Oikofugic Ortega

2010-01-17T08:53:00.001-08:00

Flucker's reicpe for Alfajor

One day I got a cooking lesson with Flucker on how to make alfajor. Actually, I was just the translator tagging along for Flucker teach another volunteer cook (Amy) how to make alfajor. It was great to watch him give the lesson as a full cooking class and have a front row seat to watching two cooks do what they love. The resulting cookies were delicious and surprisingly easy to make.

Ingredients:

Prepare a bag of Manjar Blanco/dulce de leche -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dulce_de_leche
Mix 2 parts of sweetened condensed milk to 1 part sugar, and reduce until carmelized.
Place in a pastry bag (or in our case a ziploc baggie with a hole cut out of a corner)

Ingredients

1 kilo of flour

1/2 kilo of pork manteca (You can use vegetable shortening, but the pork fat was tasty)

4 egg yolks (You can save the egg whites for Pisco sours!)

400g of condensed milk -- 350ml or 1.5 cups of milk

1 tablespoon of vanilla (This is an estimate because it was done by hand or "al gusto")

1 teaspoon of salt (This is also an estimate -- "al gusto")

On the table or a large shallow pan pour out most of the flour into a mound and then create a well in the middle to hold the yolks, manteca and milk. (This is a similar technique to making pasta)
In the well of flour, add the manteca, yolks and milk, vanilla and salt.
Combine the ingredients by hand by adding the flour from the edge of the flour well and keeping the liquid in the center.
Keep working the dough, by rolling, combining, stretching and pulling until it becomes tacky. (If it gets too tacky add a little flour to keep it from sticking to the surface.)
Your are done mixing when the dough can be torn off and thrown at the table and it stick and in tearing it off it isn't too stretchy.
Preheat oven to 180(C) -- 350(F).
Tear off a thumb sized hunk of dough (1/2 oz) and form into a rough ball
Place on a cooking sheet and press using the heel of your palm to make a disc of dough about 1.5-2 inches in diameter
Make about 30 -40 discs (It goes pretty quick once you get used to it)
Take a fork and poke twice into top of cookie to let air escape
Place in heated over for about 10 minutes and golden brown
Remove from oven and let cool for 2-5 minutes.
Take one cooled cracker, spread dulce de leche inside and place another cracker on top to make the cookie.
For extra credit, you can sprinkle all the cookies with powdered sugar.

The cookies should be served cool, but if people are around they will be eaten before you get too dessert. It goes a lot better if it is made with love.

2010-01-14T08:46:00.000-08:00

Pisco Sour

These two recipes for Pisco Sour were given to me by Robert down in Asia. If you find me at your house please make me the dry recipe as I prefer the variant to more alcohol and less sugar.

Dry Recipe

3 oz Pisco

1 oz simple syrup

1 oz lime juice

1 egg white

Shake all of them hard in a shaker with 7 cubes of ice.

Garnish with 2 drops of bitters on the foam

Sweet Recipe

3 oz simple syrup

2 oz Pisco

1 oz lime juice

1 egg white

Shake all of them hard in a shaker with 7 cubes of ice.

Garnish with a dash of bitters on the foam

2010-01-06T22:21:00.000-08:00

San Francisco de Asis -- January 6 to January 13th -- The time spent working on the site had a number of notable memories. Rather then give you a chronological order of events I will paint the picture of the stay using some notable highlights of things that I will always remember.

Showers -- They should always be described, as "exhilarating", "brisk" and "invigorating" and never "cold". The best part of them is that if you peeked out the top vents you had a shower with a view of the Pacific Ocean.

Watching the building change daily-- One of the joys of working on a physical construction with a team of people is that every day you could see the site change. We had the joy of getting a building with a roof but no flooring, and by the time we left, the concrete floor was poured, all the windows and doors were framed, and the interior walls were beginning to be laid out and framed. I will always think of the floor as mine, and the third terrace (of 5 terraces) as something that I built for the community center.

Las Terrazas -- We spent a night on the balcony of a restaurant serenading downtown Ancon by having one of the locals (Henri) introduce us to the owner's son who set up for us two electric guitars. We had Billy (the lead singer of the Dusty 45's) play music with the owner, a couple of his own pieces and even encouraged the rest of us to sing along with him or play ourselves. The night included me singing El Rey with Machado both in the bar downtown and as through the city streets as we walked back up to the work site. It was a beautiful night of drinking beer, pisco sours, whiskey, wine and sharing a moment in time with new found friends.

Police -- One day the police showed up and wanted to know if everything was going well on the site. We had a large number of the volunteers throwing rocks down the hillside above the site collecting them for a rock wall we were making to surround half of the building. The police came by to find out if what was happening was what we expected. The local Peruvians thought they were just looking for a "mordita", but I was more than willing to play the ignorant American and answer their questions about, what we were doing, which week we were in the project, and why people were on the hillside. When the police initially offered their help by asking me, "What can we do?", I asked them if they were willing to go up the hill and help us collect rocks. They laughed. It got even better when Nico told them it was his birthday and we proceeded to have them take pictures with us and we were able to lead the 6 of them singing "Las Mananitas" to Nico for his birthday. Humor saves the day. They gave us their cell phone numbers and told us to call if we ran into any problems.

Port-o-potties -- The hardest part to get used was having to dispose of the toilet paper in a waste paper bucket and not down the toilet. I would have that would have been gross, but that was not as bad as you think. The worst part was only when the port-a-potties were delayed in getting cleaned and you had people who weren't quite used to the food yet trying to get to a normal bowel movement.

The Daily Schedule -- Up by 5AM. Working by 6AM and ready for lunch by 12:30AM. The second half of the day was 2pm to 5pm. A half day of work was easily 6-7 hours, and a full day was 10-11 hours. The stretches were broken up by a mid-morning snack at 10:30AM of a piece of bread and diluted juice. Exhaustion usually capped the day having us wanting to crash by 9pm for our next 5am wakeup call.

Carol's food -- Carol who was the cook (but not a professional cook) would make meals inspired by the fresh food of the day. Fortunately for us, the fresh food of the day was everything as the fruits and vegetables were excellent and Carol was inspired to make salsas, granitas and even cooked up pork shoulder roasts. I have to admit I can't necessarily be a fair judge, because after every grueling day, every meal tasted like the best meal ever which was common to feel after being exhausted. But as always, "Por la boca, entras el corazon".

Translator -- Nico and I worked as translators for the site. The best part about this role is that we were called in not only for the important conversations between the lead engineer, and the team, but also for the casual conversations between the other volunteers and the local kids and volunteers. This allowed for a unique opportunity to get involved in everyone's discussions once the topics began getting beyond the basics of just "Buenos Dias" and "Pisco Sour". The most poignant moment in the role was translating the "Thank you" speech on the last day. "Se siento como un sueno, un sueno de no queremos despertar" -- "It feels like a dream, a dream that we don't want to wake from". The speaker was in tears, I had some manly welling going on, it was beautiful.

Flucker's food -- Flucker was the cook for the Peruvians who made and served food out of his house one block away from the site. He made a delicious pasta with pesto, escabeche, lomo saltado, cuy, and causa all of which I had the good luck to taste and enjoy. Even better, he gave a full cooking class to myself and Amy another volunteer how to make Alfajor cookies from scratch. In the process of making the cookies and talking about him about his cooking, I learned that he was taking classes on making Turkish and Arabic rice dishes at a cooking class in Lima. My opinion of his cooking shot up as I realized he was still challenging himself in broadening his own cooking skills. His best cooking ingredients were love and a sense of humor.

Dancing with the local kids -- One night the 14-17 year old kids asked us to go to one of their houses to go dancing. The only problem was that it was a little awkward in that the dance was basically simulated sex on the dance floor. It looked like they took the dancing straight out of the inner city and imported it to a sand riddled district an hour north of Lima. Given the age and other issues, I and the other volunteers found it best to dance with each other using a less aggressive style.

Music and Guitar Playing -- The work site was frequently filled with music as the local kids kept wanting to borrow our ipods and listen to the latest and greatest music. When they weren't listening to the music (or looking at the pictures) on the ipods, they would play a guitar which was alternately a 6 string (or 5 string if a string was broken) and play into the night.

There are other moments I may remember later, but these vignettes are the ones that capture the highlights of working on the site.

2010-01-02T12:10:00.000-08:00

Asia -- New Year's Week -- Dec 31 - January 2nd

New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

This post is inspired by a comment made by Keith Martinez when we were discussing our mutual loathing of performance reviews and how to make them simpler and tighter.

Summary:
New Year's and the New Year's celebration in Peru was unique on so many levels. It was strange being away from most of my family and relatives, and on top of that learning the customs of a different tribe, but they were so much fun it was worth the trip.

Three accomplishments
1) Dancing all night long -- It is easy to do this when you start at midnight and the DJ plays an eclectic mix of spanish, 80's and dance music until 7am. The dancing was fun and since we were a large group of 20+ people there were many people to pull out to the dance floor and dance in a group with. Given all the food and drink available pairing it with 6 hours of a hot aerobic workout was an excellent thing. After the dance was over we changed into swimsuits and threw ourselves into the pacific at 7am, it was a great way to cool off and at that hour the ocean was lovely.

Pre-party gathering

Dancing the night away

Opening bottles of champagne (my chore)

(Walking home in the morning after dancing to the beach)

2) Incredible Food and alcohol -- We had many snacks and desserts available before the midnight and during the party they served aguadillio (or levantamuertos) a spicy chicken soup at 4:30AM. The catering was done by Buen gusto in Lima and they served sandwiches of lomo saltado, peaches and cream cheese, artichoke and cheese, and desserts

(Aguadillto Chicken soup at 4:30 aM)

3) Staying healthy -- I was able to go running both on New Year's Eve morning and January 2nd with no problems. Ericka and I felt like slugs for now working out on New Year's day but then we realized we had been dancing for 6 hours and earned a pass.

Yoga in the morning

Three areas for improvement
1) Less Blackberry time -- I need to spend less time attached to electronics -- I will be limiting my updates over the next 12 days as I should really immerse myself in the time and people here while I can.

2) Better reporting -- I will try to be more concise and substantive in what I do post while I am here as you really don't need to know about every coffee break I take while I am here.

3) More unique reporting -- We are settling into a pleasant summertime rhythm for the next few days and I will try to report only the substantively unique things to keep the signal/noise ratio high.

Yours,

Ruben

2009-12-31T07:23:00.000-08:00

Asia -- New Year's Week -- Day 1 -- Dec 30th

After dropping off L and E at the airport and waiting until their flight left at 1:10 AM I trekked back to Ericka's parent's house and a bed for the evening. The next day I planned to spend the majority of the day being a tourist but I was able to help listen in planning for the New Year's party and buying alcohol and groceries for the next day.

The morning started with a visit to the Museo de Oro in Peru which had several fascinating pre-columbian artifacts. The museum housed both jewelry and a "History of Weapons" museum containing a vast collection of weapons from swords, and knives to arrow points and cavalry gear. The most interesting armament was a sword from circa 1500's thought to be that of Francisco Pizarro.

The gold museum had a tremendous collection of gold and silver jewelry including crowns, gold finger tips, nose, chin and ear jewelry and piercings. It also contained mirrors (shiny black rocks), knives, combs and large textiles with small gold squares woven in as decoration. The museum even had several mummies examples of skulls with trepanation holes in them that had been covered with gold protectors. The metal working techniques were "crude" in that the gold was not the highest quality, and that the surfaces were not machine smooth, but you could see the basis of many current techniques in the earlier ones.

As a whole exhibit it was fascinating, but I found it odd that as human beings that the two things we choose to display and preserve in museums are our weapons and our jewels. S highlighted that this was likely mostly because we choose to build our jewels and weapons out of things that will survive over generations.

Gold finger tips

Two crowns, sceptres , and a gold breast plate.

A shirt with small gold squares woven together.

The lunch and early afternoon was spent with Ericka's friends planning the alcohol and food for the New Year's party and a great lunch with Ericka's parents talking about the recent military history of Peru against Chile and terrorism, racism and culture within Peru, and then the basis of Ericka's mom's work on orphanages and the reason she has been wanting to build a community center in San Francisco de Assis for the past 10 years. The lunch was delicious and the recent history on Peru was great.

Later afternoon was spent shopping for clothes, shopping for food, shopping for supplies for the next few days, and then sitting in traffic as everyone seemed to be escaping Lima to go to the beach. Along the way I finally saw three traffic accidents, and arriving at Ericka's house the parking lot was full of people vs it looking like a ghost town earlier in the trip. We got in at the same time as some of the other volunteers for the community center and we all got in and settled in for the night. The day ended with a beautiful night walk along the beach with views of many people beginning to gather and hold parties the night before New Year's Eve. The shopping trip made me note that there was a disappointingly small number of tequila options in Peru, and if I really wanted it, I should have brought it down myself.

After mentioning all the errand running including lots of sitting around and waiting in women's clothing shops yesterday, S. provided my favorite quote of the day with a quick and earnest deadpan delivery of "I am sorry that was neither right nor fair." Which made me laugh as it was exactly the kind of phrase anyone in a long term relationship would have immediately available as a first and best response.

-Ruben

2009-12-30T19:17:00.000-08:00

I was mistaken when I said that our travel day TO Peru was the longest. Going home (for Lauren and Elias) was even longer...

December 29 was Elias and Lauren's last full day in Peru. Our day started leisurely (phew), and Ruben started his 7 mile run first. Ericka and Lauren ran 1.5 miles along the beach, then walked back along the boardwalk. We stopped briefly in the middle to chase down a red crab who we happened to get between him and his hole. Most of those crabs are way too fast to really get a close look at, they scurry down their holes too quickly.

Here's a really pretty slideshow.

After cleaning up, we went to the Asia mall to have lunch (at a really nice thin crust pizza place), check email and pick up food and water. We wound up dallying a little too long and this put pressure on the rest of our day. We ran back to the house to grab our bags. We left closer to 3pm (instead of 2pm as we had planned) to head back to the city. On our way northbound we saw an truck that had been filled with eggs that was only 1/2 filled with eggs by the time we went by. The other 1/2 were scattered all over the median and there were about half a dozen men picking up the mess. Other than that, we were fortunate that the traffic wasn't horrible yet. But the day was still young.

We dropped the bags at Ericka's parents house, and Lauren did some quick repacking - putting the smaller bags into bigger bags and lashing them down. This way we were still under the 50lb limit, but only taking 1 bag per person (so no extra $25/person charge on the way home). Then we all went out to the bike store, an artisan area and the mall in Miraflores for some shopping.

Ericka was concerned we would hit traffic around 5pm and now we see why. Most of the streets were at a standstill, although at least this way cars weren't darting at you from all sides all at once. Still it was pretty annoying. We stopped briefly at the artisan mall, managed to find parking and picked up a few more things, but Elias and Ruben were getting bored with the shopping, so we didn't stay long. We then drove over to the Miraflores mall, which is absolutely beautiful and overlooking a cliff. We wanted to have dinner in Mangos, but they didn't have any seats for 4, so we wound up having dinner at a place called Pardo's Chicken which turned out to be quite good and very fast. Dinner was a whole roasted chicken, fries, cooked veggies (cold), Pisco sours and another milk based pisco sour that tasted a bit like an eggnog drink, and we finally got to try Chicha Morada. Chicha Morada is a driink made from the dark purple corn and flavored with lime and cinnamon. It's quite good, although Elias didn't like it so much. We also tried their suspiro, but that wasn't nearly as good as the Hotel Sumaq.

After dinner we made our way back to Ericka's parents house. Lauren did some final packing and we changed clothes so we wouldn't be cold on the plane. Ericka had arranged for a taxi driver to take us to the airport, and he arrived just after 9pm. Elias was already getting tired.

