Day 62 - A Great Day For The Irish

Well we didn’t need to drive terribly far to get to Yellowstone, and because the majority of the park was closed off (including Old Faithful), there was only a limited things that we could do. We got to sleep in until about 10 and then we hit the road.

Along the way we saw beautiful landscape and Emma and I both started to fall in love with Montana. I was literally picturing an wide open plain with no one around and tumbleweed blowing across our path every 30 feet. But it was very inhabited with people and it didn’t look like the places we were driving through were run-down.

We got into the park in Montana and after driving for five minutes we were in Wyoming! Now I don’t want people to think that we weren’t going to get the full experience of the Yellowstone National Park because a lot of it was closed off. The park itself is as large as the states of RI and DE combined! That’s ginormous!!! If you ever some here for a visit, allow yourself almost a full week! You would literally have to cover the area of miles and miles of road to get to different parts of the park.

Well Emma and I grabbed a map at the gate and found a trail that looked fun. About a half-mile into the trail, we were in knee high snow. Apparently not all the trails of the accessible parts of the park were good for hiking. They did however have a good couple of miles of boardwalks. We were in the area of the hot springs. Now when I went to Costa Rica with my father, I was lucky enough to go swimming in a hot spring. The hot springs at Yellowstone were not the swimming kind. They were much more raw and natural. The fact that it was a bit chilly in the mountains was nice because you could see the steam coming from the springs very easily and it appeared very thick, even from far away.

We looked at the forecast and it was supposed to rain in the early afternoon, but we were able to get about an hour of rain-free day. It started to rain when we were walking along a river that if you travel about half a mile, there is a swimmable area 365 days area because of the spring water. We didn’t get to make it in time, but when I dipped my hand from a half-mile down river the water was still pretty warm.

Like every Irish American in the U.S. we chose to celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day with a typical Italian dinner. I was craving some lasagna and I personally didn’t want to celebrate St. Patty’s day with strangers who like to pretend they are Irish.

Oh well, I’ll have some green beer next year.

Aramis

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Day 61 - Life In The Fast Lane

So sadly our first stop the next morning was to the airport. Unfortunately Andy didn’t think it was financially beneficial for him to stay with us on the trip. I also think he just was getting anxious to get home. So Emma and I dropped him off at the airport and said goodbye to 1/3 of the three musketeers.

We needed to keep moving though. With only two people now, it was just Emma and I taking turns with driving. What is crazy about Seattle is that even though it is so north in the U.S., there is a lot of rain. Well, once we drove about 40 minutes west of the city (on a not so familiar I-90) there was a crazy blizzard a little further up into the mountains. It didn’t cause too much delay on our drive, but once get got out of the blizzard there was some of the craziest fog I had ever driven through. Lastly only an hour of getting through the fog, there was more rain, and once we got through more rain, there was beautiful sunshine! Where’s Al Rocher with the forecast when you need him!

Well there was also another surprise as I was driving. I learned the hard way that the state of Washington enforces their speeding by airplanes. Yeah so it turns out it took me 61 days to get the first speeding ticket. But it wasn’t just me getting pulled over. I think they were trying to get their quota up because three cop cars would set up camp waiting for the unsuspecting cars to come by. Regardless if the cars were speeding during the time of being pulled over, the “eye in the sky” knew it. So needless to say, I won’t be driving through Washington anytime soon.

Our hotel was in the state of Montana, because we were using the Montana entrance to the Park. During the off season, the majority of Yellowstone is closed off because of snow and plowing. But we were literally down the road from the entrance….down the road as in 65 miles or so.

The whole felt kind of strange without Andy there, but I will say it was nice not trying to figure out who was sleeping on the floor that night.

Whether she liked it or not, Emma and I were sleep budies for the remainder of the trip

Aramis

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Day 60 - Smells Like Teen Spirit

Well we woke up in Seattle the next morning and I was utterly shocked to open up the curtains and see the sun beaming right in my face with few clouds in the sky. Yeah, right. Like that would actually happen in Seattle. Of course when we woke up, it was downpour. It did lighten up when we hit the town.

