfQ2bQCJRRw-FTzYSGh_lA4kDwiUx_z0GQVQiQZPiI1Imf9i5c0H9klSUVtCQMWNc_L1VnNowKWqxObQA/s320/IMG_7263.JPG" width="213" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">That is a serious car-jack</i> </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcZC6VZ_DFIKFOvJhLniezFt1WugiT5dU03ax7yKqUtiML0wrM8opJ30LkdSbEgT4yFafA5n-46QJnqBAqUNqQRtLlBaVl9mluGu6cDyvNLPUWKq6OvrR6I6Y9S_u185nzLpTuVWIHWmk4/s1600/IMG_7266.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcZC6VZ_DFIKFOvJhLniezFt1WugiT5dU03ax7yKqUtiML0wrM8opJ30LkdSbEgT4yFafA5n-46QJnqBAqUNqQRtLlBaVl9mluGu6cDyvNLPUWKq6OvrR6I6Y9S_u185nzLpTuVWIHWmk4/s320/IMG_7266.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Mr. Big Horn</i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7_lDOilPbxOzyza6UTbvpwj9y9axDboror6f_LH_GdMqtSAegz-kjrnG7-45frp6hs3JH8ab74xgs4B1EbxcwLKs55lshXDvAn_rkw7ee8yBFeesSVFyPFXnUOQrjhkpSqcuYeTmI8pi5/s1600/IMG_7267.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7_lDOilPbxOzyza6UTbvpwj9y9axDboror6f_LH_GdMqtSAegz-kjrnG7-45frp6hs3JH8ab74xgs4B1EbxcwLKs55lshXDvAn_rkw7ee8yBFeesSVFyPFXnUOQrjhkpSqcuYeTmI8pi5/s320/IMG_7267.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Yep, that'll give you a flat...</i></div>
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We got a call on the radio from the other vehicle about some elephants, so we floored it across some roads to get to the watering hole they were spotted. As soon as we got there, we realized we probably didn't need to rush, as there was an entire herd of elephants bathing, playing, and mating in the water. I know there were a ton of amazing moments on this trip, but I will tell you right now, <i>nothing </i>topped this for me. For weeks leading up to the trip I told Julie that if I had the chance, I was going to steal a baby elephant and make him my pet. Well, I had options, as three little guys awkwardly ambled around the female elephants, tripping over their own feet and trunks. Oh my goodness, let me have one <i>please!</i><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlRoiUHZXDDecKYwH7enCNaC5YJCp6ysErxrywwl5XiRZJTxr3gMWS5XpCz8y0fjcsq1RHAwb3X5CNngn7VR-T5pXFgUwWIvo-M7Da3fz-XXi0wuuSrPY69AOADZXn5SKmHfq8ivJ39gj4/s1600/IMG_7291.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlRoiUHZXDDecKYwH7enCNaC5YJCp6ysErxrywwl5XiRZJTxr3gMWS5XpCz8y0fjcsq1RHAwb3X5CNngn7VR-T5pXFgUwWIvo-M7Da3fz-XXi0wuuSrPY69AOADZXn5SKmHfq8ivJ39gj4/s320/IMG_7291.JPG" width="320" /></a><i> </i></div>
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<i> <span style="color: red;">GIMME GIMME GIMME!</span></i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHQlIZfAUCelnM44G0rTObJnmQZBoaVkULh4v75JS6WStAaYlY_K-kWGz4oVVgnNKZBoMTIg11Hc5H7SroP3B-X4ghz0ftfUv4FtpWiMxM81UKP5gF_8lV3ieT5PwK1TLToUKNwm-vybdU/s1600/IMG_7276.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHQlIZfAUCelnM44G0rTObJnmQZBoaVkULh4v75JS6WStAaYlY_K-kWGz4oVVgnNKZBoMTIg11Hc5H7SroP3B-X4ghz0ftfUv4FtpWiMxM81UKP5gF_8lV3ieT5PwK1TLToUKNwm-vybdU/s320/IMG_7276.JPG" width="320" /></a><i> </i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">Play time</i> </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbWKRLe3vGgEB9lYqt37_tIFJYtU5isMrhtxq4cvB7y2oWRxK5S0CAZBo3OMMFeeIGMOJT-Z8i6B_YdgL5sdlwqmHLzgjwuRgZGzoWT66QEy7DgMpny8EdzVOJxTWEp8-LUpTjFPP4de7Z/s1600/IMG_7305.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbWKRLe3vGgEB9lYqt37_tIFJYtU5isMrhtxq4cvB7y2oWRxK5S0CAZBo3OMMFeeIGMOJT-Z8i6B_YdgL5sdlwqmHLzgjwuRgZGzoWT66QEy7DgMpny8EdzVOJxTWEp8-LUpTjFPP4de7Z/s320/IMG_7305.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">I love this photo - the Land Rover in the back is priceless</i></div>
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The elephants were ramming tusks and play-fighting, and a couple of them started getting a little frisky in the water. Before we knew what had happened, we were exposed to the very rare sight of the 5-legged elephant...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQCauh17i-rIEc4_1gOkact58PRQh4_goMwZB-E4kfv6JKxVR_0HG-vZ79O-xZwr_svuIz0ojfiULGaYfUIXFZ1C1MxNfnHzcfUksMlStjlyMrJTp8WpiPAKfj3hK8jbbs8WjfxQA5CFHc/s1600/IMG_7293.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQCauh17i-rIEc4_1gOkact58PRQh4_goMwZB-E4kfv6JKxVR_0HG-vZ79O-xZwr_svuIz0ojfiULGaYfUIXFZ1C1MxNfnHzcfUksMlStjlyMrJTp8WpiPAKfj3hK8jbbs8WjfxQA5CFHc/s320/IMG_7293.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<i style="color: red;">Check it out, 5 legs...</i></div>
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I could talk about the elephants for an entire post, but there were so many other animals that, as we did on the drive, I must move on. Just know I couldn't care less about what happened the rest of the trip. That was awesome.<br />
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<img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzc7Lr3u8s0X-x94DlHOCwQGDLifx5iOSSGHvoFOKvEww16RMhVMuQ4YxSvJ-XlNDyhxFq87M7ubV1rpC1DbH7QTK-TsCq3tBvVJH6XS3l4-srHPmjiU6Vp0Po8n5t2PtD5cUTIY8WqXSg/s320/IMG_7280.JPG" width="213" /> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">A couple more elephant photos</i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6-_EEdRCabDgBgjIrsYfd6ZSEyE15JakoMnmWBfK8ZZOfjsdpdLk96dF0t05HqjPK7R5PJw2R50is33azZSZ2IbCg5MMv7gobJvXI3S5lBlaH6M33bvNsMLRhDxRItLIIimHZ3kTt6dkg/s1600/IMG_7285.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6-_EEdRCabDgBgjIrsYfd6ZSEyE15JakoMnmWBfK8ZZOfjsdpdLk96dF0t05HqjPK7R5PJw2R50is33azZSZ2IbCg5MMv7gobJvXI3S5lBlaH6M33bvNsMLRhDxRItLIIimHZ3kTt6dkg/s320/IMG_7285.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i><span style="color: red;">How would you not want one of these?</span></i></div>
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Among other animals we saw during the drive were impalas, steenboks (small jumping antelope), giraffes, kudu (large antelope with huge horns), honey badgers, and oh yeah, two female lions. I list these things like it's no big deal, but each one of them was an incredibly unique sighting. The honey badgers were even more badass in person, and our guide had even more stories to back up their reputation as tough animals. Unfortunately the honey badgers were a little too quick for my camera shutter...but they live on in my memory! As for the female lions, don't worry, I'll have <i>way more</i> to say about them in future posts. There will be more photos of all of these later on.<br />
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Right around 5:15pm, H.J. pulled the car off to the side of the "road" and said we were stopping for evening drinks. He pulled out a cooler of drinks for us (which he had asked us our personal drink preference at lunch earlier in the day), and set up a makeshift table on the hood of the Land Rover, also bringing out some small snacks for us. So we sat there with a South African beer and snacks, in the bush in the heart of South Africa's wildlife reserve, surrounded by elephants, impalas and birds...and we felt safe. It's odd what a giant vehicle and a guide with a rifle can do to calm your senses, isn't it?</div>
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<i style="color: red;">Sunset during our evening drinks</i></div>
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After soaking it all in, we jumped back in the car as the sun went down and continued our drive through the bush looking (and listening) for more animals. This is when we spotted the female lions at the watering hole near our lodge.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3VInGwhQ5A2wX1TIx9tY_qpQ55Y1FRMBNfaK95HQpdpq0NKCvfEGoh7plYXpD92qXOFzK5pmBRPQpCA4aTfNtqYC6a5GjgZW_JTOuyQE1WGGd2KVTY6RpspedIEfMTg7jzX09bn0Gn1bJ/s1600/IMG_7339.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3VInGwhQ5A2wX1TIx9tY_qpQ55Y1FRMBNfaK95HQpdpq0NKCvfEGoh7plYXpD92qXOFzK5pmBRPQpCA4aTfNtqYC6a5GjgZW_JTOuyQE1WGGd2KVTY6RpspedIEfMTg7jzX09bn0Gn1bJ/s320/IMG_7339.JPG" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<i><span style="color: red;">Female lions cleaning during the night</span></i></div>
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With three hours gone by, H.J. said it was time to head back to the lodge because dinner was being prepared. And of course, as soon as "dinner" was mentioned, you could see the ears of my travel partner perk up immediately. Dinner at Gomo Gomo is an interactive experience, where we sat around a huge fire in a full circle, and the cook staff double as hilarious jesters, presenting the meals to us with dramatic flair and hilarious commentary. Our main cook, Cedric, definitely enjoyed the limelight, and made sure not a sentence went by without at least one wise-crack. He definitely had a rehearsed shtick, and when listing ingredients for a meal, he would always say something like, "with vegetables, herbs, spices, and lemon dishwashing liquid." Yes he was a character. But the meals were all excellent (lots of meat and vegetables), and we all had a great time getting to know our fellow guests near the fire.</div>
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As the night ended, the hours of flying, airport layovers, game drives and animal excitement caught up to Miss Julie, and her eyes began to flutter as we chatted with people at the end of dinner. Earlier during our orientation with H.J., he told us that we were not allowed to walk to our room by ourselves at night time due to the animals being so close to camp. So when it was time to sleep, we flagged down H.J. and he walked us to our room, keeping a close eye for prowling animals. He also gave us a radio for emergencies during the night, in case something happened and we needed to leave the room (since we couldn't go anywhere without the safety of the guide with us). With that comforting piece of information, H.J. smiled and walked away, reminding us he'd be back at 5:30am the next morning for our wake-up call for our morning game-drive.</div>
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With the sounds of the bush lulling us to sleep, we passed out in no time. I woke up a couple times during the night due to some lion roars (no joke), but other than that, we slept like two baby elephants...</div>
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<b><span style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</span></b> - More elephants (yay!), we witness the start of a kill, and Julie finds a way to compare our safari to Disneyland.</div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-61133898905108450272013-07-15T22:11:00.001-07:002013-07-15T22:11:17.352-07:00DAY #4 (July 2) - Photos, Food and Ostriches!<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">One of the best parts about this trip is that we woke up every morning with a huge slate of activities we wanted to do, and we almost raced each other to the shower so as to speed up the process to getting out and exploring!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Our third full day in Cape Town was no different, as we woke up with plans to see all the remaining landmarks and towns on our to-do list, as we would be leaving Cape Town early the next morning. After our (at this point) routine breakfast and informal concierge meeting downstairs, we set off toward the heart of the city - Table Mountain. An incredibly beautiful mountain with views all over the land and sea, Table Mountain features an aerial cableway that allows customers to ride up to the top and look over the area from the highest peak. Unfortunately for us, winter is a time where wind speeds frequently force them to shut down the cableway due to safety, and this was one of those days. We checked beforehand and they said it was open, but when we got there, the winds had picked up and it wasn't safe. But in any case, we drove a decent way up the mountain just to get to the cableway base station, so we still had a magnificent view of the area, and a phenomenal image of the clouds creeping over the mountain's edge.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Table Mountain</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With the cableway shut down, we jumped back in the car, quickly bypassed another "parking attendant", and coasted back down the hill to one of my most anticipated areas of the trip - Bo Kaap. Bo Kaap is a multicultural township in the heart of Cape Town, and is famous for its architecture, cobblestone streets, and most famously, its brightly colored houses. I had seen tons of photos of Bo Kaap in my research, and I told Julie months before that I didn't have many requests for where we went, but Bo Kaap was definitely on the short list. It certainly didn't disappoint, as we wound our way the small alleys and streets, looking at all the unique colors and architecture the community had to offer. It really didn't seem real, but sure enough, we saw people standing on their porches and walking to/from work. This was by far one of the most visually outrageous places I'd ever seen.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Enjoy the (multiple) photos of Bo Kaap</span></i> </div>
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<i>Table Mountain in the background</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After snapping enough photos to make me slightly concerned about my memory card's capacity, we decided to walk down the street to a coffee shop I had seen in some of my research, Cafe Haas. This place was so old-timey and quirky, we immediately loved it. There were old steam pipes in the walls, the servers wore top hats, and the general vibe of the place was very simplistic, rustic and straight out of the mid-1800's. We got a small snack and some coffee (okay, I had hot chocolate), and while looking at the menu, Julie pointed out that they had some of the rarest, most expensive coffee in the world, Kopi Luwak. I'll spare you the crazy details, but basically it's some coffee bean that gets eaten by an animal, and the acid in its stomach enhances the coffee (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kopi_Luwak" target="_blank">click here for the full Kopi Luwak explanation</a>). Seems like a lot of (disgusting) work for some coffee...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We left the coffee shop and jumped back in our time machine and traveled back to 2013 and walked further down the road to the Green Market Square, home to one of the largest open-air tourist markets in Cape Town. All the locals were set up with booths, selling anything from animal sculptures to African masks to handbags to James Bond shirts. It was most definitely targeted toward tourists wanting a memento from their trip to South Africa, and as if on cue, Julie and I looked to buy a few gifts for friends and family back home. We were forced to do a bit of haggling and bargaining, as these people were charging outrageous prices on the price tags, well-knowing some poor tourist won't question the price. Let's just say we didn't exactly fall for their trap. We talked the toothless lady down to about half price and were happy enough to make the transaction and be on our way.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Understandably so, all the bargaining and haggling reminded us it was time for lunch (okay, who am I kidding, the two of us are always hungry)! So we jumped in the car and decided to head back down and return to Kalk Bay on a recommendation from Keith, our wine country from the day before. Having passed the restaurant on Day #1, we knew exactly where it was, so we made our way through the harbor and arrived at our lunch destination, Harbor House. Oh my goodness, oh my goodness. I haven't even described the setting and meal and I'm already getting excited about this again. Without question, this place would offer us the best lunch of the entire trip. The setting was absolutely stunning, with the restaurant perched on the top of the rocks overlooking the ocean, with the occasional large wave creating enough splash to reach the glass walls we were looking from. This picture gives a decent view of what we were experiencing...</span><br />
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<i><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Yeah, this'll do.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">After gawking at the view for far too long, we finally looked at the menu, with the day's specials and "Catch of the Day" printed on a chalkboard behind us. Our waitress gave us some great suggestions, and told us they were known for their signature dish, the Tian of Prawns. We didn't hesitate in taking her advice, and that was probably the best decision we made the entire trip. The dish came out, with four lightly-battered prawns with a stack of avocado, tomato and eggplant, and a pesto and sweet-chili glaze surrounding the plate. The presentation alone was incredible, and the only thing that topped it was the taste. I mean, this dish finishes in the top-5 appetizers I've ever had...anywhere. The batter on the prawns was so thin, not giving it an overly-fried flavor, but just enough to give it the crunchy texture. Oh my goodness, oh my goodness.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">I want this now.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The rest of our meal didn't disappoint, as we both ordered from the special chalkboard, following the theme from a couple days earlier and selecting yellowtail and hake. The fish was creamy and light at the same time, and the seasonings and glaze gave it such a mouth-wateringly wonderful taste, it was one of those meals you hated to finish. When the bill came, Julie and I could care less what the meal cost, because no matter what, it would be worth it. We both guessed that, at home at least, the meal would be a minimum of $75-80. So what was the damage? Let's just say we left one hell of a tip, and the final bill was $36.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cape Town, I love you.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Completely satisfied, and once again singing the praises of Keith, our long-lost driver, we did a quick loop through the harbor to see what fish had been caught that day, and then we decided to complete the journey to one of the southern most regions of the area, Cape Point. Known to many as the place where the Atlantic and Indian Oceans meet, Cape Point features an iconic lighthouse at its peak, as well as the Cape of Good Hope, a rocky point on the ocean's edge. We hiked up to the lighthouse to take in the beautiful scenery and look out at the vast expanse of ocean. </span><br />