Ruben walked in with us and went into the area where the ticketing booths are, even though the sign says "passengers only." Also when we entered the lines to go up to the ticket counter, they checked our passports - Ruben at the last minute gave me his passport. The woman asked in Spanish how many were traveling and we answered "tres." This was actually not true, but better that we did this, because when we were up at the ticket counter, the woman behind the counter was confused by Lauren's last name being different than Elias'. It was good that Ruben was there to say he was the father (with the same last name) and that Lauren was the mother. Although in retrospect this was annoying (and somewhat sexist), it occurred to Lauren later that she probably should have been traveling with a notarized letter with Ruben's signature because she was doing international travel.

After a teary goodbye at the entrance to security, Lauren and Elias went in to pay their airport fees. Now the woman checking passports at the ticket line had said we could use credit card to pay the airport fees, but that was not the case and Lauren didn't have cash. So we exited the area, and tried to find Ruben at the Starbuck's where he said he'd be. When he wasn't, she just hit the cash machine and got enough dollars out to pay the $62 fee and went back inside to pay. Then they went into security and that's they saw where Ruben had been waiting to see them go in (on the side of the entrance, where we couldn't see him leaving the tax area).

We waited for a while longer, got a few snacks, and then had our passports checked again. Finally our row was called. Because of the recent terrorist incident between Amsterdam and Detroit, they actually search our carry on luggage (although only cursorily), and then patted both of us down to make sure nothing was on our bodies. Lauren had to get in the women's line and was worried they were going to put Elias in a separate (men's) line, but she asked if he could stay with her and the woman said "Si, el nino con su madre."

Elias fell asleep almost as soon as he hit the seat and got his pillow situated. It was a 6.5 hour flight. Two rows behind us a woman started to cough uncontrollably just as we started taxiing down the runway, and couldn't even answer when the flight attendant asked in Spanish if she needed help. She apparently didn't, but it was pretty worrisome. She coughed through most of the flight. There was also a small child that cried through most of the flight. Lauren felt really badly for the kid and the parents.

We arrived slightly delayed in Houston and had to go through immigration and customs, with only 1.5 hours between flights. Problem: we forgot to check what our actual gate was and started to head to the wrong gate. At one point she stopped and drank from a water fountain, just because she could. Fortunately Lauren thought to check before they got too far from the central corridor and found out the gate had changed. They managed to get breakfast and get onto the plane just as they were calling their names to board.

The flight from Houston to Seattle was pretty uneventful, although irony of irony - they played G-Force as the movie. G-force is an animated movie about gerbils... and we somehow doubt they play that down in Peru where people eat it (Cuy) as a regular meal.

What I won't miss
- Driving. Anywhere.
- The pollution, both in the air or on the ground

- Having to drink bottled water and use it for brushing teeth
- Having to worry about fresh fruits and veggies and green stuff that sneaks into your dishes as garnish
- The whole camerones (shrimp). Not just the colitas (tail). Ew.
- The upset stomachs.
- Constantly being approached and asked to buy things, or take a taxi or come eat dinner in someplace.

Things I will miss in Peru
- The people, Ericka, her family, Hector, and the other people we met along the way.
- The bananas. Oh man were the bananas good.
- The beauty of the nature around Cusco and Machu Picchu
- The relaxing time at the beach
- Did I mention the bananas?
- Quinoa everywhere.
- The cebiche, even though I probably shouldn't have eaten it... it was gooooood.
- Coca tea. It's pretty good actually.
- The yogurt drink you can get to put over your cereal or make smoothies out of.
- Suspiro. MMMMMM.

2009-12-28T23:00:00.000-08:00

Now when we arrived in Cusco, what seems like an eternity ago, our transfer Ismael had made a comment about Cusco drivers being much more sane than Lima drivers. At the time we couldn't really comment, given we had only gone from the airport to the hotel, literally across the street. Still the driving in Cusco seemed pretty crazy and we did wonder just *how* crazy was the driving in Lima. Now we know.

It's pretty crazy.

Imagine if you will, drivers going approximately 100-120 kph down a road. There are busses somewhat randomly stopping for people who are waiting on the side of the road, or they suddenly come back into the right lane after picking people up. Only they are under powered and start slowly. So the people who are zooming in the right lane suddenly move to the left. A little bit. Maybe. The line is just a suggestion. Meanwhile there people who walk across the road at various intervals, even though there are overpasses that have been built for their safety. Better yet? They actually climb UNDER or go around the barriers built in the median underneath the overpasses to encourage people to use the overpasses. Then add a random dog that runs across the road (we saw only one road kill). There are small three wheeled mototaxies who mostly hang on the shoulder, but they have to occasionally move left to avoid a bicyclist or slower motorcycle trying to carry 3 people. That of course also shifts everyone over just like the slow moving busses do. And that was before we even got to the downtown part of Lima.

We were in the car for 2+ hours to get there, and another 2+ hours to get back. We don't quite know how Ericka does it without losing her mind. Ruben somehow managed to fall asleep. Lauren spent most of the time in the back seat hugging the "Oh Jesus" bar or trying not to get nauseous. Amazingly Elias didn't throw up. We did stop for ice cream near Ericka's family in Sanborja on the way home.

And why would we brave the roads of Peru for 2+ hours on a Monday? We needed to visit San Francisco de Asis, a dry arid community on the top of a sand dunes where Ericka and her mother are coordinating the building of a community center and where Ruben will be working and translating January 6-13 (slideshow). The community is built on the hillside about Ancon - a small beach town in a cove north of downtown Lima. There we met up with Ericka's parents.

We wound up spending a few hours around the site, watching folks work, meeting a few of the volunteers from the local community, Lake Union Crew (from Seattle), and Lesotho Africa, where Lake Union Crew had done a previous service project. The work is obviously hard manual labor - mixing cement and mortar, moving wheel barrows full of cement down to a retaining wall that is being built, building the sides of the community center with bricks, and putting the sheets of roof on the center. Unlike the US, there are no hard hats, no typical OSHA safety standards. But the building is coming along and everyone does their part.

Even Elias wanted to get involved, and he was allowed to fill in one section of the wall with mortar.

After Ericka had met with the project leaders, we went down to Ancon to have lunch at a small restaurant with very slow service. The food was good (the cebiche was really tasty, although at first we had to send it back because it was all onion). Everyone teased Lauren because she wasn't quite comfortable eating the heads of the shrimp that came on her dish. Once that was done we headed south back to Ericka's beach house. We did stop at Elias' request near Miraflores for ice cream at the same shop where we ate that first day in Lima. We were all very tired and relieved to make it back to Ericka's house around 5pm.

The rest of the evening was spent much more quitely reading, walking along the beach and teaching Ericka how to play Settlers of Catan. Ruben won.

2009-12-27T23:00:00.000-08:00

"Where's my hat, we're going to go on trampoline and take a siesta," says the boy that not 12 hours ago was crying and anxious because he was afraid to approach kids on the trampoline because they spoke a different language.

Today was another low key day (slideshow). We slept in until 8:30 again. Ruben got a quick morning "sprint run" in the hopes of doing some weightlifting in the gym, but they didn't have it set up yet. Ericka and Lauren traded tips on yoga and Pilates on her deck, then Ruben joined them. Shel managed to quietly avoid the mayhem, although he was able to help with Lauren's form for a few pictures.

After we cleaned up, Elias and Ruben went back to the playground for a bit. Elias begged Ruben "Dad, come on the the trampoline. Dad, come on the trampoline, Dad, come on the trampoline!" Finally Ruben relented. Just as he got on there, a bunch of other kids showed up and joined in. Elias said "Dad, you can go away now" so Ruben hung out at the club drinking Coke light until Lauren joined for a bit. We watched as the boy wound up socializing in English - although about what, we don't know. All we could see was an occasional game of what looked like tag on the trampoline, then some form of negotiations that involved going on the see saw (yes, they still have them here) and the swings, until the gang of kids had to leave for lunch.

The five of us eventually headed first to Asia for a quick internet fix and coffee (better than the day before, but not quite up to Seattle snobby standards), then north to a town called Mala for lunch. We ate at an open air restaurant called La Huaca, which had the hugest camerones (shrimp) ever. Lauren's dish (Colitas de Camerones with ajo, until they insisted she have the rest of the camerones too) had yucca, Elias and Ericka had steak, Ruben had a heart attack on a plate and Shel had calamari. The only upsetting thing was when a woman walked into the courtyard and started pointing and begging for Lauren's food. Ericka tried to get her to go away, but she wouldn't, and finally called the waiter over who had to push her away. You could see she had soiled through her pants although (fortunately) she didn't smell. The waiter told us that was the first time that had happened, although Ericka was dubious.

We left there and went to the market at Mala - a true "local" market that also caters to tourists who come from Lima (but not foreign tourists, they tend to go to the upscale Asia Boulevard, which is a stark contrast to this market). Here's where you get your groceries, fruit, dead chickens, beer, clothing, just about anything really cheap. We wandered around the market and noticed how many things were in yellow. Ericka had told us that you are supposed to wear yellow underwear for New Year's for good luck. We also looked for some sandals for Elias, but weren't able to find the type he wanted.

After our trip to Mala we went back to the Asia mall for ice cream and finally settled on some slightly large crocs-that-look-like-keens for Elias, even though they were kind of pricey. He'll grow into them. On the way back Elias decided he wanted to just be dropped off at the trampoline, so we did because we all wanted to go back to the house for our siesta.

All four adults hung out on the deck - Ericka in the hammock, Ruben and Lauren on one couch and Shel on the other. Ruben took a good 15-20 minute nap and everyone else read. Elias came back a little while later and grabbed his hat and said the quote that started this post. We just had to laugh.

At that point Lauren and Ruben took a walk down to the beach to finally put their feet in the Pacific - a must do whenever they are by the sea. They walked north to see the rock formations and take pictures of the birds.

The beach is littered with tiny little white crabs shells as well as other shells, and an occasional bit of what looks like jelly fish jelly. The inter-tidal zone is littered with the holes that are the homes of the red crabs. Some of the red crabs were out but not many as it was still the middle of the day (the crabs seem to like the morning time the best). If you do see one hanging halfway out of their hole and you walk close the scurry inside (we theorized they can feel the vibrations of your steps in the sand). There is a little trash, but not too much. The birds are very skittish and don't allow you to get too close, even if you walk closely.

We made it out to the rocks along the water, even though some of the sand was very squishy. The sand here is very fine and in places where its very wet it feels like it will give out underneath you in places. The rocks were covered in birds in places. At this point we noticed the tide was coming in so we turned back closer to shore.

As we approached Ericka's house we noticed Elias coming back from the beach and he came out to meet us. We spent a lot longer with him on the beach and watching all the birds. Snowy plovers were diving and grabbing the Mui Mui crabs that were tossed about in the waves. But more impressive were the Peruvian Pelicans that were flying just above the really big deeper waves.

We came in for dinner once it got colder - dinner was tofu stir fry cooked by Shel, chicken cooked by Ericka and some limeade made by Lauren. Desert consisted of making a fire on the beach and making smores. Lights were out early as we had an early wake up call planned for Monday to go up to San Francisco de Asis where Ericka is coordinating the building of the community center.

2009-12-26T23:00:00.000-08:00

Day 7 (slideshow) was our most mellow day yet. We woke up late, puttered around the house, and had breakfast. Ruben took his 7 mile run along the beach. He saw the red crabs scurry into their holes, and more varieties of birds than we've seen anywhere else in the last few years.

Lauren and Ericka eeked out their 3.5 miles after he came back. There are many different smells here and it's much warmer and humid than Lauren's last run in Seattle (which was in 45 degree and rainy weather).

Ruben and Elias meanwhile went to the community pool to check that out. Upon their return, Elias braved the cold waters of Ericka's pool and even ducked under the fountain part.

The shopping trip to the Asia mall was pretty much a madhouse. After getting coffee and snagging some wifi, everyone went food shopping. Most of the stores were just opening up and the food market was crazy. Lauren tried to pay for the groceries using her credit card and when they wanted to see a second form of ID, she showed her driver's license. The check out girl didn't know if that was enough and wanted to check with the manager and took both the driver's license and credit card away. Lauren and Ericka (who was helping her try to convince them that the WA state ID was enough) didn't think fast enough and suddenly Lauren had a pit in her stomach that she had done a dumb thing by letting her credit card out of her sight.

After we got back to the house we noticed how many more people were in the parking lot - it's "Summer" after all. We made lunch of sandwiches, did some laundry (which has to air dry but takes a while, so you can only do a load or two a day. We also started a pot of soup and beans for dinner. The rest of the day was really low key and mellow. Elias got a few more trips to the playground, but he was upset at not being able to back on the trampoline because there were suddenly so many more kids hanging out and talking and he was afraid to approach them because he was shy even in his own language. Later that evening the parents went with him and he got a turn on the trampoline when everyone else was away. The parents left and suddenly all these other kids came around to join him. They tried to engage him in Spanish and he got over his "stage fright" to say 'I don't speak Spanish" so they immediately started asking him all sorts of questions in English. One kid even said he didn't like talking in English and Elias said "if I were you I wouldn't want to talk in English either." Elias felt a lot better on the walk home than he had all day.

2009-12-25T23:00:00.000-08:00

We woke up even before the wake up call on Day 6. Ruben went down to meet up with an old co-worker from Amazon.com for breakfast who was traveling through South America and just happened to be staying at the exact same hotel. Lauren and Elias stayed in the room and relaxed for a bit, which was good because Lauren's stomach was acting up again. A bit later he had a second breakfast with Lauren and Elias.

At 10 we were back down stairs for our ride with Ismael to the airport. He walked us through paying our airport taxes and to security, explaining that the taxes are not paid to the airlines because the airlines don't generally actually pay it to the government. Security was once again quick, and then we waited for 40 minutes or so for our flight. There were two flights to Lima from two adjacent gates leaving five minutes apart. We took off Elias asked when he could use his electronics. That raised the question: if you start at 12,000 feet, when can you start using electronic devices, you're already over 10,000 feet?

The flight is only 1 hour long - just enough time to get and eat your snack that they actually give you. We landed in warm, humid and overcast Lima by 1, but our ride wasn't there. We were immediately approached by a swarm of taxi drivers, and although we said "No gracias" one even just hung right next to Ruben in case he changed his mind. It was kind of eerie and annoying actually. Elias was hungry so Lauren went with him upstairs and got him a sandwich and found a Starbucks (a real one) for a couple of hot drinks for the adults. Elias' comment: "Dad gives mom entertainment, Mom gives dad coffee." The kid is pretty observant.

Hector showed up and met Ruben in the meanwhile and once we were all back together, we headed about 1/2 hour south to Sanborja where Ericka's parents live. It was so wonderful to see them and meet her sister. We then all went off by car to find some lunch, only to realize that every place is closed because it was Christmas day. We wound up eating a really crappy meal at a Bembos, although the gift inside the kids meal was a really good matchbox car for Elias. We did have some really great gelato right afterwards at a shop that just happened to be open next door.

After lunch we packed up all of the stuff to take to Ericka's beach house into the two cars. Ericka's house is about an hour south of her parents along the beach about 2 miles north of an upscale area called Asia. Ericka's house has been featured in a number of magazines including this one: (click on the camera icon below the word Mar Adentro)

Ruben and Hector spoke about a lof of things including the politics of Fujimori and whether he was effective leader or if he should have been jailed. The landscape seems like a very odd place for people to live. Where there are no houses there is nothing except barren sand dunes. When Lauren asked why there are no roofs on some of the houses Hector explained that it doesn't really rain here - it just gets misty all year, so some people have open air roofs. Many of the houses and neighborhoods look like they'd be completely abandoned in the U.S. but they're not. There are very different living conditions here.

Finally we arrived at the turn off for Ericka's place. A dirt road right turn off the highway. If you didn't know what to look for you'd completely miss it. The road twists and winds around the back of a hill and hugs the hill around a large expanse of open empty sand dune that apparently has been bought and will be turned into another large complex. We arrived at her community and the guard let us in. There were very few people in the community already because it was Christmas day and apparently "summer" starts the day after Christmas.

After unloading the cars we got to tour Ericka's gorgeous house. The pictures honestly don't even do it justice. It's just amazing, calming and very pretty. We unpacked and then went for a drive over to Asia mall to see if we could find some dinner, but there was very little open including a Chinese restaurant "Chifa Yi-Yi" and a convenience store. We had a reasonable dinner and then did some quicky shopping to get some basic staples for breakfast in the morning. The place was packed with people who had arrived that day and needed basics.