Our first stop was the marketplace. For some reason we saw a ton of Asian bakeries, and lots of bakeries in general. We saw a lot of coffee shops, especially Starbucks. Why is this cool? You are probably are saying to yourself, “There is a Starbucks on nearly every street where I live”. Well in Seattle, you will find a Starbucks on literally almost every street. The global company started in Seattle, which meant that Emma and I were determined to get a coffee at the flagship coffee shop. We walked a second time through the market and saw a tourist behind the counter and she was having a whole fish tossed to her. I don’t know about her, but I certainly would not volunteer for that type of Seattle experience.

We grabbed lunch at a little place with a bunch of character. The menus for starts, were written on brown paper bags. Definitely from all the place we have eaten, that is the most unique form of menu. We had all been smiling to ourselves along the west coast when we read that restaurants have New England Clam Chowder. I was always nervous to try it outside of New England, especially along the west coast. Well I tried it and it tasted like….well, not a good clam chowder. Probably a 2 on a scale from 1-10.

After lunch we went to the Space Needle! I was the only one to actually go up to the observation deck. If you bought a ticket, you could stay up there for as long as you’d like and use all the interactive telescopes, touch screen information kiosks, and even grab a bite to eat at the restaurant. It was super windy outside, but I managed to get some pictures. I learned that the Space Needle was built to be the center piece of architecture for the World’s Fair that took place in Seattle. I eventually went back down and we headed back to the hotel.

We got pizza and went back to finish up the last season of Dexter.

Tomorrow we had a long drive to Yellowstone,

Aramis

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Day 59 - It's Not Being Green

All I knew about Portland, OR before going there was that there were a good amount of trees, it is kind of a young city, and there is a huge park there.

I later learned that the park in Portland is the largest urban park in the country…even bigger then Central Park in New York City. The first thing that we did was head to the park. We started walking around and shortly realized that once again, it was the off season. What I mean by this is that all the flowers in the Rose Garden were not there. There were a couple of flowers that were in bloom and very pretty. Even though it was disappointing not to see a lot of flowers, the fact that the park was the greenest I had ever seen made up for it. We walked around the park for a bit and found a trail and decided to just walk it, even though we didn’t know where it went. On the trail we were surrounded by trees and the environment seemed surreal.

Online we discovered that there is a bookstore worth visiting when you visit the city of Portland. I know, I know, this is very unlike me! Going to a bookstore to sightsee! Well I was skeptical at first but once walking into the front doors I could see why people put this on there things to do. It was a privately owned bookstore that consisted of the entire city block that it sat on. There were so many rooms to walk in and so many different types of books. I ended up going to there second location across the street to look at their math section. I hate to sound like a nerd but I resisted to only buying two math books. There were a lot more that I had never heard of that really grabbed by interest. This was definitely the coolest bookstore I had been to in a while. There was a lot of character in this bookstore that no Barnes and Noble could ever match up to.

Well the trip to Portland was only a day trip and we were off to Seattle, WA to see what all the fuss was about.

For some reason though, I was really hankering for some coffee.

Aramis

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Day 58 - This Land Is Your Land

Yosemite so far has been on of the best national parks. I wish we could have stayed there a little bit longer, but naturally the road was calling us.

Today was another travel day because we were driving all the way from Yosemite to the Portland, OR area. It was a long drive and we didn’t just drive straight there, we wanted to go visit the Redwood National Forest on our way up. Well were following the GPS to the forest and hoping to hop outside the car and walk around a bit to get a better feel of how big the trees were, but the GPS kind of brought us to this suburban area where a state parks HQ was. So I think that we must have missed the forest entrance. We ended up driving by many redwoods on the road and it was getting late so we ended up continuing on towards the hotel.

For the first time though, we stayed at a Holiday Inn. It was a THREE star hotel. Yeah, it was on the more expensive side to our spendings in terms of lodging but it was well worth it. The hotel was a couple of hours away from Portland. We figured we could just spend the night and resume our travels in the morning.

And that’s exactly what we did.