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Cape Point</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Wanting to see the Cape of Good Hope up close, we drove down a short hill on our way out to the rocky crags at the point. But before we got there, we were met by a very random group of...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">OSTRICHES!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">That's right, ostriches! A group of five ostriches were just cruising around on the side of the road bordering the ocean. They paid little to no attention to the occasional car passing by, and definitely provided us with a short camera break. After the big bird photo shoot, we finally arrived at the Cape of Good Hope.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On our way back, we passed the ostriches again, and within five more minutes, we came across some more baboons on the side of the road.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Lunch time!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">From Cape Point we drove up the part of the western coast we had yet to see before cutting over to the eastern side again. Unfortunately, there was some serious construction occurring on some of the roads, and combined with it being a normal work day rush hour on a 2-lane highway, we were in for a long drive home. We spent much of the time completely stopped, but luckily we were so happy with the day's events that the drive didn't deter us <i>too </i>much. One hour and 45 minutes later, we rolled up to the hotel for a bit of rest before the dinner hour.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For our final dinner in Cape Town, we decided on a highly rated (by the LP Bible, of course) Ethiopian restaurant in downtown Cape Town called Addis in Cape. Similar to our night at Gold, this restaurant was an eating <i>experience</i>. The atmosphere was very unique, as the tables we sat at were actually large woven baskets called <i>mesobs</i>. Only about knee high off the ground, the round basket-tables had a flat piece in the middle, allowing for food to be placed on them. In traditional Ethiopian-style cooking, the food is served on a large plate covered in a pancake/bread-like concoction called <i>injera</i>. The <i>injera</i> is a spongy, absorbent sourdough based thin pancake that you use in place of utensils to eat your food. After ordering chicken, lamb, beef and vegetables, we watched as our waiter dumped the four entrees onto a massive piece of <i>injera</i>, then presented us with a bread basket full of individually wrapped pieces of <i>injera</i> (which looked like rolled hot towels).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Injera</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i style="color: red;">Our spread at Addis in Cape</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It is hard for me to put into words how amazing this meal was. I definitely think part of my excitement stems from the novelty of the food, the unique presentation, and of course, the underrated action of eating with your hands. But that would be an injustice to the food. All the meats were seasoned better than any meat I'd had. The lamb was my personal favorite, although all of the dishes were superb and not a scrap of <i>injera</i> was left. The combination of experience and taste made Addis in Cape a four-thumbs up in our book!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Coming off of an amazing day of photography, long car rides, and outrageously delicious meals, we were ready to mash our faces into our pillows. We had an early morning and a long day ahead of us, so we packed up our suitcases, laid down, and dreams of prawns and <i>injera</i> danced through our heads.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</b> - We end our time in Cape Town and begin our next adventure</span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">...wildlife safari!</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-1942364653503781722013-07-15T20:07:00.000-07:002013-07-15T20:07:01.804-07:00DAY #3 (July 1) - Wine, Wine, Wine!<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">For our second full day in Cape Town, we decided to venture out to Stellenbosch, the popular South African wine country. Many wine enthusiasts here in the states are probably familiar with South African wines, as they have a large presence in the wine market across the country. With that in mind, we thought what better way for two wine-lovers to spend a day in a foreign country than to investigate the local wine scene?!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">During our research and planning, Julie found a tour company that shuttles people around to different wineries all day, and includes a guide who gives you some background and history of the area as you go through the towns. The cost of the wineries was included in the tour fee, so there was absolutely no stress or responsibility at each place...you just walk in, sit down at a table reserved for you, and begin your tasting. This sounded like a perfect way to introduce ourselves to an unfamiliar area, so Julie booked the tour in advance of the trip.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After another egg and bacon breakfast at the hotel, and a quick consult with the front desk about our daily activity, we set out on a beautiful hour-long drive out to the eastern wine country. One thing we discovered was that the day before we arrived it had been pouring rain and gusting wind, which was typical weather for Cape Town winters. However, from the moment we set foot off the plane to the morning we left Cape Town, we had all sunshine and no bad weather. By the time we left a few days later, the locals were asking us to stay so the weather would continue. Anyway, the drive was absolutely spectacular, with long rolling green hills, beautiful puffy clouds and thick green patches of trees lining the countryside. We knew we were in for a treat.</span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The drive to Stellenbosch.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We navigated our way relatively easily to the pre-determined meeting point where the shuttle would pick us up, and within minutes our van pulled up. Our driver for the day, Keith, got out of the car and introduced himself, and within seconds of knowing him, Julie and I knew this guy was going to be <i>awesome</i>! We got in the van to find that only two other people had booked the tour, so the four of us would have a relatively private, small tasting experience all day long. Definite advantage in the world of wine tasting! The two girls, in their early-mid 20's, ended up being from Texas, and were very easy to talk to. They were celebrating one of their birthdays, and they told us very early on that their goal for the day was "to get hammered." More on this later.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>*SIDE NOTE*</b></span> - Apparently as the van pulled up to meet us, Keith looked at us and then said to the two girls in the back, "That Julie looks thirsty!" Yep, already sizing up the wife as a boozer!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Once we were all situated in the van, Keith first drove us around downtown Stellenbosch and gave us the historical background of the town, its Dutch heritage, and some great information about the buildings and their original purposes. I think Stellenbosch was a unique blend of Napa and Solvang, with a wine-country setting in a smaller, quaint town feel. After our quick driving tour, we set out for our first winery of the day, L'Avenir.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Arguably the most beautiful grounds we saw all day, L'Avenir is a beautiful, small tasting room that sits on a large plot of grassy land that overlooks its vineyard. We were fortunate enough to sit outside overlooking the grounds, and we had a very nice tasting as we soaked in the sun and the sights of wine country. As he would for most of the day, Keith would join us at our tables, introduce us to the staff, and just be our concierge while we drank and asked questions. Not necessarily our favorite wine of the day, but certainly one of the best overall experiences.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Wine tasting on the patio</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">L'Avenir grounds</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">From there we continued on to Warwick, a popular winery that has a large distribution in America as well. Once again we had the ability to sit outside, and this time our tasting room attendant was extremely knowledgeable and gave some excellent descriptions of not only our wines, but the history of them and the winery itself. One of the more unique moments of the trip came at this winery. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Keith told the winery attendant that we had recently married (slight stretch of the truth, but he did it for our benefit), and later on in the tasting he came out with a bottle of wine and a very unique drinking container called "The Wedding Cup." There is a long folklore story that goes with this, that I will attempt to briefly paraphrase:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A silversmith wanted to marry a princess, but her father (the King) said he would only allow him to marry her if the young man could make a cup that allowed both a man and woman to drink from the same time, without spilling. After many attempts, the young man came up with this chalice, inspired the shape of a woman's body. As the man drinks the top cup, the bottom cup swivels away, toward the wife. The cup worked, the King approved, and they all lived happily ever after. This cup is now used by the Warwick winery for weddings and anniversaries. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So we were instructed to drink from the cup, but with one additional set of rules - Julie was not allowed to use her hands. So I held up the chalice, and as I drank, I ducked down so she could drink from the bottom cup. Odd, but totally fun moment.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The Wedding Cup</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Look ma, no hands!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After we finished up at Warwick (and bought a bottle for home), Keith drove us just outside Stellenbosch into a neighboring wine-town called Franschhoek, where we had a lunch reservation at <i>La Petite Ferme</i>. Keith did not eat with us, he just dropped us off, then drove off to go eat an orange in his van until we were ready. The restaurant was perched atop a very high mountain, and had an open-air patio that overlooked the entire valley of vineyards. It was, without question, one of the most beautiful places I have ever been in my whole life. The four of us sat down for lunch, where we ordered a cheese board, more wine, and, on the recommendation of Keith, some amazing entrees. The quality of the view was matched by the quality of the food. Definitely one of the highlights of the trip.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i style="color: red;">Cheese board at La Petite Ferme</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i style="color: red;">The view from above La Petite Ferme</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Stuffed from our lunch, we lumbered back to the van, ready to go to our next stop. But before we set off, we first drove up the mountain a bit higher, where we found baboons on the side of the road, taking in the view like we were. It was here that Keith informed us he wanted to take us to FIVE wineries in one day, and we needed to pick up the pace if we were going to make them all. SIR, YES SIR!</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Baby baboon!</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Baboon crossing!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After the quick detour, we stayed in Franschhoek and quickly reached our next winery, Boekenhoutskloof (yeah, it's a mouthful). Much to Julie's excitement, as soon as we got out of the van we were greeted by 4-5 massive dogs, including a couple Great Danes. They had some deep, scary barks, but proved to be all talk, as they immediately fell victim to tons of petting and cooing from my crazy wife and the two drunk girls. Once we finally got them away from the dogs, we went inside to start the next tasting. Boekenhoutskloof is known for a special wine named "Chocolate Block", which is a blend of Syrah, Grenache Noir, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cinsault and Viognier. We tried that wine (and weren't huge fans) among some other ones, and after a very quick round of tasting (the girls were starting to pound the wine at this point), we bought a bottle on our way out and headed out to hit our fourth winery of the day, Grand Provence. </span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Large porcupine sculpture outside Boekenhoutskloof</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Unfortunately I do not have much to say about Grand Provence, as we were there for a very brief amount of time. The Texas girls were plastered at this point, and started to become slightly rude as they would say things like "We don't need the history of the wine, just pour!" Not exactly my favorite moment of the trip, but due to the combination of the drunk girls and trying to hit five wineries in one day, some of the typically calm wine tasting experience was lost at this place. The grounds were nice, as were the people...and that's about all I got.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <i style="color: red;">The entryway to Grand Provence</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We finished our wine tasting quintet with a trip to Tokara, a stunningly beautiful winery with a tasting room that is elevated above a valley of vineyards, with a floor-to-ceiling window for customers to view the area. Our wine tasting facilitator was a very nice, young South African guy who had never once left Cape Town. He was very passionate about the wine, and was very informative. After our experience at the last place, Julie and I tried our best to separate ourselves from the drunk girls, and I think the attendant picked up on it, so he just poured for them, then turned his back and spoke to us. We had a wonderful time and walked away with a couple bottles of wine from Tokara. Definitely my favorite wine of the day.</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKX6pZzs3TCrDEIQYsULiq5DxHXQQKeCaaFdHKsl2Tqrc64qpybDA-2C-8EWuls99yMoGnZzhpYlEhmexZx4BLhq5ff5t7bjjzM1ZvsrcCAAz2YVjtgDrgabZ9GfoMu124UwPSNiW23hNw/s1600/IMG_8999.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Stopping for a photo at Tokara</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With the two Texas girls hammered into oblivion, and getting slightly emotional, we were ready to make our way back to Stellenbosch and call it a day. We had an absolutely amazing tour, with huge kudos to Keith for making it an incredibly special experience neither of us will ever forget. He dropped us off at our car at around 5:30, we hugged him and thanked him for his hospitality, and then he drove off, with the two drunkies passed out in the back.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Keith, our hilarious wine guide</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Earlier in the trip we had decided that we would stay in Stellenbosch for dinner, as there were many highly-rated restaurants in the area, including some suggestions from Keith. Not quite ready for dinner, we stopped at an ice cream place where we got some incredible, wonderfully rich ice cream, and sat inside discussing our dinner plan. After scarfing down the ice cream (sorry Mom, we spoiled our dinner), we walked toward our restaurant of choice, only to find it was closed for construction! We regrouped, found a new restaurant and walked about 15-20 minutes to De Oewers, a place specializing in fancy South African cuisine. After a little bit (okay, a lot) of confusion about where the restaurant was, we finally realized that two restaurants shared a wall, and (we think) had same ownership, and there was no visible delineation between the two. Apparently De Oewers was <i>not </i>the place we wanted, but rather its sister restaurant, De Volkskombuis (yeah, another mouthful).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We had an excellent dinner, with Julie ordering a sampler platter of different African meats, including a chicken pie and bobotie (beef curried mince, spices, egg custard), while I ordered a braised oxtail. Between all the wine and the extremely rich food, it did not take long for us to realize that we were absolutely zonked. We quickly paid the bill and very slowly ambled our way back to the car, ready for our hour-long drive back to the city. The drive was relatively calm, with the wife dozing off every now and then, and finally we found our way back to the hotel, parked the car, walked up the stairs, kicked off our shoes, and drifted off into sleepy-wine-la-la-land.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</span></b> - We visit Crayola-colored houses, go to the southern tip of the continent, meet some ostriches, and have one of the most uniquely wonderful meals of my lifetime.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-74813843305457474672013-07-14T20:45:00.001-07:002013-07-14T20:47:36.962-07:00DAY #2 (June 30) - Coastlines, 12-Course Meals and Glitter<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
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We woke up Sunday morning very excited to begin our adventure in Cape Town. We had talked a lot about how we liked that we had split our trip up into two parts: the first being the more self-sufficient, throw-on-a-backpack-and-go style, and the second part staying at a lodge where meals and responsibilities are taken care of for us. This first piece reminded us of our honeymoon in Greece, where we did everything ourselves, did lots of research, spoke to locals, and just enjoyed the journey. We were ready to live it up in Cape Town.</div>
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<span style="color: red;">*NOTE*</span> - Be forewarned...this is an extremely long post. And not just because I'm long-winded. We did <i>a ton</i> this first day.</div>
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We made our way downstairs for breakfast in the hotel, and we were greeted with a quaint dining area with tables set up with cereal, juice, breads, and yogurt. Once we sat down, a server came and took our hot food order, and within a few minutes we had eggs, bacon and tomatoes to go along with our coffee and juice! It was so nice to have breakfast taken care of in the hotel, because then we were able to just head out and go!</div>
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We decided that we wanted to spend our first day in Cape Town driving the long eastern coastline and getting a feel for the culture, food, and climate of the area. Having had our first driving experience under our belts, I was confident that I was comfortable (enough) to jump back in the vehicle and navigate on the wrong side of the road without incident (or more importantly, accident). With catch phrases like "inside left" and "wide right" to remind us of how the turns should be negotiated, we ensured a safe driving voyage.</div>
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We set out driving south along the eastern coast to go check out all the fun beach towns the Eastern Cape had to offer. Our first stop was Kalk Bay, a small beach town that was lined with some cute coffee shops and small businesses. It's main feature was a harbor and pier where the local fishermen came in from their morning fishing sessions to fillet and sell their day's catch. We got there a little before they arrived, so we walked the pier and took photos of the old boats in the harbor, the sea lions in the water, and some of the day's catch being filleted. It was probably my favorite part of all of Cape Town. The town was quaint, the restaurants were excellent (we'll re-visit this in a couple days), and it had a real local, "homey" feel to it. Kalk Bay alone made us feel like our 30+ hour trek to South Africa was well worth it.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Kalk Bay Harbor</i> </div>
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<i style="color: red;">Sea lions below the pier</i> </div>
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<i><span style="color: red;">Kalk Bay Pier</span></i></div>
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It was in Kalk Bay that we were first exposed to one of the odd features of the Cape Town tourist culture. In our pre-trip research we had read that there might be some confusion between "parking attendants" and "parking watchers." Basically, the struggling economy of Cape Town has forced some locals to become creative in their money-making ventures, and one of the ways they have made some side money is to stand on the street, and when they see a car about to park, they run to the car, do some fancy hand signals like they are helping them park. Then when you get out of the car, they say "We'll watch your car while you're gone to make sure it's safe!" You kind of awkwardly smile and go on your way. When you return to your car hours later, they come running back to the car and say "I watched your car, no one stole anything!" And as they say this, you notice their open hand extending toward you, soliciting compensation for their valiant deed. Let's just say that this will not be the last time you hear about "parking attendants" in this blog post...</div>
