Las Vegas Spring 2014

I went to Las Vegas last weekend for a quick girls getaway. We stayed at MGM. Both nights we went to Beacher's Madhouse. I think the word "madhouse" described that place perfectly. 

Here we are waiting to get in to Beacher's the first night:

Here we are taking selfies outside the bathroom. We were probably trying to give our aching feet a break from our killer heels!

One of the girls in my group had some luck with the slot machines. She ended up winning about $100 which was exciting to watch. 

This is us on night two. I learned all about accessorizing from these girls. My plain Jane style just didn't cut it in Vegas. Luckily these girls shared their statement necklaces, purses, and earrings with me. 

This is us on our last night. We actually stayed out until about 5am even though we had to be at the airport at 6 and 7am. We stayed up all night and it was definitely a night to remember. 

I love having amazing, fun, spontaneous, smart, beautiful girl friends! 

Zion National Park

Last week I went to Zion National Park in Utah with JR and his brother for a week! Our campsite was very small but we had free wi-fi which was cool!

We did part of one hike, The Narrows, which was unlike any other hike I've ever done because it was up a river! We stopped along the hike to have our lunch and it was just awesome to look at the time and realize that my friends at work were probably eating their lunch in a boring and crowded hospital cafeteria while I was dining on a rock, with my feet in the water, looking at a waterfall, and surrounded by the canyon walls. 

We stopped in Vegas for one night on so that we wouldn't have to drive home all in one day. We splurged on a suite that had a washer and a dryer and full kitchen. It was such a shock to go from cooking over one tiny flame and having to use shower tokens to all the luxuries of a Las Vegas hotel suite! I would definitely do this again though because it made our drive home much more pleasant!

Desserts from Wicked Spoon:

Poll: Hostels

Source: hostelworld.com via Madisyn on Pinterest

I've been thinking about my next big trip! I kinda want to go somewhere very soon (I have a ton of PTO, plane tickets to the places I'm looking at are cheap, and I'm about to start taking a class in a month). Since I doubt anyone would be able to accompany me on such short notice, I'm thinking about traveling solo! One thing that sucks about traveling solo is that I wouldn't have someone with whom I could split the cost of the hotel. Sooooo I'm entertaining the thought of staying in a hostel. :-/

I don't know.

I think it would be a fun and budget friendly adventure, but is it safe? What should I do?

Should I stay in a hostel?

• Yes! Go for it! It'll be a fun adventure. You'll be fine.




• Eeek! Don't go! You might get murdered in a hostel!

Acepolls

More polls: over 60 dating Snygga skor Hotel polls

Labor Day Weekend Road Trip- Day Two

We took our time getting ready at the hotel. We checked out around 11am and were on our way to San Jose.

My cousin knew all the popular food places. Our first stop of the night was The Counter on Santana Row. It was so fun customizing our orders. I had a veggie burger.





Even though we were STUFFED, my cousin convinced everyone to try Hello Desserts! This place was amazing!



I got a Fruity Delight. Soooo yummy! Suddenly, I wasn't so stuffed anymore. I finished the whole thing!

Labor Day Weekend Road Trip- Day One, Part Two

We got to Santa Cruz at about lunch time. Luckily, the hotel let us check in early! I love staying at (clean) hotels!

!



We rested for a few minutes and then got back in the car and drove to UC Santa Cruz! I have been on the campus twice before. It's hard to believe that the first time I was here was like 8 years ago and the last time I was here was like 5 years ago! It makes me feel old!

The campus is really beautiful with lots of trees, hills, and roads perfect for skating!



Since nothing was open on campus, we drove downtown and had lunch at a little cafe. We were super excited that they served breakfast all day, but in the end, none of us ordered any breakfast items.



We walked around and shopped downtown for a couple hours, but no one bought anything. I saw a pink Santa Cruz skateboard that I considered buying but ended up not. But I'm still thinking about buying it... hmmmm...

Then, we drove down to the boardwalk. We walked around there for a little while. We were expecting it to be in the mid-70s, but it was much colder! Brrrr.



After that, we drove back to our hotel to freshen up before dinner.

For dinner, we walked across the street to Caffe Lucio.



This restaurant has character! Lucio himself looks over every plate and you can hear him yelling at the servers in his Italian accent. Then, in the middle of our nice dinner, our waitress turns on a disco ball and then all of a sudden it was a party! There were flashing lights, a disco ball, and Black Eyed Peas blasting on the stereo!

I really like Santa Cruz! I enjoy the hippie-ness! The best thing is that it has been super easy to find good vegetarian food at every place we've been to!

