Down Under Part 11...The 80 Degree Temperature Drop Home

Did you know the distance between Hawaii and Idaho in November is not so much a distance as it is a temperature. 80 degrees to be exact. Yuck! So to recap we woke up in New Zealand Saturday morning, spent the whole day there, left New Zealand about midnight Saturday night/Sunday morning, flew for about 9 hours and landed in Hawaii Saturday morning. I have officially time traveled back in time. Longest Saturday of my life.

When we got to Hawaii we went to the rental car place since we had about 12 hours before our flight to Las Vegas. Once we got our car from the annoying car rental place that doesn't listen we went and got lunch again at the shrimp place. It was good enough to go twice. Then we went to the famous Ted's Bakery. I had the best pie ever called Chocolate Hupia Pie. I wish I could have it once a week. We then went to the beach to lounge for a bit. We played in the ocean and laid in the sun. It was glorious.

I had hoped that Bri would have forgotten about the dang free cd she got a coupon for on the way there. She didn't. So I told her we could go get the dang thing. It was back in my favorite city (not) of Waikiki. It took forever to drive there and find a parking spot. She got the cd and then we had dinner. Dinner was yummy and that's where I checked the weather. At that point it was night there and dark out which means the temperature had dropped since our beach time earlier. It was 79 in Hawaii at that time and a whopping 0 back in Idaho Falls. I thought about missing my plane. But alas I missed my bed so we headed back to the airport. By the way the parking to get the *free* cd was $8 and my sanity. Not so free. And I'm fairly certain Bri did not enjoy the cd so much. Whatevs. Good story now right? We made it to the airport, got our last bit of food since our gate was in Hawaiian Siberia, and flew home. I sat in front of someone who probably had Ebola or a really bad cough, one of the two. I sorta slept and we landed Sunday morning in Las Vegas.

When we got to Las Vegas we had to once again collect our bags. Bri's bag was high stacked on the conveyer belt and she missed it so I jumped for it. Well when I grabbed it I held on tight and the conveyer belt took me with it. I was weak from the possible Ebola/cough from the guy behind me. I've always wanted to ride the baggage claim, but not like that. Bri got a kick out of it though so it was all worth it. We ate breakfast and waited for our flight from Vegas to Salt Lake. We were exhausted. The plane got there and we made it back to Salt Lake around noon Sunday.

We had one last leg of our journey to Idaho Falls. The dreaded shuttle ride. Imagine if you will what we looked like. We hadn't showered since our first Saturday that week probably close to 72 hours ago, we had gone to the beach in Hawaii, swam in the ocean, and had been on 3 plane rides. We were gross. I wore my shirt from Bondi Beach in the hopes that people would realize I came from a beach and not from the gutter. The shuttle ride went fine and we made it back around 5pm on Sunday night. It was freezing of course and there was snow on the ground. It was nice to be home in my own bed but I admit I left a bit of my heart back in New Zealand. It was an amazing unforgettable trip of a lifetime. #blessed...seriously.

Down Under Part 2 It's Gettin' Hot In Here

Our flight from Las Vegas to Hawaii was filled with a lovely Benadryl induced sleep.  It was much needed after our early travels to Vegas and then not flying out of vegas until 1am.  We got into Honolulu Airport a little before 6am on November 2 2014.  That was just enough time to grab our bags and head over to the shuttle pick up area to get to our rental car.  The guy who picked us up on the shuttle was great.  He was friendly and made sure we knew where we were headed and how to return the car when we were done.  Awesome customer service.  Then when we got to the rental car place they were super rude.  As soon as you told them you didn't want their "gas refill" option (which means that you can return the car back with half a tank and they will pay to fill it up at a lower rate, but they charge you for half a tank no matter how full you bring it back...this isn't a good option for a one night layover on Oahu) they became terrible and snappy.  Then they saw our luggage and told us we had to get a bigger car and pay an extra $10 a day.  We explained we had done this in another similar car before.  They didn't care.  Terrible customer service.  For reference this company was Advantage womp womp.

We took our car (we named Chandler) and went Kailua to put our toes in the ocean on Lanikai Beach and then to Cinnamon's Restaurant also in Kailua.  So far it's been my favorite breakfast ever.  I got my usual Red Velvet Pancakes, but I also had to get the Guava Chiffon Pancakes too.  If I can swallow my pride gulp I'll admit that the Guava Chiffon ones are better.  I would love to have those every sunday morning.

