April 2012 - I left my heart in San Francisco

Goodbye sunny dry Vegas and hello cold and wet San Francisco!  

My first impression is that it is a beautiful city but, San Francisco,  how wet and cloudy are you! Also, i made the fundamental mistake of calling it 'Frisco but the locals hate that. Some lovely locals correct me and say that only tourists call it 'Frisco but the locals always call it San Francisco or the City.

We drop our bags at our hotel South of Market and near the Union Square Park. Good central location and walkable everywhere and also very very close to some great shopping!  Our first port of call on a rainy evening was to get some lovely fish ball noodle soup. San Francisco has a huge Chinatown and a large Asian population as well and this makes sourcing a damn fine fish ball noodle soup easier than say the greasy fast food halls of Vegas!

San Francisco

We spend the next few days like so:

- having brunch at the trendy and foodie Embankment where they even serve a 'proper' coffee - no filter thank god!

- being a good tourist and visiting Fisherman's Wharf, having fish chowder at SF institution, Boudin's (yum!);

- riding the street cars up the steep San Francisco hills;

- an amazing twilight tour of Alcatraz which is an eerie place to be at after dark.

On a rare clear and sunny day, we booked ourselves on a Blazing Saddles 'City to Sausolito' cycling tour of San Francisco. I was initially a little daunted given San Francisco is such a hilly city and despite the old adage about not forgetting how to ride a bike, it had been many many years since i rode one.  Nevertheless, i was super keen and followed our Peter O'Toole 70+ years guide (who was surprisingly fit and agile) through paths that wound their way past:

-  Victorian terraces and swanky Bay side residences in the posh suburbs of the Marina District; - through green and pretty Crissy Fields where we stopped for amazing hot chocolate and to pat the rascally 8 week old Mason (golden retriever pup), then 

- over the rusty red San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge where we had to fight with traffic on both sizes of wandering tourists, fit joggers, lycra clad serious bikers and other cycling tourists such as ourselves.

We made our way to Sausolito - a quaint and pretty Bay side town with a very village-y feel - a Rose Bay meets  Balmain vibe.  We caught the next ferry back to our side of the Bay before we bad farewell to our cycling friends and guide.

Yosemite

During our trip planning sessions, i had wanted to build in as many outdoorsy activities as we could given our tour was based around 3 cities. I had the bright idea (at the time) to do a day trip to Yosemite National Park from San Francisco. I had always loved national parks and was intrigued by climbers of Half Dome, hiking through huge Redwoods and of course the chance of meeting Yosemite Sam!  however, i severely underestimated the time it would take to get there from San Francisco - it took around 4 hours in a little bus to drive past the dreary outer suburbs of the city, through orange orchards and before we hit the clean and clear mountain air.  I think we spent around 5 hours at the park, having lunch then wandering around for short hikes around the central base past lovely waterfalls and scrambling squirrels. We also made a quick pit stop at a viewing point to attempt to see Half Dome. Because of the cold and rain, it was shrouded in mist and a dusting of snow! It was hard to imagine rock climbers going for it given how steep and imposing it looked.

After a lovely half day in the mountains, it was time to get back to the city and another long dreary bus ride back.  When we rolled in, we were forewarned by the weather bureau that the city could be hit with a severe thunderstorm! It was ugly enough, with high winds and blistering rain.  After a quick dinner near our hotel and a quick drink, we headed back to our hotel to fall asleep to the sound of the storm.

Napa Valley

I'm really loving this part of the trip. After 4 nights in Vegas which was way too long a time for a nature loving, outdoorsy person like me, I was loving San Francisco. SF, with its cool and friendly people, urban hippies hell bent on sustainability, great food and tolerant attitude, the only thing i would fault was its weather!  

Being only an hour away from the city, we decided to grab a car and head to Napa Valley - the grape growing region in the East Coast. It was also my first time driving on the right hand side and also in a great wide Chevy. It took a little getting use to especially trying to keep the whole car within the lane and not impinge on other cars in the adjoining lanes!  We decided to spend 2 nights in the Marriott at the Napa Valley, a lovely and very comfortable hotel with the most amazing pillows!  We were based in Yontville, a very posh wine town decked out in faux English rose gardens and quaint weatherboard style cottages.  We had dinner that night at an awesome Cal-French restaurant called Angel's with super fine local wines.  It was so nice to be able to just chill and have really good food and really good wines. No fast food joints in SF and the Napa, thank you very much! 