Tomorrow, we're driving down to SJ to do some shopping and visit with cousins <3

Labor Day Weekend Road Trip- Day One

We wanted to get out of town for the long weekend, so we decided to take a trip to Santa Cruz!

Day 8

I shot up out of my bed at 3:00 a.m. after only 3 hours of sleep. I had been tossing and turning all night worried that I would sleep through my alarm clock. I tried to go back to sleep, but my heart was racing. I wanted to get started with my long journey home. I decided to go ahead and get going with my day.

I had arranged to have a taxi pick me up at 4:00 am to take me to the airport for my 7:00 am flight. But I was ready to go by 3:30 am. So I sat and waited in the dark lobby.


At 10 minutes til 4:00 am, the taxi driver dressed in a dark suit came into the lobby and loaded my things into the sleek Skoda car.

When we started driving away from the hotel, I told the driver "I'm so sad that I have to leave, I love it here." I don't think he understood what I said because he didn't respond at all.

I arrived at the airport a little early so I bought freshly squeezed orange juice and read my magazine. My first flight of the day was from Prague to Amsterdam. Our flight was 15 minutes delayed which sucked because I only had an hour between arriving in Amsterdam and departing to LA. I had a great seat next to the exit with lots of leg room. Unfortunately, this was only for my short flight.



When I landed in Amsterdam, I had to run from one end of the airport to the other. Luckily, I had printed out a map of the Amsterdam airport which I was able to study on the flight. I arrived at my departure gate just in time to board! Phew!

My flight was loooong. Ugh.

I was so happy to arrive in LA. It seemed like I couldn't get off the plane fast enough. JR picked me up. I was happy to have someone carry my luggage! We stopped in Ventura and Santa Barbara on our way home. I ended up at home around 5 p.m. and was happy to take a shower and relax for the evening.

Day 7

"How do you feel about going home tomorrow?" my roommate asked as we were layering on clothing and preparing for a morning bike ride.

After a lonely day six, I woke up feeling ready to go home. "I had a good time in Europe, I'm dreading the travel back home, but I'm anxious to be home," I replied.

But throughout the day, my desire to go home turned into dread! I didn't want to leave! I loved Prague too much.

After breakfast, we went on a bike tour through the narrow, bumpy streets of Prague. It was difficult because there was about 15 of us wandering through the crowded roads. Plus, the cobblestones made the ride extremely bumpy! But this was an excellent way to see much of the beautiful city at just the right pace.


One of my favorite thing to see on the bike tour was sculptures by the controversial artist, David Cerney. We saw three of his sculptures on our tour.

The first one we saw was this man, probably Sigmund Freud hanging outside of a building.



The second one we saw were these giant babies. These ones were in Kampa Park. From Kampa Park, you can see Prague's TV tower in the distance. These babies crawl on that tower (I was unable to see this) possibly suggesting that babies these days are raised by the TV.





The third one we saw were these guys proudly peeing in a pool shaped like the Czech Republic. The sculpture was broken at the time, but you are able to text a message to a certain number and they will move their hips to pee that message.


We also rode by the Lennon Wall again.

Next to the Lennon Wall, there is a little gate with a bunch of padlocks locked to it. People in love come to this gate, lock a padlock on the gate, and then throw the key into the river below.



The bike tour ended around 1pm. By then, we were starving. I went with a small group of people to eat at a nice restaurant in the Palladium Mall. I ordered the same thing I had for dinner the first night I arrived in Prague. It was so salty and delicious! Yummmmmmmmmmmm!



Then, we were going to all go to a museum together. But first, me and another person wanted to stop by our hotel to use the restroom. We were supposed to all meet in the lobby in like 10 minutes. I was down there, waiting... for like 20 minutes. Apparently the two girls misunderstood me and just went on to the museum we were supposed to go to. And the guy who also had to use the bathroom ended up falling asleep in his room. I got tired of waiting plus I was anxious to get the most out of my last day in Prague, so I ventured out on my own.

I first stopped by a Salvador Dali exhibit in Old Town Square. I wasn't able to take pictures though.

Then I walked across the Charles Bridge where locals sell artwork and jewelry. I bought some photos of the Lennon Wall (as it used to be) for my brother.

By then, it was already almost dinner time. Our group met in the hotel lobby so that we could walk over to a restaurant and have a traditional Czech dinner. This time, the food was just okay. There was a lot of meat, which isn't my favorite thing to eat.

There was live traditional Czech entertainment. At the end of our meal, the dancers picked people from the table to join them in their dancing. One creepy-ish guy came over to our table to pick a partner. Immediately, all the girls pulled out their cell phones and pretended to be busy texting. I was too slow. He picked me to join him! Ahhh! But it was fun!



