Plane Blogging

Exit Glacier at Kenai Fjords (source)

Some bloggers get paid to brag, I had to pay $14 just to log onto the internet only to find that I can't watch Netflix and instead I had to find something else to do which required less bandwith (and more effort).

In December Tre's mom approached me about planning a trip for the three of us to Alaska, and since then I have been planning, booking, and re-planning every moment of our adventure.  Today finally came, and here I am on the longest flight ever sandwiched between two McCarthys, on an airplane headed for Portland, after which we board our final flight from Portland to Anchorage, Alaska.

Once we get there we will be driving a rental car, first south to Girdwood and Seaward, and then North through Wasilla to Talkeetna and to our farthest destination at Chena Hot Springs before we solemnly journey home, with a quick stop in Portland on the way back.

I am going to do my best to blog along the way with a trip report of sorts along with reviews of the services we use and the places we stay.  Here's a quick preview of whats on our itinerary:

Sheraton Anchorage Hotel
Alyeska Resort and Alyeska Sky Tram
Angel's Rest Cabins in Resurrection Bay
Alaska Sea Life Center
Kenai Fjords tour by Snow Cat
Traleika Mountaintop Cabins at Mt. McKinley
Chena Hot Springs Resort

Aloft Hotel at the Portland Airport

(hopefully) VooDoo Doughnuts

You can follow along with our trip by adding me on instagram

Provincetown trip 2

So I got back from the cape on Wednesday, and on Sunday Tre and I were headed right back down.  This trip was for 2 purposes - 1) to visit Tre's dad who lives on the cape, and 2) to go on a Whale Watch with our good friend Scott .   He does amazing private Whale Watch tours for 4-6 people on a small boat out of Pamet Harbor in Truro.  Seriously, if you visit Cape Cod, and want a truly New England experience a tour with Scott is a must do.

Anyways, Sunday morning we were up bright and early (read: 9 am) and on our way to the cape.  Luckily, most people are coming off the cape on Sundays and we didn't hit any traffic.  Once we were over the bridge our first stop was EMS for some sleeping pads, as we were finally going to try "camping" in Tre's Honda Element.  Our second stop (if you don't count Marylou's Coffee) was to visit his dad for a bit, and finally we made our way to the lower cape and to our campground at Dune's Edge.

The campground was so quaint, and pretty.  Camping on the cape gets a bad reputation because they don't allow any fires, but we didn't plan on cooking - it was really just a quiet place to spend the night.  Dune's edge was perfect, it was quiet, the facilities were clean and we had a great stay there and I wished we could have stayed much longer.

That evening we headed into town for dinner at our favorite Ptown spot - Devon's.  Last summer we spent a long weekend in Provincetown for a wedding, and the first day we were there we found out that Devon's serves vegan breakfast items.  The first day we went, it was just the two of us, and the next day we returned with a party of 6 or so, and the last day we were there with probably 10-12 people.  This time I was excited to try dinner, and it was really perfect.  We sat in the back with a view of the beach.  I started with a salad of grilled butter lettuce, watermelon, toasted sunflower seeds and balsamic vinegar.  Tre had a massaged kale salad with strawberries and honey mustard vinaigrette.  For my meal I had seared quinoa cakes with asparagus tepanade, herb salad and pickled ramps.  Tre had the North African lentil stew with candied cashews.

After dinner we went back to the campsite, set up our bed and turned in early.  The next morning we met Scott and another couple, Tim and Kristin, at the harbor and we were off on the boat.  As soon as we got around Herring Cove we started seeing minke whales.  For the next six hours we coasted around Race Point, watching minke and humpback whales dive, sleep, feed, and dance about 30-100 feet from our little boat.  We snacked, we took a lot of photos, and on the way back we were boarded by the Coast Guard for a "safety check".

Pictures stolen from Scott's Flikr.  Check it out for tons of great pics from our day at sea.

two whale spouts

Disney World pt 10 - Our Last Day

Apparently, on our last full day I didn't take any pictures until we went to dinner.  That night we had our last dinner at Narcoosee's which is a signature restaurant in the Grand Floridian Resort.  I planned it so that we would be having dessert as the Wishes fireworks were going off and it worked our perfectly.

This was the best meal of our trip.   Our waitress was both professional, and personable.  I started with a peach salad which was phenomenal, and the chef altered the vegetarian dish to be vegan.  It had seared tofu with baby squash - they were SO cute, little zucchini, pattypan and summer squash.

For our last morning I booked a pre-park opening breakfast at Crystal Palace, so that we could get some nice photos without people, and so that we could get to Space Mountain early.  This was the day before the 4th of July, and the holiday crowds had arrived and we had to work around them.  This was also seemingly the hottest day of our trip.