Evening time was spent playing "Bananas" (mixed in Spanish and English) and making brownies.

2009-12-24T23:00:00.000-08:00

What. A. Day. (slideshow)

Our last full day in Cusco started at 7:30, with our breakfast buffet again at 8. We were picked up by our bus around 8:40. The bus had to go all the way around the plaza which we could see was already filled with all the tents of all the vendors. The bus got pulled over by a police who seemed to only want to harass the driver to prove he had all the proper documentation. After another delay to combine buses and wait for the tour guide, we were on our way out of town, past Sacsayhuaman, Q'enko, Puca Pucara and Tambomachay (all seen on the first day) and onto the Sacred Valley.

Our first stop was at a small market which I don't believe is even on the map. We wandered the stalls for a bit, used the rest rooms and pet the llamas and alpacas. Ruben tried on a couple of hats, and Lauren bought a sweater and a dingle hat for Elias.

Our next stop was on an overlook of the Sacred Valley and Urubamba river. We took some pictures and stretched our legs (and were approached by more locals hocking their wares).

Finally we arrived at Pisac and the market. There are ruins there, but apparently we didn't have a chance to go see them. Instead our tour guide, Sylvia, took us into to show us how to tell the difference between good silver and fake, good alpaca and stuff that's mixed with synthetic and where to get the best empanadas. We got to spend quite a lot of time in this market, which also included an open air food market where folks were selling a lot of fruits, vegetables and newly killed chickens. We had some good success at negotiations, and some were just ok, but overall we still felt like we did ok. One little faux pas was that Ruben decided to have a picture taken with some of the young kids and Elias and Lauren. After the picture was taken he gave them all one Sol. Apparently each person in the photo is supposed to get a Sol, but we only had 1 coin to give.

The kids in general are pretty heart wrenching and they know it. They run through the streets selling things - they're cute, they know how to sell. One later in the day even asked Lauren where she was from and when she replied "Estados Unidos" the girl replied "The capitol is Washington." The folks on Madison Avenue know nothing about marketing in comparison to these kids.

The next stop was lunch at Tambo in Urubamba. We can't seem to remember the restaurant's name, but we went down a road that had a sign that said "Arco Iris" and we seem to recall the word meant "abundance" in Cetchua. The restaurant was in a beautiful hacienda by the Urubamba river and served a buffet of different local salads, hot foods, etc. Of note: the chile relleno was very spicy, the trout ceviche (we dared to try) was really wonderful, and the rice pudding was some of the best we've ever had. We also had a corn pudding, which really was a kind of watery, purple gelatin. The small Pisco Sours were free for the adults, and Elias got a free lemonade.

After lunch we wandered down to the river side where there was a swing. Elias spent time swinging and we spent time chatting with Mina, one of the three women from Alabama we had been touring with the last few days. Hiking back up to the hacienda winded us all, even though we thought we were getting acclimatized.

Our next stop was in Ollantaytambo to hike the ruins. This was probably the most excellent part of the afternoon. We first paused by the two "doors" that Sylvia explained were the entrances from the Inca trail. Once again our bus driver somehow managed to navigate the incredibly narrow streets, avoiding pedestrians, dogs, and other vehicles. We parked and Sylvia explained the significance of the site, then we hiked up. And up. And Up. Now mind you this is at 2800 meters so we had to take the steep stairs s-l-o-o-o-o-w-l-y. We stopped half way up and Sylvia gave us a break by explaining more about the site and the architecture. Eventually we climbed to the top to where the Sun and Moon temples were - and the incredible views. After we were given 15-20 minutes to choose which way we wanted to hike down - we choose the longer way to hike down through another path, even though Elias was a little reluctant.

We thought about getting a coffee here:

Once the group was back together, the bus took the long climb back the mountains to Chinchero, which is at 4000m. (On another trip we'd like to visit the salt fields of Maras and the ruins in Moray). Chinchero was where the girl really engaged Lauren with her knowledge of the U.S. capitol. We were then treated to a demonstration of how they make and dye the wool for their intricate hand weavings by some women who speak very little Spanish - our tour guide had to translate from Cetchua for us. Ruben walked up the hill to view the inside of the Church, and Lauren and Elias took a little longer to shop and saunter up the streets. It's a difficult climb for us "de la playa" when you're that high up and the locals will joke with you about it if you let them. Eventually they just waited outside the church and watched the townspeople as the kids played and the adults sold wares at another small market.

On the way back we were stuck behind a really smelly truck filled with corn and kids who were riding on top of the corn pile. The bus driver was obviously getting annoyed at the truck driver for not letting us pass. The young boy was obviously showing off for the bus. At one point he got up with a stick, broke the stick in half and waved them about. Then he saw three boys who were waiting for him by the side of the road and threw the stick at them just before they threw their sticks at him. The boy on the truck managed to nail one of the boys on the road square on the head. I'm not sure but I think all four were laughing. Finally the bus driver was able to pass and made some snide comment (in Spanish) about the driver of the truck.

Ruben's final comment on the tours was this: we had the perfect trifecta of tour guides: the shaman who was resentful of Pizarro bringing Catholic faith and usurping the local culture; the mystic spiritual who claimed scientific proof for the energy vortices that occurred around Machu Picchu; and the social activist who kept espousing people power to the Andean communities. It made it all so interesting.

We made it back to Cusco around 6:30 and had to avoid the plaza again. we were dropped off not near the hotel, but a few blocks away and needed to walk through the plaza to get back. That was a really amazing experience of sights and smells. There were so many things we weren't quite sure why they were being sold - particularly mosses, branches and colored powders. Elias so wanted to buy the fireworks, but we resisted.

We stopped at the hotel, then went back out to find a place to eat. We first tried to find the place where Ruben's friend Matt was eating called the Devine Comedia. We found it, but as it was an expensive French restaurant and Elias told us he had enough of Peruvian and fancy food, we decided to back track. He kept asking for Mexican food and although we weren't quite willing to quite cater to that whim, we were willing to go to Hannah's suggestion, Jack's. That was, until Ruben riveted on the blue glowing door of "The Fallen Angel" across the street from the Hotel Monestario and next to the Precolumbian art museum. With a name like that we had to go check it out.

This was probably the most interesting place for us to eat in Cusco. They had a limited Christmas eve dinner that included an aperitif, appetizer, main course, and desert for $30 US. One of the menu options was turkey and Elias was wiling to give it a try. He even tried the trout ceviche over a potato for his appetizer and although he didn't like the ceviche so much, he thought the potatoes were ok. Ruben had the mushroom soup and Lauren had the Andean salad to start. Ruben had the sweet potato ravioli for dinner, Lauren and Elias had the turkey and the drunken pears were served with lemongrass ice cream and a hard candy sugar "fan" decoration.

But better than the food was the incredible decor. Some of the six person tables had fish tanks in them. Many of the seats were faux tiger, leopard and zebra prints and opened up to hold a person's belongings. Some of the chairs were actually daybeds, with throw pillows of red and black latex hearts. There was a large glowing statue of Lucifer with medusa like hair in the middle of one room that had a really tall ceiling. From this ceiling was attached a red spandex aerialist "rope" that was attached out of the way to the side (we wondered when the aerialists came to do their shows). There were also tons of disco balls spinning, although none were lit. Our room contained the bar, behind which was a booth with DJ wearing a conductor's type hat spinning various tunes (fortunately nothing with a pan flute theme). Our room also contained a picture of two angels fighting and.... Flying Pigs. Yes. Flying pigs. Many of them. It was absolutely awesome. The waiters were all wearing shirts that said "Fallen Angel - Full of Pleasure" with little wings on the back.

On each table were three things for us: Paper crowns, a "present" that looked like and English "Cracker" which was filled with shredded paper, three paper streamers called "serpentinas" and a small ornament, and a bag filled with 10 sparklers. At one point we even lit some of the sparklers in the restaurant along with all the other patrons in the room. We left about 1.5 hours later and the place was packed.

We walked back to the hotel via the plaza again. Some kids set off a M80 really close as we walked by and it startled us silly. We were back at the plaza just before 9 pm, and stood on the steps of the church. Again we were approached by people selling things including a 12 year old girl who offered to have Elias hold her llama for a picture for a sol. The church was getting ready to start mass. We walked the length of the cathedral, then back through the booths as they were closing. This is where we really saw what the vendors were selling, or really what at this point they were packing up at this point.

The rest of the evening was spent packing and organzing and writing up trip notes. Ruben went to sleep early. At midnight the fireworks went off, and continued at least until 2am.

2009-12-23T23:00:00.000-08:00

Ruben had set his alarm for 8 am with the thought of going back up the mountain to climb Wayapicchu, but his blackberry wedged and his phone never made noise. At 8:30 Lauren woke up with a pressing need to use the bathroom. Something she ate the day before was definitely having it's revenge. She climbed back into bed miserable and didn't much feel like leaving the room for breakfast.

Ruben and Elias went to breakfast by themselves and instead of the intended buffet, they served them off the menu since there were so few patrons in the hotel. They brought back some toast and jam for Lauren who was still in bed. Ruben also got our check out time extended from 10am. All had to admit the slow start was what they needed, although this was not the way they expected it to happen. After a bit of a discussion, Lauren did decide to break out the ciprofloxin in her kit, took a pill and then a nap. By noon she felt not quite normal, but maybe like she could venture from the hotel long enough to get to the restaurant for their pre-payed buffet.

Today's slideshow is here.

The buffet was at Toto's house which overlooked the raging water. We had a nice long leisurely lunch (and even Lauren found some really bland food, including the best tasting banana). Ruben even found an espresso from a cart outside the door. We all three tried Inka Cola, which looks obnoxiouly yellow like Mountain Dew, but doesn't quite taste like it. We couldn't quite place the taste in fact. Elias liked it, but the adults are not sure it was worth the Soles, particularly given how sugared up Elias got after drinking it.

Aguas calientes is a nice town in a beautiful setting, filled with dichotomies. One was noted while we were eating we watched as the men doing the construction work on the street would dump the extra rocks and building material right into the beautiful rushing river.

After lunch we wandered the town for a while, first into the town square where we saw a christmas tree made of green plastic sprite bottles and a coffee shop called Discovery Coffee who's logo was designed to look awfully familiar.

Then we walked up the street to the hot springs - the other place we had wanted to visit if we been up for it and remembered to bring our bathing suits. You can rent bathing suits and towels, but we'd rather use our own. As we walked up the street, we were approached by every restaurant owner telling us about their food. Ruben responded "Ya comimos" and they would back off. A few of the shops up near the hot springs are actually spas that offer massages and Ruben wondered about their authenticity. When Lauren asked about that, he mentioned (another dichotomy) the sign at the front desk of our fancy hotel that had a picture of a small child hugging her knees that said that said basically that child prostitution is wrong.

We walked back down the street, then into the market and got some ideas of the things we wanted to buy once back in Cusco. We saw a lot of very young kids with their mothers at the market - some just playing with rocks and empty milk crates. We had seen slightly older kids coming home from primary school on our earlier walk up the street to the hot springs, but I didn't really see many kids Elias' age (Part of this I realize is that the kids here are mostly smaller than Elias, and a kid who looks Elias' height may really be 12 or 13). Just before we got on the train we bought some ice cream and then were followed by a very young girl, who didn't seem to have a parent around) who looked longingly at Elias eating his. When we approached the train station there were two waiting platforms, and it appeared that the tourists went into the covered waiting area but the locals seemed to be going to a more open waiting area.

The train ride home was similar to the train ride to Aguas Calientes, except that as we were getting our tea service we had to stop at a train crossing. Small children climbed down next to the train to beg as we were eating and an announcement specifically said for us not to toss things out the train to them. The other item of note on the train was the "fashion show" that was put on by the man and woman porter. The guy, a seemingly shy, bespeckled guy, got dressed up in these beautiful baby alpaca gorgeous sweaters and looked adorable. The woman was this skinny almost model like woman who really showed off the women's clothing beautifully. We were also treated to a show by a guy in a traditional garb wearing a very odd white mask.

We arrived in Poroy and were picked up by Ismael and taken back to Cusco and our hotel. By this point, Ismael explained, the Plaza De Armas was closed down so that they could mark the various stalls for the Santuranticuy market which is on Christmas eve. We had to take an even more circuitous route back to the hotel. Ismael explained how we'd be picked up for the next day (8:25 in the lobby for an 8:40 pick up) for our tour of the Sacred Valley.

After a quick stop at the hotel (and more oxygen for Elias), we headed back to the plaza to find some dinner. The place road up to the plaza was a madhouse, filled with people just waiting to go set up their spots. We did a circuit of the plaza and were again approached by people from all the restaurants trying to get us to come try their food (free pisco sours! happy hour!) We finally settled on one that appeared to have a few people in the balcony. Unfortunately it was yet another buffet, but they did have some food Lauren could eat off the menu (Ruben and Elias got the buffet). Elias thought the rice pudding was just simply excellent.

On our way back to the hotel we made one final stop at Jack's Cafe where our friend Hannah had worked for a time when she lived here in Cusco a couple of years ago. Honestly? We should have taken her advice and eaten there instead of where we did eat. Next time we know...

2009-12-22T21:57:00.000-08:00

Day 3 and another 5am alarm. Lauren had a really rough night (1:30 am bad dream) and woke up with a really bad headache. She started out by checking to see if the oxygen tank was still in the hallway which it was and she took a good 5 minutes of oxygen before even going in the shower. Elias didn't start out much better, and well... it turns out we all needed some oxygen before preceding with the day. Ruben brought down the larger bags to check them with the hotel for the night. We had left with us 3 smaller bags that contained pajamas, changes of clothes, rain jackets, our dop kits, meds, cameras, snacks, the computer and other things to occupy us for the train trip (things we should have included: perhaps more clothes in case we got wet on the mountain and the cable to upload today's pictures onto the computer). Lauren also had a small backpack for carrying things when climbing up on the ruins.

The hotel included a nice complementary breakfast buffet of cereals, yogurt, made to order omlets, many types of bread, crepes and other warm items. Elias' appetite was still pretty off and he barely ate. Lauren did a bit better, and Ruben was thoroughly enthralled, particularly with the papaya juice.

By 6am we were done with breakfast and we went to look for Ismael who had just arrived at the hotel lobby. He took us to a van, to take us to Poroy and to the train station. He first showed us our tickets, round trip tickets for the train, round trip bus tickets and our tickets to Machu Picchu. He explained that the train used to leave from Cusco, but it took 4.5 hours to Aquas Calientes. Now the train leaves from Poroy - 20 minutes by car, but it only takes 3 hours. The trick is getting to Poroy.

The car took us passed the Cathedral and then winding up some crazy one laned streets out of town. The houses on the hillside are just amazing - how people build and live in these things is just astounding. The houses vary - some can be nice, most are really pretty ramshackle - made of adobe mud or pieced together from various bits of building materials. Dogs run about. It's a bit surreal as we (the tourists with money) are driving past people in their day to day lives. Some stand and watch as we go by, others just go about their work.

Finally we came to a larger two laned road that leveled off. At one point Ismael commented on the lack of speed limits on the road and asked about our speed limits - 50 km or so on roads. Lauren told him that yes, we have posted speed limits, but it doesn't mean that they always get followed, it only means that you get a ticket if you get caught by the police. He also commented on the truck carrying a caterpillar tractor that was barely tied down and how we'd likely not see that in the U.S. Lauren agreed.

There is a slideshow for this days worth of pictures.

Ismael left us at the train station and we boarded right on time. Our seats were separated and Lauren sat across and one row behind from where Elias and Ruben were sitting. Unfortunately we were facing backwards, but the views were no less spectacular, particularly since the top of the car also had windows. Shortly after we left they served us a breakfast tea service in terra cotta cups and saucers. Elias drank some Coke Zero, ate 1 grape and refused all other food.