Next we headed to the North Shore to enjoy some beach time.  Luckily it was early enough in the morning that we got a great parking spot at the Waimea Beach Park.  It was glorious there.  We played in the ocean, soaked up some sun, and took naps.  I love naps.  A couple of us ended up a little lobster like from this excursion, but totally worth it for me.  I could do relaxing beach days like that frequently.

For lunch I wanted to go get food from food trucks.  I had seen a special on the Travel Channel about these little food truck areas on the North Shore and wanted to give it a shot.  I had actually eaten at one of them before.  Giovanni's Shrimp Truck.  Oh my goodness.  It was better than I remembered.  I had a half order of the lemon butter with a side of their hot sauce.  If I lived there I would probably eat that daily.  I also got an Acai bowl with granola and honey and banana.  Caryn lived in Brazil and ate those before and said the ones they have there were legit.  I was not disappointed.  I wouldn't mind that for breakfast every day (except the day I get my pancakes).

 

After lunch I dropped Bri and Caryn off at Pearl Harbor to go out to the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial.  I had already been so I used this time to drive to Waikiki and check us into our hotel.  I forgot how terrible the traffic was in Waikiki.  It's bad, and there are so many one way streets that are allegedly two lane, but seriously should only be one lane.  HATE IT.  Then the hotel elevator only worked when you scanned your card.  Unfortunately I didn't get this memo so I just kept riding around because other people were requesting the elevator on other floors.  I had too much luggage, there was no air conditioning in the common areas of the hotel, it was hot, and I was frustrated.  I was almost in tears when I made it back to the lobby and someone explained it to me.  I got the luggage up there and then went and picked up Caryn and Bri.  It was a glorious 86 degrees that day.

We headed back to the hotel, changed, and walked to Waikiki beach.  We walked around there for a bit and spent some time in some of the stores and then headed to bed for sleep in an actual bed.  It was a pretty good day in Hawaii.

The next morning we got up, repacked, and headed to the airport.  I got to stop by a store that the company I work for owns which was neat.  I met people I had talked to over the phone, but had never seen before.  It was neat.  Then we went and got gas in the car so we didn't get charged the bajillion dollars they swore we would if it wasn't "completely full" and "filled up within 2 miles of the rental car drop off".  In case anyone (or future me) needs to know here's the address for the nearest gas station to the airport:  Chevron Honolulu, Valkenburgh Street, Honolulu HI.  You're welcome.  Just say no to their stupid half take gas fill up program.  We returned the car and got to the gas station and then got shipped out to the nether regions of the airport where there was no food, no shops, one vending machine, and, according to the crazy lady, only one outlet.

Short little story:  We got to our gate pretty early for our flight from Honolulu to Auckland, New Zealand.  Because we were some of the first people there we found a spot in the corner where we could set up all of our bags, plug in our phones, and just chill for a couple hours.  This middle/older aged lady came and sat practically right next to us.  Now this was a huge gate...huge.  And if you saw how it was all set up you would realize it wasn't in the main part of the airport so it's not like random people not on the flight were taking up seats from another gate.  This was just our gate.  She could have sat anywhere.  We were watching videos and a little loud which is why we picked a corner of the airport so we wouldn't bug anyone.  She acted all annoyed and then came up and said she wanted one of the outlets because we had the only ones in the whole gate.  Rude.  There were others.  So we packed up our stuff and moved next to the completely empty outlets.  I hope that lady's phone somehow fell in the ocean.  end of story.

We got on the plane to New Zealand and mentally prepared for our 9 hour flight.  We watched movies, chatted, read, laughed, and ate the whole way.  I might have also taken a small nap.  We got into Auckland around 10pm. on November 4th local time.  This was 20 hours ahead of our home time.  They made us sit there while they sprayed us and our baggage down on the plane.  It was weird.  Then we walked off the plane into NEW ZEALAND!!

