lols. my parents booked a cruise for us. i've never been on one! i'm excited. to eat a ton. and stuff. seven days, next month, GO TIME.

road trip film part II

last of the film photos from our road trip.  even with a disposable camera, the pictures look so much nicer than my crappy digital. i've been taking more pictures at home, too, so those to come as well.


Nick Vegas


attempting to fix the broken sideview mirror, Washington DC


motel in Atlanta

places i've been. this doesn't include everything cuz of some glitches in the map, but there is still that big lonely spot in the middle calling my name.......... :'(

mini break

My boyfriend Nick is starting his new job next week so we wanted to spend some time together this week before that...he works in finance so sometimes his hours are crazy.  When he was at his last job I was working in retail, which meant when he was off on weekends (and sometimes not even then) I was always working!  I'm kind of afraid that we'll both get super busy again so this seemed like the perfect time to take off midweek as I had the whole week off (I'm a tutor and my students were off this week. My wallet is sad).  

I want to explore more of the great state of California in my downtime to keep the travel bug satisfied until we can go to SUDO AMERICA.  I really want to see Lassen Volcanic National Park, but it's snowing there this time of year...then I remembered Ashley of Milk Teeths (peep her awesome blog) mentioning a sea glass beach in Fort Bragg, California and that seemed pretty awesome.  I remember seeing sea glass on TV when I was a kid and I'd always wanted to see it, but never had!  So it was off to Fort Bragg...

It's the middle of winter and Fort Bragg is a beach town off Highway 1, so it was definitely a downtime to be there.  I really like seeing places in the off season though, kind of in their natural state.  We saw a lot of different places in their off season during our road trip.  We stayed in a Super 8, and there's something about anonymous chain hotels that really appeals to me...it's sorta noveau romance, no?

After doing intense planning for 309485309485 different places and things on our road trip, I didn't really want to plan anything for this impromptu overnight trip.  I knew I wanted to see the sea glass beach, but other than that we just kinda drove there with no plans.  We checked stuff out, and we spent a lot of time just relaxing too. It was nice to get away and have a sort of reprise of our road trip~

There is also a cool train that goes through the redwoods called the Skunk Train, we didn't ride but I kinda wanna go back for the Mother's Day brunch!  Regular rides are a bit pricey at 50 a pop, but it seems cool!  There is also a museum if you're into the nitty gritty and a quaint sort of downtown area .

Hopefully we're going to a cave  soon with some friends! And Disneyland on Memorial day, maybe!

The drive up on highway 20 is a bit windy (and pretty, as it goes through a forest).  Do yourself a favor and throw the car in 2nd gear on the way over (it's about 5 hours from the Bay Area).

 by the time we got there, we were starving and we ducked into a random Mexican restaurant. I got my favorite, chile relleno!   It was delicious, but I miss crunchy chile relleno like I had in New Mexico!  Actually, I just miss New Mexico in general.

 Glass Beach.  It was pretty crazy to see all that sea glass! I think it would be way cooler if people left more of the glass!  People collect a lot of the cooler pieces.  If you go when it's cold like we did, wear a hat!  My ears were so cold they hurt :3

 huhuhuhuhu! my face is so round. 

 the back of one of my favorite sweaters~

 Those who go to Fort Bragg MUST have breakfast here at Egghead's Restaurant, it was awesome (the pictures of my food didn't turn out)!  It's Wizard of Oz themed, but not in a corny way.  I didn't get to eat there, but Nit's Cafe, is a few doors down and looked interesting :o

some...thing

I went to my first meetup.com meet up today!  Living in Silicon Valley is kind of cool because more people are up for internet meet up type events.  It was a small meet up for people who enjoy travel.  I figured that after my road trip, I qualified!  I definitely soaked a lot in and am itching to go on another trip!  In the meantime, I have a laundry list of cool places right here in California that I would love to check out.  I noticed at the meet up (and among other travel loving people) that there is a lot of emphasis on far flung locations...that is great, but I really love domestic travel here in the USA, too!  It's a vast, beautiful country.

But yeah. I'd still like to gtfo here sometime soon and see somewhere new~

cannon firing re-enactment

During our road trip, Nick & I went to a cannon firing re-enactment somewhere in Pennsylvania...or was it New Jersey?  Anyway, I was pretty pumped up for this.  It was exactly the kind of weird thing I hoped to go to on the trip.  The re-enactment was complete with a bunch of guys in period costume.  I wonder, were they worn out because they were poorly taken care of, or for authenticity?

Anyway, I was pretty sad that they were only firing blanks, but I guess it does make more sense than firing a cannon ball off into the woods.

It hit me today.  I miss travelling.  I miss my road trip.

I just realized that the only pictures I took in Alabama were of a McRib sandwich (disgusting) and a Piggly Wiggly.