Aramis

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Day 57 - California Dreamin'

I could not believe it! We slept in until 10 am. Normally when we sleep in the tent we wake up around 7 or 8, so it was nice to get a couple extra hours of sleep.

Today was all about exploring the park. We wanted to go hiking and we picked a trail that was just a short drive from our campsite. We parked the car and headed towards the waterfall. There was a fantastic waterfall in the park that flowed down the humungous rock and there was a trail that eventually would lead you to a great view of it. We set off and immediately it was our hardest hike we had chosen to do. Really intense zig zagging up the rock. In order to get a good view of the waterfall we had to hike 1.5 miles up. I really enjoyed the fantastic views from way up and the waterfall was even cooler from the viewpoint.

After the hike Emma and I went to the gift shop and suddenly I was craving ice cream. So what do I do? I go to the little convenient store and get two chip-wiches. They were just what I needed after a 2.5 hour hike. By this time it was getting close to dinner and went back to the cafeteria did our typical camping thing later in the evening.

I wish tomorrow wasn’t our last day in the park.

Aramis

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Chicago!

We were up early on Thursday for the 12 hour drive to Chicago. Timmy's friend from Merrimack, Jill, is doing an Augustinian Volunteer program in Chicago (same program as his friend in San Diego). Friday, while Jill was at work, Timmy and I went to breakfast at a bakery down the street from her house before taking the train into downtown. It was a rainy/foggy day but we still managed to get in a bunch of sightseeing: the big bean, the Marilyn Monroe statue, Michigan Ave, the flagship UNO, and the river. We headed back to Jill's just in time to go with her to the airport to pick up another Merrimack friend, Sam. The four of us went to dinner and then headed to a few bars near Jill's house.

Saturday we got our 3rd oil change (and they washed the car!) then met up with Jill and Sam downtown to go to Wrigleyville to see the Cubs stadium. We went back to Jill's for a bit then back downtown to go to Howl at the Moon (piano bar) for the night. Very fun.

really liked Chicago, very big, but definitely a cool place to visit!

Sunday we left in the late morning to get to Cleveland....

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Mt. Rushmore & South Dakota

We woke up early on Wednesday for a big day of driving and little sight seeing. We made it to Mt. Rushmore in about 7 hours and got to stretch our legs on a beautiful afternoon. It was pretty surreal to see the monument as it seemed like we were just looking at a picture. Timmy has a friend from Needham, Nicole, who is doing Teach For America in St. Francis, SD so we headed there for the night. She lives in a trailor with one roommate right next to the school on an Indian Reservation. It was very interesting to learn about the community and her experience working at the school and definitely a culture shock to say the least. We had tacos again for dinner, and were all early to bed as we had a LONG day ahead of us.

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Colorado

On Sunday we drove to Colorado, and about 2o mins away from Cheyenne, Timmy realized the gas light went on, lets just say it was a VERY close call, but we made it to a gas station! Monday we headed to Boulder and did a hike up Eldorado Canyon and drove on Flagstaff road to get a great view of the city. We then headed downtown Boulder for a bite to eat at a local pub and brewery, and one of our servers was actually from Dennis! We then met up with our mutual friend JJ Bruno (whose family summers on the same street at Timmy's) and his girlfriend for a drink at a bar downtown in the college area.

Tuesday we went downtown Denver and walked around 16th street mall and got a feel for the city. We then drove to Red Rocks, a recommendation by my dad, which is about 20 mins west of Denver, and is home to an amphitheater where famous musicians have played along with many, you guessed it, red rocks. Very cool. We headed to the little downtown area of Red Rocks for lunch before driving to Colorado Springs. My friend from UNH lives in CO springs so we stayed with her for the night after an afternoon of walking through Garden of the Gods (bunch of trails around/up and down rock forms) with her new puppy! It was great to see a friendly face from home and reminisce over a home cooked taco dinner.