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Anyway, after spending some time in the Kalk Bay harbor, we jumped back in the car and made our way further down the coast and drove through Simon's Town, another coastal business community. This area had many more shops and pedestrians, with lots of tiny shops and interesting store fronts lining the 2-lane coastal road. We just drove through Simon's Town, as we were on our way to one of Julie's most anticipated parts of the trip...to see the penguins of Boulders Beach.</div>
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Boulders Beach is a sheltered beach area where a large colony of Africa Penguins can be observed by (paying) customers. We made our way to Foxy Beach, where the observing boardwalks the opportunity to get up close and personal with the penguins. Julie was in absolute heaven, looking at all of the birds flapping their wings, waddling on the beach, and swimming in the ocean. We spent some time taking photos, walking around, and taking in the sights of the beautiful area, and as the afternoon progressed, we started to realize it was definitely time for our next meal.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Penguin gang</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">Think she's happy?</i></div>
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We jumped back in the car and decided to cut across the mainland a bit to make our way to another popular destination, the cove at Hout Bay. To do that, we entered a windy toll road that took us through an area called Chapman's Peak. And if ever my patience was going to be tested behind the steering wheel of a car, this was that moment. This was the most winding, back and forth, switchback-filled road I'd ever driven...and I had to do it with the passenger side basically dangling over the edge of a cliff! By the time we got to the bottom of the mountain, I realized I might have been <i>a tad </i>stressed, as I realized I hadn't breathed in about 10 minutes and I looked down to see my white knuckles glued to the wheel. Deeeeeeep breath....<br />
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<i style="color: red;">A quick break at the top of Chapman's Peak</i></div>
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After the drive of death we made it to Hout Bay, a small cove known for its food and local craft and food markets. On another lunch recommendation from the LP Bible, we stopped at Fish on the Rocks, a bayside fish market that specializes in fish and chips. The best part about this place was that you got to pick the fish you wanted for your fish and chips (fries) meal. Julie decided on the yellowtail, while I went with the hake, a mild white fish. They gave us absolutely insanely huge serving sizes, and did an incredible job of battering and frying the fish without making it ridiculously thick and greasy, and allowed the fish to be the star of the meal. We would both agree later that it was probably the best fish and chips either of us had ever had. We had the food out on a picnic-style, community table overlooking the bay and the peak we had just traversed, and after inhaling the food, we did our best to peel ourselves off the seats to explore the nearby market.</div>
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The Hout Bay market was definitely one of the most culturally appealing parts of our Cape Town experience. As soon as we walked in to the massively large circus-tented bazaar, we were presented with some incredible sights, sounds and smells. The local vendors were peddling their sculptures, crafts, apparel and toys, while the music vendors played songs of local South African artists. The food vendor area was by far the most impressive, with an incredible hustle and bustle surrounding the food carts, wine bars, beer taps, and food sampling areas. We saw so many unique types of food and variety of options that, had we not just gorged ourselves on fish and chips, we probably would have wanted to sample everything. The atmosphere was electric, buzzing with locals and tourists alike. Definitely a cool hangout spot.</div>
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After tooling around the area a bit longer (and being accosted by a "parking attendant"), we had a nice drive to the western side of the cape en route to another popular beach town, Camps Bay. When we arrived, I was very much reminded of Santa Barbara, with the long beaches lined with grassy areas between the sand and the road. We took the opportunity to slip off the shoes and walk the beaches and tidepools and enjoy the crashing waves on the rocks. After being approached by a couple bold beggars and peddlers, we decided it was time for a drink, and Julie had a place already drawn up right on the coast. We went to Caprice, a nice sunset-special type cocktail lounge with outside seating that looked across the road to the ocean. We sat back and took in all the sights and sounds of this awesome town, including a couple street performances by some locals. Definitely one of those moments where we remembered to take in our surroundings and just breathe.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">On the beach in Camps Bay</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">Drinks at Caprice and the LP Bible that got us there!</i></div>
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And then the fun began.<br />
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As I mentioned earlier, the streets were crawling with self-appointed parking attendants with absolutely zero legal authority looking for a cheap way to make a buck. Well, after having been accosted a couple times that day already, we were over it. As we walked back to the street where our car was, we saw the attendant from very far away, and before he saw us. Our car was parked at the very top of this long street, just before a T-intersection where we would be heading next. The attendant was between us and our car, and Julie and I knew that if we passed this dude, he would follow us <i>all the way to our car</i>, then ask for a tip, even though he probably hadn't even so much as <i>looked</i> at our vehicle over the past two hours. So Julie and I made a bold play. We decided to take the long way, divert ourselves to a side street, loop all the way around that T-intersection and bypass the guy entirely. As soon as we got to the top of the street, I poked my head around the corner, saw the guy at the base of the hill with his back to us, and I gave Julie the "coast is clear, let's go" sign. We bolted for the car, jumped in, and tore off straight ahead, never looking back. We beat the system. And we were proud. And just as a final note (I promise) on the parking attendants...how deserving of a tip was he if we were able to <i>steal our own car</i> without him seeing? Justice was served.</div>
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We finished the drive back to our hotel, and showered up before we would go out for dinner. We consulted the LP Bible again, and this time we settled on a restaurant named Gold. It was a restaurant inside a local museum, and was advertised to have some cool live entertainment and good food. After getting the necessary directions via the hotel WiFi, we jumped back in the car and rolled down the hill to find Gold. We found it quickly, and as we walked up to it, we found a big huge oak door that was closed, with a sign that said to use the intercom. Julie buzzed in, a security guard answered, and then this happened...</div>
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Guard - "Hello?"</div>
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Julie - "Yes, um, we're here for dinner..."</div>
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Guard - "Uh, ok..."</div>
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(long pause)</div>
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Guard - "The restaurant is no longer here. It moved."</div>
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Julie (confused) - "Oh, um, ok. What's the new address?"</div>
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After some tough deciphering, eventually not hearing the correct street name, we rushed back to the hotel, Julie looked for the new address, and found that the place had relocated close by, so we headed out to the <i>new </i>Gold restaurant. We laughed the entire way to dinner, thinking what that security guard must have thought when Julie randomly buzzed him saying "Umm, we're here for dinner?" Hilarious.</div>
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After a really short drive, we found our way to the restaurant, which was tucked away on a small dark road with very little lighting. But as soon as we stepped in, we knew we were about to have a great experience. All of the staff were dressed up in traditional South African dress, headwear and facepaint, and we were immediately escorted up to the second floor of the 3-story restaurant. Now, in addition to the live entertainment, the main reason Julie chose this place was because she found out they serve a special 12-course set meal. Yes, you read that right. Each person gets <i>12 courses</i>. All you do is sit down, select some wine, and then you don't do any ordering...you just let the food parade begin. Knowing I'd be blogging about this later, I did us all a favor and just took a photo of the menu (sorry for multiple photos, the menu was too large to fit legibly in one photo)...</div>
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<i style="color: red;">The first seven courses</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">The next five courses</i></div>
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<i>Bread, soup and biltong dip</i></div>
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<i style="color: red;">The main entrees</i></div>
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All the food was insanely good. We didn't want any of the courses to end. The soup and bread were incredible, and the samoosas were wonderful. All the meat and vegetable dishes were uniquely seasoned and marinated, and the desserts were a perfect end to the meal. Throughout the insane food fest, we witnessed three live musical performances, where the staff played bongo drums, dances, and brought some guests out to dance with them. All the performances had a story element to them, although being in Afrikaans, it was harder to follow. One show had some odd over-sized puppets with oddly positioned breasts come out and dance, which freaked Julie out. One of the shows had this crazy woman come out with a Tinkerbell-type wand and dumped glitter <i>all over me</i>. Now, for those of you that don't know...I HATE glitter. I hate it so much that I get upset when I get birthday cards with glitter. And this woman just took that and multiplied it times infinity. I was literally sparkling in the restaurant.</div>
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<i style="color: red;">Don't do it...</i></div>
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Oh, and then this happened (watch until the end, it's worth it)...<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Note the breasts.</i></div>
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Yep, 14-courses meals, glitter, and puppet abuse. This place had it all. And to top it all off, as we left, our waitress offered to paint our faces with South African markings. So then this happened...</div>
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<i style="color: red;">Would you expect anything less?</i></div>
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Just another normal night, right?</div>
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<b style="color: red;">*NEXT UP*</b> - We head to Cape Town wine country, meet some baboons, have some young drunk companions, and get incredibly confused finding our restaurant for the second straight night.</div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-71296957844300025952013-07-14T17:46:00.000-07:002013-07-14T20:47:50.777-07:00DAY #1 (June 29) - Welcome to Cape Town!<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We technically left for our trip on Thursday night (6/27), but the majority of the time was spent in cars, planes and airports. Our travel path looked like this:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>DRIVE</b>: San Diego to Los Angeles (2 hours)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>FLIGHT #1</b>: </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Los Angeles to London (10.5 hours)</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>FLIGHT #2</b>: London to Johannesburg (11 hours)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>FLIGHT #3</b>: Johannesburg to Cape Town (2 hours)</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">(*NOTE - During the course of this travel bonanza, we lost Friday altogether.)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">With well over 30 hours of travel and layover time under our belts, I'm sure you can imagine it was quite the relief to finally land in Cape Town. All the stress of flights, connections, customs, boarding and baggage checking finally behind us, we were finally able to breathe and forget about all the stress...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Until we rented the car.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Now, I had privately been a bit worried about my first experience with driving on the left side of the road and the right side of the car. I wasn't sure what it would be like, how different it would be, and what the South African drivers would be like. I had spent a good amount of time getting directions before we left so I could minimize the stress of the driving. Since we didn't have international data plans, our iPhones were no help in navigating, so we had to do our prep-work before the trip. So how did we do?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Let's just say it wasn't mine and Julie's best moment.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Between our jet lag, major hunger, physical exhaustion (neither of us slept well on the flights), and unfamiliarity with the area, we immediately got stressed and lost. As soon as I would miss a turn, I'd blame Julie, and as soon as I got anxious, it made Julie anxious, and we both just went into complete shutdown mode. The roads actually were incredibly well-marked and not confusing, but just being new to an area makes you second guess every set of directions you have.</span><br />
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Panic. Sheer Panic.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After a very humbling drive that featured about ten U-turns and 30 expletives (only out of my mouth...Julie is a saint), we <i>finally</i> arrived at our home base for the next four nights, <a href="http://www.theone8.com/" target="_blank">The One-8 Hotel</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">During our Cape Town research in the prior months, we found this hotel and really liked it because of the area it was situated (Green Point), the free parking inside its gates, the overall look, and of course, the price. We couldn't have picked a better place, as it featured very nice rooms with large bathrooms, as well as a downstairs lobby where they cooked us a fresh, hot morning breakfast every morning. The two main attendants were extremely attentive and helpful, as they would end up helping us plan our itinerary almost every morning before we headed out for the day.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Since we were absolutely exhausted, and glad to be done with the navigating process, we threw our bags down, crashed on the bed for a much-needed siesta, and agreed to get up in a couple hours to go walk around to the local waterfront area and get some food. And so we slept. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">HARD.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And when we woke, everything was right in the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After freshening up a bit, we packed up the backpack and began our stroll down the main drag in Green Point, as we made our way down to The Waterfront, a popular tourist area and mall where tourists and locals alike shop and choose between many different food options. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">As we walked to dinner, we passed the Green Point Stadium, which was one of the host sites to the World Cup in 2010. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We noticed very early on that South Africa was a melting pot as it pertained to food, with many cultures being represented in the food world. </span><br />
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<i style="color: red; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Julie at the V&A Waterfront</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">True to form, Julie opened up the Lonely Planet "Cape Town" edition and picked out a great sushi place called Willoughby's inside the Waterfront mall. We asked our waiter what was good, and we ordered off a few of his suggestions. We ordered a glass of wine while we waited, and as soon as that first taste of the wine hit our tongues, we knew we were in for a great trip. Not only because we love drinking, but because we had a full day planned to the South African wine country in Stellenbosch. If this wine was any indication of what was to come, we were in for a great wine trip. The food ended up being amazing, especially some rock shrimp that were absolutely addicting. It was far and away their most popular item on the menu, and we had no problem understanding why.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Our first glass of wine at Willoughby's</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After dinner we took a few photos, but felt the overwhelming chaos of the day start to take its toll on our bodies and minds, so we slogged back to the hotel, ready for a full night's sleep...in a bed, not a plane seat. And holy hell, combine that with a glass of wine, good food, and a long walk...we were done-zo.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>NEXT UP</b></span> - We drive the western coastline, see the local fishermen bring in their catch, eat a 12-course meal, and get covered in glitter.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-4768150895746921392013-07-08T09:58:00.002-07:002013-07-08T09:58:20.497-07:00Back From the Bush!<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Just a quick note to say we are back safely from our amazing trip to South Africa. We spent time exploring in Cape Town, and then spent three days at a private wildlife reserve lodge.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The experience was truly incredible, with memories that will last us a lifetime.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">True to form, over the next few days I will be doing a day by day breakdown of the trip. Give me some time, as I have some 1,000 photos to sort through, and a lot to write down.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Stay tuned!</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-82025593555396207922013-06-26T20:34:00.000-07:002013-06-26T20:34:04.757-07:00SOUTH AFRICA!!!<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
