my quarter century birthday

I decided to make the absolute most of my birthday as it fell on a Friday. My one day turned into a 4 day long weekend as I signed up to do different activities I had not done before. I reached for the land, air and sea, all in one weekend.

Let's rewind to Thursday, the start of it all...

Thursday, my birthday eve, I celebrated it with my family. A nice dinner followed by what can only be described as the most amazing cake to ever grace my presence. This is saying a lot, because I am not exactly a "cake person." I generally would prefer something along the lines of ice cream, cookies, or sweets for dessert. However, I saw this post on Pinterest a few months ago; Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cake. Yes, you read that right.. cookie dough inside a cake. Never in my wildest dreams could I have guessed that I would be getting that cake for my birthday. {and I certainty was not going to attempt to make it!} This cake was hands down, the most delicious cake I have ever had, with little bits of cookie dough, running through the middle.

Friday, was a typical day of work for me. Although I did get a free birthday drink from Starbucks! A great way to start any day, if you ask me. After I was done for the day, I raced home because Brett had a couple presents left for me that I was ready to open. Yay for presents! Tissues paper and wrapping paper covered the floor but it was time to leave! We quickly fixed ourselves up a bit and went to grab a bite to eat before tearing up the track on Go-karts! I have been twice before and it is a really fun experience to just let loose and race your friends. My parents even came and my dad was brave enough to get on the track with us. It was a great Friday night.

Saturday morning, we drove down to Monterey, as we booked a 4 hour rental for Stand Up Paddle-boards. {or SUP} We figured 4 hours would be a sufficient amount of time as neither of us had done this before. We were expecting a little more trial and error, that's for sure. We got the hang of it in about 15 minutes and off we went. We had such a good time paddling through the "slough" as the tide was helping to carry us. We thought we had plenty of time to get back to the dock to return the boards, with 2 1/2 hours to fight the tide and return. Little did we know just how difficult it was going to be to paddle against the tide. It was really hard going and for a good portion of the time, as hard as I paddled, I just stayed in place. We eventually made it back to our dock and returned the boards. As soon as I got in the car, I immediately fell asleep {sorry, Brett!} I was so exhausted.

Sunday morning involved sleeping in, past 10, I might add! Which is something I haven't done for a very long time. We had a lazy morning as we were gearing up for a big activity, a flight tour and lesson. We arrived to the airport early and filled out some paperwork and waited in the lounge for the pilot and plane. I was expecting an air tour around the bay area and a short in flight lesson, that's what it seemed like would happen on their website. As soon as we got in the plane and went down the check list, the pilot showed me the controls for the plane and off we went! I was flying a plane the entire time we were up in the air. Of course he helped assist in take off and landing and through a patch of turbulence we had. Otherwise he was explaining the gauges and talking about the area we were flying over. The 45 minutes went by so fast and before I knew it, the wheels hit the runway and it was all over! I loved every minute being up in the air and is something I would definitely do again. After we left we went home to make dinner together and fell asleep really early after such an amazingly long weekend.

My 24th year was a pretty big one looking back on it. It took me to far away lands, local new discoveries, new job, new apartment just to name a few. Really looking forward to see what my 25th year will bring me.

Cheers!

X x

a few from memorial day

Despite the rain yesterday, it was a very lovely and relaxing Memorial Day.

We started by going to a cemetery where Brett's great-grand parents were buried and brought flowers and placed an American flag by their graves. It was raining the whole drive up there, but luckily once we arrived the rain stopped.

The cemetery was having it's own little Memorial Day BBQ and we had some coffee, chips and a hot dog before we made our way out. Rain and clouds didn't stop us from heading over to the beach and taking a walk along the water with Brett's dog Mario close behind.

There is a restaurant we stopped at for a late-lunch-early-dinner-snack and sat outside by a fire pit to consume what can only be described as the best lobster roll in the country. (well, it was voted 5th best in the country, but still!)

To walk off our delicious and rich lobster roll, we walked through the main street and looked at the lovely antiques, jewelry, and art shops. As well as bought some bread home from the bakery. We eventually made our way back home and just spent the evening relaxing.

X x

mykonos never sleeps, no seriously

Mykonos is one of the hottest summer destinations for people from all over the world who want to relax on white sandy beaches and party until the sunrises. This place puts Vegas to shame, but more on that later.

We took another ferry from Paros to Mykonos, it was only about 45 minutes because the islands are so close together. We were staying on the southern end of the island, about 15 minutes from the port and main town. Our hotel was adorable with an all white exterior and little blue doors. It was the perfect "Mediterranean style" I was hoping for! Also, it was only steps from the beach and a few restaurants.

First of all, we were so overwhelmed when we arrived into Mykonos. It was much busier than Paros, there were people walking and driving all over the place on these little windy roads. Luckily our hotel had a shuttle and picked us up so we didn't have to figure it out on our own. We spent our first day and night there just looking at maps and walking around everywhere to figure out what our surroundings were. There was a bus that would come every 15 minutes to take you into town. There were also taxi boats that would ferry you around all the coves from one beach to the other; it was perfect. We spent most of our time during the days on the beach and playing in the water.