In the morning we headed to Mt. Rushmore

I absolutely loved Colorado, definitely a place I could see myself living in at some point :)

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Day 56 - Full House Theme Song

How did it go by so fast? We were up early and off back into the city to meet up with our friend Sarah from Chatham. She had moved out there about a month before we got there and moved in with her sister while she found a place to live and a job. Well she already had her favorite breakfast place. We met up with her and it was a quick walk from her place.

I knew it was a great breakfast place when the waitress greeted us with a breakfast cocktail special. Sangrias were the special drink of the day! But even I knew it was too early for drinks. Sarah told us all about her job she has and about what it was like to live in SanFran. She walked us around her neighborhood and the best part about where she lives, is that it is right by the row of houses always featured on Full House! That part, other than seeing Sarah, was one of my favorite things I saw in SanFran. Sadly we had to get a move on! we were going across the state all the way to Yosemite National Park for two nights!

By the time we got to Yosemite it was nearly dusk. It was the perfect amount of time to get to our campsite and set up camp. Yosemite was one of the larger parks we had been to. There was a lot to it. The best part about it was that our campsite was in the center of huge rocks on three sides. It was such a great sight to see.

Well we grabbed a quick bite at the cafeteria...yeah this place has a cafeteria, it's that big. We went to bed and it was actually a warm night...only dropped to about 35 degrees I believe.

I slept well even though I was anxious to explore the park.

Aramis

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Day 55 - Come Fly With Me

4:15 am!! Wow it comes so fast. You're probably thinking, "now Timmy, why on Earth would you get us that early?". Well folks, it is because by 7 am I would be in flight in my first ever hot air balloon ride! Emma and I booked a ride over the Napa Valley! So we had to be at the hotel where the vans were by 6 am.

It honestly wasn't that bad getting up, mainly because I was so excited for the ride. We stayed south of SanFran/Oakland and Napa Valley is just a short two hours from our hotel. It was a bit cold that morning but I was hoping that the flame from the balloon would be hot enough to warm me up. At the hotel we signed the "you/family cannot sue us if you die" contract and we hit the road sitting next to strangers who had the same interests we did. They drove us to a starting location that I guess depends on which way the wind is blowing in the morning. We got out and the balloons were already in the process of being filled. Between the two of us, Emma is certainly the daredevil. She was excited, while I on the other hand was starting to feel a little anxious. I mean we were going to be a half mile up in the air! Sometimes higher! There were 48 people and only three balloons, and if you did the math in your head like I did, that means that 16 people (17 including the "pilot") would be in the basket all at once. I mean I get nervous when there are more than 6 people in an elevator. You could only imagine how I felt knowing almost three times that would be on the voyage with me.

Well it turns out I had nothing to worry about. Our pilot had been doing this since the 80s and estimated that he had done over 4,000 rides. That's a lot of rides. I was of course the nervous nelly that needed to ask the question, "how many times have you done this". We were the last balloon to take off and before we knew it we had lifted off. I was right about one thing, the flame coming from the heating mechanism was HOT!...So I felt very toasty even high in the air. It was certainly a "couples" kind of thing to do...go on the balloon ride that is. Very romantic one would imagine. So romantic that there were TWO, not one but TWO proposals that morning. One was just feet away from where Emma and I were standing in the basket!

What was great about flying over Napa is that we got to see the bird's eye view of all the vineyards in the area. From far above, it really looked like a puzzle with each vineyard having it's gradient one way or another. Some plots of lad must have had 10,000 (I kid you not) sticks int he ground for the vines to grow one. And of course the houses that were centrally located on the vineyard were not modest in the least!

As we began our decent to the ground I was relieved. Our basket made contact and I knew that I was going to live another day!

Well the rest of the day included a short trip back into the city of SanFran. I drove on Lombard Street (the very twisty curvy road that's on essentially a 45 degree downhill), and we also did some great people watching in Chinatown (the countries largest Chinatown). After that it was back to the hotel! The whole entire day seemed like two separate days for me.

The next day we were all excited to see a fellow friend of ours Sarah Summers. She as going to show us her scene.