I meandered through the streets taking in everything! I especially love the way Prague looks in the evening, after the sun sets but before it gets completely dark. I just wanted to memorize everything.

When I got back to the hotel, I reluctantly began packing. That was it. My trip was over. :(

My roommate fell asleep while I was packing, so I didn't even get to say good bye.

I went to bed around midnight and tossed and turned all night dreading the next day.

Day 6 part 2

(Writing from HOME SWEET HOME)

After our walking tour, we had a lunch cruise where we were able to try traditional Czech food. We started our meal off with a shot of something (I think it's called Becherovka?). It's supposed to help you digest your food. Our tour guide said that her grandmother takes a shot of this every morning for good health. She says her grandma is often smiling because it contains almost 40% alcohol.





We also got 4 free drinks on this cruise, so I decided to take this opportunity to try a Czech beer. They say that in Czech, beer is cheaper than water. I'm not a fan of beer or any carbonated drinks so I didn't drink much of it. Oh well, it was free!



From there, we were free to do our own thing. I first went to the Palladium Mall (right next to our hotel) where I HAD to buy warmer clothing. It was rainy and windy. It was about 34 degrees, but felt like 31 degrees according to weather.com. So I bought a long sleeve t-shirt from H&M and a thick black scarf.

I walked over to the hotel to empty out my purse a bit (I inadvertently collect sooo much stuff throughout the day... receipts, fliers, maps, brochures, change etc) and change into my new warmer clothes.

I then walked over to find the John Lennon Wall. I wanted to be sure to get pics of the wall so that I could show my brother. It was really hard to find and I almost turned back to the hotel a couple times because it was soooooo windy and cold! My umbrella kept flipping inside out. I eventually found the wall and took a ton of pictures!





After viewing the wall, I began the walk back to my hotel. It was cold, but I took the long way back. I wandered around the old part of the town and then the new part of the town. I wanted to remember everything about this beautiful city. I wanted to remember the way the cobblestone paths felt underneath my worn out flats. I wanted to remember how windy and cold it was (I've only been this cold like two other times in my life). I wanted to remember the delicious smells coming from the spring market in Old Town Square.

I decided to go through a little museum. I think it was called the Torture Museum. They had a bunch of information on ways people were tortured in medieval times. The museum was dimly lit and they had a soundtrack of spooky sounds playing throughout the room. It was totally spooky. I'm not sure why I came here by myself! Luckily, there was a couple going through the museum at the same pace as I was. I just stuck close to them, being careful not to enter a new room until they did first!




We were on our own for dinner. I just grabbed a orange-apple juice to tie me over until I could decide on a real dinner. I went to my hotel to get a break from the cold. I ended up getting too cozy and ended my day there, without dinner.

Other people on the tour. including my roomie,went on a Pub Crawl where they went to like 3 bars and 1 night club. The pub crawl included lots of free drinks and entry into the club, but I felt like it would be a waste for me. Many of my tour mates came home early in the morning... around 4 or 5!

It was kind of a lonely afternoon for me, so I updated my blog, skyped with JR, and spent some time on facebook.

Day 5

I started off the day with a quick breakfast at the hotel. Then we loaded our bags onto the bus.



Then we were on our way to Dresden, a town about 2 hours from Berlin, near the boarder between Germany and Czech. One interesting thing about this town is that it was bombed during the last few days of WW2.

We had 2.5 hours to explore Dresden and eat lunch. One of the girls I met on the tour and I went in search for lunch. We ended up not eating at a restaurant. I got two pretzels and she got bratwurst.

This girl is interesting. She's hard for me to hang out with because she's really... "frugal" (same girl that didn't want to leave the club until we had 4 people to split the taxi cost). She goes from place to place searching for a bathroom that only cost 30c euro to use. Also, she walked to three different bratwurst stands to see if any one was cheaper. I can understand wanting to be frugal, especially because she's still a student, but why worry about one or two dollars if you already spent thousands on a trip to Europe?

So what ended up really making me mad was this. The reason why we grabbed a quick and easy lunch was because we both really wanted to see a museum called Zwinger. It was actually HER suggestion, but I really wanted to see Raphael's Sistine Madonna so I was excited too. Then, when we got inside, she saw that it cost money to enter (duh!) and was like, "I don't know if we should go in because we won't have enough time to see everything. Should we do something else?" So I was like, "We have an hour and a half, what do you want to do?" and she just kept walking around leading me around the whole damn city. It was too cold to be wandering around like that. I would have gladly paid just to be able to stand inside a building. So I've been avoiding her ever since. Hhaah.