Over the next few days, we wandered around various vineyards like the rustic romantic Robert Biale winery, famed for its quirky Black Chicken zinfandels and Mondavi/Rothschild's Opus One - housed in an imposing sandstone tholos, where we were served by polite and cold iPad clad attendants and where we shared a $80 glass of shiraz (!).  That night we had another lovely meal at the delectable Ad Hoc, sister restaurant to the glitzy Bouchon, which we could not get into without a booking many moons in advance.

Ahhh, good food, good wine, intelligent and liberal locals - i loved San Francisco and its surrounds.  However it was time to head to our 3rd and last destination - La via Highway 1!

 

April 2012 - What happens in Vegas...

It's 2012, another year and another April. There's been a long time between travels where I suffered a broken ankle, had surgery and met my future husband to be!

This trip,  however, is strictly a girls' road trip and Dee and I are shopping, partying, drinking in the U.S of A. First world all the way and a far cry from the usual backpacking trips i prefer but they say, a change is a good as a holiday!

Dee and I were very excited and land firstly at LA where we had a short layover before flying into Vegas!

Vegas .... and my first impressions were that there were lots of loud tourists, wearing loud clothing and carrying large loud bags! looking out the window and as if in stark contrast, it's all desert with very little apparent life. Sand and sandscapes dominate my taxi's window frame before I glimpse a highway and a skyscrapper and look what we have here, the Sphinx and the Eiffel Tower!?  No, i've not teleported halfway around the world in 60 secs, i've just glimpsed the Luxor Hotel and the Paris Vegas Hotel.  Vegas is huge and loud and I was totally in awe of all this artifice and crass commercialism in the middle of the desert.

We checked into the Wynn Hotel - a lovely 5 star hotel at one end of the Strip.  Our hotel had a whimsical Alice in Wonderland inspired garden and Mad Hatter's Tea Party vibe to it especially when the lovely blooms are vying for attention with the bright blinking lights of poker machines situated in the foyer!

I was feeling jetlagged and it was getting late, so we freshened up in our lovely big room and wandered next door to the Venetian Hotel to have sushi.  Wandering the alleys next to the canals, listening to the gondola men singing, it almost felt like Venice, except i could always hear in the faraway music of gambling chips clinking and poker machines chirping from the ubiquitous gambling dens at each hotel.

Time to retire for the night at the lovely Wynn.

When in Vegas, you fall into a routine of sleeping in, going shopping, and before you know it, it's time to catch a show, drink cocktails, have trendy fusion food and party it up in some exclusive nightclub!  Dee and I managed to catch 2 Cirque Du Soleil shows here which were fantastic as always. 

Some of Dee's friends were also in town (local Aussie party girl Diane and Kiwi expat Martin) and we went to some very trendy Thai place for dinner called Tao where my fortune cracker very aptly advised that 'Naughtiness is a Virtue'. Well, i was in Sin City!

Martin and Diane - being old party hounds in Vegas, had managed to book us into an exclusive night club in the Bellagio. We had front of house seats for the famous fountains and views of the Paris Las Vegas Eiffel Tower.  After some hours of clubbing, my feet were starting to hurt and it was time to call it a night. 

Walking the Strip back to the Wynn was an eye opener. There were teenagers drunk and carrying yard sticks of fluorescent alcopop, grim faced hard core gamblers heading off to try their luck at the cheaper off Strip gambling dens, Vegas cops followed by reality TV crews filming "The Strip" apprehending some kid caught trying to hustle tourists, wild eyed and jet lagged tourists stumbling around at 2am in the city that never sleeps - and there we were, stumbling around in high heels and stopping to take a photo at the (fake) Trevi fountain! 

I had kept this routine up for 2 days and nights and now seriously felt like i needed a holiday from this holiday.  Tomorrow - we're heading for a helicopter and kayaking adventure on the Grand Canyon - I was so looking forward to this. Finally, some outdoors and a break from all the partying!