The train took us through through a river valley (as trains usually do) and we were surrounded by either terraced farms and fields, or high canyons. One oddity they warned us about - after going through the valley where they grow most of the corn and quinoa for the Cusco area, the train traverses hillsides by doing switchbacks down the steep cliffs by alternately running backwards and forwards.

Another oddity which confused both Lauren and Ruben was which way we were headed. We figured out that we are Northern hemisphere biased. The sun was rising to the east and we were heading away from it. However, we were "felt" as though we were heading South west. What we neglected to account for was that the sun rises and sets with a north bias in the Southern hemisphere and all the celestial clues we have about which way is N, S, E, or W is completely confounded by them not behaving as they "normally" do. Ruben is hoping for a clear night sky and not to lose his mind as he tries to rationalize this. It is oddly disconcerting as we both typically have good navigation skills when we can reason about the time of day and the position of the sun, and all those "truths" are not applicable here.

The types of countryside, flora, people, animals and types of houses held a fascination for Lauren but she was unable to grab any good pictures from her backwards seating arrangement. Kids still wave to the train as it drives on by. We stopped in Ollantaytambo and another passenger came on board and took the emtpy seat beside her, making it more difficult for her to turn around to look forward. The canyons became even morefertile and dense beyond the stop. Even Elias commented on how tall the canyons are. Just before we arrived Ruben managed to convince Elias to drink a sprite and eat a Z-Bar, even though the Z-bar wasn't his favorite flavor.

We arrived in Aguas Calientes at 9:50 and found our guide Raquel - a small woman who also spoke English, Spanish and Quechua. We checked in with her, then dropped our bags, minus the food, water, cameras and rain coats (oh and the Lakeside Sentinel fork!) with our hotel drop - which felt very weird just to leave our bags with some random stranger on the street. They did give us official looking bag check tickets and Raquel assured us that was the right thing to do. We also visited the bathroom before following her and her green and yellow flat (because she's so small - her words!) through the town market to the bus station. There are so many things that are tempting to buy although we've been told it's more expensive up here than in Cusco.
The bus ride was an experience. Elias was quite nervous. It's a 1/2 hour, 1 lane road full of switchbacks and the drivers take it at what seems like a really fast speed. At one point a bus going down met up with us, they had to back up a bit to find a place where we could safely pass. We saw a few people hiking up the mountain, which looked like an interesting idea - there are even stairs in places.

Finally we arrived at the top and we were given 10 minutes to go to the bathroom and get a snack. The bathroom was the first experience - we had to pay a Sol to go in... and you have to grab toilet paper on the way in, there is none there. This means you have to make a decision as to what kind of visit it will be before going in. Very troubling, particularly if you don't get enough paper. Ruben finally got Elias a ham sandwich which we were told we could sneak in to keep with the group. It was the first thing he agreed he would eat pretty much in 36 hours. We showed our tickets to the gate (and strangely our tickets needed our names, and our passport IDs) and went through.

The first part of the climb was really steep. Elias was still incredibly grumpy and very nervous about the climb but we slowly got him to eat more and more. We stopped here and there, partly to catch our respective breaths, partly to not pass another group and partly to hear Raquel tell us about the history of the place. We took a ton of pictures.

As the tour progressed three things happened 1) the food hit Elias' blood stream 2) Lauren's stomach began to cramp terribly, she thinks either because of a reaction to the acetazolamide or the acetazolamide and dramamine together and 3) Raquel's explanations of some of the formations at the site (particularly in the temples) kept claiming scientific proof from NASA and other "scientifically proven" sources to mystic energy at the site. Ruben, stealing heavily from Patton Oswald, commented quietly to Lauren "I'm going to punch all the tofu on the planet if I have to listen to people talk about energy vortexes." He would to do this tour again with an actual scientist, historian, archaeologist or engineer.

The tour ended after 1pm and after a brief pause to talk to Elias and give Lauren a bit of a rest from her really badly aching stomach, we headed back down to the entrance of the site. None of us were up for snack food or the buffet, so we decided to have lunch in the really nice restaurant in the hotel at Tampu at the Sanctuary Lodge. One thing made this all the worth it: it gave us access to the hotel bathrooms where we didn't have to pay for the bathrooms or pre-decide toilet paper needs. Lunch, including desert, was wonderful and meanwhile it started pouring outside. Elias even ate half a burger and saved the other half for later, and most of the desert. We waited for a while to see if the rain cleared and Lauren's stomach settled (it mostly did) and eventually wandered back to the site. We convinced Elias to go back out for a little while, and there were very few people there - as with our trip to Disneyland the rain made all the non Seattle-ites run away. It was wonderful. We did meet another family from Sacramento and a woman named Sioban from Santa Clara. Ruben found the entrance to Wayapicchu - which he's contemplating climbing tomorrow. Lauren was happy because she got to explore the areas which were hard for her because her stomach was hurting so much the first time around - this time it was much more enjoyable.

We came back down to the bus around 3:45pm. The bus almost had a head on collision with another bus as it went down the mountain, but they somehow averted that. We had the driver drop us right off in front of the hotel Sumaq and walked into the lobby.

There are only like 11 patrons in the hotel tonight. We have been treated really well. It's a beautiful hotel anyway, right along side of the rushing river. They are doing work (by hand? No Caterpillar tractor equipment) to dig a trench right in front at the moment, but that's only during the day. Our room is off the back - but right under the train tracks - LITERALLY the train tracks are 5 feet away and about 10 feet up out our back slider. It was noisy until about 11pm, then it stopped).

The desk clerk served us Coca tea and some home made potato chips with a very tasty guacamole while we waited for our room keys and she told us all about our services. Our bags were ready. Elias took the porter to our room (Ruben gave him a tip to give to the man) while Ruben and Lauren finished their snack. It's odd to be able to give him such freedom.

Sweet cakes were available from 4-5:30 and Pisco sours were available in the bar from 5:30 - 6:30. We just missed the Pisco sours but we did have an absolutely delectable dinner at 6:30 that was included in the price of the hotel. The deserts, if possible, were even better than the dinners.

The rest of the evening was just spent catching up and resting in the room. Tomorrow is a rest day until we take the train back to Poroy where we will be met by Ismael to be taken back to Casa Andina.

Songs heard in Peruvian flute music:
"Love Hurts"
"Killing Me Softly" and "Fernando by Abba"

2009-12-21T23:00:00.000-08:00

The phone call came too soon, particularly since the room was pretty noisy (someone's car alarm went off around 3:30 am). Ruben answered but we promptly ignored it and fell back to sleep for 1/2 an hour until Ruben's 2 backup alarms went off. The second alarm got Lauren to jump out of bed in that weird almost sleepwalking way. What finally woke both of them up was when she came out of the bathroom exclaiming the water really swirls the other way! It turns out that's only an urban myth and likely a feature of a) the toilet and b) sleeplessness.

Extracting Elias from bed was another story... but eventually we did get everyone up and going, had a slight breakfast buffet at the hotel and walked back across the street again to the airport. Another oddity, being approached by people in bright green and black jump suits asking if you if you want your checked bags "wrapped" in plastic as a security measure. That didn't exactly help our sense of security, but we knew we had packed such that all of our really important things were in in our carry on bags.

We checked into our LAN flight, then headed to the gate, stopping at a cash machine to get some Soles. We also stopped to pay our flight tax, although not everyone who was going through the gate did the same and we wondered if we were paying some kind of ignorance tax by doing so. We're pretty sure we were supposed to pay the approx $6.00 airport fee tax and we seem to remember someone saying we should do this as we left the airport as opposed to on the way back to avoid the lines. Once paid we went through security, and we next wondered if we had to throw out the bottles of water we had on us. Ruben asked the security agent, who asked "A donde van?" Ruben replied "Cusco" and he replied (in Spanish) we could bring on water, wine, beer, whatever we wanted. We also didn't have to take off our shoes or pull out our liquids and gels.

The flight to Cusco was quick and bumpy and unfortunately for Elias, not too pleasant on his stomach. The kid refused the Dramamine offered and he lost his breakfast shortly before landing. Fortunately he's gotten quite good at telling us before hand and there were plenty of airsickness bags, and the woman across the aisle was very understanding.

At Cusco airport we were met by a lot of people with carts offering to get our bags for us. Ruben headed straight to the Hotel Andina kiosk and they had our names already down. We got our bags, and did wind up hiring a guy with a cart. They're very tricky, this particular guy made it seem like he had been hired by Ruben who had just left for the bathroom. He struck up a conversation with Lauren and got just enough information from me or from the bag tags to make it seem like he was supposed to take the bags for us. It was really weird - somewhat harmless in the "It cost us $5.00" harmless, but still weird.

Just outside we saw Ismael who was waiting with a placard with "Ruben Ortega" on it. Ismael is our "transfer coordinator" for us for the time we're staying here. He showed us to our bus, and took us to our hotel, giving us a lot of helpful tips on the way - like taking it easy, drinking the coca tea, don't eat anything to heavy and don't eat guinea pig on the first day, and to be careful, particularly with street vendors.

As we were waiting to check in the bag check guy served us coca tea, and Elias was even willing to try it with a bunch of sugar. Ismael went over a lot of other information, including our rather overwhelming itinerary for the next few days. Fortunately he wrote much of it down and had a few maps to guide us along.

Eventually we wound up in our rooms (they hotel wound up upgrading us to 2 adjoining rooms instead of 1 triple, which was actually fine). Ismael suggested we rest and relax but that we needed to be down in the lobby at 1:25pm sharp for a 1:40 pick up for our afternoon tours. He was sure to mention this was Cusco time, not Lima time. The rooms were really nice, there were bottles of water in the bathrooms and free Wifi, so Lauren finally got connected for a bit. All of us slept, including Mr "I can't sleep" Elias. Although Ruben had his alarm set, we wound up getting up a bit earlier, albeit reluctantly.

We went down the lobby little early and asked for oxygen as both Lauren and Elias were feeling the effects (mostly headache) of the high altitude. We each took 5 minutes of the oxygen and felt a little revived, but probably could have had more. We didn't have time to eat, although Ruben and Lauren each ate a sports bar and Ruben got some rolls from the restaurant for Elias.

Ismael shuffled us onto a bus that somehow navigated tiny streets. A guide ran from hotel to hotel in front of the bus to alert the patrons just before the bus arrived to pick them up. Ruben commented that if he could run a marathon here, he could run anywhere.

We were dropped off with another couple in front of the cathedral in the main square - apparently we were to be hooked up with another English speaking tour bus, with our tour guide Adriel. Once on the square we were approached by many vendors, all hocking ponchos, brightly colored pictures, coca leaves and candies, knit hats, and some in brightly colored clothes holding tiny llamas (ADORABLE) offering to have you hold them and take a picture with them for a sol or two. It was all very tempting but having been warned, we stayed away. Check out more pictures starting on this page of our gallery.

We were shuffled onto our other bus for a brief moment for an orientation, then back off the bus for a tour of the Church. Our tour guide was a man named Adriel, who's native tongue (as we learned later) is Quechua, he's Catholic, married to a Jehovah Witness and is learning to be a shaman. The chapel we entered when we walked in was impressive enough - the front is completely gilded and very ornate. And yet this isn't the biggest room. Adriel discussed the religious roots of the area, spoke very fondly of the old Incan traditions and way of life and how it evaporated with Pizzaro and the Roman Catholic faith. Ruben's favorite was the feeling of tremendous anger and resentment of how the Incas were conquered so quickly. He further explained how many of the pieces of art in the church were copies of original pieces with Peruvian features. For instance the choir room was carved in a similar style to one in a European church, but into each of the arm wrests were carved naked women with pregnant bellies. The next room was absolutely huge and the altar was made completely in silver, not just gold leaf as in the other room. There was a third room too, but by this time Elias was starting to fade and Lauren sat back with him. One of the people working there offered oxygen and we should have taken them up on it at that point, but didn't.

We returned to the bus, through the throngs of folks trying to sell us more wares. The group decided to walk through the two tiny streets was the Inca Palace. We stopped at one point and Adriel talked about the stone wall and how this was some of the original Incan work - how it's not made with mortar, just the stones are hooked together and they lean inwards in order to make them secure in the earthquake zone. We were standing and listening to this next to a lady who was weaving a belt by hand. It was quite interesting to watch. Ruben's comment was how much easier it was made to do that with a Jacquard Loom - Lauren's retort was how much skill it took to know exactly which strings to lift to get the right pattern.

Once at the Incan Palace Ruben took Elias in to the medic right away as he was really complaining of not feeling well. They gave him oxygen and he perked right back up and they caught back up to us as Adriel was giving us more of a talk on the history of the Incas. We spent quite a while in the palace and he told us about how they put together buildings such as this. It was really fascinating. Once we were done with this building we all got a bathroom break - the bathrooms were on the back side of the building. This took us passed a beautiful garden with some amazing fuschia trees.

The bus picked us up and we headed for our next bit of the tour, to Sacsayhuaman. Again, we were amazed at how the bus navigated the traffic and the narrow streets. The bus climbed what seemed to be impossible roads until we got to over 12,000 feet. Elias started to complain again although we were dubious that he was using this as just an excuse to get out of seeing the next tour site. But we had told him to tell us if he felt ill. Ruben bought some chocolate and some coca candies in the hopes he would eat something and Lauren took him to the medic. They took his complaints pretty seriously and checked his sats - found he had an oxygen level of 80% - which was not what we expected. The nurse gave him more acetazolamide (generic for diamox) and I realized that likely he had thrown up his dose in the morning. the nurse also said that young children and older folks have the most trouble with the altitude.

He had about 5 minutes of oxygen until his sats were back up to 98%. I thought about having her check mine as well, but decided against it. We caught up with the group and Adriel was explaining the significance of the site - as the head of the shape of the Puma which is Cusco, the center of the Incan empire. Pictures are all starting on this page. Elias was happier to be outside but even happier when we were given 10 minutes to go explore one side or the other of the ruins. We gave him the choice and we climbed up to the top to over look the entire city of Cusco, VERY SLOWLY. It was beautiful and really impressive.

We caught up with the tour and got back on the bus. Both Elias and Lauren were about ready to head back down but there were two more stops on our journey. The next stop, after passing but not stopping at the fort of Puca Pucara, was Tambomachay an aqueduct. When Adriel gave some of us the opportunity to stay on the bus, Elias asked to and Lauren offered to stay with him. He was just pretty much done at this point. Ruben went and took pictures. On the way back Ruben bought a corn cake from a street vendor and offered some to Lauren on the way back onto the bus. It was wonderfully sweet and tasty, but Elias wouldn't touch it. The idea of food was making him feel nauseated.

The final stop was at the Q'enko tunnel (mother earth). This time Ruben stayed on the bus with Elias and Lauren toured the site and took a few pictures. It was a very impressive natural formation, one Elias would have liked had he felt better.

Finally we returned to the city and dropped most of the tour group off at the main square for them to get to their hotels. Adriel helped us to our hotel where we went in, and back up to our room with some oxygen before we went down to dinner. Elias finally ate a little bit of chicken broth, two cubes of chicken and some pasta, but really not enough for his growing body. Lauren and Ruben enjoyed most sustenance, the food at the Casa Andina hotel is quite good.

We packed up our stuff - one day and nights worth of clothes for our trip to Machu Picchu and the rest back into our larger bags. Our 6 hours of sleep came quickly to us all, because we needed to be awake early for day 3 of our adventures.

The thing we learned from day 1 and 2 was this: The real problem is that we really should have spent one extra day acclimatizing to the altitude, particularly with a younger child. I think if we were to do this again, we'd spend an extra day on a walking tour with a city tour guide get oriented to Cusco city and get more of a chance to rest. The other thing is that if you have younger children, the afternoon "three tours in one" was a bit much for Elias. He was really bored in the Cathedral, and somewhat bored in the Inca Palace. Sacsayhuaman was his favorite and we suspect he would have enjoyed the other two locations if he hadn't been so burnt out from the other two tours earlier on.

