When planning my getaway to South Lake Tahoe, I was a little worried about being able to find gluten free, vegetarian options available. After doing a bit of research, I was happy to see that there are a number of restaurants in the area that offer eats suitable to my diet. Since I had a long weekend full of wonderful eats, I thought I'd share some of my dining experiences with you all, so here we go! The first night we were in town, we had dinner at Blue Angel Cafe, a cozy, crowded restaurant that offers a little bit of everything, including menu items clearly marked 'gluten free' -- which is great for a newbie GF girl like myself who isn't all that experienced in eating out since beginning to experiment with eating gluten free a month ago. I ordered a quinoa & bean bowl, which ... [Read More]
travel
Exploring Catalina Island for the First Time
Last weekend I got a chance to drive down to Southern Cali to spend time with my parents in the Anaheim area. Coincidentally, my hubby and I had flown out of New Jersey on the Sunday after Christmas, and my parents flew into L.A. that Tuesday for my dad's work. He's a football coach and was one of the coaches for a football game sponsored by the Marines Corps, called the Semper Fidelis All-American Bowl. Since my dad was busy during the days with game preparations, my mom and I did some exploring of the area together. One day we went to Disneyland to walk around and check it out. I've been to Disney World a bunch of times, but this was my first time to Disneyland. They still had the park all decked out for the holidays, which naturally, I loved. We both love the It's a Small World ... [Read More]
Touring the Philadelphia Eagles Stadium
In honor of this weekend's NFL playoffs games happening - and in what happens to be the morning after the Eagles suffered a crushing playoff loss - today I'm recapping my recent trip to Philadelphia to tour the Eagles stadium, Lincoln Financial Field. Adam and I surprised my father-in-law with the tour as a Christmas gift. As you may remember, I'm a NY Giants fan, but he's a big Eagles fan, so we thought it'd be neat to see with him. We started off in the Eagles Pro Shop, which was a huge store with everything Eagles that you could possibly imagine, from normal gear like jerseys and hats to Eagles-clad cutting boards and purses. It was a group tour with a guide who was very knowledgable about everything about the Philly team. We learned about the history of the team and stadium ... [Read More]
Venice: The City of Dreams
(source) Well, I seem to have gotten sidetracked with my Euro trip recaps, but I'm back today with a post about the last place I visited during my vacation last month -- the beautiful city of Venice! While I experienced a combination of cool but sunny, then gloomy, rainy weather in The Netherlands, Germany, and Austria, Italy was perfect: bright sunshine and in mid-70's during my stay there. We stayed on the Lido of Venice, which was just a quick ferry ride away from all of the action on other islands via one of these bad boys... I found that hotel prices were pretty damn expensive on other touristy islands. The Lido was a bit more reasonable, and after some research, I chose a place called Albergo Quattro Fontane. [Side note: The above picture cracks me up, as ... [Read More]
An Afternoon at Seattle’s Pike Place Market
[This post was written yesterday but published this morning.] Hi there! I’m blogging from the skies, as I’m currently in route from Seattle back to the San Francisco airport. My work trip was a short and fun one, and I’m happy that I’m heading back today because it’s my anniversary - four years of blissful marriage with my man! :) Any who, when I arrived in Seattle on Monday morning, my co-workers and I met up, visited our client’s offices, then stopped by our client’s home to see where he lives. Check out the view he has from his house next to a lake: Pretty pretty right? After that, we headed downtown to explore. We spent a couple of hours in Pike Place Market, and I loved it there! The market had so many cute unique shops with works from local artists, plus lots of fun ... [Read More]
Wine, Pizza, Tartufo, Oh My! My First Dinner in Venice
Sometimes in travel, just like in life in general, things just don't go fabulously. This was the case for my husband and I the day we traveled to Venice from Austria. Everything started off fine. We caught a train from one town in Austria to another, and with 15 minutes in between when the train got into the station and when the bus to Venice left, we figured out where the bus was and made it with a couple minutes to spare. The not so great part of the day started when we got off the bus and had to figure out where the ferry was that could take us to the Lido of Venice where we were staying. After walking around confused for awhile, we found the ferry area but could only find ticket window drive-thrus. My husband went to ask the kiosk man where we could buy tickets, and the man ... [Read More]