The next day we said good bye to our lovely friends and Dee and i put away our high heels, make up and party dresses and got ready for a wilderness adventure!

We headed to the local airfield to catch a helicopter flight over the Grand Canyon. It was a gorgeous day and it felt so stark with the clear blue sky and the never ending desert stretched out before us.  Our helicopter took us over the Hoover Dam - very impressive feat of engineering over the Colorado River. We also flew over the Grand Canyon and many other equally impressive canyons but which missed out on the title 'grand'.

The helicopter then landed us to an old tin mine town and we progressed to grab our kayaks and do a lazy paddle across the still and very cold river.  At a dare, i jumped out of my kayak and into the water and regretted it instantly. The water was slimey!! i thought i was going to start metamorphosising into a 3 eyed mutant like that episode in Simpsons, or Family Guy or was it Futurama!?

Unfortunately the helicopter ride did not allow us to stop at the Grand Canyon reserve to walk some bridge and peer over the rim. Oh well, it was mightily impressive from above as well!

Our last night in sunny and warm Las Vegas - Dee and I had some yummilicious Italian food opposite our hotel.  Food had not been good so far (except for at Tao) as the food had mostly been of the fast food variety and bad ones at that and coffee has been dismal too! But tonight's dinner was just delicious - they even had broccoli on the menu yum!

So we said 'see ya' to Vegas and tomorrow, we head for San Francisco!

Sri Lanka - Safari!

Safari doesn't immediately come to mind when one thinks of Sri Lanka but it is famous for it! Particularly for leopards at Yala National Park and for blue whales off the coast of Mirissa. For this alone, I descended the heavenly Ella and plunged back into the soupy humidity to hunt for leopards with my camera. Yala is a huge park but one that is world famous for the highest concentration of leopards in any given area. The Yala leopards are the top predators within the park and every person I had spoken to who had been there had seen one. I started pre-dawn to try to beat the crowds but as the early hours rolled past, we were soon joined by many other jeeps. It was quite disconcerting to have so many jeeps vie for the attention of the elusive leopard. There were sometimes 6 or more jeeps on the red dirt roads jostling for a glimpse of the leopard at one of its favoured spots. It had been 3 hours and no sight of a leopard, I had resigned myself to not seeing one when, 100m in front of our jeep,crossing the road like he owned it, was a young male leopard. We zoomed towards it as it sauntered into the undergrowth and my trembling hands only caught the last swish of its tail, as if to say, 'now you see me, now you don't'.

From elusive leopards to the biggest creature on the earth, the blue whale. Recently discovered off the coast of Lanka, off the tiny fishing village of Mirissa, is a pod of blue whales.

Years of civil war kept researchers and scientists away and so the discovery of the pod was only 2 years old. These giants are several buses long and are notoriously shy. I joined 6 other tourists on a leaky fishing boat as we traveled out to the Indian Ocean. It was the tail end of the whaling season as the seas were getting rough. About 1.5 hours out to sea, we see blue whales! 4 of them and a humpback. We see alot of humps from its back and many many diving t

ails but didn't get a chance to see one poke its head up - there is a scientific name for this but it looks like the whale sticks its head up and has a nosy around at all the boats. We get close to 50m of some of these whales and we see the arch of its back but never get to see or appreciate it's full size and glory. If I had been here a month earlier, I could have possibly dived or snorkeled with the whales.

Mirissa was my last destination before a whistle stop at Colombo and home. I spent lovely days at the beach, in the sun, eating fresh fish and learning to surf. Sri Lanka is an enchanting place and one that I will always remember fondly for its people, its gorgeous natural wonders and fiery curries!