2009-12-20T23:00:00.000-08:00

It's been the longest travel day we've ever had. It started at 5am Seattle time when we had to wake up. The towncar picked us up at 6:15, and we were on the flight just after 8. Our flight took us through Houston, where we had about 1.5 hours layover, then onto a 6+ hour flight to Lima. That was a tad bit delayed (1/2 an hour) but we did arrive just before midnight local time. Dramamine induced sleep was fitful for Lauren and practically non existent for Elias.We took a few pictures.

We were given one customs form on the plane to fill out, very early in the flight. We arrived at the same time as a really large Delta flight - apparently from Salt Lake City. Both planes shuffled into this one area where we queued up into about 8 lines. These 8 lines were just feeder lines into 1 big long snaking line, that fed into 15 or so immigration lines. A few with younger children or who were in wheelchairs/needing special assistance got shuffled off to another (shorter) line. Flight crew went off in another direction. Lauren likened it to being on a Disney ride, only you don't get the thrill of Space Mountain or Indiana Jones at the end. Ruben mentioned that the thing he likes about traveling is noticing all the different noses. Elias was exhausted, really thirsty (we didn't have any bottled water on us,a slight fail on my part as I had intended to buy a few bottles in Houston), and guessed that the line was going to take an hour. Lauren pulled out my knitting and made some headway on my latest project as we snaked through the line.

At one point Lauren noted that everyone else seemed to have another form that we didn't have. Ruben didn't seem concerned, but when we arrived at the immigration official, he immediately asked for the forms. Ruben went over to one of the other agents, got 3 forms which we had to spend another 5 minutes filling out information that seems could easily be gleaned from our passports. By the time we were done, someone else in front of us was having troubles with their paperwork, so there was an additional delay. Finally we got up to the agent again, all our paperwork was in order and we were stamped and let through.

Ruben took Elias to the bathroom and Lauren headed to baggage claim to see if she could find water and our bags. The problems were a) we had no Soles (local currency) so she couldn't use the drink machines. and b) our bags weren't showing up on any of the carousels. The first thing you're accosted by is people trying to sell you cell phones for $10. Finally our bags came off the carousels and we headed to customs. We punted on getting water at that moment, even though Elias was getting crankier and crankier. It was pushing 1:30 am at this point.

Customs was pretty easy. Press a button and it tells you "green" - just go through or "red" you need to be searched. Total luck of the draw. Someone just in front of us got red... so lucky us, we got to go straight through.

Then there is the throngs of people waiting, some with signs. We knew we needed to wait for Hector - the guy Ericka had sent to collect 2 of our bags. Finally Lauren spotted a woman (standing next to a man) holding a "Lake Union Crew" sign and never did that look so welcoming! A few "Mucho Gustos" later and we were walking out the front door of the airport.

Now we were told that the hotel we were staying at was right across the street, but we thought we'd have to take a taxi or something. Nope. Literally. Right. Across. The. Street. We're talking 50 feet from door to door. Maybe.

Ruben checked in while Lauren and Elias got some water from the bar. We got up to the room and showered and hopped into bed. It was 2am. Our wake up call was for 5am. This was the most expensive 3 hours and a shower we've ever paid for.

2007-03-12T16:07:00.000-07:00

Whistler, BC - Day 2 and 3

The pictures from day 2 are here.

Elias and Miranda decided not to do the ski school on Sunday, so we all went up together. We took it a little too easy in the morning (especially waiting for the two teens) and wound up seeing a HUGE line for the gondola, so instead went for the Fitzsimmons Express instead. At the top we popped right onto the Garbanzo Express up. A quick trip down Lower Whiskey Jack and we took the Emerald express to the Roundhouse lodge... were we immediately wound up having lunch.

Elias had been concerned about the chair lifts, but a few lifts with mom and papa and it was all good.

After lunch, Ruben and Matthew headed off to the terrain park. Pablo and Andy had gone off before - Andy's doing terrificly well with linking her turns. Elias fell often at first, but really got the hang of it after a while. He's very good at pointing himself down the mountain. Jonas had a bit more fear of pointing himself downhill (wouldn't any sane older person?) but he was much better at stopping himself.

Elias, Jonas and Lauren who were making their way down the mountain to the learning center (at mid-mountain) slowly. At one point the camera guys stopped and asked if we wanted a picture of the boys. They snapped this terrific picture.

Soon after they spotted Matthew and Ruben heading up the Emerald Express chair lift. Jonas decided to take that chairlift back to the Roundhouse and then take the Gondola down because his knee was hurting him. In retrospect, that was a very wise decision. Lauren and Elias continued down to the learning center.

Ruben and Matthew split up and Matthew went down the mountain. Ruben caught up with Lauren and Elias just as Elias was starting to get a little tired and the snow was getting icier. This was problematic for Elias who was falling more and more. Shortly after Ruben caught up, Elias fell hard on his back knocking the wind out of him and really hurting his bottom. One of the instructors who was coming down the mountain heard him cry and asked if we wanted him taken off the mountain. He set Ruben's skis up in a cross - while we evaluated Elias. We were pretty close to the mid mountain gondola entrance, so Elias said he'd have papa ski him down.

Ruben carried Elias while skiing down, which was a bit scary on the icy conditions (for me who was behind them). But they made it down safe and sound. Next time Elias gets a helmet.

Ruben took Elias down to the hotel, while Lauren took the gondola back up to the Roundhouse. From there she took the run to the Harmony Express. At the bottom of the run (a very easy green run), she saw they were closing off the Harmony Express, so she skated as hard as she could and slipped in just before they taped off the entrance to the lift line. She got on the lift at 2:59 pm exactly - the lift purportedly closes at 3pm, but they let the people in line behind me get on as well.

The run from the top was a good one - not nearly as windy as the last run the day before and the snow wans't quite as beautiful, but it was completely enjoyable nonetheless. There were very few people on the run, which made her nervous being up there "alone" - still she had no problems and didn't fall until she was 5 feet from the bottom of the mountain.

Exhausted she called Ruben for a "boot rescue." He came (with Devon in tow) bearing boots, and a very welcome apple for some energy. Then they all went to the Columbia Sportswear shop to help Devon choose a new jacket.

Learning from our mistake of the previous day, we left for dinner around 5:30 pm and had dinner at the Mongolian barbecue place.

After dinne we went to watch the Sunday night "Fire and Ice" show - where various folks who work at the mountain jump through a firey hoop.

The next day Ruben and Pablo woke up early and paid extra for "First Tracks" - breakfast and the ability to be the first folks on the mountain. They skied more Monday morning than (practically) the first two days put together.

Meanwhile Lauren, Devon and all the kids had breakfast in the village.

Noon had us checking out of the hotel and heading southward. We wound up stopping in Vancouver for some Crepes and almost had our car towed by being parked in a place we shouldn't have been at 3pm (around rush hour).

The rest of the (long) drive home and dropping off the skis was completely uneventful. All and all a fabulous trip.

2007-02-17T23:05:00.000-08:00

Whistler Ski Trip

I should preface all this with the fact that Ruben went to Tahoe for a skiing trip just a week ago with an old buddy of his. He had a great time, skied a bunch of runs for his first time on the newer parabolic skis.

One of his goals of his sabbatical was to take me and the kids on a trip to go skiing - like up at Whistler. I was a bit resistant at first - basically not wanting to take another trip, yet here we are.

We left a little late from Seattle (seems familiar no?) - around 4pm after collecting Matthew's friend Jonas from his house and then Elias from school.

Traffic in Everett sucked as usual. It took us nearly 2 hours (at least 45 minutes longer than normal) to get to Mt. Vernon - our first scheduled stop - to pick up the lift tickets at the Haggen grocery store.

We got off at the main exit for Mt. Vernon and found the Haggen, up the hill a couple of miles. We also stopped here for dinner at their cafe - which was quite nice.

Little did we know that there was a Haggen JUST off the very next exit. Oh well, live and learn.

We hit a bunch of traffic at the truck crossing border (there's road construction up here), and even with the rainy, foggy weather and twisty windy roads, we made to to the Village at around 10pm. This means that a normally 5 hour drive took us 6 hours. Oh on the way we saw the 7-11 in Squamish where you can also buy the tickets for less money than on the mountain.

We arrived and checked into the Coast Whistler Hotel - the rooms are nice, clean but a little small. We do have 5 people in this little room, but it works. We just have to schedule bathroom time.

Today we got up at 7 to get Elias up and ready for his full day snowboarding lesson. Pablo (our friend from CA who met us up here with his family) brought us yummy fresh pastries and even yummier hot out of the oven croissants.

Elias was with his ski school at 8:30 and we ran back to the hotel (about a 3 minute walk) to get our gear on. Pablo, Ruben and I got back to the gondola around 9am and after 40 minutes of waiting in line (and quite a few interesting discussions, including a very existential one) we were actually on the thing. I could feel once we got above around 4500 feet because I started to feel a little queasy.

Ruben's GPS kept track of our movements for the day - I'll link to that when I can upload the data. We started out by going straight from the top of the Gondola down the Marmot or G.S. to the Harmony Express (quad) lift to the top of the mountain

At the top we were treated to an amazing view of the peak (picture to follow). It was windy and cold, but not too bad. We went "off the back" side of the slope through the Sun Bowl - which is a black diamond. Pablo attacked the run. Ruben was confident, but it was a little much for me - first time on parabolic skis and still learning how to deal with good turns in deep(er) powder. Ruben and I "escaped" on Burnt Stew Trail (because I was burnt) and we missed the turn that would have taken us to the Symphony express chair. That was probably for the best though - I think that whole back area would have been too much for me. I was already bonking and it was our first run.

Ruben and I stopped at the base of Harmony and got some water and a cookie. This helped me tremendously. I think the altitude issues were being exacerbated for me by dehydration.

Ruben and I contacted (by SMS) Matthew (and Jonas) and Pablo to tell them to meet us at the top of the Gondola at The Rendevous for lunch at noon. Then he and I went on another run of off Harmony, even though the lines were huge. The wind and clouds were picking up at the top and I did overhear someone say "you can really feel the storm coming in." Now I knew that there was more snow on the way, but I didn't think it was coming in that early - I thought we'd be getting a pretty good day of skiing in.

We took the Saddle run down to the T-bars, then those back up to Pika's traverse and the Ridge run. A quick swoop down and we were at a lunch table at 12:05.

Lunch was fine - uneventful. Ruben and I stuck with Matthew and Jonas for 2 runs - but it was obvious that Jonas' cold was not helping the fact that he has less experience on a snowboard than we do on skis. We took the Jolly Green Giant run to the Emerald Express lift, back up and then we went down Marmot again to Harmony.

Along this route I heard someone comment "wouldn't it be nice to have some kind of magnetic binding?" - So Ruben and I started to figure out if electromagnetic ski bindings would work... my comment was that the battery would have to be in the boot.

At this point it was really obvious that Jonas needed to head down the mountain for some rest and recuperation. Matthew was also tired, so they headed down the nice mellow Sidewinder while Ruben and I waited in line one more time for Harmony Express. In hindsight this was exactly the right thing to do.

We hooked up with a guy who was from east LA (Chino Hills) on the lift and chatted with him. He, Ruben and the other guy had all been to Tahoe and could compare notes about the runs there. Meanwhile, the weather was frightfully cold. I bundled up the best I could, but it was still biting through everything - the wind was intense. Towards the top the ice spray burned and the winds were pushing us UP the hill on the chair lift.

We immediately got off and followed signs to the Harmony Ridge run. The blowing snow was ... well it was intense. I suddenly could understand how people can get lost in bad snow conditions very quickly on a mountain. I even (at one point) looked for a spot of shelter out of the wind and made the mental image of clearing out a nice spot to keep the wind off of us.

No one else was on the run. I did feel very alone - but the snow was incredible. I felt very isolated, but at least Ruben was with me. He and I just kept plowing down the mountain, enjoying and yet fearing the solitude of the slopes.

Finally we got back down to the Harmony Express chair to find the line completely cleared out and the chair not running. It was only 2:43 - the chair wasn't supposed to close until 3! As we skied past we heard that they had to close the entire top of the mountain due to high winds: at least 70kph.

The run down from Harmony via side winder was ego skiing, except that there were so many people. Quite a contrast to what we found at the top. Also the run was a bit chewed up from all the skiers and snowboarders. There were a lot of mountain safety type hosts on the mountain tot make sure people weren't being stupid.

A little bit down the hill the snow turned to the round ice granuals that you mostly see in Snoqualmie pass. Still, good skiing, if a bit more icey in patches.

The bottom was a MESS - too many people and slush for snow. Still we made it down just after 3pm - in time to pick up Elias from camp (around 3:30). Ruben returned to the hotel with the skis and cleaned up while I waited for him.

He had a great time, but didn't want to do a 2nd day of classes. We'll take him up to the magic carpet and family ski area tomorrow. Pablo and Devon picked up their kids too - we all reconvened at the hotel and hung out until dinner. We were surprised by a BIG basket of fruit and snacks sent to us by my parents. It was incredible and perfectly timed. The fruit was a hit.

We attempted to go to dinner around 6pm - big mistake with 5 hungry children. We opted for plan B - get the kids pizza (and the bigger kids Japanese food), pay the bigger kids and go out to eat a placed called Seven for tapas. It was very very good - and the hotel supplied van (and driver) to get us there was a huge win in the pouring rain.

Tonight we're all tired, but the plan is to go back up tomorrow. The time and the configuration of kids and adults will all be dependent on the weather. But more tomorrow... right now everyone is asleep except stupid me :)

2007-01-10T17:35:00.000-08:00

Photos from the road

They're located here.

2006-12-18T23:38:00.000-08:00

This time we're on the road to California - first to the bay area to visit friends, then to east LA to visit family. Our hope was to get on the road early enough to make it all the way, but we didn't leave Seattle until 10:30 am... We stopped once in Portland to see a friend, and another time just north of Roseburg, where Subway was a hit with the little one for dinner.

The Siskiyou pass was completely clear and bright. Actually we only saw a little bit of snow - some on the side of the road just south of Portland (like it had just snowed earlier - or maybe the fog had frozen everywhere)... And then a couple of clumps in the pass.

The bambino started to get car sick just north of Redding so we stopped here for the night and stayed at our "usual" place - the Red Lion Inn on Hilltop. This time no McDonalds for breakfast though (the last time we did that both of the guys got violently ill).

2006-10-08T21:00:00.000-07:00

Where have we been?

Lauren
(who lived in the NE and drove to Washington via the Northern route).

Ruben
(who lived in CA and WA, and has driven across the country via the southern route and back via the northern route)

create your own visited states map or check out these Google Hacks.

Lauren

Ruben

create your own visited countries map or vertaling Duits Nederlands

2006-09-03T22:14:00.000-07:00

Never again through Heathrow part II

We woke up really early, and caught the shuttle to terminal 1/2/3 at 6:20. We were at the terminal around 6:30 and took the free shuttle to Terminal 4. We were there more than 3 hours ahead of time for our 9:55 am flight to Amsterdamn. International flight. 3 hours right?

KLM wouldn't let us check in. There was an earlier flight. They had a limited number of workers checking people in.

So we waited and had breakfast. We got in line early, before our alloted 8am time. Given the crowds, that didnt' seem like long enough, so we snuck in line early. But we couldn't tell which line was which - there was a flight to Africa that was going through check in at the same time and it was also a very long line right next to our line.

Once that was sorted out, we waited and waited and waited. There was one set of people checking in that had to completely rearrange their bags to get under the 25kg weight limit. I swear they spent 1/2 an hour with 1 person behind the counter. Then 2 of the maybe 5 attendants were shifted to working for Air Malta instead of KLM. There was still like 2 of them on the "business and first class" section, but only like 2 or 3 for coach.

All in all it sucked.

On the counter when we finally got to it was a notice about planes being delayed for bad weather and they couldn't guarantee connections. We had maybe a 1 hour layover. If everything went well. Bad idea on our part.

They booked us on the flight, and said we'd just have to check in Amsterdam about our flight.

We got on the flight and the on board computers that showed connection information were saying we had to check our arrival gate. It also showed that the Seattle departure gate as E17.

E17 was empty as we rolled passed when we finally landed. The plane had left. And it wasn't even due to leave yet. It left 15 minutes early.