And that was it! I got lazy with picture taking by the end.  After Magic Kingdom we went downtown to get lunch at Wolfgang Puck Express, and we got more donuts to take home.  It was a great trip, I can't wait to go back in November to try the new Be Our Guest restaurant, and hopefully ride the new Little Mermaid ride!

Disney World pt.9 - Animal Kingdom, La Hacienda de San Angel

The last park we had to visit was Animal Kingdom, so with a good nights rest we got to the park for opening the next morning.  Our plan was to ride Everest as many times as possible before a line formed, and then to move onto the other stuff.  

We saw the Lion King show, which I like, buy my dad LOVES and went on the safari.  We also did It's Tough to be a Bug, and Dinosaur before we headed out.  Tre and I really like this park, because of the heavy and authentic theming, and the animals, but when I go with my dad we don't spend much time here.

Lunch options for me at this park are somewhat lacking, so we decided to go back to Art of Animation so I could get a pizza.  As you can tell from the picture, it was great.



That night we headed to Epcot to have dinner at La Hacienda de San Angel.  I was pretty excited about this one, because it was a newer restaurant, and new to me.  I read on another blog that they offered vegan tacos, and since they offer chips and salsa to start it feels like an appetizer.

This ended up being the second best meal of our trip.  The restaurant was clean and airy, they had booth seating for parties of two and the food was fresh, simple and tasty.  The story with Hacienda, is that it has the same owners as San Angel Inn, which specializes in Mexican restaurant food, but Hacienda is recipes from the kitchen of the owner's wife.

After dinner we watched Illuminations from the bridge between Mexico and Norway.  We had a great view, and were able to relax a bit after dinner.  Epcot had extra magic hours that night so we rode Living with the Land, and my dad rode Mission to Space.

Disney World pt. 8 - Jiko, Animal Kingdom Lodge, and Babycakes

When I decided I wanted to eat at Jiko, it quickly became the thing I was most looking forward to on our trip.  An African Signature Disney restaurant with a separate vegan menu? Count me in! This trip we had two signature meals planned, so we decided we would pay out of pocket for this one, knowing that I would want to sample the appetizers, and tea instead of sticking to the rigorous "drink meal dessert" structure of the Disney Dining Plan.  In most cases, this assortment of 3 suffices, as I am lucky enough to be able to find places with vegan main courses, never mind appetizers.  Most places stock sorbet, vegan cookies and vegan ice cream for dessert, so I would much rather have that than some mediocre salad.

Anyways, we got dressed and headed to the Animal Kingdom Lodge.  To get to a resort, from another resort the general rule is that you'll have to two two forms of transportation.  There are a lot of exceptions to this rule (see - monorail resorts, port orleans etc.) but generally you have to go to a park, and then to the other resort.  This adds significant time to travel estimations, so we had to leave pretty early for our dinner.

When we got there, the restaurant was still relatively quiet.  Despite this, we were seated next to a party of four adults on a double date.  This was fine, they seat people in one section because of the servers and such, but these people were pretty loud, and being in a quiet restaurant next to the only people audibly talking made it a bit uncomfortable.  This, in no way is the fault of the restaurant, and I am sure that at my request we could have been moved away.  It was just an unfortunate thing that happened to dampen the meal as my dad and I are both practiced mumble-talkers.

Anyways, our server was an older man who obviously had an appreciation for good food service.  He was very professional, albeit not very personable.  The other glitch in this meal was that my dad is not an adventurous eater.  I never realized how much enjoyment in a meal comes from sharing food, trying new food and talking about the food with whoever you are eating with.  He was not nearly as enthused at the idea of trying a sampler of African dips and breads, and I felt a bit strange mowing down on an appetizer (meant to share) all by myself.

When the food came, I was kind of underwhelmed.  I got some kind of lentil cake with "bunny chow"which is a pastry stuffed with some veggie curry.  It all tasted.. fine, but I was not blown away by taste, creativity or presentation.  Both items were fried, and that make the whole thing feel a bit greasy, and heavy.  That being said, at a "regular" restaurant, were I to see this, and eat it, I would be happy, but with such great reviews, and with special attention to the vegan menu this did not knock it out of the park.

In lieu of dessert I got some African tea to go, as did my dad and we walked around the resort a bit to see the animals and to snap some photos.

After dinner we decided to head to Downtown Disney, because no parks were open late.  HUGE MISTAKE because obviously, if no parks are open - everyone was at downtown Disney.  My dad was being a headache grump and I wanted donuts and the whole things was miserable.  We were fish swimming upstream, but we made it out and back to pop century, with a half dozen donuts to wake up to the next day.