USA! USA! USA!

montreal in a nutshell

Boston

While uploading road trip pics I realized how much fun I had in Boston.  It's such a great place to take a trip.  There is tons to do.  It's a cool city + it has a lot of history. Boston!

question time

Hello everyone!  This is really cliche, but I'm going to say "sorry I haven't posted in a while"!  It seems that lately, I've either had no time or no internet access! Bad combo!  Anyway, one of my former co-workers asked me about my trip on facebook, and I thought some of his questions might be questions that other people would like to see answered, too.

Q:
So KK, how about a little insight on how you came about the idea of a roadtrip. I don't know if you have a blog or anything, that gets into the details. I enjoy the pics, but am interested on the daily finances, how you figure where you are going, do you have an agenda or of a list of things you want to accomplish and do you see an end to this trip, or is it more like a fly by the seat of your pants and one day stop walking and say "I think i'm going to go home now". My wife and I have toyed with the idea. I think it is very exciting to just go and enjoy life and see what is at the end of that road. Scary but exhilarating also. Thanks. 

A:
Hey! Sorry for the late answer, I've only had internet on my phone lately! But hello from Pennsylvania!

Well, I was reading Kerouac's On the Road when I kind of had the idea to go on a trip (although I have always liked travel and really didn't like the book in the end, haha). My bf and I both kinda hated our jobs (haha)/where we were in life so doing something drastic like the trip seemed really appealing. He was already planning on quitting his job and I thought a cross country road trip would be fun, and when we got together to talk about it, the trip kind of developed from there into this giant balls-out thing.

I do actually blog about the trip at http://gimmefantastic.blogspot.com/
Although lately, I haven't had much time to post :(

From the onset, I thought trying to have an itinerary would be kind of crazy for a trip of this magnitude... so we do kinda just take it a few days at a time, although we are following a sort of path across the top of the country rather than just driving around randomly. We're basically planning on going in a big circle around the country and ending up back home in California and skipping a few of the more desolate states in the middle of the country. We both have some places we really want to see...most of them are the must-sees along with a few random places/things and we're also stopping wherever we have good friends/family that we can visit/crash with. We aren't really sure when we'll be home...the original plan was to be traveling around for a year, but now that seems totally crazy and overly ambitious, haha.

As for the finances, the money to finance the trip is really my boyfriend's and not mine, to be honest! He's an accountant, so he's good with money/numbers and I leave all of that to him! When we decided to travel, he looked at how much he thought it would be and thought about if we'd have enough money. He was able to save a lot of money while working by living modestly. We really think that most peoples $$$ go to things like mortgages, kids, and new car payments. Without any of those things it's pretty easy to save a lot, it seems.
Anyway, the basic plan is that he saved up about 30k and about half of that is for the trip, and half is for him to get re-established when we're done travelling. Ostensibly, when we've spent the alloted money for the trip, it will be time to go back home.

We have been travelling pretty modestly...we only got a hotel room for a few nights in Vegas for $20/night...other than that we have been camping ($10-20 a night), crashing with friends/family for free, or sleeping in our car in Walmart parking lots or rest stops. In Canada and in big cities where sleeping in our car would get us hassled by cops, we've stayed at hostels which has been about $50/night for both of us. Sometimes we can even get a private room for that price and hostels are usually in really happening areas of town.

Other than accommodations, we try not to spend too much money, with food probably being the one big exception because I love to eat good food :3 Although we never really eat anywhere too fancy/cook a lot too. We brought a bunch of dry goods to cook and eat (especially when camping).

Gas has overwhelmingly been the biggest expense, and it has already gone wayyy over what my bf estimated we'd spend! ...and I drive a Honda (although, it is loaded down with all our stuff, which affects the mileage).

Oh man, I'm sorry for the novel I've written in answer, haha! If you guys can travel, you totally, totally should!! Serious. People think traveling this extensively is crazy, but a lot more people do it than one would imagine and it's really easy if you budget travel, haha. Although, I do think that my bf and I are probably more willing to live without creature comforts than most. I don't know much about RVs, but they do seem pretty comfortable (although unwieldy and really expensive).

---

Nick & I are slowly but surely becoming American road trip travel experts.  If anyone out there has any other travel or road-trip related questions, feel free to ask.  You can comment here, e-mail me, or ask anonymously on my formspring (I also answer all manner of ridiculous, anonymous questions on formspring).

Orange County, California

Since I went to school at UCLA and my sister attends UC Irvine, I've been to Orange County many times.  Overall, I really don't like the place--especially Irvine.  It's the perfect example of American planned suburban ugliness.  There aren't nearly enough trees, the streets are wide but parking is prohibited EVERYWHERE--and the list goes on.  What an awful place!  We really only came to visit with my sister.  Luckily, she'd moved into a nice, new apartment with some lovely girls who had decorated the place really well.  