The countdown is finally over. Our South Africa trip is here!</div>
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Obviously I will be coming back with quite the docket of blog posts to unveil. But in the meantime, here is a quick preview of our upcoming adventure...</div>
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-4 nights in Cape Town</div>
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-copious amounts of food</div>
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-copious amounts of wine</div>
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-3 nights on safari at a private reserve</div>
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-Julie making friends with meerkats</div>
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-me stealing a baby elephant</div>
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-Julie racing a cheetah (and winning)</div>
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...and yes, all of these things will happen. Twice.</div>
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<b><span style="color: red;">AWAY WE GO!</span></b></div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-54912071281988346012013-06-20T13:16:00.000-07:002013-06-20T13:16:37.024-07:00NBA Finals Game 7 - What Next?<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">You all knew it was only a matter of time before I posted about this year's NBA Playoffs. They have been exciting and intense, showcasing some of the best players and match-ups that the league has to offer. Now 14 teams have been eliminated, and we find ourselves in every sports fan's dream scenario...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>NBA FINALS - Game 7</b></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I am so excited, I am actually counting down the hours to tip-off (just under five as I write this). This is how it should be. The two best teams in the league. Neither team winning more than one game in a row in the series. The <i>most talented team</i> in the world versus the <i>best team</i> in the world. The best player in the world versus the Hall of Famer with four rings already. The old school coach versus the young coach. This series has it all.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I could go off on a long tangent about Game 6 and how the media blows everything out of proportion. I could talk about how important free throws are. I could talk about how Gregg Popovich leads one of the most entertainingly-horrible press conference in professional sports. I could talk about Magic Johnson having the uncanny ability to somehow relate any sentence back to his days playing as a Laker. But I'm not going to. What am I going to do?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Just Watch.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I'm sure ABC will have at least eight pre-packaged highlight reels of the Spurs "Big 3", the Heat "Big 3", Ray Allen's place in history, Kawhi Leonard's free throws, flashbacks to Lebron's "Decision", and Duncan and Popovich's relationship as their run slowly fade into the sunset. But I won't even notice. I just wanna watch this game play out.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The adjustments each team has made have been unreal in this series. The role players have had good and bad moments. The stars have all had their time in the spotlight. And now it comes down to one game to decide the NBA Championship. <i>One game</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Do you realize how insane that is? Forget for a minute that any team in the league, including Miami and San Antonio, would kill for this chance to win one game to win it all. But to reflect on an entire season, all the hours of training, lifting, practicing and shooting...and to see it all culminate into 48 minutes of frenzied glory. The defense will be frenetic. The offense will be calculated. The energy levels will be through the roof. And yet, throughout all that, these guys have to somehow channel the right amount of energy and frenzy without playing careless or with reckless abandon. The line is thin. Razor thin.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So to Lebron James and Tim Duncan - best of luck. I'm not even going to taint this post with a prediction of winner or score, or even a hint at who I'm rooting for. A lot of people would ask to see these players' best 48 minutes of basketball tonight. But not me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I know they're gonna bring it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I just want to watch.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-32222154994440658072013-06-04T10:13:00.000-07:002013-06-04T10:13:27.406-07:00My Life...By The Numbers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I assume many of you have heard of or seen the youth art toy called Paint by Numbers? Well enjoy Livin the Dream's "Blog By Numbers", where I countdown from 11 (my favorite number), and re-tell a random story or general factoid that has some (often paper-thin) relation to that number.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Bizarre concept, I know. But hey, it'll be fun!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: cyan;"><b>Marc's Blog by Numbers </b></span></span><br />
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</b></span><span style="color: red;"><b>11 - </b></span>My Lucky Number.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10 - </b></span>When I was in Little League, my baseball jersey number was #10. I wanted #11, but some other snot-nosed kid got it before I could. Anyway, while wearing #10, my single most embarrassing moment occurred. This one requires a bit of background...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">During my second year of baseball, our league gave the option for kids to go to the plate wearing a batting vest. Well my cautious mother told me that if I wanted to <i>play</i>, I had to wear the vest. So all season I threw on the vest on my way to the batter's box. Luckily a lot of kids wore them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">However on this one particular afternoon, I ran in from the field and was up first the next inning, so I threw on my helmet, grabbed my lucky bat, took a couple practice swings, and marched off to the plate. I stared down the pitcher, dug my foot in, spit a big squirt of Big League Chew juice to the side, and bared down. And then, as the pitcher went into his windup, he heard a faint voice yelling, and he backed off the mound. What did he hear...?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">My mom. Running full speed from her seat in foul territory in the outfield. Yelling at the top of her lungs. "Marc, Marc, MARC! PUT YOUR BATTING VEST ON RIGHT NOW!"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">All my buddies are laughing. I'm embarrassed beyond belief as I put my head down and drag my bat back to the dugout to grab my straight-jacket. And then I didn't get a girlfriend for another few years.</span><br />
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<i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Thanks Mom.</span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9 -</b></span> The number of colleges I applied to. Talk about a random list - Stanford, Duke, UC Davis, UC Berkeley, University of Washington, University of North Carolina, Northwestern, Georgetown and UCLA. And no, there was no real reason that I applied to each one. So...Go Bruins.</span><br />
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</span></b><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">8 -</span></b> Ah yes, the Elite 8. In the 2005-06 college basketball season, UCLA made a run all the way to the NCAA Championship game in the March Madness tournament. Thanks to the help of some family and friends, I was able to go to all six of their games. The most amazing game of all was the Sweet 16 victory over Gonzaga in Oakland to advance to the Elite 8. In this game, UCLA was down 17 points and looking like a dead team walking. Then one of the most epic comebacks in college basketball history happened. And then this happened:</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The most exciting live sporting event of my life.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7
- </b></span>Years ago that I got my internship at the Holiday Bowl. SEVEN YEARS!
Holy hell, seven years ago I was fresh out of college, barely of drinking age, hadn't
developed my awkward patch of chest hair, and had a metabolism faster than Usain Bolt. Times have changed.</span><br />
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</b></span><span style="color: red;"><b>6 -</b></span>"Eat 6 saltines in a minute Marc!" Everyone said it couldn't be done, and then I saw my best buddy Tom do it like a champ in another friend's garage. So I decided to go for it. I dominated the first 30 seconds, chewing and noshing the salty crackers in my mouth. And then everything turned to drywall in my mouth. And then someone cracked a joke. And then I laughed so hard that I spit dried saltines all over my friends. It looked like a real-life snow-globe. True story.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUGLn39nsBkGMTEA3G_goaEx6NoJVx4zrDVktD-UxwosFgemw5ZBAzEzqqWtUaF2eviuonD_OqioVx4GDVVuiJYKGT3oB_EXJerNyJSbKlDwk2GjwnN8UrIu6eCSN5XHYghx1-TrILSVgD/s1600/crackers_saltine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUGLn39nsBkGMTEA3G_goaEx6NoJVx4zrDVktD-UxwosFgemw5ZBAzEzqqWtUaF2eviuonD_OqioVx4GDVVuiJYKGT3oB_EXJerNyJSbKlDwk2GjwnN8UrIu6eCSN5XHYghx1-TrILSVgD/s320/crackers_saltine.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">6 in a minute</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b> </b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5 -</b></span> The number of Olympic rings. The Olympics have a balance beam gymnastics. competition. When I was eight, I went to a week-long summer camp where each day you did a different sport (soccer, softball, basketball, gym, bowling, etc.). Well Wednesday was gymnastics day, where all the kids got to go do somersaults on the mats, try to do handstands, and walk the balance beam. Now, being an undeveloped eight year-old, the balance beam had minimal scare-factor to me. Oh geez would that change. The teachers helped us get up on the beam by a set of stairs, and then we had the option to either run or walk across. I was a little piss-ant kid, so of course I wanted to run. And that I did. For one step. And then my foot slipped, my legs fell to both sides of the beam, and I got nutted so bad that I spent the next two months being mistaken for my mom and sister whenever I answered the phone. Balance Beams - The Anti-Puberty.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <span style="color: red;"><i>The nutter...</i></span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>4 -</b></span> This number reminds me of 4-Square. Which reminds me of handball. Which reminds me of the first real "fight" I ever got into. In fourth grade I was playing handball (the kind with the big red bouncy ball on the wall), and I was playing against Brandon C. Brandon was a year older and was a punk kid that no one liked, and was notorious for having a bit of a hot streak in him. Well, I was pretty hot stuff on the handball court, displaying a wide array of skills including sliceys, rainbows, and sliders, and I kicked Brandon C.'s butt. And then he said I cheated. And then I said he was a liar. And then he ran at me, I tried to elude him (also known as running away like a baby), he grabbed my shirt collar and ripped it from neck to sleeve so that the sleeve was dangling off. So I turned around and socked him in the temple. I wasn't really aiming, it's just where my fist landed. It hurt a lot. We both got sent to the Principal's office. My mom got called by the school secretary for the first time ever. The nurse gave me a "loaner" shirt, which was obviously the shirt kids get when they throw up on themselves. And I went back to class. Brandon C. was an idiot. And I destroyed him in handball.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <span style="color: red;"><i>Damn Brandon C.</i></span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>3 -</b></span> This reminds me of how I wooed my wife. We met in a bowling league (yeah, I know, we're awesome), and much of our flirting and courtship stage revolved around our Tuesday night bowling nights. Well, our team made the finals, and in the final frame, we were trailing the other team, and I was the only bowler remaining. We were down so much that I needed three straight strikes to win the whole thing. So I stepped up, feeling more pressure not to bowl a gutter ball in front of Julie, and bowled a strike. I looked back, gave her that shoulder shrug that basically meant "Lucky shot", waited for my bowling ball, stood up, took a half-serious deep breath, and bowled another strike. This time I walked back, grabbed my ball, then looked at Julie with a "Uh-oh, this might happen" smirk and turned my back. Then I stared down the alley, took a very serious deep breath, and let it fly. And all those little pins fell down. A TURKEY TO WIN IT ALL! Pretending it was no big deal, I casually turned around to see all my teammates cheering and clapping, except for one. Julie just sat there, staring at me, shaking her head, giving me the "You've got to be kidding me. I'm never going to hear the end of this" look. And she was right. <i>That </i>my friends, is how you get the girl.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i><span style="color: red;">The lady-killer</span></i><span style="color: red;"><b> </b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>2 -</b></span> Number of tickets I've received for non-speeding violations. Which reminds me of another time I was pulled over <i>for eating a girl scout cookie</i>. No, you didn't read that wrong. A few years back I was leaving a friends house late at night, and I was leaving, my friend gave me some girl scout cookies for the road. Being the pig I am, I tore into them as soon as I got into the car. Well, I made a turn at a stop sign, and within five seconds there were flashing lights behind me. Obviously panicking, I throw the half-eaten cookie in the center console, grab my license and registration, and wait for the cop to come up next to me...the whole time trying to figure out what the hell I did. He asked if I knew why he pulled me over, and I responded, "Honestly, I don't have a clue." He said it looked like I had been on my cell phone, and I told him I hadn't made a call in three hours, and that my phone was in my pocket. He asked to see it, and when I showed him, he then said, "Well it looked like you had your hands up to your face back at that intersection." And then this exchange happened...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">ME - "Officer, that's because I was eating a Samoa Girl Scout Cookie."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">OFFICER - "I'm sorry, what?"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">(At this point, I reached into the center console, picked up the half-eaten cookie, and showed him.)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">OFFICER - "Well, uh, be careful with your cookies and have a good night."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">And then he walked back to his car. So many questions. Did he really pull me over thinking a cookie was a phone? Why did I feel the need to be an asshole and tell him the <i>type </i>of Girl Scout Cookie I was eating? Why did he say to "be careful with my cookies"? What is he thinking when he walks back to his car? Does he tell anyone this story?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">One of the most bizarre stories of my life.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>Most dangerous cookie on the roads...</i></span></span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>1 -</b></span> One is the loneliest number. That song was sung by Three Dog Night. Julie and I want three dogs (a rescue dog she can run with, a French Bulldog, and a Boxer). I know, those are some pretty specific criteria, but when you live with Julie, you learn to expect specificity when it comes to her obsession with canines.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So...did you get all that?</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-30704360993263886272013-05-31T14:50:00.001-07:002013-05-31T14:57:24.192-07:00ZION BACKPACKING PART #4 - Wiggles, Creepers and Bumbleberries<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Similar to the morning before, we woke up early, packed up our stuff, and hit the trail. Given that we had about eight miles to hike, a shuttle to the visitor center, a 45-minute car-ride to pick up the $60 Priceline Negotiator Jeep Wrangler, a 2.5 hour car ride to Vegas, rental car returns and checked baggage...we figured we should give ourselves as much time as possible to finish the hike, but also <i>enjoy </i>it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i> Ready for the final day!</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We hit the trail just past 7:30am, and decided to log a few miles before we broke for breakfast. The morning was incredibly still, with barely a breath of wind, and the warm sun hit our backs as we started climbing towards the top. The view Monday morning was absolutely breathtaking, with an expansive panoramic view of the entire canyon, and the early morning sunlight blasting the red and orange rock walls. <i>This </i>is what we had expected all of Zion to look like, but we were pleasantly surprised that it was just one of many visuals we would get over the course of the weekend.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYcIfAnvVhux3axa4Q0sHFGKDGvgy_wUFSlaOXzJW7DwF-RCHoBXvRj2TqZjo7nHAIdwRZNjX3b0RnQBDCla_08edFVTA5T-GbEtB9iDk2utR4VoukoU-4MBAfL9ZrAs_Fv5TWwFpck_er/s1600/2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYcIfAnvVhux3axa4Q0sHFGKDGvgy_wUFSlaOXzJW7DwF-RCHoBXvRj2TqZjo7nHAIdwRZNjX3b0RnQBDCla_08edFVTA5T-GbEtB9iDk2utR4VoukoU-4MBAfL9ZrAs_Fv5TWwFpck_er/s320/2.jpg" width="240" /></a> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Beautiful view at 8:00am</span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We found a great little breakfast spot in a clearing between the trees on the cliff's edge that overlooked the canyon. For the final time we broke out the granola bars, fruit leather, and trail mix. We enjoyed the view, cracked some jokes, and then decided we need to hit the trail because we still needed to get to the next water source, Cabin Springs, to fill up our water bottles and camelbacks to keep us hydrated for the remainder of the day's hike.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Within moments of returning to the trail, we looked up</span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> to see two deer standing on the trail about 50 feet ahead of us. As we continued walking they slowly walked away from us, always keeping a safe distance. The one ran off, but the other one was quite brave and just stood by as we passed him, no further than 15 feet away. Pretty cool.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> See the deer on the trail?</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">And there it is up close!</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">A bit further down the trail, we found the trail break that dove down to Cabin Springs, where we would find our last available water source until the end of the hike. Similar to Potato Hollow, Cabin Springs was located at the sheer edge of a cliff, which provided some incredible views for the group while they waited for me to filter the water. So I started to filter the...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Oh wait, did I say <i>water</i>?