So we had to work with the transfer agent who was going to put us on a plane that went through Minneapolis and got us into Seattle around 12:30 am. That would be 10 hours later than our original arrival time. I asked if there was a flight through Detroit and if so, what time did that leave. She said 5 minutes before the Minneapolis flight. I asked for that one, but she said that there were no connecting flights to Seattle that same day. I asked for it anyway, because my parents live 30 minutes from the Detroit airport.

So much to Matthew's chagrin (he wanted to get home on Sunday), we stopped in Ann Arbor for a night. My parents were so happy to see us! We flew home the next day and arrived about the same time (one day later) we would have if we had caught the direct flight from Amsterdam to Seattle. So all in all that worked out - Amsterdam's airport rocks.

2006-09-02T21:17:00.000-07:00

Never again through Heathrow (If I can avoid it).

Now this has nothing to do with the recent terrorist activities or terrorism in general. I just can't believe the incompetence. I mean we saw it just a bit when we first got to London two weeks prior and it took for ever for the Enterprise rental shuttle to pick us up. That should have been the hint. But I'm getting ahead of myself

Yeah, we started the day again with breakfast (with, surprise, more bread!), packing up and checking out but storing our bags for a few hours while we did a little shopping on Grafton and playing at St. Steven's Green. We met back up at the dorms at noon and took a very cramped cab ride to the airport. The ride took about 1/2 an hour but cost us <>Oh and that wonderfully tastey Irish brown soda bread? It got lost. Well not really. Kate and Michelle wound up with it over night and left it with the people at the desk at the Jurys Inn the folllowing morning. Well they were completely useless and didn't pass it on to us, literally 1/2 an hour later when we checked out.

At dinner we discussed some of our favorite parts

Ruben: The Castle (Bunratty)
Elias: The London Eye
Matthew: The Food
Lauren: Meeting Sheila and her family and seeing David and Sian and Cambridge.

2006-09-01T19:41:00.000-07:00

Dublin

Today was our day to wander Dublin, and there are a bunch of pictures starting from this page. We walked and saw the Book of Kells at Trinity college. Then we walked to the Four Courts and took some pictures for Michelle. Eventually we wound up at the Guiness Brewery and Storehouse for lunch. There we met Ruben's co-workers from Amazon.ie, Jean and Craig. We had lunch at the Storehouse and got our free beer.

We spent some time doing the Guiness tour: as much as we could given that it wasn't that thrilling to the kids. Ruben had a beer (with a shamrock in the foam) at the Gravity Bar up at the top of the Brewery.

Instead of walking back we took a tour on a double decker Green and Yellow bus. This way we could see much more of the city, including the huge park.

Kate went to see the National Gallery and we took the next stop. Ruben took the kids back to the rooms while Michelle and I shopped on Grafton Street for an hour. Then we rested as well.

We had dinner at Luigi Malones in Temple Barf ... I mean Temple Bar. We didn't want to stay long past dark because it was getting a bit seedier, although Ruben went on Walk-a-bout to see the area after he had gotten us back to the rooms.

2006-08-31T14:23:00.000-07:00

Limerick to Dublin

Another travel day. First breakfast in the hotel (not included as this wasn't a B&B, but expected). Then we checked out, put everything and everyone in the van and I dropped them off at the train station. Then I drove to the car-rental-hole-in-the-wall-not-connected-to-the-auto-dealership place to meet Sheila and drop off the car. Low and behold, Rory wasn't there. No one could find him. Finally he sauntered up at 11:15 am and didn't do anything to officially return the car. I asked him why I was pre-charged for the gasoline (no one had told me I was going to be and at 87 euro this also pissed me off), and we had only used a half a tank of gas. He said he'd change the charge to reflect that I only used half, but I'll believe it when I see it on the charge card. He gave me no receipt different from what I had and I didn't have time to argue. We had an 11:30 train to catch.

Sheila saved the day by driving me to the train station. That also gave her the opportunity to say goodbye to everyone.

The first train to Limerick Junction was pretty rickety in comparison to most of what we had ridden on this trip. The second train was much nice are rocked back and forth less.

We arrived in Dublin at 2:30 and walked to the taxi stop. Fortunately we were able to get just one cab to the dorms. Ruben worked his magic and got the driver to give us an impromptu "tour" of the city as he was driving by various points of interest.

The dorms at the Royal College of Surgeons are located on Lower Mercer Street, near Grafton street and St. Steven's Green. The college apparently rents out the rooms during the summers when the students aren't there. The prices are relatively cheap, but they're spartan - dorm rooms, but they gave us really nice sheets, pillows, duvet and towels. The bathrooms are tiny, but each room has one. We came up the stairs, opened a door to find two more doors, one on each side of the hall. The rooms are clustered in groups of 4 behind these locked doors. We were all on one floor, but the problem was that Elias and Matthew were in one set of 4 rooms and we were in the other. Plus there weren't any phones to call between. This is the one place I worried aobut the kids being "separated" - but in the end it was fine. Michelle was in the same group of 4 as the kids (in a single) so there was an adult available for them if there was a problem. Kate was in a single room in our group of 4.

After settling in we wandered Grafton Street. We found McDaids where Kate and Michelle were going to meet Kate's friend Laura. Our family was too hungry to wait long for dinner, so we went to a great place called Wagamama. This place was great, I wish they had them here. (Addendum! Apparently they are opening one in Boston in early 2007. We may be taking a trip there!) I tried a drink while I was there called Kombucha - I have to find that here as well.

We walked around a bit and found yet another internet cafe, hung out by St. Steven's Green (while Ruben took Elias to the park inside). Weirdness: The sign states you can't have playing balls in the park. Funny: Matthew decided he needed to bring a frisbee into the park. It's not against the rules! We had desert at Butlers Chocolates. Then we went back to the dorms for bed.

Dublin

Aug 31, 2006 - 102 Photos

2006-08-30T13:58:00.000-07:00

Ennis to Limerick

Bunratty and Limerick

Aug 30, 2006 - 85 Photos

The morning was the usual: breakfast, then we packed and were on the road at 10am. We hung out at Bunratty castle and village for much longer than I had expected - 3 hours. It was raining when we got there but we didn't let that hamper our fun. Nor did we let the obnoxious German tour group spoil our fun either (did it say this was an entrance. No, it was an exit. Would you please get out of my way. This staircase is for going UP not down.) Sigh.

Remember to click on the photo at the right to see more interesting shots.

We drove to Limerick and checked into the Jurys Inn. Then we followed Kate and Michelle to drop off their car. Somehow we had thought the car drop off was at the train station, but it turns out it's no where near there, but in an auto dealership. However, as we found out later, the car dealership has nothing to do with the car rental place and the car rental place never seems to have anyone behind the desk. We had to wait and wait when we dropped off Kate and Michelle's car. It was worse the next day when I was trying to catch a train at a certain time and the guy was no where to be found and not answering his cell phone. Like I said, I'm not renting from Irish Car Rentals again.

We all piled into the van and followed Sheila's directions to the University of Limerick - where she works. We had a blast the rest of the day with Sheila and her family. First we puttered around the campus, had a snack at the coffee shop, saw the installation of self portraits (some were pretty weird, some were pretty good), drove to the Hunt Museum and went through those exhibits. They had a good "treasure hunt" activity for Elias who really got into it. One of the questions was "how old is the vase in the picture of the Hunt family." I guessed maybe 100-150 years old. Elias put down 1200 years. I sort of chuckled to myself. It turns out the vase was over 2000 years old (might have been older than that, but Elias was the closest).

Then we walked to a tavern, had a drink while Elias and Ruben made a came of coasters, then Ruben and Sheila made eyes at each other.

Dinner was fantastic at a place called Copper and Spice restaurant. The only weird thing there was apparently you had to be buzzed in to enter the restaurant. They must have had some kind of break in...

After dinner we went to have some tea and coffee at their lovely house in the country. Matthew and Finn hit it off really well - Finn was teaching Matthew how to do Hurling and Gaelic Football. Matthew hit a tennis ball with the hurling stick like he would hit a baseball and managed to hit it out of their back yard (going, going, gone). Then they came inside and proceeded to dessimate the chocolate bread and tarts that Sheila had laid out for us. We also shared in some tea and coffee I had brought from Bus Stop Espresso. I was so glad to be able to meet Sheila and her family in person and I hope we get to visit them again either in Ireland, the states or anywhere in the world.

2006-08-29T23:04:00.000-07:00

Ennis day 2: Quin Friary and Craggaunowen

5am. I’m woken up by Ruben’s going to the tiny bathroom because his stomach just went into a revolt. It was either that he got what Elias had, or the sausage or the Jameson’s from the day before but Ruben’s stomach just revolted on him. He was for the count for the rest of the day.

I went for a run around 6:30 am by travelling up and down the path by the river a couple of times. It still was only 2.8 miles. After I showered, I had breakfast with the girls. Matthew and Elias ate separately (and were apparently pretty well behaved) while I took the laundry to be washed. We had to leave the laundry, but tha tgave us the time to find coffee and internet access.

Around 11, all of us (except Ruben who was asleep in bed fighting off whatever it was he had) drove towards Craggaunowen (or as we said, with as much as much of the backs of our throats as possible, Cragannnnnnowowowowowen). On the way we stopped at the Quin Abbey - the last Franciscan Friary. There was an incredibly cute pup hanging out there, and he had somehow managed to get behind the locked gates. No one could figure out why it was closed - all indications said it should have been open, but we walked around outside anyway.

We had a great drive to Craggaunowen and stayed for a few hours. First we went through the castle and then followed the path to see the ring fort, farmers house, etc. We even saw the stinky boars. It was much better when we got up wind of them. Seriously.

Quin Friary and Cragganowen

Aug 29, 2006 - 58 Photos

On the drive back we had a bit of an incident though. An oncoming car was across what you could call the centerline (if it existed) of the road. There was a slight pull out on my side, so I pulled to the left. After the oncoming car passed, I pulled out of the pullout, but apparently there was a rock right at the corner. I hit the side wall of the tire on the rock, popping it instantaneously. I pulled over (and back into the pull out) and we started to change the tire (or tyre as the case may be), but there was NO documentation in the car. It turns out the tyre is under the back of the car, and there are covers over the lug nuts. Some very nice older Irish man came by and helped us out. I think it was after that that we stopped at the pub across the street from the Abbey and we had lunch. The little pup wasn't anywhere to be found though.

Once I had dropped everyone back at the hotel, I called the car company. It turns out that even though I was paying an extra 15 euro a day for insurance, "tyres, windscreens and wing mirrors aren't covered." And as a matter of fact, the woman I spoke with at Irish Car Rentals wasn't very helpful at all. In fact, we had a number of problems with the, including the rental car return in Limerick, so I doubt I'll rent from them again.

I drove around Ennis on the spare and found a small tire shop where they were able to fix the tire very quickly for 110 euros. An older gentleman from the north part of County Clare (and a friend of the owner of the tire shop) was looking at a phone book in the spot where I was waiting. It was a bit difficult to understand him, but I got most of it. He asked if I had "relations" in Ireland and I said no, but that my friends did and that their last name is Mulhern. He immediately said "Oh from Galway."

He also suggested that if you ever drive to the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren, to go from West to East. He says that way you're not on the cliff side of the road AND the sun is not in your eyes.

Another short, older gentleman (also difficult to understand) asked me to dance while I was standing there. He's apparently a taxi driver who is also a matchmaker and a dancer. It was funny, and it did get me into a better mood (I was pretty steaming about the car rental/tire/insurance thing).

Ruben got out of bed for a while when I got back and we walked to pick up the laundry and hit the internet again. He faded pretty fast and went back to the B&B while we stayed a little longer in town, looking for a converter for Matthew's game boy which was out of charge.

For dinner, I took the kids to the Town Hall. We had a really good time together. The food was fancier than the kids were interested in, but it was good. It was apparently owned or run by the same Corner House where the Poets Corner is located.

That evening, Matthew convinced me to see Snakes on a Plane. I told him I didn't know why I was going, and he asked me "Why *are* you going?" to which I replied "To do something with you." Pointless movie, but we had a good time.

2006-08-28T23:03:00.000-07:00

London to Ennis

Most of today was spent traveling – a taxi to Victoria Station, a train to Gatwick, plane to Shannon, shuttle to the rental car place, and a rental car to Ennis. The taxi driver in London tried to give me a “discount” fare of 80 pounds (down from 100) straight to Gatwick. I happened to know that it was only going to cost us 20 to Victoria station, and less than 40 for the tickets since the kids are half of the 14 pound fare. I didn’t take his “deal.” He later commented to Ruben (in the cab while we were all there) that I didn't take his incredible deal.

We had lunch in Gatwick airport – and once again Elias ordered lunch and didn’t eat. Matthew only ate part of his lunch – the mashed potatoes and peas, and a bite, maybe of one of the sausages. Elias ate one of his other sausages. On top of that, Elias threw up. Fortunately we had a bag available. Ruben took him to the bathroom, we finished up and went to the gate.

Ennis Ireland

Aug 28, 2006 - 47 Photos

Ennis is a small sleepy town. Well it was pretty sleepy by the time we got there because it was after 6pm and everything seems to close up after 6pm except for the pubs.

Our B&B (The Clare Rose Cottage), is really great, very clean, cool rooms. The kids were just down the hall in their own room with 3 beds (although they used 2). Our bathroom was small, but very clean. The showers were a little weird – they had instant on hot water tanks and very low flow.

We caught up with Kate and Michelle at the Poet’s Corner in the Corner house. Great food. Elias was better, but still complained about the smell of beer in the taverns and almost refused to go in. He did eat though. After dinner we walked around town and I started to notice that shops were more heavily protected – things like grates that cover the windows, etc. which is something that we didn’t really see in England. I think it was Kate that said that the personal crime rate (theft) is higher in Ireland than in England.

Then we got a call from our good friend Sheila who was shopping with Finn on the “Shannon side of Limerick” and would we want to meet near Bunratty. Of course we did. We piled into our van (it was a bit cramped) and drove less than 20 minutes to Bunratty and Durty Nellies. We had some drinks and some yummy apple pie a la mode and talked to Sheila about whether or not we could make it to her place on Achill Island. Unfortunately we couldn’t make the logistics work, so we’ll have to visit the next time we’re in Ireland.

Once back in Ennis, I stayed with the kids and Michelle, Kate and Ruben went to Cruises (est. 1658 next to the Abbey). Ruben said he had a blast, but that could be the 2 shots of Jameson’s talking. They listened to some Irish music and claimed it was like the Prancing Pony from the Lord of the Rings.

2006-08-27T14:02:00.000-07:00

Cambridge

We woke up and had another dull breakfast in the hotel, then we made our way to Paddington station. There we paid our homage to St. Arbucks, the Patron Saint of Coffee. It wasn't Bus Stop Espresso, but it worked in a pinch.

Our friends, Griff and Sian told us to take the train from King's Cross, so we took the tube to that station. We found out once we got there that it was closed, which was really a bummer since we wanted to take a picture of Platform 9 3/4.

We took another tube to Finsbury park and bought our tickets to Cambridge, only to hear from a rather rude rail operator "Why are you going up there" (to visit a friend) and "What did you do that for? You should have taken the train from Liverpool Station." So now we had to change in Stevenage. The rails were closed at Kings Cross for maintenance and they were doing electrical work on the line so the train from Finsbury to Stevenage was a slow diesel train. We didn't care much though, our ignorance tax was only our time.

As an aside here, text messaging in Europe is totally the way to go. I found that we had no delays in terms of sending or receiving messages. That's how we communicated with friends while we were there.

We arrived shortly before noon and got picked up by Griff in their $1400 van, bought off ebay. My first impression was how much the kids have grown! We had seen them over a year ago and Ceri and Annie were still young and Dylan hadn't even been born. Dylan is now a year old!