Sri Lanka - Ella and Ceylon Tea

My trip to Ella had to be the most beautiful and most horrible train trip i've taken. I had not pre-purchased 1st class tickets a month in advance, meaning my chance of getting a seat in the viewing carriage was nil. I purchased a 2nd class ticket which came with a warning that it was the middle of the Singalese new year and my chance of finding a seat was next til nil. Still, I was optimistic. I had caught trains in India, China and Egypt - surely Sri Lanka was not going tobe a problem! The pity I saw in the station master's eyes was starting to worry me...The train rolled up and i was a little surprised to see how much in disrepair the old steam train was in. It was a mad scramble to get on board quickly to grab a seat with my backpack on. Unfortunately, I had climbed into the 3rd class carriage, where the locals were standing in an open carriage. The carriage was so packed that I had no chance to get into 2nd class and was stranded in the dining car with other lost foreigners. However, making the most of a bad situation, I spent the next 7 hours standing up, making new friends of local families heading to the hills for holidays. A few hours into the journey, the train passes through gorgeous hill country, with tea plantations, waterfalls and magnificent scenery. I happily spent half my time hanging out from the side of the train, taking photos and enjoying the fresh mountain air.

Ella is extremely beautiful and staying at the Waterfalls Homestay run by

Aussie expat couple, Martin and Karen, was the perfect balm after the harrowing first couple of days in Sri Lanka. I spend the next few days hiking with a lovely Swiss family and their 3 boys to Ella Rock and Little Adam's Peak, chilling out at the beautiful guesthouse, playing with Martin's many dogs and cats and chatting with Karen. I loved that gorgeous place, which was just so clean and comfortable, i didn't want to leave. Karen and Martin areliving my dream. I still recall the conversation I had with some travellers in Sihanoukville in Cambodia over 10 years ago where we talked about opening a guesthouse. In my dream, the guesthouse looked exactly like Waterfalls Homestay - serendipity!

Sri Lanka - April 2011

Another April, another awesome month of taking advantage of public holidays! With 2 weeks to spare, I scour the globe for somewhere that's not too far and still exotic enough to appease my nomadic spirit. Isettle for Sri Lanka.

My sister's immediate reaction when I tell her is, "Why do you

always want to go to places like that!" It's true, why do I always want to travel like that? By like that, she means, backpacking to foreign destinations where people don't speak English, where I don't know anyone, where the food guarantees giardia, the roads are bad and there's always a threat of civil war looming. I don't know why i'm attracted to places where travel is hard... actually I do, it's because when I arrive at a place where I don't know anyone and I have no plans, it really tests my skills, challenges my senses and makes me feel so free and alive.

I arrive in Sri Lanka in the dead of the night - midnight in an airport that amusingly has more whitegoods being sold in duty free than perfumes. The number of stores selling washing machines and fridges was astounding! My friend later tells me that it's to attract cashed-up workers from the Middle East, on the way home to see family after a few years of slaving in the desert. What better gift to bring back to the wife you haven't seen for years than a washing machine?!

I catch a taxi to Negombo, a beachside town that I hardly see as I roll into town at 2am and leave at 630am the next morning. I'm on my way up north to see the UNESCO famed sites of Sigiriya and Dambulla with a side trip to visit an elephant orphanage. The drive through winding country roads with lush rice fields, framed by gentle rolling hills, is so picturesque that I fall into bucolic bliss.

It's several hours before we reach Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage, a place that has gathered a bit of controversy from naturalists who claim the centre is exploiting its elephants for

profit. I see many elephants being herded by mahouts with cruel looking wooden batons with nasty metal hooks. I'm sad to see a huge blind bull elephant with magnificent tusks chained up. What surprises me are how vocal the elephants are, trumpeting loudly and also growling menacingly whenever a tourist got too close to the young babies. The babies were hilarious, so playful and small and ever agile and mischievous. The highlight was bath time for the elephants - loud trumpeting heralded the stampede of around 50 elephants, rushing towards the river to the delight of throngs of tourists. It was very sweet to see the matriarchs keeping a close eye on the babies, one which was swept off his little feet with the currents threatening to sweep him away before a protective trunk picked him up and settled him back to his feet.

After Pinnawala, it was another long drive to get to Sigiriya, a mysterious rock formation with remnants of a palace or temple at the top. I bumped into an Aussie tourist and we climbed up steep and rusty metal stairs precariously tied to the side of the rock. Through the soupy humid air pregnant with the promise of rain, we made our way to view mysterious cave paintings of, depending of whether you believed it to be a temple or palace, sexy half naked court dancers or the goddess Tara. Either way, it's amazing that after 2000 years in this wet air, the paintings were still so well preserved. Still higher up, we pass through giant lion's paws carved into the side of the mountain to reach the top where nothing much was left of the palace/temple that existed there. It was a tad cooler and a welcome breeze was blowing through. How

ever, the breeze also hinted at rain and we rushed back down the rock and I was in the cab for all of 10 mins before the heavens opened up and monsoon rain thundered down.