Aramis

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Day 54 - I Left My Heart In San Francisco

As I have mentioned several times before on this blog, I have been very fortunate to have traveled a lot in the past, especially at a young age. Well when I was 11 my family went to Hawaii and on our way back we stayed in SanFran for a couple of days. Well I am twice the age of what I was the last time I went to SanFran and it was a totally different experience.

We one thing that I wanted to do was to see the Golden Gate Bridge. We drove into the city and parked near this park along the water. The park was beautiful (I know I use that word a lot but it was true!). It was located right next to this large windmill and we started walking towards the bridge. THEN we realized that it was really, really far away so we enjoyed the time by the park and went a little bit closer to the bridge at yet another park. I honestly could have sat at that park for hours just thinking about the ingenuity and the brilliant minds that created the Golden Gate Bridge. It's just a ginormous bridge with only two towers holding it up.

On our way back home we went the long way and went over the GGB! It's was soo cool and a hell of a lot larger than I thought it to be.

When I was younger I never realized how the hills of SanFran effect the driving. It's really hard to drive on those hills! And we were driving an automatic! Going on this trip has given me a greater appreciation for the architecture throughout the country; and SanFran has such an icon style of architecture to its neighborhoods. I could really picture myself living in a house in one of the SanFran neighborhoods.

We'll have to see what time will bring me!

Aramis

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Day 53 - Californication

Well I don't know about Emma or Andy, but I was really excited to get to the San Francisco area. It was just another driving day because when we got to our hotel, which was located about 30 minutes from the city, it was kind of late and we were hungry.

As we drove along Highway 1 to SanFran the coastline did not disappoint. Andy described it as a 3 hours roller coaster. The road hugged the corners and would go up and down. It was FUN!

Well we got acclimated to our little hotel room and planned for the next day.

Aramis

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Day 52 - Down by the Bay

It was gonna come sooner or later. I am talking about my Spring allergies. They were terrible!

Well the agenda for today was all about making our way toward San Francisco. I quarantined myself in the backseat the whole day. Even though they were only allergies I didn't want to get anyone else sick. We took highway 101 from LA to Santa Barbara. This is the highway that hugs the coast of California and we were nearly right on the edge of the ocean the entire way to Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara was a very nice little town. I can only imagine when it's the summer time and the streets are swarming with tourists. We lucked out with the weather and at a great place right outside in the bright sun! And guess what...it was a mexican place! Go figure.

After that we headed to our hotel we booked in a really cute little town called Morro Bay. For dinner we walked about 300 feet to a local pizza place. Emma even met a friend there who even invited her back to his place. It was tempting for sure, but Emma really isn't into 7 year olds.

My allergies didn't get any better. But tomorrow was a new day.

Aramis

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Day 51 = Hollywood

So this was the day I was waiting for! We hit up with Hollywood area! We got up and headed to Sydney's apartment. It was really, really cute. And such a great location/ Literally a street over from Hollywood Boulevard.

The first thing that we did with sydney was hop in the car and go to one of her favorite places to eat. This little outdoor eating area wasn't in Hollywood, but more so through Beverly Hills. What I really liked about LA was that there were so many dinner parts of the city that was just totally different. Just a couple of minutes outside Beverly Hills we got into suburbia, so even though it was LA it didn't feel like the city. Sidenote: Sydney pointed out where Bill Cosby's house was which was insanely huge.

While we were in the car we drove around a bit while Sydney showed us great places to view the entire city. Then we went back to Syndey's place and parked our car. We just went to the next street over to check out the Hollywood Walk of Fame! I didn't step on any of the stars because in my eyes, it felt like I was stepping on tombstones. How I could I be so disrespectful to Meryl if I stepped on her star! Some other sites we checked out on Hollywood Boulevard were the Kodak theater (where they film the Academy Awards) and Gremlins Chinese Theater (where they have the handprints in cement!) It turns out that I have the same size hands as Marilyn Monroe! Who da thunk?

Unfortunately Syd had to go to an event featuring the cast of Parks and Rec. So Emma, Andy and I did our typical thing of going out to eat and hitting up a FroYo place. FroYo is soooo good!

Sadly that was our last night in LA and I didn't see ONE star!!! Oh well. Next time.