We had a yummy and tumultous lunch (what do you expect with 4 kids under 7 years old and a 15 year old). Elias was pretty wired and although he didn't seem to remember them, he had a good time

We spent the afternoon on a long walk around Cambridge, marvelling at the age, the multitudes of bikes, the recycle bins and of the buildings and saw some of the 26 colleges there, including the one Sian attended. We also saw the cheese shop owned by their friend, but it was closed, what it being a Sunday and a bank holiday weekend.

We finally hired a punt and went boating down the river Cam. Griff it quite good at it, Matthew, Ruben and I were barely passable, but all took our turns. The only problem was that after the soda and nachos, Elias got another stomach ache. We even went under the Mathematical bridge at Queen's College, which originally was not held together with any bolts - just interlocking pieces. Now it's bolted together because too many people were taking pieces out.

We had a snack at a Mexican café. Hrm. a Mexican café in England. They used what looked like Doritos for Nachos, but at least they used white cheese. We missed the 6:51 return train and aimed for the 7:45 supposedly to Kings Cross (which was still closed). Apparently that’s the faster train back to the city, even with a change. We stopped at their house for a while to visit. It wasn’t until we were at the station that we found out that the trains still weren’t running to King’s cross, so we took the one to Liverpool. Elias slept most of the train ride, but he woke up will the stomach ache flaring. He moaned and held a bag to his face, but didn’t throw up, the entire way through the tube and back to the hotel.

Griff told us a few interesting things:

Why there are no garbage cans in London. It’s because terrorism, terrorism pre 9/11, terrorism from the times of the IRA. They used to throw bombs in trash cans.
When we told him we were impressed with how the trains ran on time, he told us about a job where they needed to work on the timing for the tubes. He said that during peak rush, people pour down into the tubes at a rate such that the platform will fill up every 30 seconds. If there are too many people on the platform and more come down, people could potentially fall on the tracks, which would force them to shut down the line. So it's important that the trains show up every 30 seconds and no later. If a train is 10 seconds late, they slow down the the escalators that bring the people down the stairs. 15 seconds late, and they stop the escalators, which buys them about 15 seconds as the people will stop at the top of the escalators for about that long before they just walk down anyway. 30 seconds late and they have to shut down the line.People as fluid dynamics. Simulations are fun (and useful)

Click on the picture below to see all the photos from our trip to Cambridge.

Cambridge

Aug 26, 2006 - 81 Photos

2006-08-26T11:38:00.000-07:00

Salisbury and Stonehenge

I'll admit, we got spoiled. Breakfast at the Hotel Averard is a bit more spartan than the one at Old Boroughs Arms where we could have eggs, porridge etc, complementary with our stay. Here we had to pay extra (like 6 pounds, which is the equivalent to us to $12.) So we stuck with Wheatabix (one of my new favorites), more toast that we knew what to do with, cereal, and grapefruit sections. Oh and weak french press coffee (because we're too impatient to wait for it to get strong).

Ruben was a good boy and ran the 4 mile loop in Hyde park to (and I kid you not) "Impress his GPS unit). Silly geek boy. My GPS is far more impressed, running twice in Rye and once in Ireland. :)

Michelle and Kate left right after breakfast to go to Gatwick for their flight to Shannon, Ireland.

Salisbury

Aug 25, 2006 - 55 Photos

We, on the other hand, took a series of tubes and trains and made it to Salisbury before 1pm. I now understand why most of the tours to Salisbury and Stonehenge start so early in the day!

We had lunch in a terrific spot - someplace Ruben found in a brochure called the Haunch of Venison. I don't generally go off of a brochure's recommendation, but this was cool. It had a Pewter bar and a mummified hand, purportedly cut off during a game of cards.

Elias wasn't happy though. He claimed his stomach hurt and he wouldn't stop complaining about the smoke. He ordered chicken nuggets and proceeded to waste almost all of it. Ruben had to take him outside.

We toured around the town and went into the Cathedral. There was a wedding in the chapel that day, so we were a little restricted, but it was impressive to hear the choir and the organ playing. Then we went in to see the Magna Carta. Elias mostly ignored it and hung to the side at the time, but once back in Seattle, he mentioned it in the context of something old on TV - so we know he learned something. We definitely need to explore this area of England more, maybe using Salisbury or Amesbury as a base.

One of the things Matthew wanted to do is see Stonehenge, so we took a bus there. It was a nice ride that went past old Sarum (something else to explore when we have more time), and through Amesbury (a very cute little town, about the size of Rye from what I could tell).

Stonehenge: well like everyone else had warned me. It's not worth it. Elias was still feeling sick so Matthew and I were the only two who paid to get in. Ruben could see it from the street anyway. We basically paid $30 to go in a circle around the rocks. Because we were on one of the last busses there, and Elias wasn't feeling well, I rushed and didn't get the audio commentary... which would have helped me understand the history a bit more. My dad had sent me the book on it though, so I had a chance to read that later. Matthew took a ton of pictures and has an idea of what to do in Photoshop now that we're home.

Stonehenge

Aug 25, 2006 - 68 Photos

The bus ride back was nervewracking for me because Elias felt so terrible. His stomach was really hurting, but I thought this was more due to him not eating or from gas pain.

Getting on the train wasn't too much fun either. We couldn't find a seat in the train car we first got on. Ruben was helping and carrying Elias, and I had his bag, my bag and the camera. Plus we had to chat with each other up and down the aisle, so people could definitely tell. Yes we stood out as tourists. Well as we're walking down the aisle, I turn to see a woman following me. At first I shrugged my shoulders because I thought she was as frustrated as we were trying to find a good seat and it was taking us a while to walk down the aisle with Elias feeling poorly. Well when we finally found a group of four seats almost at the end of the train and sat down, she stopped right next to us and asked the the women across the aisle some random question that I didn't hear. One of the women, who had just taken a bite of apple, looked at her very strangely and said she didn't understand (later I realized they were probably Israelis speaking Hebrew). This strange woman then just turned around and walked towards the front of the train. I firmly believe she was a pickpoket trying to get into one of the bags I was carrying. I immediately checked everything and all was well, but it really pissed me off.

London Eye

Aug 25, 2006 - 25 Photos

The rest of the train ride was fine - Elias didn't get sick and slept. We came in at Waterloo station. Ruben was really excited to realize we were right next to the London Eye. As Ruben put it, if we couldn't see all of London by foot, we might as well see it by air. Convincing Elias, who has a slight fear of heights and still wasn't feeling well, was a bit of a challenge, but we took it slowly. I sent Ruben to buy the tickets while we went to the bathroom. We got in line and Elias was still crabby, even as we got to the front of the line, until all of a sudden it started POURING on everyone who wasn't under the overhand. Out popped all of the the umbrellas. We got into our little pod and went for a ride through the London skyline.

We took another tube trip back to the hotel and ate at a nearby restaurant called Olio. It was good and Elias at a bit, but not much.

2006-08-25T10:57:00.000-07:00

Rye to London

The kids and Ruben arrived today, but more about that in a moment.

We started the day the usual way: waking up. We did actually get dressed for running AND find the footpath in question. We started to run down the path only to find...

THE PATH WAS UNDER CONSTRUCTION.

That's right. Not 1/4 mile down the path, across the next main street, the path was closed for probably 100 feet, and under construction with no way around it.

So we decided to run down the road to Dover and back. It was a busy noisy road, but I managed to get in almost 3 miles of running.

After breakfast we checked out of the hotel and did two more loads of laundry. We were on the road at 11am with delicious warm scones from the Mermaid Tea House. I also bought a flapjack which is like a thick, slightly sweet oatmeal bar. It was very tastey.

Ruben, Elias and Matthew to London

Aug 24, 2006 - 5 Photos

We had an uneventful drive back (a small bit of traffic) and Michelle managed to return the car completely unharmed. During the drive I kept wondering where Ruben and the kids were. I even got a phone call from my mother who was up in the middle of the night wondering the same thing. I tried calling Ruben's phone a number of times, but it wouldn't connect (It turns out his "international dialing" option had somehow been turned off, a later phone call to Cingular rectified the situation). Matthew finally called from the hotel when we were trying to find the rental car return place at Heathrow. It turns out that their flight from Seattle to Amsterdam had almost run out of fuel - Hot weather and less tail winds than they expected and they had to land in Scotland for about an hour. They did make their connecting flight to Heathrow, but just barely, so their bags didn't make it on the plane. That was nice for them - they didn't have to lug their bags to the hotel! (Click on the picture to the left to see more from their travels)

We, on the other hand, had to lug our bags onto the Enterprise rental shuttle, TO the airport terminal, through the terminal to the Heathrow Express. We took that directly to Paddington Station, which was maybe 1/2 a mile from the Hotel Averard.. Unfortunately we got a little lost trying to find the hotel.

Our first impression of the hotel wasn't so great. All of the other buildings around it look like they have a fresh coat of paint, and the paint on this hotel is peeling. The interior is a weird mess of twisty windy stairs, elevators, and fire doors - and it took me until that evening to figure out the best way to get from our room to the kids' room (the kids were in a different room downstairs, but it was easy enought to call between the rooms). The decor is a old and gaudy, but it was fairly clean and the people there were courteous. The other plusses are that the hotel is located just on the north end of Hyde Park, close to a tube station (the Lancaster Station, which was unfortunately closed while we were there), the neighborhood feels pretty safe and it's relatively inexpensive. All in all the place grew on me, but I wouldn't stay there again.

Once we all had checked in and cleaned up, we took a walk through Hyde Park. Matthew was exhausted and had napped only an hour or two in the hotel. He was groggy until after dinner. Elias was full of energy and with no fear climbed to the top of the Peter Pan sculpture! We also saw the Princess Diana memorial, which I thought was perfectly fitting for her. Elias loved it, although the water was cold.

We walked clear across the park, and saw the Albert Memorial from afar. Kate and Michelle shopped at Harrods while the rest of us found a tiny downstairs (not very good) Italian restaurant and had some supper. Elias ordered and didn't eat. I chalked it up to jet lag. Little did I know.

After dinner we took the tube (including a change) to St. Pauls and the Courts. Michelle wanted some pictures by the Old Bailey. Elias wasn't feeling too good, so Ruben took him back to the hotel early. Kate left with him to meet up with her Keane friends. Michelle, Matthew and I poked around that section of town for a while, then took the tube back, getting off at Marble Arch instead of Queensway. Turns out Queensway is closer. We had a long walk back to the hotel. Ruben unfortunately had done the same thing but with Elias and his backpack on his back...

Click on the picture below to see our photos from London

London

Aug 24, 2006 - 46 Photos

2006-08-24T09:25:00.000-07:00

To Battle We Go

Despite best efforts, and getting up at 6am, I could not get myself to go running. It was raining and uninspring.

After breakfast we got into the car and drove to Battle where we explored the Battle Abbey. The ruins were very cool, but it was pouring. We were able to keep dry on the bottom floor of the old Abbey ruins, and I took a lot of pictures of the interesting ceiling architecture. Our made up quote of the day was "History is just gossip spread by nostalgic winners."

Click on this next link to see all the pictures from Battle.

Trip to Battle England

Aug 24, 2006 - 36 Photos

The rain let up a bit and we wandered through the town, which isn't as interesting as Rye. We wound up having a poor cup of coffee at the Cafe Belge while we waited for Kate's friends Jill and Helen. Jill caught up with us at the Cafe and we found Helen sitting in her sister's car in the car park. I decidced to ride with Helen and Jill to help them find Rye. Kate and Michelle left before us but got lost, so even though we had to park across the river in Rye, we got to the hotel first.

We had lunch in the Pumpmakers Arms, which because of the font and the angle I was reading it as the "Wanker's Arms" all weekend. I had a "jacket potato" (baked potato) with beans and cheese. It was passable, but pub grub nonetheless.

We wandered around town, then Helen had to leave to pick up their friend Margaret (who was at a train station in Battle). Jill stayed and we wandered Rye again in the rain. One nice thing: Jill had forgotten her umbrella at lunch and it was still their waiting for her when she realized it and went back to retreive it.

After getting Jill on a train back to London, Kate, Michelle and I tried to find the Camber Castle - which is out in the field just to the south of Rye. I have gotten really spoiled in the states: the paths here are just not well marked and maintained. We found the start of the path, but walking in the middle of the field it didn't feel like we were going on the right path. Also we weren't really dressed for the challenge that is avoiding sheep shit in the middle of a field. That and the menacing weather forced us to turn back.

Michelle and Kate went back to the hotel and I set out to find the elusive footpath for jogging on our last morning in Rye. Eventually I found the entrance near the Landsgate and walked back to the hotel. I am usually very very good with direction, but something about the layout of Rye really confused my sense of direction. I finally understood it all after walking around the day before we left.

After a brief rest and snooze in the hotel, we had a great but pricey dinner at a place called The George in Rye. We shared a bottle of slightly sweeter but a local wine from Bodiam Castle. Our nightcap was more geeking at the internet cafe across from our B&B.

2006-08-23T22:19:00.000-07:00

Rye - day 2

Today we woke up late after my second fitful night of sleep. I don't know if it was that I was sleeping close to the main road or those @)$* seagulls screaming at 5am but I felt like a zombie when I woke up. Kate would probably say it was the ghosts. She did say that I talked in my sleep again.

Another huge breakfast with even more toast (what is it with the toast?) where I had "porridge" (oatmeal for the rest of us) and tried this nasty stuff called Marmite. Kate and Michelle had eggs that apparently rival their mother's light and fluffy breakfast offerings. After we were stuffed we did the thrilling job of 2 loads of laundry. Kate and I thought about taking the train to Cantebury in the afternoon but those plans never quite were realized. Instead we puttered around Rye, visiting the Wednesday Farmers Market, the St. Mary's church (and bell tower) and a bunch of the wonderful little shops. The town was hopping - we didn't realize how popular it was because it had been dead quiet during the evenings when we were around since we arrived. (The pictures are all in this album)

From the top of the bell tower you can really understand why they built the town where they did - you can see everywhere. Just as I was climbing down, the clock struck 1 and my ear felt like it was packed with cotton the rest of the day.

We walked over to the Ypres Tower, where we saw the hoard or French teens. At least we assumed they were French as that was what they were speaking. They had invaded the town for the day. They were being... so... teenlike. I kind of wished Matthew was there to see how they acted because, well, it was so similar to him and his friends, it transcended cultural boundaries. It did make me miss the kids though.

We had lunch near the Rye Castle/Ypres Tower Museum at the Ypres Castle Inn. Kate and Michelle had an Asparagus soup and a pint of a different type of cider (it might have been Magners), and I had a Dover Sole that was litterally fresh off the boat caught in Rye bay. The sole was served bone in, which was ok, but there was also some guts or brains or something that was kind of gross which I could have done without. It was bathed in butter and lemon and was incredibly tender. The garnish was a seaweed called Samphire that grows only natively in the Rye marshland and (as the waiter claimed) one other place in Britain. The samphire was good, salty but a bit freaky to eat.

We all agreed that the bartender was cute.

After lunch we wandered back up the hill and around town some more, then Kate got tired and went back to the room to nap. Michelle and wandered some more and bought some very funny postcards for my friend Elizabeth and some jewelry from a second hand store. I'm not usually one to buy presents on a trip, but these were just too perfect to pass up. The woman in the second hand store, who was VERY chatty, apparently lived in New York city around the time I was born and lived there.

Michelle and I had fantastic tea with scones, clotted cream and jam up at "Simon the Pieman" - Rye's oldest tea shop. The scones were incredible.

For dinner we walked to the other side of town, marvelling at how quiet it is when the day tourists leave. Our walk took us to where the "Landgate" stands, something we had missed in previous walks. There used to be 2 gates - the Landgate on one side of town and the Strandgate on the other. The Strandgate stood on the site where the hotel's kitchen is today. It was demolished in 1708 because carriages had gotten too big and couldn't fit through. The Landgate must have been wide enough to last the test of time, although it's obvious that it hwas heavily damaged and burned over the years (from the Normans, apparently).

The Old Borough Arms is partially built on the old town wall, and you can see the old wall in the hall near the downstairs rooms. There was originally an old wooden building in front of the wall, but it was blown up in WW II. Glynne told us that the Germans were on their way to bomb London but they were overpowered and pushed back. They didn't have enough fuel to get back with all of their munitions on boar, so they bombed the town). One thing I'm wondering is if the bombing that destroyed the old building was the same day as the bombing that destroyed the garden house where Henry James wrote.

