Category Archives: travel

Finally.

As for Ireland, we are booked!!! Finally!

It was hard as hell finding a place both in Kinsale & Dingle (both are smallish towns) since it turns out many smaller, family-run inns and B&Bs close down in November.  So basically, it was pretty much just as difficult for us to book rooms in November as it would have been do book rooms in the middle of the tourist season in the summer.  Go figure.

Interestingly enough, in Dingle as it stands right now, it’s just us and the owner. Now that should be interesting. I guess the good news is that if we’re the only guests, we might be able to get breakfast served later since we’re such late sleepers 😉

I’ll assume that since Galway is a college town, it wasn’t nearly as difficult to book our rooms.  But even then, I only had two places two chose from (I went with the 4 star location over the 3 star since there was only a $20USD difference for the night).

So now the travel agent just needs to confirm Dublin and Belfast, neither of which are small hotels, so I don’t forsee any challenges. That puts us in three B&Bs in the smaller towns and two nice hotels in the city. And lucky for the hubs, he gets WiFi in all locations so he can keep tabs on all the post-election coverage.  Won’t he be excited?

All I need now is for the winter clothes to start showing up in the stores and all is good.  Such a relief.  Now I can just focus on worrying about my dad,  his stopping heart and the pacemaker surgery on Monday…as if that’s not enough.

I’m So Ready for Fall

Real fall or at least the sort of fall that we get here in LA. I’ve my crave-able pumpkin spice lattes twice now and well, 1) they’re just not as enjoyable when it’s 80 degrees out and 2) they just don’t seem to taste quite as good as I remember.

But the real reason I’m waiting for fall is that we still have clothes to buy for Ireland (the hubs has NOTHING short of a couple long-sleeve tees to wear). So of course, now that I need those sweaters and warmer attire, nothing is hitting the stores. Which is odd. I remember wearing a sweater to school that first day back because it was new (only to die from the heat of Indian Summer in Jersey), yet short of ordering online, I can’t seem to find sweaters anywhere. What’s up with that?

And when are all the cool scarves, hats and gloves going to hit the stores? Even online there’s just not much available. So we rush the holidays (yes, Halloween stuff is already up), but we stopped rushing the winter clothes? Well that’s just not acceptable. Give me my thermals and cashmere scarves now please! Or at least over the next couple of weeks so I can consider ourselves ready for Ireland already.

On that note, I will be shooting out last minute confirmations to our B&Bs and Ireland will be officially and finally booked! Hell yeah!

And Still More Ireland Planning

But first, man, what a PITA planning this trip seems to have been.  At this rate, all the travel agent did is book the flight and our hotels in both Dublin and Belfast.  I’m researching and booking the entire rest of the trip.  Oh well, I’m sure we’ll have fun and that’s what matters.

We’ll start if all off by flying into Dublin and driving 3.5 hours to Kinsale in County Cork for two nights.  This will give us some good food, pretty sights and the Midleton Whiskey distillery. Kinsale is actually considered the gourmet capital of Ireland. And well, I’ve heard that Midleton Whiskey is great (and that the distillery is authentic and doesn’t feel as “fake” as the Jameson one in Dublin – we’ll visit there as well).

From there it’s one night in Dingle over in the Ring of Dingle for some good music and pretty sights.  I hear that the Ring of Kerry is crazy busy (maybe not in November, but still) and that most folks that have done both rings enjoy the Ring of Dingle much better.

Next it’s up to Galway for two nights (might just go with the Jury Inn since it’s in the heart of the Centre and has wifi – that husband of mine will NEED his wifi).  We’ll finish things off  with two nights in Dublin, one night in Belfast and then one last nigiht in Dublin again.  We have to do it that way since one of the reasons we’re going is to see Herbie play in Dublin on his daughter’s birthday, with his daughter and his manager.

So now I just need to send out a bunch of emails to the B&Bs in Kinsale, Dingle. I still have a couple emails out to B&B’s in Galway that I’m waiting to hear back from in case we decide to go that route.  In the meantime, I’ll have the travel agent send over some boutique, family-run hotel suggestions for Kinsale & Dingle (though I’m pretty certain Dingle will be a B&B since it’s so small).

I expect we’ll have things finalized (no, REALLY finalized) by Tuesday or Wednesday the latest.  At least now, I know where we want to go and why we’re picking the locations we are.  This puts us miles against our original, early planning stages.