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">What I should have said was "a sad ass mud-stream trickle with no elevation at all, making it virtually impossible to get a solid amount of water in a bottle."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I'm not bitter.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After digging inside the stream, removing some twigs and making an area slightly deep enough to get the bottle in there, I got enough water to fill two bottles, which was enough for the final five miles of the hike. At this point Jennifer had made up her mind that she was going to say something back at the Visitor Center, because relying on that type of a water source for survival is a bunch of bogusness. </span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Searching for water...</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Relieved that I would not have to find "flowing water" the rest of the trip, we went back to the trail and began our final five-mile descent into The Grotto. This portion of the hike was what I had expected the entire trip to be like, hiking down switchbacks inside a canyon against the red, orange and yellow walls of the cliff's edge. The majority of the hike was spent in the sun, with hundreds of lizards basking in the sun on the hot rock walls. We came to a few spots with an excellent echo-effect (where Branden promptly yelled "MIYAGI!"), and then at the bottom of the first area, we found ourselves in a small, shaded basin that must have been at least 15 degrees cooler than everywhere else on the trail.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The Gang</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We then started the last major climb of the weekend, but this time the trail had been paved over with cement. Kind of took away from the overall experience, but as Branden noted, we were obviously getting close to the end when you get signs of civilization like cement trails. The climb was very intense, probably the longest lasting one of the weekend, and being on our third day and toward the end, we were happy to make our way to the last panoramic viewpoint of The Grotto. We took one last snack break at the top of the mesa, surrounded by cacti blooming with prickly pear flowers. I did a bit of random exploring, but then we could all tell we were ready to finish this hike, take off our boots, and leave all the "flowing water" behind us...so we trudged on.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">View from the top</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The descent into The Grotto's end was steep and quick, and as we began our trek, the number of day-hikers we passed increased exponentially. As we got to the main Grotto lookout point, we each got hit simultaneously with the most horrendous wave of nausea, as the nearby port-a-potties below us were situated in the sun, basking in all their "glory." I can not tell you how disgusting the smell was emitting from those things, but you can imagine how much we double-timed it to get down the hill and past that atrociousness. Bleh.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">As I mentioned before, The Grotto was a high-traffic area, and as we continued to descend, one woman looked where we were coming from and asked, "Are Walter's Wiggles up there?" After asking her to repeat her question, and still clearly not having any idea what she was talking about, we each had our own unique reaction, including Jenn saying "I don't know what you're talking about, but it's pretty up there," and me saying "I bet there's a guy up there named Walter who will wiggle for him." We would learn later that there were a series of switchbacks that Zion is known for called "Walter's Wiggles" (which, for the record, the woman had already passed)...but I liked our answers anyway.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <span style="color: red;"><i>Walter's Wiggles</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The number of people we ran into continued to grow, and we soon realized we were the only people there that had been backpacking over the weekend, and thus were the only ones with heavy packs and trekking poles. Everyone there was out for a nice day-hike into the most accessible low-point of Zion. At one point someone looked at us very judgingly, then looked at their friend and said "We don't need trekking poles." To which Branden quite curtly replied, "You haven't walked 25 miles." At this point in the trip, nothing could have made us laugh harder. Epic call-out.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">You'll notice that I keep saying "as we continued down...", and that's because this downhill finish to the hike was no joke. It was switchback after switchback, with an incredibly steep decline the whole way down. The knees and ankles took a pounding, and we were glad to have our trekking poles to lessen the blow. At one point, I took a break at one of the switchbacks, and Branden and Jenn pointed out something above us. Directly above us there was a small outcropping where a bighorn sheep stood overlooking all the day-hikers. We stood there for about 15 seconds before we could confirm it was real, because it did not move for quite some time. After a quick ear-flick, we knew it was real.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Almost at the bottom of the hike, Branden's foot was killing him, my hip had a random seize-up, and collectively we were all ready to have our backpacks off completely. We charged ahead, reached the bottom, then continued along the flat (ah, flat felt <i>so</i> good) trail that ran along a river. And when I say river, I mean bona-fide rushing rapids in at least two feet of water at its <i>shallowest</i>. Now <i>that </i>is what I call "flowing water."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">To our great pleasure, the trail opened up and allowed hikers to go down to the river and freshen up. Well, we did more than that! Branden led the charge, taking his boots and socks off, leaving all his clothes on, and just wading out into the middle of the river and sitting down in the middle of the rapids. It didn't take long before I followed, taking off my boots, socks and shirt and finding a deep enough pool to dive headfirst into. The girls were quick to follow my lead, and after a bit of convincing, stripped down to their sports bras and underwear and dove in. The water was very cold, but given the hike we just finished, nothing could have felt better. We enjoyed the water, scrubbed ourselves clean, and just enjoyed the end of the trip in that river. Then we looked up to see an older gentleman with his camera out snapping photos of the ladies! After realizing that "Take a picture, it'll last longer" wasn't exactly a witty response, I just yelled, "Hey, how'd those pictures turn out?!" He quickly snapped off his camera and went on his way...with his wife next to him. Friggin creeper.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <i><span style="color: red;">Branden loving the river.</span></i></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG3nAZuDRGNGPsGcjy6-rlrMZb_y-F9oG_MF2K33iQ_0ksPH_M17sKasqtvi6q4AQ8UzZGQZ4bcDNi7aFBM9X03aAqQv0OMZhwMuoSiwe4sIFBG2OgKtdMAlmVovzTCkbQAkrncRZxlx1K/s1600/11.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG3nAZuDRGNGPsGcjy6-rlrMZb_y-F9oG_MF2K33iQ_0ksPH_M17sKasqtvi6q4AQ8UzZGQZ4bcDNi7aFBM9X03aAqQv0OMZhwMuoSiwe4sIFBG2OgKtdMAlmVovzTCkbQAkrncRZxlx1K/s320/11.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>Julie getting the courage to dive in</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Once we were sure there were no more paparazzi, we dried off, threw our clothes and packs on, and walked across the final bridge to the waiting area for the shuttle that would take us back to the visitor center. Julie saw the shuttle about to depart, and she took off like a bat out of hell to hold it for us to jump on, instead of having to wait for the next one. I hadn't seen her move that fast all trip! It was awesome. I heart my wife.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">On the shuttle ride back, Jenn told Julie her plan of getting a patch from every National Park she visits and putting them on her backpack. Julie thought that was the coolest thing ever, so they quickly decided Julie would do it too and they would call themselves "Patch Bros." Whatever that means.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After about a 10-minute shuttle ride, we were dropped off and the girls went inside the visitor center to get patches, and for Jennifer to follow through on her vow to berate the rangers for having bad information about "flowing water." After that, we decided we were starving and headed straight for food and would pick up the second vehicle at the trailhead later. On a recommendation from one of Julie's friends, we hit up Oscar's Cafe, just outside the park limits. The waitress seemed to understand our desire for fluids and salt, as she brought out bottomless chips and salsa, as well as a round of waters and lemonades (and iced coffee for my wife who had been deprived of the caffeine for 3 days). We went through 3-4 baskets of chips, and I believe 3-4 lemonades and 2-3 waters...each. <i>Then </i>we ordered our meals, which we weer all incredibly happy with. But we ate with our eyes, and by the end of the meal, we all sat back in our chairs, feeling amply bloated and sated, but unsure of whether we would be able to move ever again.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">But, we weren't done there. On our way up to the mountain two days earlier, Jenn saw a sign for "Bumbleberry Pie" and spoke that name about every two hours or so during the course of the weekend. We had no choice to go there and check it out. It ended up being a small bakery and ice cream shop, and as Julie says, there is <i>always </i>room for ice cream!</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Bumbleberry!</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Now completely stuffed, we hopped in our rental car to go pick up the $60 Priceline Negotiator Jeep Wrangler. But as we started the drive, we made the realization that it was 3:00pm, which was Julie and Jenn's prescribed nap-time for the previous two days. And within minutes, we realized that Julie had floated into "la-la land", and turned into the loopiest, hyped up on nitrous-oxide person I've ever seen. Odd as it was, it made for one of the most entertaining car rides I can ever remember. I won't go into detail cuz it won't be nearly as funny retold, but just take me at my word...she was ridiculous.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We dropped Branden and Jenn at their car and then the two cars caravanned back to Las Vegas to drop off our rental cars and go tot he airport to catch our flights (around 8:00pm). Julie and I reflected on the trip, talked about our plans for the week, and then basically zoned out for the 2.5 hour drive. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The only other odd thing that happened worth reliving was the baggage check. You may remember in the first post (<a href="http://livinthedream11.blogspot.com/2013/05/zion-backpacking-part-1-planning.html" target="_blank">ZION PART #1</a>), I alluded to the fact that we bought propane in Vegas since TSA doesn't allow you to fly with butane or propane tanks in your luggage (checked or carry-on). Well, after checking our bags downstairs on Monday night, and going through the security lines before the gate, the four of us grabbed some food, hung out and chatted before Branden and Jenn took off on their flight. After saying our goodbyes, Julie and I made our way to our gate, and as we sat there, I received a text from Branden that said "You took the propane out of your backpack, right?" </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">A shot of sheer panic went through my body.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"Holy sh*t, I have the leftover propane in my checked backpack downstairs!"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I told Julie (and Branden via text), and we agreed I should tell the Southwest attendants. I told the woman at the desk, she didn't seem overly concerned because of the almost-empty tank, but phoned downstairs to let them know anyway. Having done my due diligence, I sat back down, slightly relived, and then I realized something else...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"Holy sh*t, I have a second thing of propane in my <i>carry-on</i> bag!"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Yep, that's right. The propane in my checked bag was the one Branden bought at Walmart along with the stove on that fated trip Friday night. But I had <i>also </i>bought a propane tank for the stove in Vegas, thinking Branden was bringing the stove to match it. And since it wasn't needed on the trip, I left it in my duffel bag so I didn't have extra weight on the trip. And now it was in my bag under my feet in the airport...<i>inside the security gates! </i>How the hell did the security scanners not pick that up?! After realizing that question was no longer important, I slowly unzipped my bag, slyly grabbed the propane and mozy'd over to the nearest trash can and threw it in like I was holding an activated bomb.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Yeah, I'm a special one.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">And that's how the epic stories of the Zion trip ended. Just the way they started. With the damn propane.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-89704888205853129642013-05-30T13:16:00.000-07:002013-05-30T13:16:58.159-07:00ZION BACKPACKING PART #3 - Snakes, Naps and Astronaut Ice Cream<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Sunday morning I woke up to the sound of someone opening up a food bag, and I immediately thought I had overslept. I sat up in the tent, saw that Julie was still asleep, and realized that it was about 5am, and the sound I heard was Branden or Jenn re-arranging their Fritos blanket.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">A couple hours later we all woke up and decided to pack up camp and hit the trail to log a few miles before we stopped for breakfast. After taking down the tents, re-packing the packs and some unsuccessful attempts at warming our hands (it was 37 degrees when we woke up), we set off on our second leg of the trip at about 7:15am. We had about 12-13 miles to hike that day, so we knew an early start would allow us to enjoy the scenery and go at an easy pace all day. As we hiked the last bit of the Wildcat Canyon Trail, the temperature raised quite dramatically in a small amount of time. By the time we reached the top of our first short climb of the morning, we were already shedding layers as we noted the temperature had raised about 20-25 degrees. It was going to be another beautiful day!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vrTc-X65_x4CpwNfKHpLSfeGWTOI3TBBqhW9XLklFZdbj34l9OCTFAD9z0DDIJf2zDjUcys69hWpCjvC96CqLP9db-vs0qTdM09Z5-EE7ZCEvfeqW8RaQJ8AT7sS7RhJoUdaFse7kEsi/s1600/1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vrTc-X65_x4CpwNfKHpLSfeGWTOI3TBBqhW9XLklFZdbj34l9OCTFAD9z0DDIJf2zDjUcys69hWpCjvC96CqLP9db-vs0qTdM09Z5-EE7ZCEvfeqW8RaQJ8AT7sS7RhJoUdaFse7kEsi/s320/1.jpg" width="320" /></a></span> <i><span style="color: red;"> </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i><span style="color: red;">Launching early on the Wildcat Canyon Trail</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After finishing the final two miles of Wildcat Canyon, we reached the Lava Point/West Rim junction, where we decided to enjoy our morning feast. We busted out the granola bars, yogurt-covered raisins, fruit leather (kind of like a fruit roll-up) and sat on the trail enjoying the scenery. It was at this point that we realized how few people we had seen thus far on the trip. Considering it was Memorial Day Weekend, and great weather in Zion, we assumed we'd be seeing a lot of people. But as we soon realized, the West Rim (our route) was much less inhabited/popular than the eastern areas of Zion, namely Angel's Landing and The Narrows. On Day #1, we passed a total of two people all day. On Day #2, the busiest stretch of the West Rim, we probably saw 8-10 people all day. And let me tell you, no one in our group was complaining about having one of nature's most beautiful settings all to ourselves.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Lava Point Junction</span></i></span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The West Rim trail is roughly a 10-mile stretch that offered up some of the most gorgeous views of the entire trip. Similar to the day before, we seemed to walk through different ecosystems every mile, from dense trees to desert to meadows. We stopped a couple times for snacks (Julie's favorite part was the "walking buffet") throughout the morning, and then around lunch time we came to Potato Hollow.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpO3jZMMI0Ut51LEiFky_98CuLOsxK5EhGnejm3-FF__ad9vmS84WGDKya0QiRG3iY7HBXU6baEgYQwsZjJA_7229HlzjtXvWJ6AiQXgzspLTbR7jJtymmCYKJ38v-36S2zXCMs-cFzEIZ/s1600/3.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpO3jZMMI0Ut51LEiFky_98CuLOsxK5EhGnejm3-FF__ad9vmS84WGDKya0QiRG3iY7HBXU6baEgYQwsZjJA_7229HlzjtXvWJ6AiQXgzspLTbR7jJtymmCYKJ38v-36S2zXCMs-cFzEIZ/s320/3.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i> </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>Views from the West Rim</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">On our maps, Potato Hollow was designated as the second area of our trip where we would find "flowing" water. After our previous day's experience, we were slightly concerned about what this next watering hole had to offer. We dove down into a meadow and found some standing, incredibly boggy, ugly water. We knew we couldn't pull from this, but were optimistic that a water source had to be nearby. But before we could take another step, a guttural scream emerged from my wife...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"SNAKE! SNAKE! SNAKE!"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We turned around to see Julie and Jennifer backpedaling, looking for the nearest high ground, but the whole time Julie's eyes stayed transfixed on something in the meadow grass. We followed her gaze to see a decent size garter snake laying in the grass, with its head and neck up and poised. Branden, the snake expert of the group, guessed that it had probably been laying on the trail in the sun, felt us coming, then slithered to the tree and was smelling us. That did nothing to calm the nerves of our ladies, and it was at that moment that Branden and I realized that today, we would be finding water on our own.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <span style="color: red;"><i>The meadow right before we saw the snake</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Before I go into what happened next, I want to acknowledge something very odd that happened during that snake sequence. I am not embarrassed to admit that I do not like snakes. I might even go as far as to say that I am scared of them. I never had one as a pet, never tried to chase them as a kid, and other than needles, there is nothing I dislike more. But here's the odd part. As soon as Julie freaked and saw the snake, something about her and Jenn shaking in their boots must have flipped a switch inside me, because before I knew it, I was saying "It's fine. It's just a garter snake. He's not gonna hurt you." I honestly had zero fear of that thing...and I think it was because I had two people ten times more afraid of it than I was. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After the girls politely bowed out from the water search for fear of more serpent sightings, Branden and I did a bit of off-trail bushwhacking with hopes of hearing the sound of flowing water. Well, at first we didn't hear anything, but as we dove deeper into the trees, we came to a huge clearing with an impressive gorge going across the middle of it. As we hiked around it and took some fun photos, we looked down and at the very bottom we saw a pool of water being filled by water funneling down a completely vertical cliff wall. Considering the basin was probably a good 80-100 feet down a sheer gorge, we once again realized we were in for a water challenge. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFcBR997ADysUwdiklrhxVpb5vIi_OsQetPIS-Slj87fz_XvHQTMWRKoL2BqSpjJZQFxW9B-c-Y5Lw3t7G7nZNXAxv5LUwVvKPLETMYvvXgrSonUB3VP7j_I8cWgycJNlzz3gvkwkt2kw9/s1600/6.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFcBR997ADysUwdiklrhxVpb5vIi_OsQetPIS-Slj87fz_XvHQTMWRKoL2BqSpjJZQFxW9B-c-Y5Lw3t7G7nZNXAxv5LUwVvKPLETMYvvXgrSonUB3VP7j_I8cWgycJNlzz3gvkwkt2kw9/s320/6.jpg" width="320" /> </a></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>The gorge we found while searching for water</i></span> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We hiked to the far side near some trees where the water seemed to be leading up to that sheer wall, and with the help of some marshy ground and buzzing bugs, we found what seemed to be the slowest moving "stream" we'd ever seen. It was probably eight inches wide, two inches deep, and was laying at an angle that barely allowed for a water bottle to event fit. Oh, and did I mention that we were on the very <i>edge</i> of the cliff, overlooking that 100ft gorge? At one point, Branden held on to the one tree sitting on the edge of the canyon, and leaned his whole body over the cliff to look down. His wife would have had a panic attack had she seen it, but it goes to show how crazy close to the edge we were seated as we went through this ordeal. After a few lame attempts to find a way to fill the bottles by me, Branden found a small area where we could get about half of a water bottle filled up, which we would then pass through a filter on another bottle, then do it again, then use the purifier on that bottle. Considering we were trying to fill a 4-liter camelback and two 1-liter bottles, suffice to say it took us longer than we would have liked, especially since we were standing on the edge of a cliff.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>See that water? Yeah, that's the cliff we stood on (top left)</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"Flowing" water? Thanks Zion.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After about an hour of hiking the canyon and filtering water, we finally were ready to make our way back to the women-folk. I imagine by that point they had either assumed we were eaten by snakes, or they had eaten all of our food, or both. As we made our trek back, Branden and I hoped that during this long break, the girls had prepared us a chicken pot-pie or something delicious for our efforts. We finally found the girls resting in a shady area, just then breaking out the food for lunch. Alas, there were no pot-pies.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <span style="color: red;"><i>Goofing around at lunch</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After we explained our water adventure to the unimpressed wives (they were hungry), we all sat around in the shade and enjoyed our lunch. During the course of the trip we had discussed how Julie can't handle spicy food, and how she as missing out on one of the best snacks of the trip - soy and wasabi almonds. Well, apparently Branden felt that Julie was <i>really </i>missing out, so at a random moment of distraction, he dove his hand into the bag of wasabi almonds, walked toward Julie, and rubbed his wasabi-covered fingers on her lips. At first we didn't know why he had touched her lips, then he explained, and her face was one of sheer terror as she exclaimed, "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?!" Branden smiled, Julie maniacally wiped her lips off, and Jenn and I rolled on the floor laughing. It was awesome.</span><br />
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<i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Yum!</span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Another odd moment that came during our lunch break was when a group of people passed by, with a very small Asian woman wearing a pink mask to cover her nose and mouth (like a dentist's mask), a handful of plants in her hand, and dragging her trekking poles behind her. First off, it is illegal to pick plants in a national park, and she had enough in her hand to start her own botanical garden. Secondly, her unused trekking poles left such a distinct drag mark on the trail that we could see <i>exactly </i>where she went once we got back on the trail. She was most certainly out-of-place in the wilderness, and we were very curious what convinced this group of people that backpacking was the activity for them. But I digress.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">With our batteries recharged from lunch and our water bottles full, we set off again on the second half of the West Rim. We were immediately faced with the steepest climb of the weekend. Considering we didn't exactly have a full head of steam leading up to this point (on the contrary, we had full stomachs), this climb seemed even more intense than it probably needed to be. But the climb was a great one, with a very steep incline that led us to a viewpoint with some beautiful scenery below us.</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">At the top of the post-lunch climb</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We continued our trek and easy pace all afternoon, stopping at some incredible canyons and bluffs looking out at the red cliffs and canyons of Zion. A couple more decent climbs broke up the hike very nicely, and throughout the whole time we were able to follow the trekking pole drag marks of our masked friend from before. As we made our climbs, Jennifer entertained us with her fully memorized rendition of the hilarious AT&T commercials featuring the four kids at a small table talking to the male facilitator. Her imitation of the young girl talking about being a werewolf was spot on, and equally hilarious material for a long hike.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>Jenn's rendition of this girl is classic</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">At the top of our last climb, we came to the junction leading us off the main West Rim Trail and onto the Scenic Rim where we would find our campsite for the evening. We were even more pleased when we found that the site was only about 50 yards away from the junction, arriving there at 2:30pm. We had made it! With multiple breaks for breakfast, lunch, snacks, water filtering and photos, we hiked 12.5 miles in seven hours. A pretty solid days work!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The awesome relief that comes with finishing a long hike was enhanced even more when we came to our campsite. It was a beautiful clearing, with a perfect area for cooking, another flat area for our tents, and since our hike ended at the top of a huge climb, we were set up atop the canyon overlooking all the surrounding areas. It was absolutely perfect.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><i>Our amazing campground</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">With some tired feet and tired bodies, we set up the tents, and like clockwork, the girls dove into the tents for their 3:00pm nap-time. I seriously think the clock struck 3pm and they fell asleep. And this time, they slept for 2.5 hours, leaving Branden and I some quality time overlooking the canyon's edge, talking about anything and everything, all while taking in all the sights and sounds Zion had to offer. Easily one of the best moments of the trip (no offense to the wives).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">With our stomachs starting to rumble, we woke up the girls and told them we were going to start dinner soon. Julie and Jenn took over cooking duties for the second straight night, and like the night before, we were going to experiment with another dehydrated meal courtesy of Branden and Jenn. This time we had a pesto pasta that was excellent, and we followed it up with a chocolate mousse and graham cracker dessert, as well as a couple dehydrated ice cream bars (aka "Astronaut Ice Cream"). After 12.5 miles of hiking, it's easy to say that <i>anything</i> tastes good, but let me tell you...this meal was the real deal.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <i><span style="color: red;">Dinner time!</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After some dish cleaning and changing into some warmer clothes, the four of us headed to the bluff to enjoy the sunset, with the sun casting beautiful orange and red colors onto the canyon backdrop. It was much warmer on this night, and we stayed up until long after the sun had set before we made our way to the tents to crash for the night. There was a collective sigh as our four heads hit our pillows simultaneously, and other than a few stray Frito-sounds, we were done.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Taking in the sunset</span></span></i></span></div>
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</b></span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>NEXT UP</b></span> - We finish our 27-mile trek, find all the day hikers, "do the wiggle", strip off our clothes, and oh yeah - have a hell of a time finding water.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-13902334994927933962013-05-30T09:02:00.000-07:002013-05-30T09:02:30.349-07:00ZION BACKPACKING PART #2 - Where We Define "Flowing"<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
With the exception of Miss Julie, each of us woke up Saturday morning feeling as if we had barely slept at all. Oh wait, we hadn't. Damn stove.</div>
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After taking our turns enjoying the luxuries of showers and indoor plumbing for the last time for three days, we set out for the Zion Canyon Visitor Center, where we would pick up our permits, check for any last minute information, and leave one vehicle (our hike would end at this spot on Monday). We wanted to get on the trail ASAP, so we got to the visitor center just after the doors opened at 7:00am, only to find a line of about eight people already waiting! Considering we were still in need of a campsite for one of the two nights, a shot of obvious panic went across my face. Branden saw it, settled me down, and basically acted like a mom and said "Everything is going to be alright." Good ol' Branden.</div>
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While we stood in line, we looked up at the boards on the wall that gave updated information on the water levels of the various streams in the park, three of which we planned to visit. Our three streams and springs were labeled "flowing", which was excellent news, considering the other levels were "trickle" and "not moving." Perfect, there is plenty of water on the hike each day and we have planned our campsites properly to be near water each night. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief. </div>
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If only it had lasted.</div>
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Once we made our way through the line, we got our permits for the wilderness campsites we needed, left our rental car in the lot, and jumped into the $60 Priceline Negotiator Jeep Wrangler to drive 45 minutes to our launch point - Wildcat Canyon Trailhead.</div>
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<i style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">A decent map of our 3-day route. We started at Wildcat Canyon Trailhead (left)</span></i></div>
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Once we got to our launch point, we strapped on our packs, took the obligatory "before" photos, then wasted no time hitting the trail.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Away we go!</i> </div>
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This first day would be our shortest hike from trailhead to campsite, so we decided to add a couple miles on to the route by taking a side trip over to Northgate Peaks. This proved to be an excellent choice, as it offered us one of the most beautiful views of the entire trip, as well as the first of many snack breaks! Homemade granola bars, yogurt covered raisins, Biltong jerky, dried fruit, Wasabi & Soy Sauce Almonds and trail mix with Peanut Butter M&M's! It will come as no surprise that snack time quickly became Julie's favorite part of backpacking. The view was beautiful, and it didn't take long before Jenn started comparing the landscape to that of the animated movie "Cars."<br />
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<i style="color: red;">"Cars Land"</i> </div>
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<i><span style="color: red;">Snack time!</span></i> </div>
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We navigated our way back to the main trail, and Jennifer's unique talent of making anything into a song entertained us for much of the hike. The rest of the hike was beautiful, with the landscape and wildlife changing seemingly every mile. We crossed from pine cones to cactus, and sand to dense trees. It was truly an amazing sight.</div>
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<i><span style="color: red;">Enjoying every step.</span></i></div>
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As we neared the end of our hike, we came across a small trickle of water coming down off of a hill with lots of greenery. We knew we must be close to the main water source on the map, so we continued down into the river basin where we would find the flowing water from Sawmill Springs. And we never found it. Not a drop. Oh yeah, that little trickle of water on the hill that I mentioned? Yep, that was <i>it.</i> Luckily, I have skinny enough arms that I was able to shove the water bottles into a narrow crack in the hill that had a solid funnel effect and fill them up. Really Zion Visitor Center? This is "flowing"?<br />
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Worst part was, that was the most accessible running water we would encounter the whole trip. <br />
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<i style="color: red;">Wait, there has to be water </i><i style="color: red;">somewhere!</i></div>
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At the bottom of the hill we found an amazing clearing that had obviously been inhabited by campers before us, and we jumped at the opportunity to set up camp in such a pristine campsite. It was only a short walk away from our "water source", which made it that much more desirable. So we dropped our packs, opened up the food for a lunch of tortillas, peanut butter and Nutella, and sat in a beautiful open area of the basin. After lunch, it didn't take long before Jennifer showed off an incredible talent - falling asleep in a 2-legged chair. Now, when I say 2-legged chair, I mean a special backpacking chair that requires the use of your feet as the other two legs, balancing the existing back legs of the chair. It was one of the many pieces of equipment that Branden and Jenn were testing for their John Muir Trail adventure, and despite the fact that it was hard to get in and out of, Jenn found no problem using it as her personal siesta-chair.<br />
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<i><span style="color: red;">Girl is talented.</span></i> </div>
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Once the chair snoozer woke up from her post-lunch snooze, we set up our tents, air mattresses and sleeping bags around 3pm. Well, it didn't take long before the two girls were inside the tents laying down, and fully asleep. Nap time became another backpacking favorite of the ladies. It also was the first time Branden and Jenn got to use their new sleeping pads, which, although extremely warm and comfortable, when rolled on they had an eerily similar sound as someone rolling around on a bag of Frito's.<br />
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<i style="color: red;">Campsite in Wildcat Canyon</i> </div>
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While the girls slept, Branden and I made a couple trips to the <i>flowing water source</i> so we would have enough for dinner and cleanup. On our way up, something caught my eye and I looked up just in time to see a bobcat run up and then dart into the bushes. This would be the first of a series of random animal sightings.</div>
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Finally, it was time for the most anticipated part of the day - dinner! Remember, Branden and Jenn cooked and dehydrated all of the meals themselves, and the menu for the first night was a meat lasagna, and it was THE BOMB DOT COM! A+ for effort. A+ for taste! We followed up the meal with a store-bought raspberry/chocolate crumble cobbler. Oh man, I could have eaten four bags of that stuff.</div>
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With full stomachs, clean dishes, <i>flowing water</i> nearby, birds chirping and the cool night air upon us, we decided to turn in for the night. I will tell you, there is nothing more relaxing than staring up at the stars through your tent, listening to the wind through the trees, the chirping of birds and bugs...and the sound of your friends doing barrel rolls on a bunch of Frito bags.<br />
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Paradise.</div>