Checked into the Holiday Inn - nothing like the cheap and cheerful chain hotel but attempting to leverage some of that brand, my guesthouse was fine but had that damp feeling from being in this humidity. I was a little disappointed (ok a lot) by the pathetic shower with pressure so weak that it merely trickled water out. I had a pleasant surprise when I first turned on the tap in the basin and instead of water, out came a little black frog! I thought it was very cute but fortunately no more frogs came out after the first one.

At dinner, I got talking to a lovely family, expats living in Laos and backpacking through India and Sri Lanka with a 3 year old cherub. I was so impressed that a family of 3 were travelling for 5 weeks with only one backpack! And Ethan the cherub, like my own similarly aged nieces and nephews, was soon demanding his iPad!! and out came the iPad which Ethan then proceeded to operate confidently. These babies are so techie!

September 2010 - New York - When in Rome...

People always say, when in New York, you gotta do this and that. Well, I kinda threw that list out the window being my second time in the City and truthfully, I was a little lazy. My first visit 5 years before was filled with activities and sore feet. This time, I just wanted to chill out. My 6 days in the City included:

- visiting the Guggenheim and being amazed at the amount of famous artworks available under one roof;

- walking across the Brooklyn Bridge;

- eating more Mexican than I should've (the restaurant, Mole, in the LES is awesome);

- drinking more pomegranate magaritas than i should (because they do it so well here);

- aiding the economy by shopping like crazy at Woodbury Commons;

- looking cool in Williamsburg, Brooklyn where the guys wear skinny jeans, dark beards, curly hair and Wayfarers;

- admiring Brownstones in the Upper East and West Sides;

- eating damn good Cajun ribs at Acme's (with hot sauce!);

- having a 'When Harry Met Sally' met the Reuben sandwich at Katz's Deli orgasmic moment;

- peeking into the many community gardens in the LES;

- spotting Liev Schrieber on 2nd Street;

- buying Apple products at the iconic store on 5th Avenue (this generation's Tiffany's); and

- walking from Midtown to Downtown and back to the LES through Soho, Greenwich, Union Square and the Flatiron district because those NYC blocks didn't seem to look that huge on a tiny map!

Staying in the LES in a non-touristy part of the City is great because I start to feel like i'm part of the neighbourhood and feel like i could really live this crazy city. My favourite moment of this trip was when the local postie greeted me with, "Good morning, Miss Cynthia". At that moment, I almost, almost felt like a true NuYorker.

September 2010 - New York - NuYorkers!

Christine and Joanne are two cool cousins from New York who I met in Pompeii 10 years ago. Since then, I've been to visit them once before in 2005, stayed with Jo in her lovely place in Hoboken (as in Crunch) in Jersey and visited Chris in fashionable Brooklyn and we had pomegranate magaritas and partied it up in some dive bar off Canal St.

I meet up with Chris and Jo, their partners and kids at the Bronx Zoo. We catch a few trains to the Bronx area and my first impression is that there isn't anything sinister about it - although there are a few more projects or housing commission buildings around. It was a record hot day in late September and the zoo was packed with families visiting. The only thing missing was a wading pool and I looked at the polar bears swimming in their icy enclosures with jealousy. It was great to catch up with the NuYorkans - Chris has a lovely little boy called Finn who was fascinated with the tigers and Jo has her little chubby baby, Jackson, who is just so adorable.

Over the next few days, I catch up with both girls for various lunches, dinners and even tea at a twee little place on the Upper West Side called Tea with Alice. We even visited Chris' work, the Sesame Street headquarters, near the Lincoln Centre and get to cuddle up to Grover and hang out with in Oscar's trash can. Pity i didn't get to meet Elmo, who i'm told was off on a busy book signing tour!

After dinner that night with the girls at Rosa Mexicana in the Upper West Side, we stumble on a scene shoot for Gossip Girl! You gotta love New York for celebrity spotting!!