Aramis

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And then there were two

Andy made the decision to head back home so Timmy and I dropped him off at the airport on Friday AM and made our 11 hour drive to a town just north of the Yellowstone entrance. At about an hour of out Seattle we hit a minor snowstorm, and then within another half hour we were driving through sunshine and snow-less ground. We made it to Livingston is nice time, a little before 8. Saturday we headed into the park, about an hour drive. Unfortunately, only the north part of the park is open until mid April so we were unable to see Old Faithful, but did get to see some hot springs and unbelievable views of the mountains.

Onto Colorado tomorrow!!!!

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Rain rain and more rain

Leaving Yosemite, we headed back towards San Fran to get back on the 101 to go through Redwood National Park. It was quite rainy and I have to say I was underwhelmed by Redwood, but we may have missed the area that is so well known. We headed towards Portland but stayed the night South of Portland in Eugene, Oregon in a lovely 3star Hilton. We lived like kings (and a queen) for a night :) In the AM we were off to Portland. We made our way through Washington Park (so green) although the rose garden was not in season and it was raining. Then we headed into the city center for pizza and a block long bookstore called Powell's. I have to admit I could have spent all day there. We soon headed out of Portland and on towards Seattle.

Guess what....it was raining. And also raining the next day. Thursday we went into the city to Pike's Public Market, a combination of shops and farmers markets. We also hit up the flagship Starbucks and the space needle. All in all I liked Seattle, however, it does rain a lot there.....not a big fan of that.

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Day 50 - Fun, Fun, Fun

Wow, still can't believe that we were in California.

Today was all about the Santa Monica area. This is the beach of all beaches in California in my opinion. We drove to the pier and parked the car and hung out on the pier for a bit. We had to wait a bit to go on the rides because they opened at noon. We only went on the ferris wheel but got a great view of the beach and the rest of the pier.

The walked to Venice Beach which is a good walk down the ways. As we walked down the pathway there were countless people running, walking, biking, roller blading. In fact, now that I think about it I didn't really see many people out of shape. We even stopped for a moment to check out the guys lifting weights and working out at Muscle Beach. They were HUGE! Probably just body builders doing their 3 hour routine.

As we walked along the beach there were so many different beach type shops with crazy people standing outside them. We were there in the off season but I can only imagine how busy it would be during the summer! We reached the end of the beach, grabbed a bite to eat, and walked all the way back in the sand. God I miss summer!!!

Before we went back to the car we went to the 3rd Street Promenade, a huge outdoor shopping area with stores and restaurants. We all split up and did our own thing for a bit. I snuck off and got a quick fix of FroYo. If you never have been to one of these self serve places, it is an absolute must!

One of the most surprising things I learn/realized about LA was that there is traffic literally any time of the day! So it takes about an hour to get anywhere! So by the time we left Santa Monica and got closer towards the downtown area, it was already dinner time! Depo gave us a great recommendation for a solid night of LA. He told us to go to a certain restaurant/bakery for dinner and then hit the hills of Hollywood to see great places to view the entire city! We got kind of lost in the hills, but I enjoyed seeing all the nice houses that I will never be able to afford. (maybe one day...)

The day was certainly filled with a lot, but we were looking forward to seeing Sydney again tomorrow! A mini reunion!

Aramis

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Day 49 - Rollercoaster

I was feeling mixed emotions that morning. On one hand I had to say goodbye to Jeannine and the city of San Diego, but on the other hand our next big city was the city of angels. And Las Angeles was only about a few short hours away. But as much as I was sad to say our goodbyes, seeing Jeannine gave me a boost of energy that I could have only gotten from seeing someone like her.

Before we knew it though we were already in our hotel room just outside the city. It turnsut that Emma and Andy both had a friend from Chatham who goes to school out in L.A. to be a screenwriter and he was able to take time out of his busy schedule to take us to some cool hotspots for dinner and drinks. Depo is his name and he has been in L.A. for a couple of years. We met him at his house/apartment and he drove us to the Grove (where they tape Entertainment Tonight with Mario Lopez) and got dinner in a place called the Farmers Market. They had tons of small little stands to order food and it was kind of like a cafeteria.