The nightlife just exploded from there, everything revolved around the night - eating, drinking, shopping and clubbing took place all night and into the early morning. Restaurants and shops were packed from 10pm until about 1am, it was such a strange feeling to be in a restaurant eating a full dinner at midnight, but at the same time it felt so right. Makes sense, doesn't it? Anyway the three most famous and biggest clubs in Mykonos are: Space, Scandanavian Bar and any of the three clubs in Paradise Beach. Of course we went to all three. :] However, no one actually came to the clubs until about 4am, seriously. We tried, we really did to keep up.. but by 4am I was just so tired {Brett too} that we had to just get back to our hotel and crawl into bed. I really don't know how they can do it, I mean honestly what do you do until 4am anyways?! It beats me, but basically Mykonos won this time.

Of course not everything was party, beach, party, beach, repeat. We spent a little time walking through the town in the afternoon, while there was no one else around and I was able to get some great pictures. Mykonos is also known for a couple of other things, one being their windmills. There are 5 of them grouped together in the main town up on a little hill and they are beautiful. They can be seen from pretty much any point in the town and from the harbor. There is also a local "celebrity" of the town. His name is Petros and he is a pelican. He is beloved by his town and he is extremely friendly. You can easily find him just wandering through the town because there is a group of people chasing after him with their cameras. He even let me pet him one afternoon. :] I also could not get enough of the beautiful bright white buildings with its deep blue roof. I think when a lot of people image the Greek Islands, that is what they picture {because that's what I pictured} but those beautiful little buildings are all small churches and they have them almost every couple hundred feet! I even read somewhere that there are 365 churches on the islands of Mykonos alone. That is a pretty huge number for such a tiny little island, don't you think?

 We also lucked out and while we were wandering through the town there were tables set up with local Greek food that had just been cooked by the local women, selling them for a euro or two a piece. It was perfect! We were able to try homemade treats cooked by these women who were selling them to raise some money for a cause. My favorite, of course was baklava, which is a very sweet, flaky pastry. Oh it was so good to have it fresh & homemade. 

Mykonos definitely had a completely different style and vibe from Paros, so we had no idea what to expect for our quick day visit to Santorini, but we were ready to move on. It was great while we were there, but I think if I were to do it again, I would choose to stay on a different side of the island. By the time we had to checkout all we wanted to do was sleep. The hotel shuttle took us back to the port where we waited for the ferry to take us to our next destination. Let the adventures continue.

X x

preview / reflections of the greek islands

We made it safely back from our vacation and as happy as I am to have real water pressure and be in a real city again, part of me is ready to hop back on a plane and do it all again! This whole unpacking and organizing and commuting and working this just isn't the bee's knee's.
Anyway, onto happier times. To get to/from Greece we had to fly through London and since we were leaving on July 29th, {2 days after opening ceremonies} we decided to pick a flight with a long overlay so that we could go & explore London and the Olympics. We arrived in London about 1pm on the Monday and went straight on the underground into town. We weren't really sure where to start so we just got on and then decided we would figure it out as we go. Here is the great thing about London, they were so informational and helpful about the Olympics, a fantastic host. They have underground maps obviously on the trains, but they changed them up and put writing on the stops where the Olympic events were held. So we went straight for the village to see what that was all about. It was so busy and hectic and unfortunately we couldn't actually get into the village since we didn't have tickets for anything but we still were able to stand around and take some pictures. Then we found "beer gardens" that were set up with a big screen and some beer/snacks around so we sat in a couple different areas and watched some events.
The only thing I really wanted to do and I told Brett this since I saw it, was go see the London Bridge with the Olympic Rings. Unfortunately when we got there, {just my luck} the rings had been up all day & no one knew why. We stayed around there all night and they never came down. I was so disappointing. We did walk across the bridge and I got a shot of them against the bridge. Not the same, whatever.  I did get a fabulous shot of the bridge at night, lit up with all the different colors. Then about midnight when the last train was going back to the airport we got on that and just stayed in the airport until 5.30am when everything opened up and got on our plane that departed for Athens.

The Greek Islands were pretty incredible. I lot different than Brett & I had imagined, but at the same time was exactly what I was picturing. Each island was completely different. It had its own personality and different people and way of going about things. We went to a total of 4 different islands, staying 3 or 4 nights, except Santorini which was only 1. As soon as we got used to the island we were on it was time to leave and then explore / figure out / conquer the next. We did an amazing job and I am so happy with our selections, I wouldn't have changed much. Maybe just a couple little tweaks, but nothing big.
I have decided to split up the posts by island since each island was so different. So without further ado; these are a few of my favorite pictures as well as a little preview of what's to come while I sort through 400+ photos and get them ready to share with you.

X x