Stupid Ireland Planning: And So it Continues

I’m so frustrated!  The travel agent shot me an email and it turns out the hotel in Killarney that I wanted is no longer available.  Well, I really don’t like any of the other options.  I really wanted something small, family run and walking distance to the pubs and nightlife.

I’m okay with that most of what we wanted wasn’t actually IN Killarney anyway.  And it was pretty expensive compared to the other cities.  As someone once said in a review…there’s a reason Rick Steves doesn’t mention Killarney in more than a couple of sentences.  Turns out it’s a pretty major, touristy sort of place.

And well, I’m not going on vacation to Ireland, land of the very hospitable and courteous, family run inns and B&Bs to stay in some highfalutin (my wording), luxury hotel to attend the spa and eat in the actual hotel.  Not quite are thing, so now I have to rethink everything.

I’m thinking either Cork and a B&B in Dingle or Kenmare and a B&B in Dingle.  Or something like that.  Then we’ll just do Jury’s Inn in Galway.  I’m just bummed that I have to do still more research.  There’s a reason I decided to use a travel agent…to save time and not have to do the research, but it turns out I’m still spending the time and doing the research.

So frustrating.  I’m a bit bummed. I’m sure it will all work out for the best, but still.  I  just wanted to vent.  Feel free to pass along any suggestions. I’m open to anything at this point.  Yikes, it’s only 6 weeks away!!!

Totally unrelated, I found out that one of my girl crushes, Samantha Brown has a new Passport show out.  How did I not know that?  More importantly, how did I not know she was here in LA not too long ago and has also recently been to Santa Fe (drinking margaritas, eating enchiladas with green chile and hanging out at my all time favorite spa..ever!)  How do I miss these things?

Back From Sonoma!

We got home and settled in last night.  Overall it was an absolutely awesome trip. Best of all was being able to visit with my good friend.  We don’t get to see each other often enough.  But after this too quick visit, you better believe we’ll be heading out to Madrid to visit with them sooner rather than later!

And yes, it was filled with lots and lots of wine.  To be honest, we’d only managed to visit four wineries, one vineyard’s shop on the square and then had a bottle with dinner and a bottle back at the hotel.  But that was just enough to still enjoy everything we were drinking.

Overall, it was a bit of a Zinfandel kind of day.  Oh, but right before dinner we followed the advice on the guy from Porter Creek Winery and enjoyed a glass of some Oh.My.God so good chocolate port from Rosenblum Cellars.  We were seriously regretting only carrying on a bag and not checking our luggage, we fell so in love with this stuff.  I mean, the aroma alone made you just want to dive in and soak in it and it tasted even better still!  And I’m definatey not someone that drinks port.

As for dinner, we were considering trying out the Girl and Fig in Sonoma, but since we were just a couple of blocks away from one of our favorite restaurants in the area, we headed there.  Once again, dinner at Zin Restaurant and Wine Bar was absolutely amazing and our waiter treated us very well. We started with some odd but delicious calamari, butter bean, sausage and frise thing in a skillet that was awesome! We were fighting each other off to sop up the juice with the bread. Then there was a tasty frise, goat cheese and grilled peach salad (that I plan on duplicating!). Of course, we each had (and shared) some great dishes – though my short ribs were rumored to be the best of the bunch. And let’s not forget the shared dessert. A great end to a beautiful day with friends.

The visit itself was too short and our time together is too far between visits, but we definitely made the most of our time together.  Right up to killing one last bottle of wine while hanging out in the hotel lobby enjoying the fire catching up late into the night.  It was almost painful to wake up the next morning.  After a light breakfast we parted ways.  Until our next visit…this time in Spain!

And now some photos (clicking on them will make them larger)…

Just outside our hotel – we had a view like this from our room (this was from the deck though)
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The view crossing the Russian River
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Let the wine drinking commence!
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Are these beautiful or what?
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We don’t have this many varieties of garlic in LA
Garlic at the Healdsburg Farmer's Market

Don’t they just make you crave a glass of wine? No? What about grape jelly then?
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Life Lesson: Car Rental Schmar Rental

Guess what? Turns out there’s a serious difference in the daily rate between booking a car for a week and booking a car for 1 day and 16 hours. I’ve done Hotwire before for our car rentals and I’ve gotten some great rates. This time though, there’s not much of a rate difference between Hotwire and the standard travel sites.