To be fair: there is a lot of good Asian food in Irvine and if you like beaches there are plenty of nice ones around the OC.

my sister's cute apartment

a supersweet banana split at Watson Drug  with Ed, a friend from college/OC expert

my adorable sister

I feel like a bowl of delicious ramen at Santouka is an OC mandatory stop for me even though we have a Santouka location back home, too.  It's seriously just the best ramen!! If there's a location near you, have a bowl for me~

Long Beach, California

Even after living in LA for a couple of years I'd never really been to Long Beach.  Luckily, my dear friend Ariz ♥ let us crash for a night and showed us around.  We weren't there for too long, but I really liked The LBC.  It reminded me of home (the South Bay Area in California) but with just a little more flavor.  It's a really diverse city.

Los Angeles, California

Hello from a rainy rest stop in North Dakota-- rest stops here have wifi...who'd have thought?

Anyhow, after going to Santa Barbara, it was time to go to LA.  I studied at UCLA, so visiting LA is always something of a homecoming for me.  We crashed at my best friends' apartment, and it was great.  I was a bit apprehensive about Nick meeting them for the first time, but he fit in just fine and we all hung out like old college times, only better because it was +love.

my best friend got me a belated birthday present -- japanese vinyl

my best friend & i ♥

couple photo

It's always good to visit LA, but at the same time it's also good to leave.  The place just starts to get to me after a while and I feel overcome with the feeling that I have to get the hell out.  So after LA it was off to Long Beach...

Santa Barbara, California

Damn, I haven't posted about the places I've visited in a while!  Well, after Solvang we went to Santa Barbara to visit Nick's brother who goes to UCSB.  It was my first time meeting him so I was nervous, but he was a very nice and warm person.

I was expecting Santa Barbara to be something like a frat boy town, but it was actually something like half brotown, half hippie town, which I wasn't expecting.  Why do hippies like the beach so much? I wonder...

It must be nice for the students at UCSB to live right on the beach.  I mean, it isn't a particularly nice beach, but still~

Anyway, Santa Barbara also lived up to its reputation for being a party town, too.  We had a ton of fun.

Hello from Portland!

one of the worst pictures of me ever

California recap

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Tomorrow we say goodbye to California and goodbye to much of our support/social network.  The real adventure starts now.  Here's where we've been so far:

• A. San Jose -- home, the trip's starting point!
• B. Yosemite National Park
• C. Sequoia National Park
• D. Santa Maria -- Nick's hometown
• E. Solvang -- the Dutch tourist town
• F. Santa Barbara -- to meet Nick's brother
• Los Angeles -- to visit a bunch of my friends and revisit the place I went to college
• Long Beach -- to hang with Ariz
• Orange County -- to visit my sister
• San Diego -- to visit the lovely Julie
• The Salton Sea -- to see the sea and Slab City
• Joshua Tree National Park
• Humboldt County to visit my old friend Sofia

I'll write about all these places soon~  There are a few places that we skipped for various reasons: Big Sur, Lake Tahoe, Death Valley (figured that in the summer heat Death Valley=death).  I'd like to see these places some day...I figure that since I'm a Californian anyway, it'll be easy enough to go see more of the state some day.  We went to so many places but really, California is huge.

Wish us luck as we push northward to Oregon!

Solvang

Solvang is a Danish city in California.  This pretty much means Danish style architecture, Danish bakeries, and other random Danish things.  I'd never been, so I was pretty excited to stop here.  
The above picture is of aebleskivers, a Danish treat.  They were reaaalllly sweet.  It also just so happened to be the farmers market while we were in town.  We picked up a basket of raspberries and ate them right then~
There is also a Pea Soup Andersen's location nearby in Buellton.  Andersen's is a restaurant famous for its pea soup.  So, we went in to try.  The soup is thick, vegetarian, and served piping hot.  Worth trying!
Overall...Solvang is a cute place, but mostly a tourist trap.  It's worth a stroll through if you're in the area, but not a detour.

Santa Maria, California

Why would anyone want to go to Santa Maria?  Well...there is absolutely no reason to go unless you are visiting someone.  After conquering two national parks, it was on to the next, greater challenge: visiting my boyfriend's parents deep within suburbia.

I'm pretty skittish, so the thought of staying with my boyfriend's parents and integrating with their household was pretty terrifying.  Luckily, it was already my third time staying over and they are both very nice, open people.

Santa Maria is really one of California's buttholes, so there was nothing to do.  That meant there was plenty of time for relaxing, reading, writing, and playing with the household dogs.  It was also really great to eat home cooking. ♥






PS: Nick has been blogging away about our trip at A Californian in Outer Space.