I was certainly the most fascinated by all of the cool stories Depo was telling us. Little “ins” that Depo knew from being in the business and cool intern stories of getting coffee for his boss who knows high profile celebs. I could have sat and listened to so much more. I would really love to see a celebrity while I am in L.A. Depo took us to his favorite place to get drinks and we all continued to catch up and he did the typical “so tell me about this trip” and we try to explain it as best as we can.

Later that night we met up with the Fleischmanns. Sydney Fleischmann worked with all of us at the Candy Manor just so happened to be moving to L.A. a couple of days before we got there. Her parents were there to help her move in and we all met up at Yogurtland and had some FroYo (thank you for buying Mr. F, next time is on me)! We caught up and it was just super awesome to all be in a new location with each other. Syd and Depo gave us things to do and Santa Monica was definitely on their things to do.

Hope it’s sunny tomorrow!

Aramis

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Day 48 - Surfin' USA

We were so lucky for the weather while were in San Diego. It was Saturday and the weather was perfect!

Emma, Andy, and I went to breakfast and met Emma’s aunt at a great breakfast place Emma’s mom had recommended. We enjoyed the company of Anne because she was a local and she was even more of a traveler than the three of us. Having just retired from the Navy she lived all over the world. Quite the interesting life with many stories to tell. She did us a huge favor and took us to the naval bases in San Diego. These places were huge! She would tell us all about each ship or plane that we drove past. We went to a total of three bases and the last one had the best view we could have gotten of San Diego in the area. The city was beautiful. Once the lovely tour was over we were dropped off back at our car to head back to Jeannine’s. Emma spent the day at Starbucks because she wanted to watch a live streaming of her old UNH skating team at Nationals. Andy joined her there because he wasn’t really feeling the beach, which is where Jeannine and I wanted to go.

Jeannine took me to La Jolla, CA sits right above San Diego. It is a super cute town and even in the beginning of March everyone was spending the day outside in the gorgeous, casual, and typical weather. We just sat along the beach and people watched. We didn’t want to spend too long there because Andy and Emma were stranded at Starbucks. We picked them up and went to a Mexican style burritos. I didn’t really like it. It didn’t even come close to a Corner Store burrito.

The night ended with a little Trvial Pursuit. State school (UNH and UMass) vs private schools (Merrimack). Who won you ask? Well let’s just say the small classes might have helped.

I couldn’t believe that tomorrow we had to say goodbye to San Diego, and more sadly goodbye to Jeannine.

Aramis

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Day 47 - You've Got A Friend In Me

Even though Jeannine had to work in the morning, she just so happened to have a half-day. Andy and I left her house to go pick Emma up at her Aunt’s place. We grabbed a pastry at Panera and mooched off their Wi-Fi. Emma and Andy decided that they wanted to go to the Zoo and I just wanted to hang out with Jeannine so I dropped Emma and Andy off at the Zoo and went back to the house to pick Jeannine up for some lunch.

Jeannine knew a great place for lunch. She took me to this Thai place that had a lunch special of soup, an egg roll, and pad thai for only $7! What a deal!!! It was so good I got two orders! While it was just Neens and I, she showed me all of her favorites places in her neighborhood. It was nice to finally see where her school is and where she teaches PE.

When Emma and Andy were all done, I drove back to pick them up and we all squeezed in the car to head back to the house.

It turns out that Jeannine is running a half marathon next Sunday so she has been training for the past couple of months for this. Lucky for us, it was one of her day offs. So I was really happy that I got to see her for the whole day!

Emma is the only vegetarian in the group but Jeannine knew about an all-vegetarian sandwich shop that we went to eat at. It was really good. They had really good French fries. The rest of the night was spent around Jeannine’s dining room table playing card games and catching up. Jeannine and I were being crazy as usual so it just reminded me a lot of senior year.

I miss Merrimack. But I had a little Merrimack with me when I’m with Jeannine, for sure.

Aramis

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