Disney World Pt. 7

So instead of acknowledging my shortcomings as a blogger, I'm just going to continue as if I never left and you'll forget I suck by the end because you'll be so mesmerized by my amateur photography.  OK?

The next morning we got to Magic Kingdom for opening, and since we had already done quite a big at this park before our "Magic Kingdom day" we decided to hit some attractions that may not be "must dos" for us, but they are ones that you must do when the park opens, otherwise the lines aren't worth it. (to us, at least)  We headed straight for Fantasyland, and took a flight with Peter Pan, a ride on It's a Small World, and a spin on the new Dumbo.

The thing with Dumbo is that it's a basic ride, that appears in myriad forms around the world, but because it is so iconically Disney there is always a longish line for it.  (read 15+ mins, too long for "I don't wait in lines" Amanda) It's because not that many people fit on the ride, and because it is not continuous, there is not a perpetually moving line of people onto the ride.  Recently, along with the Fantasyland expansion, there was a re-branding of the once hellish Mickey's Toontown in favor of a new "Storybook Circus" with a re-vamped Dumbo ride at the center.  Now there are TWO Dumbos, and the queue weaves into a circus tent where there is a great air conditioned playground.  The entire area is really cute, we even rode the old "Barnstormer" kiddie coaster, which is now branded as "The Great Goofini" in which Goofy is a circus stuntman and you ride along for his wild antics.

After Fantasyland we headed over to one of my favs - The Haunted Mansion, then continued to my other fav, Splash Mountain.  The park started to get pretty busy at this point, I knew we weren't going to last much longer - it was real hot, and the Brazillian tour groups were everywhere.  We got fastpasses for Splash Mountain, and decided to cool off with some Dole Whip Floats.  Luckily, it was busy enough that Tortuga Tavern was open so we took a little respite in the shade and AC while we waited to be able to fast pass something else

We stopped into my favorite Disney gift shop outside of Splash Mountain, and I got a great Splash Mountain mug - which of course is now my favorite.  In the store they have all these little cubbies where the animals live in the "Briar Patch".  I wish all rides had such strongly themed shops, and ride specific merchandise - or at least the classically Disney rides.

I can't remember what else we did, but I think it was hot and we headed out.  That evening we had dinner at Jiko in the Animal Kingdom Lodge.  To be continued...

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Disney World pt. 6

So after lunch we escaped the sea of park go-ers and the oppressive sun to return to the controlled climate of our 200 sqft "hotel" room.  Now, a note about Pop/value resorts.  They are small rooms, noticeably smaller than moderates - but where they take the space away is so smart, and efficient you have to look around to notice it.  "Oh instead of a shelf they put a coat hanger on this adjacent wall" so for two neat-ish adults, it's plenty of room and not restrictive at all.

Against my better jugement we decided to walk over to Art of Animation for a snack, and so I could snap pictures of the Cars area.  We LOVE free dining, and we got it this trip with a pin code I received in the mail.  Because I hate being wasteful - we always try to use our snack credits on relatively expensive items ($4.50 +) so I decided we would get smoothies to keep us cool while we wandered a bit around the new resort.  Art of animation has a make your own smoothie counter, and the smoothies are all $5, and they are filling/refreshing/healthy which makes it a great option for snack credit.  I got a mango smoothie made with soymilk and tofutti, and my dad got some kind of "energizerrer super b vitamin blah blah" thing.  Unfortunately these did nothing to stop us from melting in radiator springs, where it was at least 10 degrees hotter than the sahara desert! It must be because they have no grass

After our walk we freshened up a bit before dinner.  Our plan of action was to use our fast passes for Rockin Rollercoaster, then take the boat over to The Boardwalk for dinner at Kouzzina.  After dinner we planned to head back to Hollywood Studios for the 9:30 showing of Fantasmic!  So, thats exactly what we did - got dressed and hopped on the bus over to the park.

 
Last time I was at Kouzzina, it was with Tre in Nov. 2011.  It was THE best meal of our trip.  The head chef of the restaurant created a feast for us, and took time to sit and chat with us about how she made it, and about the ingredients and the story behind the dishes.  It was an incredible spread, and in the end she sent us home with a complimentary bottle of Greek olive oil.  I know it's a meal we will talk about forever and ever.  Now, that experience definitely made me want to return - but I of course do not expect such special treatment anywhere.  That being said, this time, while our server was excellent, she was a little terse? and it's the only time during the trip that a chef did not come out to speak with me.  Again, I don't expect special treatment at all, and honestly I prefer not calling extra attention to myself, and also again, we had an excellent meal - however, it was a far cry from my last experience there.

We got back to the room relatively early, so while my dad swam I walked around a bit snapping pictures of the resort.