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<b style="color: red;">NEXT UP</b> - The girls encounter a snake, we hike the West Rim, and go in search of...you guessed it...WATER!</div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-73659635818044200612013-05-29T15:30:00.004-07:002013-05-29T15:33:46.435-07:00ZION BACKPACKING PART #1 - Planning, Priceline and Propane<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Last weekend, the wife and I took to the backcountry as we joined two friends on a 3-day backpacking trip in <a href="http://www.nps.gov/zion/index.htm" target="_blank">Zion National Park</a>. We hiked 27 miles over Memorial Day weekend, had ridiculously perfect weather, and enjoyed some of the most beautiful scenery nature has to offer. What follows is a four-part anecdotal recap of our adventure...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">As a bit of background, I did a ton of backpacking as a kid, with my step-dad always taking charge of the planning and mapping of the trip's itinerary. With the wife now expressing interest in the activity, I am now finding out what it was my step-dad was doing all those years! Under normal circumstances, I would have my Eagle Scout buddy Branden and his wife Jennifer help plan the trip...but considering they were in the middle of job interviews, selling their house, searching for a new one, and moving from Washington D.C. to the Bay Area <i>the week before the trip</i>, they didn't exactly have spare time. Which meant...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I was on my own...gulp.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So as you can imagine, by the time the trip came around, I was equal parts excited and nervous, just hoping that I hadn't forgotten some obvious permit, rental car or equipment detail that would derail our trip. And for those of you that know how OCD I am, you can imagine how many times I called the Zion Canyon Visitor Center, double-checked the hotel reservation, and made sure we had every conceivable box checked. I will say thought, despite being very busy, Branden took the time to share his "Master Packing Spreadsheet" online, so we were able to see who would be bringing what. This was a huge help...almost. More on that a bit later.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The other interesting part of this trip was that Branden and Jenn had big plans to go hike the entire John Muir Trail in August (about 2.5-3 week trip). Because of that, they had a lot of stuff they wanted to test out, including tents, chairs, sanitary wipes, and most importantly, food. They wanted to know what meals were worth bringing and which should stay home. But these two aren't your average backpackers. They have their own food dehydrator, so instead of purchasing pre-packaged meals at REI, they cooked all our meals, dehydrated them and packed them, so we could be their personal taste-testers in Zion. Oh wait, did I tell you that they were <i>moving across the country </i>the week leading up to the trip?! #dedicatedbackpackers</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <i style="color: red;">Meet Branden & Jenn, the stud backpackers</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So, despite my nerves, Julie and I took off Friday afternoon and flew to Las Vegas, where we then rented a car and drove the 2.5 hours to our hotel in Springdale, Utah. Along the way we stopped at a local Big 5 so we could get propane (since it's a big-time "no-no" to fly with butane and/or propane tanks on airplane). Remember this sentence, it <i>might </i>become an issue later. After a quick dinner stop, we headed to our hotel in Zion.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Now, due to their crazy new schedule, Branden and Jenn weren't going to arrive in Utah until about 1:00-1:30am. So Julie and I figured we would check in, get our packs ready for the morning launch, fall asleep, and then begrudgingly open one eye as our friends popped in well past our bedtime. We checked into the hotel and were given our room number, so we made the trek up the stairs with our packs, and started looking for our room. A younger couple obviously on their way back from the pool walked in front of us, and as we came to our assigned room, the shirtless guy in front of me puts his room key in <i>my door </i>and it opens! Wait, what the hell? Apparently our slightly tired and awkward hotel front desk attendant gave us the wrong room keys. Now my question is - what if we had showed up 15 seconds later? Those two would have been undressing from their wet bathing suits in their room, and we would have walked right in to see all their glory! Opportunity missed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After we got our <i>correct </i>room keys, we settled in and it wasn't long before Julie passed out. Soon after, Branden called to let me know they had landed in Vegas and had just got their rental car. And apparently Jenn is one bad-ass negotiator, cuz somehow she ended up with a Jeep Wrangler for $60...total. As she said..."PRICELINE NEGOTIATOR!"</span><br />
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<i>This is how you get a Jeep for $60</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Anyway, since I was ready to go to sleep, Branden and I talked briefly about the game-plan for the next morning, including what time we were waking up, how we needed to spread some of the weight across our four backpacks, and how long it would take to get our permits. During that conversation, Branden casually said, "And since you brought the JetBoil stove and bought propane, we'll carry the food." And then this happened...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: cyan;">Me</b> - "Uhhh...I'm bringing the stove? Our master spreadsheet says you're bringing it."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: lime;">Branden</b> - "You're joking right?"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: cyan;">Me</b> - "No, I'm dead serious. I do not have a stove. The spreadsheet said you're bringing it." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: lime;">Branden</b> - "Uh, no it doesn't. You were supposed to bring it."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: cyan;">Me</b> (voice escalating) - "NO. I printed it out and <i>am looking at it right now</i> and it says you were going to bring it."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: lime;">Branden</b> (not quite convinced) - "You were buying the propane so I figured you were...wait, hold on...crap."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b style="color: cyan;">Me</b> - (silence)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">After a bit of ranting, self-loathing, slow realizations that no camping store is open at 11:30pm, and ill-fated discussions about living off of granola bars for 3 days, we then realized that WalMart is open 24/7 and sells camping stoves. So instead of coming straight to the hotel, Branden and Jenn made the unenviable late-night trip to pick up a stove. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">At midnight. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">At WalMart. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Now <i>those</i> are some great friends.</span><br />
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<i><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Branden not happy about the midnight WalMart run</span></span></i><span style="color: red;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The tired couple finally arrived at the hotel (with stove) around 2:30am. They put down their bags, used the restroom, grunted in my general direction, and passed out. No words necessary - we had a big trip ahead, and within minutes of being in Utah, we had already had to make a late night stove run.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">If this was any indication of how a Marc-planned backpacking trip was going to proceed, we were all screwed. With that daunting thought in mind, we all held our collective breath as we turned off the lights and went to sleep. I stared at the ceiling, filled with anxiety about messing this trip up for everyone, and just hoped that my over-the-top paranoia-planning method was thorough enough to get us by. Would it?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Stay tuned for the next post, where we get the permits, hit the trail, and have serious doubts about the National Park's definition of "flowing water sources"...</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-28224454431712619802013-05-10T10:31:00.003-07:002013-05-10T10:31:46.529-07:00My Current Obsession - Music<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I have been listening to a lot of different genres of music lately, and have created some pretty awesome Pandora stations in the process.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">My go-to station right now is Pinback. I know, I know...not exactly current or hip for 2013. But nonetheless, the music that comes out of the Pinback Pandora station is perfect for everything...sitting at desk at work, driving home, going for a run (not that I do that, but I imagine it would be great for that too).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">And before I get into the new bands I've found, I find it necessary to give a shout-out to my musical adviser, former roommate and fort-extraordinaire, Matt C, who introduced me to Pinback many moons ago. I mean, who doesn't love this song...</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><b><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Pinback - <i>Penelope</i></span></b></span></div>
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/whDxCpxrkTc?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I have "discovered" some great bands along the way. Granted, they are all pretty mainstream to people who listen to this type of music, but I have never in my life claimed to be hip at all, so this is all very exciting for me. Here's a list of some of my favorite bands I've been exposed to over the past few months (and a sample song from each):</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The Xx - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PElhV8z7I60" target="_blank"><i>The Islands</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ratatat - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64liF2VuLxI" target="_blank"><i>Loud Pipes</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Little People - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkwPVkPbWzU" target="_blank"><i>Basique</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Blackmill - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JSqHKk_QPI" target="_blank"><i>Spirit of Life</i></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">But by far, my favorite new song that I've been exposed to is from Martin Solveig. This song rocks. Enjoy...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>Martin Solveig - <i>The Night Out</i></b></span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So yeah, that's what I've been listening to. Any other bands I should check out?</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-80293332803715904852013-05-01T15:12:00.002-07:002013-05-01T15:16:32.940-07:00What Ever Happened to...<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I'd like to introduce a new blog segment on Livin the Dream called "What Ever Happened to...?" where I ask about someone who used to be popular (or well-known enough) who has potentially fallen off the face of the earth. Or even better, is still popular in the world, thus further proving how "un-hip" I am.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">For this week's edition, I ask...</span><br />
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<span style="color: cyan;"><b><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">What Ever Happened to...Tatyana Ali?!</span></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Now, most of you that are my age probably know her as cute little Ashley Banks from <i>The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, </i>and rightfully so. But when <i>I</i> think of Tatyana Ali...<i> </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i>This </i>is what I remember...(click the image, I promise it won't disappoint)</span><br />
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<a href="http://vimeo.com/62413601" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWdgi8Kof235ruXxF7BUw3eCR53y-TkJP71TVbzTRg71WrRiHzjortV7u-C3CwFKuEh8Oe3cM9OJzzXQCQHF5Vvwc2A6k9eZa47igL6QLSTEwHqmBw1PQuv6kgq0_k390m_HGU5bwdyOiW/s1600/tayana.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><a href="http://vimeo.com/62413601" target="_blank">"Daydreamin" (1998)</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Talk about an old-school <i>jam!</i> I mean, just that "bow-bow-bow" beat still gets me 15 years later! Girl had some old school, wannabe dance-moves, a great sound engineer, and some fly-girls, and that's all she needed to create this gem, which, for the record, peaked at #6 on the Billboard Top 100 in 1998.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Oh, and by the way, she has her Bachelor's Degree from Harvard, was a spokesperson for Obama in his 2008 campaign, and now finds herself acting with the Wayans Brothers (Craig & Damien) in <i>Second Generation Wayans </i>on BET.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So overall, I'd say she is..."daydreamin" about 1998.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Who says I can't make jokes?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">P.S. - Today's post dedicated to Tom B.</span></div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-75632938852418597782013-04-26T14:43:00.001-07:002013-04-26T14:43:23.765-07:00Who Are All You People?!<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">So one of the most common things you have seen me ask over the years on this blog has been "Does anyone even read this thing?" Well, unbeknownst to me, this blog software allows me to go in and see how many times my blog has been viewed, and can even see which blog posts have the most viewers. Now, having started this blog back in May 2008, I figure five years of data is enough for me to find out if this blog attracts anything other than my wife, my mom, and random people Google-searching keywords that include "living + the + dream."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">And after looking at all the analytics and data, what did I discover...?</span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><b><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">YOU PEOPLE MUST HAVE NO LIVES!</span></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Over the five years, I have had a total of <span style="color: cyan;"><b>73,632 pageviews</b></span>. No, that's not a typo, and yes, I have been checked for vision problems <i>and</i> mental illness. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Seriously, how did this happen? There are only two possible explanations...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Option #1 - I AM AWESOME! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Or...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: cyan;"><b>THE REAL EXPLANATION</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Apparently my blog has been read enough that over the years, it has become a popular search result in search engine results for some frequent keyword searches. Below I have copy/pasted the reader statistics as it pertains to the most popular posts over the past five years. Looks like a lot of people are searching board games, Halloween, and candy!</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikKoSzF_GzOGh-eS3Q4bwHhyphenhyphen5b4WZayDpjAReoZsVHIPbZed8vsdnqWHE1WFyQumpF5OFvr08Aq_fCMsi5m_TiW4Mm-3pY5kxGZ8_g0yeVFV8B16_0PzvwY-aGSZv5V6EPY-cEhKGlB9Qp/s1600/blog_stats+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="456" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikKoSzF_GzOGh-eS3Q4bwHhyphenhyphen5b4WZayDpjAReoZsVHIPbZed8vsdnqWHE1WFyQumpF5OFvr08Aq_fCMsi5m_TiW4Mm-3pY5kxGZ8_g0yeVFV8B16_0PzvwY-aGSZv5V6EPY-cEhKGlB9Qp/s640/blog_stats+copy.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Not sure what all this means, but I guess it's enough to keep me writing! Leave a comment with your thoughts on what all this means. And now that I have these stats...I know you're out there, so leave a comment!</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-67304089193973894932013-04-22T13:31:00.000-07:002013-04-22T13:32:20.273-07:00Backpacking - Retro Diary - Day #2<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">What follows is a retro-diary of Day #2 of our overnight backpacking adventure to the Laguna Mountains in eastern San Diego. <a href="http://livinthedream11.blogspot.com/2013/04/mrs-living-dream-goes-backpacking.html">Click here for Day #1</a>!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: cyan;"><b>BACKPACKING RETRO-DIARY - DAY #2</b></span> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>4:10-6:30am</b></span> - I spend most of the time staring out the tent, not sleeping great, and listening to the wind. The wife apparently loves the sound of wind, cuz it knocked her right out.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>6:45am</b></span> - I roll over to face Julie, and with her eyes wide open (obviously having been awake for a few minutes already), she shrieks "HI!" I have never seen anyone so excited and so happy that early in the morning, after sleeping overnight in a tent. Only my wife.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>6:46am</b></span> - Julie's hungry.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>6:55am</b></span> - With the local streams not high enough to run water through our hiking route, we had to maintain enough water for the hike out, so unfortunately had to opt out of our morning oatmeal and hot chocolate, and just settle for more trail mix, dried fruit, and PB&J tortillas. I was a little bummed about this, as I had called the wilderness office two days prior and they told me two different creeks where we could stop for water on our two-day trek. Both proved to be bone-dry. I still blame myself.<span style="color: red;"><b> </b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:10am</b></span> - After temporarily quelling the storm that is Julie's stomach, it was time to start breaking down camp. And once again, since Julie had never camped before, this was another new experience. She enthusiastically jumped in and helped un-stake the tent, take out the poles, fold up the tent and tarp and stuff the bag. Sounds pretty uneventful, but she did it smiling and loving every minute of it. So glad she was enjoying it!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:20am</b></span> - After repacking our packs, making sure snacks were easily accessible for the wife, we did one more lap around the campsite to make sure we had everything. Julie said her goodbyes, and we set off for for the final five miles of our 11-mile loop.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:21am</b></span> - Julie's hungry...just kidding. I was just getting used to typing that.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:40am</b></span> - We finish the Pine Mountain portion of the trail, jump across Pioneer Mail picnic area and hook up with the Pacific Crest Trail for the final four miles of the hike. This was by far my favorite portion of the two-day trip, with some incredible ecosystem changes along the way. We saw all types of landscapes over the two days, including desert, tall oaks, tons of manzanita bushes, chaparral, huge rock piles and more...it was so diverse. Really interesting to have all of those unique ecosystems co-exist within miles of each other.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:55am</b></span> - "SCAT!" </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>8:15am</b></span> -</span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> We reach the top of one of the first portions of our trail and are treated to a magnificent view across the mountain, deep valleys and tree-covered hillsides to the northeast. We had some amazing views of San Gorgonio Mountain and San Jacinto Peak. It was the first time we really had amazing views during the weekend, and Julie was awestricken with the sight. I was really happy we had this opportunity, because I spent most of my backpacking days in the Sierras, where every new lake and mountain had breathtaking views, and I didn't want Julie to think that we were never gonna see something like that! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>8:18am</b></span> - After snapping some photos from the peak, we continue on the trail, turn the corner to head back west, and...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>8:19am</b></span> - HOLY HELL! As soon as we turned that corner we got absolutely blasted with wind. I mean, it was gusting harder than I have ever hiked in before. My floppy bucket hat started slapping me in the face, the straps on our backpacks fluttered everywhere, and any time a particularly large gust came through, I swear I saw Julie physically get moved off her path as it took the collective weight of her and her backpack into a different zip code. At this point we were about halfway into the PCT, so we had two miles to go, and virtually all of it was uphill and into the wind.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>8:30am</b></span> - I hear giggling behind me. Julie thinks this wind is hilarious, and she starts talking about how fun this is. I love my wife.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>8:50am </b></span>- After having our heads looking straight down to cut the wind for about half an hour, I finally pull off the trail toward a peak for a quick view of some more valleys. We talked about how fun of an adventure this was, and even more so with the wind. We weren't letting anything put a damper on the experience, and were so happy to be backpacking.