I guess I learned that there’s a difference between with how far out you should book your car even if you’re using a discount service. I figured that like the hotels, they’d rather have the room (in this case the car) booked, than unbooked and thus, give you a bargain on Hotwire. Turns out that’s not the case. If I’d booked our car a few weeks back, when we first started making our plans, I’d be saving about half the price.

Who knew?!? Well, probably everyone else but me. Oh well, it’s all about visiting and hanging out with my long time friend. And um…drinking wine.

Greetings From San Francisco!

Here’s a brief tour of my hotel room here in San Francisco.  I’m waiting on my wine opener and crackers now – scratch that, they’re bringing me chocolate instead!  Woohoo!  Gotta love hotels with loyalty programs!

Trying to decide if I want to head on over to Fisherman’s Wharf on my own or just hang low today.  I’ve never been to Fisherman’s Wharf (except to run out and squish a penny while we were zooming through my first time in SF), but I’m just not so sure I’m up for siteseeing by myself right now.  Hello, it’s tea time downstairs right now and I just might meet fellow blogHers down there! I already introduced myself to the lady checking in before me.  She’s not here as a blogger, but as a vendor.  So there’s no stopping me now.

Then there’s the newbie party at the Westin (just mere stumbling steps away) tonight at 8:00.  I’ll need to shower and change (even having a good hair day) before heading over.  Oh and in hindsight, I wish I’d have brought my purse with me afterall instead of just the wristlet.  At least tonight I’d have easily been able to carry my biz cards, my camera and my Flip.

And speaking of the flip, I’m just sitting her (the chocolate has arrived – will go great with my glass of Cab!!!) listening to the mighty Oprah (boring topic) and waiting for the video clip to upload to YouTube. Sure takes a while.  Hurry hurry, I want to head downstairs for tea & sherry.

Crap, my wireless connection might be too slow for the upload.  I called the front desk, they had me call tech support.  I don’t have high hopes for getting a strong enough signal to upload.  Guess I’ll be bringing my laptop with me tomorrow afterall.  Grrrr.   Maybe I should try again from tea & sherry downstairs – no go…they don’t use the same service downstairs.  Double Grrr!

Video tomorrow then.  Now, I’m off for tea and sherry.

Last Week Was Crazy

And this week doesn’t look any less crazy.  I think I must have had something going on every day last week.  In fact, one of both of us were so busy, that we only had one meal together at home (not cool).  I actually canceled my Saturday seminar so I could spend a little time at home with the husband.  Now this week isn’t looking all that much better since he leaves on Wedsnesday morning to head out to Chicago for the rest of the week and I leave on Thursday.

I’m doing another LWL workshop tonight on blogging.  But before the workshop, I’ve got a session with a client and dinner with a friend.  At least it should be a short workshop since a good quarter or third of my original attendees probably won’t be there.  I think I’ve had at least 5 cancel already.  Add to that the natural flake-factor of about a third and yep, not expecting much.

I think I’m doing it too soon on the heels of the last blogging workshop.  Which is fine.  It’s just the sort of motivation I need to get out, find a location, opening things up to the general public and start making some money at it.  I’ve been giving it away since January and I feel totally comfortable with my giving back-ness.

And of course, I’ve got BlogHer this weekend!!!  I’m really starting to get excited.  There’s been tons of talk on the BlogHer network about what to wear, what to bring, how to survive that I just can’t help but get excited.  I’m just waiting on a cute dress I ordered for Thursday’s newbie mixer and my postcards so I can promote my website.  I expect both any day now.

If you’ll be at BlogHer and would like to meet up or at least say Hi, feel free to drop me a line.  My goal is to meet people and make some connections, so don’t be shy.

NJ History: I’m Just Slightly Appalled

I need to be quick (and let me preface by saying that I’ve been enjoying a glass or two of wine), so here goes…

The school teacher in me (specifically, the 4th grade, history teacher in me) is absolutely appalled that I ended up with a guy that just doesn’t seem to care that he’s walking by a building where our first President has slept.  Or that he’s walking about Princeton with the very buildings were our Continental Congress, well, congressed and declared Princeton the Capital the United States in the early days of our country’s history.

Hello?!?!?  We were stand right there, looking at Nassau Hall (pictures once I get home), the very location where all of this went down.  What the hell?!?!

Nothing.  Not even mentioning battlefields as we passed by.  Nothing at all.  Seriously, how could I have married this man???  Damn good thing I love him to pieces, I’d guess.  And let’s not even mention that he just doesn’t get the food that I’ve been craving since we arrived.  Diners!!  Need I say more?