Here's an old picture of me and JR with that famous image taken from the bottom of Raphael's Sistine Madonna. Looking at this copy hanging on the wall of Santa Maria's Straw Hat Pizza is not as cool as looking at the real deal in Europe, but oh well.



Here are some pics from Dresden.





We walked into a Mc Donalds because that girl wanted to find a cheap bathroom. But I thought this was cool... at most of the Mc Donalds I've seen here in Europe, they have a separate section for Mc Cafe which is like a little cafe with desserts and coffee drinks.



Then we eagerly got on the bus (it was super cold outside!) and were on our way to Prague! To pass the time, we did introductions. We had to stand up in front of the bus and tell everyone your name, where you're from, who you're traveling with, when you're leaving the tour, and one celebrity you love and one you hate.

Then, 2.5 hours later, we arrived in Prague. I instantly fell in love with this city. It happened as soon as I got off the bus. I just love everything about Prague.

It amazes me that a driving 5 hours away from Berlin will land you in a city completely different! It's a different country, different language, and different currency! It's amazing to me because if I drive 5 hours from my house, I could be in San Francisco. Yeah, SF has its own culture, but we still speak the same language, use the same money, and have the same governor etc.





After we checked into our hotel, we went out to dinner as a group. I was totally worried about Czech food, because German food didn't appeal to me at all. My tour manager kept saying, "Czech food is wacky!" Luckily, the dinner we were served was AMAZING! It was the most I had eaten all week. It doesn't seem wacky at all. It was salty and delicious!





After dinner, we went on a quick walking tour of the city, just so we could orient ourselves. The streets are narrow, crowded, and windey so it's easy to get lost!

Our tour manager suggested that we see a blacklight show. She warned us that it was weird "like an acid trip" but said it's "totally prague" so of course I wanted to watch the show!



It was... interesting. Weird. It didn't make sense to me, although I heard later that it was supposed to be about Alice (from Alice in Wonderland) growing up. Uhh.... okay. But I'm glad I went. I would totally go back tonight if it wasn't 25 euro. I think it was a bit overpriced.

I came back to my hotel after the show. It was sooo cold outside! I'm not used to this kind of weather. Anything under 55 degrees is "freezing" to me! My roomie was ready to go to bed, so I sat outside my room and skyped with JR/updated my blog. While I was sitting outside of my room, an old lady asked me if I needed help :) and some creepy old man asked me to come in to his room. Hahah. So I decided to go back inside my room and get some sleep.

Day 3

I woke up today and suddenly realized I have my mom's credit card with me. It had been with me the whole time, I guess I was too stressed/tired yesterday to think clearly and realize I could use it! So now, no one has to worry about me or feel sorry for me! I've got enough money and whats better is that none of it is mine! Ha!Ha!

We had a breakfast buffet at the hotel. Also, here's a picture of my roomie (left) and a fellow Californian (right).





Then, right after breakfast we boarded the bus and went on a quick drive around town. We just drove by all the popular sights. We did get to stop at the berlin wall for about 15 minutes. I loved all the artwork! There is so much art in public places around this town. Statues, graffiti, paintings, and murals are everywhere! It's so colorful and funky, I love it!









POP quiz.... Does anyone know what happened in 2002 at this posh Berlin hotel?



Then, we took a 30 minute drive out of the city to visit Sachsenhausen (don't ask me to pronounce that word!) I'll make my next post solely on that memorial/museum.

After Sachsenhausen, we drove back into the city where we were dropped off and free to do our own thing. The bad thing about this tour is that the tour manager really pressures us to get to know other people and spend time with others. It's hard for introverted people like myself. I was already craving "alone time" so I wandered off by myself and checked out the Pergamom Museum. I have a ton of pictures of I-don't-know-what. I think it's like ancient artifacts excavated from like... babylon or something.







There were a lot of huge reconstructions and actual pieces (I think) from ancient-wherever. But what I found most interesting were the little things. I liked the jewelry, the little statues of animals, the beads, the pots etc.

After the Pergamom Museum I decided to try to make it back to my hotel. It took me a long time again. Ugh. But I got back to my hotel and now I'm just relaxing, catching up, and uploading pics. My roomie is still out, so it's really nice and quiet.

Tonight, we're going to do a walking tour. It's mainly just going from bar to bar to dance club which I'm not even interested in. I'd rather just relax, but I felt pressured to sign up and I already paid for it, so I'm going. We're supposed to eat dinner before we go out, but I'm too tired to do that :(