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9:10am</b></span> - We turn a corner, the wind dies down, and we see the road up ahead! And soon enough, we see the car! Wow, this hike didn't take us nearly as long we planned. We're back at the start and it's barely 9:00am!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9:20am</b></span> - The packs are off. The boots are off. The smelly clothes are off. We're in the car. We're happy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">It was a great first trip for Julie, and I'm excited to build on it from here. I'm excited for her to go on a multiple night adventure, camp near lakes and streams, do some fishing, and be able to lounge around in a picturesque area. This was a great starting point, and I think it's only going to get better from here!</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-43362542440579519732013-04-19T10:53:00.001-07:002013-04-19T10:56:46.718-07:00"Mrs. Living the Dream" Goes Backpacking...<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So, last weekend I took the wife on a one-night backpacking trip to the Laguna Mountains in eastern San Diego. It was her first backpacking trip of any kind, and suffice to say leading up to it she had tons of questions...most of which revolved around food, meals, and food.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We had been talking about a backpacking trip for quite some time, and about a year ago we decided that we wanted REI to be one of our wedding registry sites. What better way to get her outfitted with the camping and backpacking gear she needs, and for me to get some new toys?! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So now, with all the water filters, trekking poles, sporks and bug juice we needed (and a rare open weekend for both of us), the plans were made. I got us set up with our permits with the local Cleveland National Forest, and after making a few more REI runs (duh), we were ready to introduce Julie to the world of backpacking.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">While making our drive out to the trailhead, I was very curious how Julie would enjoy the adventure, how she would handle the outdoor elements of camping, and how she would do with access to way less food than she's used to! What follows are some of the highlights of Julie's First Backpacking Adventure...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: cyan;"><b>BACKPACKING RETRO-DIARY - DAY #1</b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9:30am</b></span> - We hit the trail for our 6-mile hike on Day #1.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9:32am</b></span> - Julie already asks when lunch is.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>9:40am</b></span> - Julie has already managed make the trip completely girly by using the words "cuddle" and "snuggle" in reference to sleeping in the tent. Of all the things she would get excited about on this journey, it always went back to two things: food and snuggling.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:00am</b></span> - She has now added the word "cute" to her verbal repertoire in describing the animals she might see on the trip. I'll tell ya, you never feel more manly on a camping trip when your wife uses the words "snuggle", "cuddle", and "cute" in the first 30 minutes of a backpacking trip.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:01am</b></span> - I make the grave realization that I've never been on a camping or backpacking trip with a girl before...and instantly start wondering what I'd got myself into.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:18am</b></span> - Julie discovers her favorite word of the trip - "SCAT!" Yep, scat.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:30am</b></span> - We hit our first trail junction, from Noble Canyon to Indian Creek. We're making great time, we're both feeling good, and we haven't even had to stop for snacks yet.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:32am</b></span> - We stop for snacks.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>10:45am</b></span> - After climbing out of a small river valley, we get to the first steep climb of the hike. During this portion, Julie discovers one of her second favorite word of the trip - "SWITCHBACK!" Once again, the capital letters and exclamation point are necessary in accurately portraying her excitement.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>11:15am</b></span> - We take a side trail for a quick jaunt over to a peak known as "Champagne Pass." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>11:16am</b></span> - Julie is sad to find out there is no champagne.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>11:25am</b></span> - We hit our second trail junction, from Indian Creek to Pine Mountain. Julie looks like she hasn't shed a drop of sweat. She's a champ.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>12:00pm</b></span> - We start looking for a good place to set up camp, with some bushwhacking involved.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>12:04pm</b></span> - Julie realizes she doesn't like bushwhacking.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>12:30pm</b></span> - We find a great hidden site with plenty of room for tent, cooking and some nearby bouldering.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>12:31pm</b></span> - Julie makes the executive decision that we eat lunch first, then set up camp. So she got her first experience with PB&J on tortillas for lunch. Add some trail mix and dried fruit, and she was a happy girl.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>12:45pm</b></span> - Julie learns how to set up a tent!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>1:00-4:30pm</b></span> - We go on a short little day-hike in search of water, realize none of the streams are full (more on this in the next post), find some more scat, play some cribbage in the tent, take a little siesta, and Julie talks incessantly about dinner.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:15pm</b></span> - Julie waits long enough and convinces me to fire up the stove for dinner. After picking out some dehydrated Pad See Ew from REI a few days earlier, she was ready to get her first taste of "camping food." So I bust out our brand new JetBoil stove setup, find a non-windy area, light a match, and...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:16pm</b></span> - Julie is shocked how quickly the water boils. She is now totally sold on JetBoils.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:17pm</b></span> - Julie is slightly disappointed when she realizes now the water has to sit in the food package for 13 minutes before it's ready.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:20pm</b></span> - She has already looked at her watch ten times.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:29pm</b></span> - She is staring at this package like a lion stalking its prey. Drool ensues.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:30pm</b></span> - She opens, she stirs, she conquers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>5:45pm</b></span> - It begins to cool off, so we transition to our long-sleeve shirts and beanies, and I tell Julie to pull out the flashlights and headlamps so we don't have to look for them later in the dark. She heard that as, "YAY, I GET TO WEAR MY HEADLAMP!" So she wore it for the rest of the day, including in daylight.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>6:30pm</b></span> - The sun goes down, the wind picks up, the girl gets cold. We head to the tent, play some cribbage and chat, and enjoy the warmth.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:15pm</b></span> - I fire up the JetBoil for some dessert hot chocolate, and it is without question, Julie's favorite moment of the whole trip. She thought it was the most amazing hot chocolate ever.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:16pm</b></span> - We're freezing so we go back in tent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: red;"><b>7:45pm</b></span> - Julie discovers all the fun parts of a mummy bag, including covering her whole head.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjULkUXzoOkvmh_uv-Rj6cQ_T4la2B5VoX_866nUSt1EKC6n7FU7puCLlE5Xj65-X9Qc-gLOAiqR9a1R8a1wLHWjNkQzclwZB6FLIx4oobyT6vxr_WdyHlqWscL6-LZmjLYBYiDVXETNbhj/s1600/b8.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjULkUXzoOkvmh_uv-Rj6cQ_T4la2B5VoX_866nUSt1EKC6n7FU7puCLlE5Xj65-X9Qc-gLOAiqR9a1R8a1wLHWjNkQzclwZB6FLIx4oobyT6vxr_WdyHlqWscL6-LZmjLYBYiDVXETNbhj/s320/b8.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><b><span style="color: red;">8:15pm</span> </b>- Julie forgets she's playing and falls asleep.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Thus ends the first day of Mrs. Living the Dream's backpacking adventure. Stay tuned for the Day #2 post, where we talk more about food, break down the tent, hit the Pacific Crest Trail, and battle one hell of a windstorm!</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-11317664447108605722013-04-03T14:24:00.001-07:002013-04-03T14:24:28.818-07:00I Can't Stand It When...(An Original Rant)<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">It has been a very long time since I went on a full-fledged rant on this blog. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">That changes today.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: cyan;"><b>"I Can't Stand It When..." </b></span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfJB-2BcYbLbLM6iRMc8qN4nKrLCzINCnsVimrOruMT6t3AqsDPrHuoNsWTn6qSATqteXHzoeawlzWUUhjJ4TuK8WlyhVffv9nzmDB2rp2hVtCSVL6WrDnpLsJD0jZfoBX84H7-Gp4iBg/s1600/birdpoo.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="98" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfJB-2BcYbLbLM6iRMc8qN4nKrLCzINCnsVimrOruMT6t3AqsDPrHuoNsWTn6qSATqteXHzoeawlzWUUhjJ4TuK8WlyhVffv9nzmDB2rp2hVtCSVL6WrDnpLsJD0jZfoBX84H7-Gp4iBg/s200/birdpoo.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>...a bird decides to take target practice on my windshield overnight, so when I finally get back to the car 12 hours later and want to run the windshield wipers, it ends up spreading the dried butt-bullets across the entire windshield. Then you end up wasting half of your damn washer fluid</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">just to rub out the mess you just spread...it probably would have been cleaner to just leave the dodo-doodoo untouched! The only thing worse than that is when they actually hit the wipers themselves, because every time I run them after that, it just creates a new white smear across a previously clean windshield. Bastard Butt Birds.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipafEbhwsZ5a7I6Ok1bmFkj2oUP7WcPaqK9nn5Bu4JbInRR4-5iKS94ixkRgiqokuhzv66UHCsbsCm7qzQuZuLn1OafUbMI0OE4HBx1RvRNFr8xzAIJ8WrakHPlWbBOxPxNV1lLsqSzSUz/s1600/ref.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipafEbhwsZ5a7I6Ok1bmFkj2oUP7WcPaqK9nn5Bu4JbInRR4-5iKS94ixkRgiqokuhzv66UHCsbsCm7qzQuZuLn1OafUbMI0OE4HBx1RvRNFr8xzAIJ8WrakHPlWbBOxPxNV1lLsqSzSUz/s200/ref.jpg" width="132" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>...sports fans solely blame the referees for the outcome of a game. I understand that a game can come down to the wire, and that referees are capable of completely blowing a call, including the last play of the game in a tie ballgame. But don't one person tell me that the sole reason their team lost was because of <i>one play</i> at the end of the game. You're telling me as part of your team's game-plan, you planned on turning the ball over 14 times, missing 11 free throws and shooting 38% from the court? Or that you planned to leave those eight runners on base? Or that you were planning on throwing two interceptions and fumbling in the first quarter? Please. The only way I will <i>ever </i>accept that a single call was the sole reason for a change in outcome is if your basketball team shoots 100% from the floor, 100% from the foul line, doesn't turn the ball over, and has at least 10 steals. In that case, I believe you played the perfect game and if a ref blows a call at your team's expense - I'll give it to you. If that doesn't happen...and it never will...then spare me. (Be happy I kept this under ten pages)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizOoDfw52KBPeoXJJCuUv_S6yVXctaPq8tHVipg6zh4a5-ekSkJlL9tsMF-ObiAeC2UZXOuP5xDGJEf9BHw2eRMmJpJGLNTkmidgQ6j_Yz5EUKTuKnWe06jf7T7gPiwxyllToKjeFzdu5u/s1600/busy.gif" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="157" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizOoDfw52KBPeoXJJCuUv_S6yVXctaPq8tHVipg6zh4a5-ekSkJlL9tsMF-ObiAeC2UZXOuP5xDGJEf9BHw2eRMmJpJGLNTkmidgQ6j_Yz5EUKTuKnWe06jf7T7gPiwxyllToKjeFzdu5u/s200/busy.gif" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>...someone calls me at the office during a blatantly obvious busy time and says "Hey, I know you're swamped right now, but...", and then asks for me to do something that is completely unimportant and a total waste of time. I mean, you just admitted yourself that you know I'm swamped at work, but you still felt it necessary to call and ask if I can change your username and password on our website because you don't like the name? Oh yes, please let me drop all the papers currently covering my desk (which, those of you that know me well, know that I hate having loose papers on my desk) so I can tell you what the date is for an event <i>next year</i> because you're worried about conflicts with your family ski trip. If the sentence starts with "I know you're swamped...", it should end with "so good luck" or one hell of a problem.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU2g1-3XeDZ7pC-XqePaRimqkwPpJVJX0xmFKALJhwweD87YqW_ffalyCFBahpKF-_i44vai3BCP4C7LIHRu-qalGYNoIbpRyvNN28G6-FEDyLoynfbEMk8J8I-YrorQh5Sq0TOfAwqs6H/s1600/phonenumber.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="149" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU2g1-3XeDZ7pC-XqePaRimqkwPpJVJX0xmFKALJhwweD87YqW_ffalyCFBahpKF-_i44vai3BCP4C7LIHRu-qalGYNoIbpRyvNN28G6-FEDyLoynfbEMk8J8I-YrorQh5Sq0TOfAwqs6H/s200/phonenumber.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>...someone you don't know leaves you a voicemail, and when they get to the point where they say their number, they do it in the most bizarre cadence in history. There is a standard cadence and grouping that we are all accustomed to when it comes to phone numbers. The good ol' 3-3-4. You know - the area code, first three, and last four. But then there are some people who missed the whole friggin' memo. An example would best illustrate this. "Hey Marc, it's Joe Schmuck. My number is 7-1843-25-312. Call me back." <i>Yeah, cuz that's gonna happen.</i> As soon as he pauses at "7", I get thrown off, and by the time he finishes, I'm not sure if he gave me a phone number or his Social Security Number. Cripes.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeN9zolj4-18xM92_NuBjs-9E9WYWEOM_-z6LTeH3UZuPgq-YXam3XKehhNTyT5m2RW7F377bMVHPj19gbQvUfcVL9SG-sRf2K_zzEPBU9kY6ak0IQO7lt9M-oCU1r13WP2Koa9NJZBCAC/s1600/cheesegrater.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeN9zolj4-18xM92_NuBjs-9E9WYWEOM_-z6LTeH3UZuPgq-YXam3XKehhNTyT5m2RW7F377bMVHPj19gbQvUfcVL9SG-sRf2K_zzEPBU9kY6ak0IQO7lt9M-oCU1r13WP2Koa9NJZBCAC/s200/cheesegrater.jpg" width="115" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"></span>...I have to wash a cheese grater. I feel like there is no successful way to do it without missing some cheese or grating my knuckles. I actually don't mind the outside grater so much as I do the inside of the block. On the outside I just rub the sponge <i>with</i> the grain of the holes and it gets the cheese smudges out. But what about those little danglers that then go inside and adhere to the inside of the block? The cheese grater is too narrow for me to reach the top of the inside, so I just blindly rub the sponge everywhere I can reach, and hope that no rebel cheddar is hiding. Ugh. I'm OCD, I know. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAn0GkjtHxgmXaEYFztswWql0NlZyN8ksn1jFu3qCNt7IboBWxoRU4Hg1GmqbMDouNbsee7PIf8srOo_rlVbpYBMtfye_JvQohkAlGp3de2CmNxgX1G3hm7_rkM6NJ9fEMGWcfXZVWkQ6F/s1600/Garlic-Press.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAn0GkjtHxgmXaEYFztswWql0NlZyN8ksn1jFu3qCNt7IboBWxoRU4Hg1GmqbMDouNbsee7PIf8srOo_rlVbpYBMtfye_JvQohkAlGp3de2CmNxgX1G3hm7_rkM6NJ9fEMGWcfXZVWkQ6F/s200/Garlic-Press.jpg" width="200" /></a> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">...I have to clean the garlic press. This has to be the most annoying thing ever. First off, this isn't something you can just blow off, rinse, put it back in the drawer, and call it a day. Obviously there is pressed garlic wedged in the pin-sized holes, and running soap and water over that doesn't do the trick. I end up getting some skewers and punching holes in each of the openings until all the garlic has been flushed from the cursed machine. Then I go with the soap and water routine, cuz the thing still smells like garlic. My wife thinks I'm ridiculous. I'm starting to think you all probably agree with her.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">That's it for now. But don't worry, there's plenty more where that came from.</span>Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6693886254532512006.post-66555704330629325982013-03-20T21:57:00.003-07:002013-03-20T21:57:54.517-07:00South Africa!<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
I'm baaaaaack!</div>
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Now, I have no idea if I am going to start posting regularly, but I figured just because my posts aren't weekly or daily, doesn't mean I have to end this blog thing altogether, right?!</div>
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I figured this was a great tool to log our journey to Greece, and will continue to use it for other trips in the future. Which reminds me...</div>
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<b>WE'RE GOING TO SOUTH AFRICA!</b></div>
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Yep, that's right, Marc is going to be in camera-heaven! We are going to be gone for about 10 days in July, including 4 nights in Cape Town, and then flying to our private lodge in the Klaserie Private Nature Reserve for a 3-night safari! We will be going out on early morning and sunset drives through the wilderness to see all the amazing animals inhabiting the area, such as lions, cheetahs, impalas, rhinos, elephants, buffalo and hyenas! And we are going during their winter time, which means there is less accessible vegetation for the animals, so they have to venture further out to get food...which means...CLICK CLICK SHUTTER! Photo heaven.</div>
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I will definitely have more to post in the coming months about this trip. But since we just booked the airfare, I thought it was appropriate to alert the masses that read this (and by masses, I mean my mom, my wife, those of you on Google+ that get a standard "new post" notification, and some guy who was really really hoping I had given up this domain name).</div>
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In the spirit of March Madness, I leave you with this kid making his bracket picks:</div>
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http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=9074140&categoryid=2378529</div>
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Good luck to all of you in your bracket pools (unless you're in one of mine, which in that case, I hope you picked James Madison to win it all!).</div>
Marchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04072895702808136103noreply@blogger.com0