Down Under Part 1 The Journey Begins

Isn't there a quote that says something like, "A thousand mile journey begins with a single step"? Well the single step on this journey began when Bri, Caryn, and I got our tired selves up before dawn on November 1 2014 to catch the shuttle from Idaho Falls, Idaho to Salt Lake City, Utah.  It was mostly an uneventful "sorta bus" ride.  They had the heat up to about 1000 degrees and my feet got a bit burned.  We had good weather, and by the time we got to Salt Lake it was in the 60s and sunny.  Pretty nice for Utah/Idaho in November.  We were dropped off right at the airport so we didn't get to do our usual mall/food trips in Salt Lake that I love.  Honestly I was just antsy to get on that plane because I felt like that was the real start.  Then I saw the plane...it looked like a pretty sketchy start.

Do people seriously still fly in things like this?  Guess so because we did.  I loved the fact that the plane was fairly empty.  We each got our own row and the flight attendant (let's call him Stove) was pretty entertaining and didn't seem to care too much about any safety shenanigans which I appreciate since this was not my first rodeo (flight).  We made it to Vegas alive around noon.  I was grateful.

We had rented a car in Vegas, but the rental car place wasn't right at the airport.  We had to take a shuttle to a rental car mall where they had tons of different rental car places and then from there ours was even further so we got on another shuttle (luckily free still) and rode to our rental car place.  It was fairly quick and easy.  Once we paid and probably signed away our first born children to them they gave us a number and pointed out to a lot where our car was waiting with the keys in the ignition.  It was behind a truck so I didn't see it (from here on the car will be known as Beverly) yet.

I'll explain first that we were traveling internationally.  I had a huge bag to check, a carry-on suitcase, and a backpack, Caryn had the same, and Bri was just missing the checked bag.  We also had a couple neck pillows on top of all that.  Basically we had a ton of crap plus the three of us.  When we walked past a truck and saw the car they had rented us I thought we were going to have to strap Bri to the roof. Meet Beverly.

Well we ended up getting all our luggage and ourselves in this little car and headed out for the strip since we only had about a 12 hour layover there.  We parked at the Paris hotel and headed for the Bellagio Gardens.

We also saw the lovely chocolate water fall they have there.  Next we hit up the Cosmopolitan to eat at Secret Pizza.  It's this sweet pizza place that really doesn't have any directions or signs to get there.  You just have to know where it is...or google it.

 It had really good pizza and a neat little hallway to get there.  Not super pricy either for Vegas.  After a little time on the strip we went down to Fremont street.  We got froyo, watched a ceiling light show thing, and saw some people that barely had clothes on.  Neat.  We played $1 each at the slots there since you can still pull the little handle to play them.  Nobody walked away with enough to pay for this trip sadly.

Once we were done down at Fremont Street we still had some time to kill before we needed to be back at the airport so we parked down at the MGM Grand and hit up the M&M store and the Coke store.  The Coke store ended up being the real star of this leg of the journey.  On the second floor they have a little cafe looking area and for about $8 they have a "Coke Tastes of the World" where you get 16 little cups of different Coke products from around the world.  It was so much fun.  I would have to say the highlights were the Fanta Pineapple from Greece and the Bibo Kiwi Mango from South Africa.  The low and by low I mean pretty close to hell would be Beverly from Italy.  Which is how the rental car got the name Beverly.  Beverly is terrible.  The best way to describe it would be to mix bitter with death and add carbonation.  Bri said if she was ever rich...or bored in Vegas she would love to just sit all day watching people taste each drink one by one and wait for the moment they drink Beverly.  I bet that could be a great youtube video montage.

                              

Once we were done there we returned Beverly, made it through security, and camped out until we loaded up for our next flight to Honolulu, Hawaii.

Eating in Salt Lake City--Round One

I absolutely love going down to Salt Lake City.  It's about a 3 hour drive and it has amazing shopping, great sites, cool history, but most important, really delicious food.  Every time I go I always have so many food stops that I leave stuffed.  I always say I'm going to try something new, but I keep going back to the same places so I'll highlight my repeats in this post.  My goal is to find new yummy places in SLC soon.  I have a few trips down there planned soon and I'm going to try and get out of my comfort zone...try...ok here's my top eats in SLC:

#5  Star of India

Most people I've talked to like to go to Bombay House when they want Indian Food in SLC.  I won't bash it because it's still good Indian food.  I've also tried Copper Bowl and it was also good food.  My reason for going time and time again to Star of India is because the food is fantastic, but so are my experiences there.  Example 1:  I went there one night with a group of my friends and they had all the lights low and an Indian movie playing with subtitles in english.  While we ate my entire group got into this movie to the point that we were singing the song from the credits the entire rest of our trip...and probably weeks longer once we got home.  Example 2: I went there with a friend one night for dinner and there happened to be a totally behaved loud unruly kid at the table next to us.  Honestly it didn't bother us, but the waitress brought us an appetizer on the house which introduced me to something I never would have ordered, but turned out to be a favorite.  I recommend getting the peshwari naan and the chicken shahi korma with a Mango Lassi to drink.  Seriously I wish I could eat this right now.

