Adventure Fund: Costa Rica 2014

I'm planning on going to Costa Rica this summer with a friend. Luckily, one of her good friends is a travel agent so she has really helped us with the planning. We're looking forward to staying at an all inclusive resort near the beach.

The trip should cost us somewhere around $2000. Since I'm a visual person, I made myself an "Adventure Fund" jar to keep in my room so that I can have something tangible to track my progress. I have enough in my savings to pay for the trip, but maybe I can stash away enough cash in my jar so that I don't have to tap in to my savings.

    

DIY Adventure Fund Jar:

• Glass jar
• Masking tape
• Krylon chalkboard paint
• Craft Smart chalk marker

Current Savings: $338.25

Target: $2000

Progress: 17%

I also made an Oregon 2014 Adventure Fund jar to give to JR for Valentine's Day. Since it was a gift, I didn't really want it to smell like pickles so I bought a mason jar and a lid with a coin slot (purchased on etsy). To add to the gift, I purchased a gift cards to a beer tasting tour and to VooDoo Doughnut.

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:

Apple Cider

Here is that little barn I mentioned in an earlier post. We stopped here because we saw it off the freeway and we thought they would have hot apple cider. JR likes apple cider. 

When we walked inside, we realized no one worked there! You purchased the apple cider using the honor system!

You just place the money in the red box. There was a poster board where you could leave a note. 

As you can see, due to the abuse of the honor system they had to take security measures! 

Here is the wall of shame. Some people were photographed taking gallons of apple cider! Why?! The cameras even get the license place of the car! 

The apple cider itself was delicious! Crisp, refreshing, and made locally. 

Roadtrip with the grandparents

Last week I took my grandparents to San Jose for my little cousin's 8th grade graduation. Traveling with old people is... challenging. I imagine it's a lot like traveling with children. When I'm driving by myself to San Jose, I prefer to stop only once or twice with each stop lasting less than 10 minutes. With my grandparents, we made 4 stops on the way to San Jose. One stop was about 45 minutes for lunch! If they had their way we probably would have stopped at every mission along the way. 

There is, however, one perk to traveling with oldies... handicap parking! 

vip parking

I had fun while in San Jose. We spent most of our time eating. If we weren't eating, we were thinking about eating or planning our next food stop. 

the foodies

On my last day in nor-cal, I was able to sneak away and spend some time in SF with Sarah, Willie, and Connie. Connie selected a restaurant for us to try that just happened to be the number one restaurant I've been dying to try for like two years! We took public transportation (yay!) to the Mission District of SF. I finally got to experience Gracias Madre  and their 100% organic vegan Mexican food. Yumm. 

chilaquiles from Gracias Madre

It was a fun three days with the cousins. Congrats to Connor! The youngest cousin is now in high school! That makes me feel oooold! Pretty soon I'll be needing that handicap parking ;)

the grad and me

Postcards

While on our 2009 road trip, I made sure to send postcards to my family at home every chance I got! Luckily, my mom saved them all. She recently turned them back over to me. I sat on my bed carefully reading each postcard from my small stack. That road trip was one of the best times of my life so I took my time reading card after card just dwelling in those happy memories. Then, I came to a postcard with a picture of a beautiful tropical beach on the front. HUH?! We didn't visit anywhere that looked like this on our trip! I turned it over and it was an old dental appointment reminder for my mom. Hahaha. I was like, "Mom, why'd you save this?" Hahaha.

But anyways, here is one postcard I sent to my brother. I sent it after visiting the UFO museum in Roswell, NM.

Weekend Road Trip 9/16/11

Right after work Friday, I drove down to Camarillo for another weekend getaway. My sister's apartment is turning into the weekend party place and I love it!

As soon as I arrived, Kelsey and her roomie, Lindsey, were ready to go to dinner. We drove back up to Oxnard and met my mom and nino who came separately. Our wait was almost 1.5 hours just to get seated! BJs is the place to be on a Friday night! While we waited for a table, we took some pictures...

When our food finally came, we were disappointed to find out that they made my sister's order wrong. They took her pizza back and offered to buy us dessert! Of course we got pizookie!

I love my sister's roommate. When the desserts came out (we decided on sharing two pizookies) Lindsey was like, "I always feel like it's a competition when you're sharing a dessert." Hahahaha... Judging by the photo above, Kelsey was in it to win it!

Kelsey drove us back to Camarillo and we had another fun photo shoot/dance party in the car.

Back at the apartment, we just relaxed and had a fun little slumber party!

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By the time I woke up the next morning, my sister had cooked us all a delicious breakfast! Such a little Martha Stewart! We all took our time getting ready. By 10:30 I was back on the road with my favorite little travel buddy. <3

I drove down to Torrance to meet up with my friend, Michael. He just moved back to California after attending grad school in Virginia. Yay!

We ate at El Torito Grill. It was so nice to just catch up on each other's lives. Mike actually drove back to California from Virginia and turned it into a road trip. It was a baseball theme road trip where he and his friend stopped at various baseball stadiums along the way! Sooo cool!

I thought the tortilla looked kinda funny...

After lunch, we were soooo stuffed! Mike suggested that we go shopping! We drove to a nearby shopping mall which was half indoor and half outdoor. As I was walking around, I started recognizing some of the places. I realized that I had actually been to this mall before!

They had this cool used book/CDs/video game store. I bought a Sheryl Crow CD for $5.

We tried to take a picture of ourselves to send to Sarah, but it was really difficult because Mike is like a foot taller than me. We eventually took a good pic that included most of both of us.

Then, some man offered to take a real picture of us. :)

Hanging out with Mike made me really miss my college life. I'm so glad he's back in California, but it's kinda depressing because now Sarah has left the state :(

Anyways, I had to leave so that I could drive to Culver City to drop off my Auntie Julie's cane (she left it at our house during Labor Day weekend). When I got to her house, we chatted for a bit. I was disappointed to find out that I had just missed my cousin, Miki. She left for work right before I showed up. I told my Auntie that I would have liked to visit Miki at work, but I didn't have a GPS and I didn't want to get lost. Auntie Julie was so cute, she was like, "Want me to show you how to get there?!" So we hopped in the car and drove to the grocery store Miki works at.

One cool thing was that my Auntie had a handicap parking thingy so I got to park right in front! We said hi to Miki, but she was super busy so we just walked around the huge store. Auntie Julie pointed out the Jamba Juice, Starbucks, bank, pharmacy, florist, bakery etc. (the store was huge).

After that, I dropped Auntie Julie off at her house and was back on the road again.

I drove to Krispy Kreme where I bought 3 dozen doughnuts. Yum!

Then, I drove to Camarillo to drop off doughnuts with Kelsey and Lindsey. Lindsey was at the gym, so I just waited around for her to come back so I could say hi. I left about a half hour later.

On the drive back home, I blasted my new Sheryl Crow CD and I just felt happy. I love making little road trips. I love getting away. I love visiting old friends. I love spending time with my family. And I love Krispy Kreme doughnuts. <3

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!

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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!

My Dream Road Trip

This is my dream road trip. I've been wanting to go to Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington for such a long time! I thought I'd just add Vancouver in there since it is so close.

What are some popular/fun/budget friendly things I could do in these cities? Any ideas where we should camp along the way?