Anyway, dinner was at the Fish Cafe - the downstairs cafe was a little less expensive, formal and hopping as the upstairs, so we chose to eat there. It was fabulous. We had a great wine (Berticot Savignon Cotes De Duras 2005), taramasalata with breadsticks and olives. I had a dish of Lobster, Globe Artichoke and Roquette risotto with parmesane cheese for dinner and an "Iced Cherry Parfait with Vanilla Syrup Basil" for desert. The Parfait was like a frozen whipped cream "cake" with cherries in it. MMMMMMM.

Our post dinner activity included a bit of time at the internet cafe across the street and digesting.

2006-08-22T22:02:00.000-07:00

Rye - day 1

Kate and I woke up at 6am to find the footpath for a jog. We wound up finding a very short footpath that ended as abruptly as it started, so we wandered around a neighborhood and between running and walking did about 2.25 miles according to my GPS. Then we wandered around the town before anything opened and found things like the Henry James house.

Click on the next picture to see all sorts of photos from Rye:

Rye

Aug 22, 2006 - 93 Photos

We showered and went to breakfast with Michelle. Our host, Glynne, told us a few stories, including the fact that Paul McCartney came into the Mermaid store (downstairs) with his chauffer ("as you do"). He also said that Tom Chapin (of Keane) lives literally across the street from the place we stayed in. Not only that, we think Kate and my window looked practically into his window. Glynne said that Tom likes Rum Raisin ice cream and "fancies himself a bit."

Tuesday was the day we took the train to London to meet up with some of Kate's Keane buddies. The first train, the "Marsh Express" was a small two car train that didn't really honk at crossings. It was more like the train said "excuse me" in a soft little "beee-deep." We changed trains at Ashford International and took another train to Charring Cross. We waited in "the" Trafalgar square for a while for Kate's friends to show up. "The" is in quotes because it was a little sur-real that I was really there. You can see the photos from our trip to London by clicking on the next image.

Tuesday trip to London

Aug 22, 2006 - 31 Photos

For lunch we tried to eat in the Crypt (near by), but it was too packed and instead found an Irish pub near Leicester Station. After lunch a few of the Keanies split off, but Mel, Helen and Jill went with the three of us, past St. Arbucks (the patron Saint of Coffee) to take an open air double decker tour bus.

All day long there were a lot of helicopters and sirens, but we didn't quite know what was going on. It turns out that while we were there, they were arraigning 11 of the terrorist suspected in the most recent airline bombing attempt.

We all slept on the train going back to Rye and had dinner at the Ship Inn Pub across the street. That's where I had my first Scrumpy Jack - which was QUITE a good cider. I wonder if they sell it in Seattle. Kate sacked out right after dinner and I took Michelle on the same walking tour Kate and I had done that morning.

2006-08-21T21:35:00.000-07:00

Wolverhampton to Rye by way of Warick Castle

Michelle and I started the morning the usual way, waking up, bathing and going down to breakfast. We knew Kate had arrived sometime during the night because the deserts we left her from our dinner the night before were no longer in front of her door.

Breakfast included a choice of cereal, toast and more toast, OJ, and a "traditional English Breakfast" - more toast, eggs, bacon, banger and beans. The woman looked at me like I was nuts when I asked for no banger and bacon (I guess they don't quite understand non-meat eaters...)

As we were checking out, we found out more about our hotel. It's 325 years old. The owner claims it's haunted, even though she doesn't beleive in things like that. They had the Ghostbusters come out and apparently the ghost is a young girl who follows the owner around. The girl was puportedly killed and thwon down the well in back. I told them taht my electrical outlet (in the corner of my room) didn't work and they claimed the ghost was probably playing a trick on me. Yeah right. I think I just forgot to turn on the electrical outlet (later in the trip I noticed on/off switches on a lot of the outlets and I think that's what was going on).

The restaurant had an interesting history - or at least the name did. King Charles II - who in the picture in the restaurant looks like Jonathan Pryce in Pirates of the Carribbean - stopped at this farm to gather his troups on the way to France.

After our morning walk around the grounds (pictures) and bit of historical trivia, we whipped the poor hamsters under the hood of our Toyoda into shape and got on the road ("Run Forest, Run!").

We stopped at Warick castle in the Town of Warick. All through of us went through the tour of the staterooms. Michelle and I went up into the ramparts to see the incredible view while Kate went to the archery and Birds of Prey exhibitions.

An album of the castle and the surrounds can be found by clicking on the on the following picture.

Warick

Aug 21, 2006 - 50 Photos

After our explorations of the castle, we wandered over the river to see the trebuchet. The two guys who were "in period costumes" were pretty giddy. Apparently they had broken the worlds record for the longest toss of a 20kg ball, 228 meters. One guy said "Do you know any other world record holders? I think not!" They also said that "If anyone else comes along and beats their record, they still have 4 turns (of the trebuchet)" - apparently daring them to try to hurl the thing further still.

By this time we were all pretty hungry, so we stopped at the Thomas Oken Tearoom and had a great lunch and some tea. Michelle had a salmon salad sandwhich, Kate had ham and I had cheese and bread. Michelle's lunch included one of the best warm scones I've ever had, and a lovely rich brownie. I highly recommend having lunch there.

Michelle did the driving all the way to Rye - the "carriage ways" weren't a problem, minus the traffic on the M25 going "Anti-clockwise." A268 is a very twisty windy road and I was starting to have some problems with car sickness. The thing that did me in was when we got lost in Rye ... I finally had to jump out of the car and get some fresh air. It wasn't Michelle's driving, it was my really sad excuse for a stomach.

We finally found our B&B, run by Glynn and Lynn, called the Old Boroughs Arms. We had dinner qat a place called Simply Italian across the street - a suprisingly good meal with a very good bottle of Pinot Grigio - a 2005 Le Due Glare - Italian Tinazzi. The next day we found out that the owner of this restaurant is actually on the same Keane fan board as Kate.

2006-08-20T14:14:00.000-07:00

Amsterdam to London to Wolverhampton

Amsterdam was wet and green and flatter than I expected - even flatter than Michigan! At this point I wandered around the wonderful airport (Schipol is fantastic), found an place where I could access the internet and just let a few people know I was ok. I couldn't get in touch with Kate and Michelle - they were probably still in the air (their flight was from Chicago to Heathrow directly), and they didn't have a cell phone anyway.

Why do I mention this? Because my plane was delayed leaving Amsterdam. Why?
1. The original plane was apparently hit by lightning (it was quite stormy) necessitating a plane change which
2. Necessitated a crew change, which
3. Delayed us until we got caught in another thunderstorm and downpour, which
4. mean we were delayed getting into Heathrow because our gate was blocked for 15 minutes upon arrival.

I just wondered how I would tell Kate and Michelle I was late. I hoped they would find KLM and find out for themselves.

I walked off the plane and through customs easily enough. It seems my bag wasn't opened by TSA, which was good considering how packed it was. I tried to get money from the cash machine, but it wouldn't dispense any (something Dean warned me about)... As I turned to find out where the Enterprise counter was near the United flight I bumped into Kate who was looking for me!

We took the Heathrow Express (free from Terminal 4 to Terminal 1, 2, 3). That's when I had my first glimmer into the "hurry and wait" that is the joy of flying through Heathrow. First they had to clear the train. Then they had to inspect the train. Then the train took 4 minutes to get to the other terminals. FINALLY we met up with Michelle who was dealing with renting the car.

>After Michelle and Kate got the car stuff squared away, they called us a shuttle, which gave us more time to "hurry up and wait." We were finally on the road around 2pm with Michelle driving! Of course we got lost once near Heathrow after hitting our first roundabout. No great surprise there. Our drive up to Wolverhampton was pretty uneventful - except that we got lost again near Wolverhampton and wound up in Coventry. But Michelle was quite the "driving on the left" trouper.

Along the way we remarked how similar the countryside looked to that of Washington State. Particularly coming down into this valley, which really reminded us of going Northbound on I-5 into the Skagit Valley.

Over the week, our mantra while driving (and particularly making turns) was "left left left left left..." - like the Seagulls who say "Mine mine mine" in "Finding Nemo

The B&B in Wolverhampton was fantastic - the Featherstone Farm Hotel. There are some more pictures of the Hotel's grounds here.

We each got a separate room. Michelle had a very pretty room with a huge fireplace.

Kate's was just small.

Mine was upstairs and was a little odder than the other two. It's obvious that my bathroom was once a closet and it only had a tub, but I managed to clean myself up just fine anyway.

After we showered, I drove the car to drop Kate off at the V Festival so she could meet with her fellow Keane Junkies (tm). It was about 10 miles away, and she found she could take a cab back. Michelle and I stopped at a pub on the way back, but we found out they stopped serving food at 5pm. We wound up eating at a place called the "Spread Eagle" (I kid you not). Michelle had the Fish and Chips and I had a pretty good Chicken Tikka Masala and a very good Strongbow Cider. Thus began my "cider tasting spree" across England and Ireland.

What whe *should* have done was gone back to the Indian restaurant attached to the B&B called the King's Repose. Had we known that this restaurant was open before leaving to drop Kate off, we would have eaten there... It's supposed to be some of the best Indian food in the country. Instead we just had an after dinner drink there.

That night I was out like a light and slept very well.

2006-08-19T13:40:00.000-07:00

Seattle to Amsterdam

The take off from Seattle was completely uneventful, which is always a good start.

After the usual "blah-dy-blah" about the safety, they introduced the seat back video systems on KLM's A330. The flight attendant literally said "There is a delay when you press the buttons. That is how the system works." The "user interface expert" in me just found that amazingly funny. They didn't say "this is by design" - the usual cop out. No apologies for the delay, but it's bad enough that they had to mention it. If it's bad enough to mention, shouldn't they FIX it?

Then shortly after take off they said they had to reboot the seat back system. First off, they said it would take 20 minutes. I found that odd. 20 minutes to reboot a computer system? Then the further said that your seatback would not be able to move during this time. Maybe I misunderstood - but just how bad could they design this that the seatbacks are controlled by the same system as the seat back video system.

During the reboot, up pops the Linux Penguin. This of course made me laugh. (As an aside, this apparently also happened during the flight Ruben and the kids took, as well as our flight back from Amsterdam -> Detroit 2 weeks later.).

I couldn't sleep during the flight so I knit, watched "Thank you for Smoking" (a must see), "Akeelah and the Bee" (predictable, but still a good movie) and "Lucky Number Slevin" (whidh was also good, despite the violence. There's a bit of a twist to that movie that I figured out early, but it still was good).

Somewhere over Greenland we saw "Sunset" towards the back of the plane and we turned slightly south. It never got perfectly dark, however.

The cresent moon over the wing was really pretty though.

At one point I looked out the window and saw a city of lights in the middle of "no where" in the ocean - it may have been Iceland. Then An hour? or so later, the sun "rose" off the front of the plane.

As we were landing in Amsterdam, the sudden realization that I was vacationing solo in another country and continent really hit.

2006-07-11T22:22:00.000-07:00

Two friends gave me some advice about driving in Ireland. The first was from my friend who lives in Ireland:

The car you rent will probably base the main speedometer and distance calculator on miles, but our speed limits and roadsigns are now in kilometers. So when you see that the speed limit on open roads is 100, that really means about 60mph, and so on. there will be a smaller kph scale on your speedometer, harder to read, but there all the same
More or less zero-tolerance for drink driving here. The limit is about a slow beer, or a half beer, and after that it's not really on. So in choosing accommodation, if planning a drink or two, try to make them close together.
Irish town names are generally anglicized from their old Irish names. So, for instance, Galway used to be Gaillimh. Many signs will use the Irish name rather than the English one, so watch out for that. Mostly you can guess - Ennis is Inis, Limerick is Luimneach, all fairly similar. Sometimes, though, there's no real relationship. Like Waterford is Port Lairge, which looks more like Portlaois, so be careful. Roads are numbered though, so that's a good guide
If someone approaching you on the road flashes their headlights at you, it means slow down. There's either a hazard ahead, like a flock of sheep on the road or something, or there's a garda speed checkpoint round the corner.
We call our police Garda, short for garda siochána, or guardians of the peace. They're unarmed, but have plenty of attitude. If pulled over for any accidental misdimeanour, the best greeting is a big smile, and "Evening, guard!". They like that.
You'll see signs on the sides of the roads proclaiming how many people have been killed on the roads of that county in the last four years. The signs are erected by the NRA. This does not mean that right-wing gun-nuts are popping off Irish motorists. It stands for national roads authority
You'll also see signs all over the place warning of major roadworks ahead. Sometimes there are, more often there aren't. Better slow down a bit, just in case.
In some parts of Clare, bored youth no doubt related distantly to ate spend their time twisting roadsigns for their own perverse amusement. Get yourselves a road map.
Times don't relate well to distance out the West. A really good website for planning journey times and route is http://www.theaa.com/travelwatch/planner_main.jsp?database=I
The worst drivers are nuns and men in flat caps. Give them lots of space if you can. Nuns are harder to recognise these days, except by their driving.

Then I received the following things to remember from a friend who had visited Ireland a few years ago.

Major highways in Ireland make 101 (in the Pacific Northwest) look like an interstate. Except for the motorways around Dublin, expect a highway to be two lanes, no shoulders, and stone walls on the side. If you're lucky, you might replace one of the walls with a cliff.
Speed limit is 60 MPH, but you're unlikely to get near it. If you average 40, you're doing great.
Speed limits are marked below the national speed limit. There's an "end of limited speed" symbol which means you can drive 60.
Signs are sometimes in kilometers, sometimes in miles. Oh well.
Passing is not for beginners.
An Audi A4/Volkswagen Passat, which looks midsize in the US, looks huge in Ireland.
Couch == bus. Lorry == truck. Bonnett == hood. Caravan == camper trailer. Garage == car park. Etc.
Couches can actually fit in a lane. Believe it or not.
Car parks often have signs telling you how many open spaces are in the park.
Gas is priced in liters, so it actually costs 4X as much as you think at first. Fortunately, it's 95 octane, rather than the wimpy stuff we get here.
Sheep have right of way. Yes, there are sheep on the highways, especially at night. Imagine sheep wandering across I-5 between Portland and Seattle, it's kinda like that. Drive carefully.
Your first roundabout will scare the living shit out of you. Don't be ashamed to leave it immediately. Roundabouts range from 4 lanes deep near big cities to a yellow circle painted in the middle of an intersection. Same rules always apply: cars in the roundabout have right of way. And don't forget, on the big ones, you can actually go around again. Roundabouts are your friends. In the Republic, there's no limit on the number of times you can go around (I think you can only go around twice in the north).
This: http://www.swindonweb.com/life/lifemagi1.jpg is real. Fortunately, it's in England, not Ireland.
Get the spelling of wherever you're headed. The pronunciation may not make any sense. For instance, Dun Laoghaire is pronounced "Dun(e) Leary".
Signage can be confusing, until you get used to the way it works.
Have a navigator. Navigator is essential for telling you where to get out of the roundabout. Get directions like "1st exit", "2nd exit", etc. Also, "9 o'clock", "11 o'clock", etc can be useful.
Cities are evil. Don't drive there. Dublin is for pedestrians and taxis, not silly Americans in cars. Trust me, drive there and you'll be sorry. Don't venture inside the M50.
When you get to a corner, look right first, not left. In cars and on foot.
Cars with a big red L in the rear window have learners permits. They're probably still better than you on the left.
Take a drive the first day. We got our car in Galway, and headed north to Mayo. Great way to get used to driving on the left.
Practice driving stick in the US before you go there, if you're used to an automatic. Chances are you'll have a stick there, and you don't want to try to learn that and drive on the left at the same time.
All the controls are in the same place, except the stick shift. Turn signals, pedals, whatnot. But that stick in the left hand is entertaining.
Germans are as confused as you are. Just more aggressive and in an RV....