Some of the Star of India Decor

#4  Whole Foods

Now this isn't just in SLC obviously, but I keep going back to it.  I usually find myself between breakfast and dinner and don't have time for a lunch/don't want to eat a huge lunch because I ate a big breakfast, too many snacks, and plan big dinners there.  Most people when they go to SLC go to City Creek Mall.  They go because it's fabulous.  It's a huge mall that is open air in the summer and closed in during the winter.  I seriously love the atmosphere there; however, sometimes people forget about the quirky other places to window shop.  One of those places is Trolly Square.  It's not quite downtown and it's really close to Whole Foods.  I love going to Whole Foods and grabbing one of their little pre-made salads or sandwiches, a sparkling blood orange Pellegrino, and of course all the samples they give you (it's tastier than Costco) and wandering around the shops at Trolley Square.  Some of my favorite shops there:  Pottery Barn, Williams Sonoma, The Spectacle, and Tabula Rasa Social Stationers.  These places are quite a treat and I would highly recommend going a little off the beaten path (yes I know Whole Foods and Potter Barn technically isn't off the beaten path).

#3  Oasis Cafe

This is my little hippie eatery.  It's not too far from downtown and completely a must-go-to place to eat at some point.  When you first get there you will see they are also connected to a little shop.  Go see it.  It's filled with essential oils, interesting books, and little nick nacks.  Now on to the food...I've only been there for dinner.  Specifically I have gone to Whole Foods to hold myself over to make sure I make it to dinner because they have different menus than lunch.  I'm going to start with dessert because why not...I'm an adult and I can if I want to.  It's a vegan chocolate cake drizzled with raspberry sauce and  little side of vegan ice cream.  Now if the vegan part is sending you packing know that you are not alone.  I was also a little concerned that I would be eating a lump of yuck, but trust me it is pretty dang good.  I would not get something gross more than once and I have gotten the chocolate cake more than once.  As for dinner they have vegan, vegetarian, and carnivore options.  In the summer or warm weather I like to eat out on their patio area and stick more vegetarian.  They have an impressive cheese, crackers, honey, and fruit platter that I like to pair with a hummus, tapenade, and grilled bread platter.  It's delightful.  In warm weather I also have gotten the rosemary lemonade.  Also quite a treat.

Summer Eating at the Oasis Cafe

 In the winter I like something a little warmer and a little more hearty.  I can say the king crab with asparagus risotto is really really good.  The filet medallions are also quite delicious. Overall it's a great find and for sure a repeat on my list.   

#2  Bruges

Bruges Waffles...half eaten

Oh Bruges how I miss you.  I will admit I don't go here every time I go to SLC.  I always want to go, but you really have to be in the mood for a great dessert.  They serve waffles, frites (fries), and sandwiches.  I've only had their waffles.  I'll only be able to comment on their waffles, but their "Machine Gun Sandwich" was featured on Man vs Food so I would guess it has quite a good reputation.  Anyway back to waffles.  The waffle I get is hot, stuffed with chocolate bars, covered in raspberries and creme fresh, and really amazing.  The only reason this is not number one on my list is because it is sweet sweet sweet.  I love sweet, but you really have to be in the mood for it, and it's quite a bit to eat...for me anyway...but try it out, you won't regret it.

#1 Les Madeleine's

Kouing Aman

Last, but not least is the little French pastry cafe.  I love going here.  It's so cute and of course the pastries are amazing.  My favorite is the Kouing Aman which was 2012's pastry of the year.  It's a little sweet, a little buttery, a little crunchy, and a whole lot of yum.  I've also tried some of their other treats and I wasn't let down.  The Kouing Aman is just a favorite.  I can't help but feel I'm in a parisian cafe when I'm eating their pastry and drinking my fruity sparkling french soda.  It's a lovely experience.  One that I experience on almost every trip to SLC.  Don't miss it.