Category: Travel

Seattle And Bumbershoot 2012 Photos Are Here

Hello again, family, friends, and everyone else too. The pictures from our Seattle 2012 trip are now online! We had a great time as usual. There are Seattle pix, Bumbershoot Festival pix, and just some other weird pix we took on the trip.

Any questions, just ask. Besides Petra and me, you will see some pictures of our friends Karl, Betty, Mama O (Linda), and Sam. Even Karl’s brother Ron and his son Antonio are in a few. Take a look! Leave a comment if you want, I’ll be waiting….

Seattle/Bumbershoot 2012 photos

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Seattle And Bumbershoot 2012 – Part 3

Part 1 | Part 2

The third and final installment in our exciting vacation saga. And soon I will post the pictures too! Oh be still my beating heart!

Monday September 3

Of course Happy Birthday to the daughter. Meanwhile , back to our vacation. We headed out to the last day of the Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival. As per our routine, we first went and got a free Starbucks drink then went straight to the VIP hospitality area for some food and to finish planning the day. Petra’s first destination was a dance-related performance called Maximum Velocity, while I went to watch Seattle-based Seapony. I liked the band, they were pretty young but have potential. Then I watch a stripped-down mini-set (was it four or five songs?) on the Toyota Free Yr Radio Stage by England’s The Wombats. They were really likable and really good, ending with a highly-modified (with banjo) version of their song Let’s Dance To Joy Division. Petra meanwhile caught the end of rocker Reignwolf’s set, and we met up after at the “secret stage” for a performance by Low. They are aptly named, the music was very downbeat and while it was ok it was not really that interesting for either of us. That changed soon, though, since the next show in that stage was Passion Pit. They are getting radio play and a lot of press for their new album Gossamer so we were curious. This show was three of the members in a stripped down session, three keyboards/synths. The main guy opened the set with just an acoustic guitar for one song and the rest were the three of them. This was a great show, with enough electric to be cool but still fairly intimate. We both liked it a lot.


Seattle And Bumbershoot 2012 – Part 2

Looking for part 1 – click here

Saturday September 1

Today was the first day of the happiest place on Earth. No, not Disneyland, sheesh! This is way better. Three long days of music, comedy, dance, and most of the other arts. We discovered the Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival in 2001 and attended that year and every year since, making this our twelfth year. Some people travel with us, sometimes different people every year and then again some come year after year. We certainly do and hopefully this will continue. Heck, we already have a room reserved for the 2013 Festival and so does our friend Linda!

By the way, best improvement ever, this year: giant video screens at almost all the outdoor venues, so everyone can see!


Seattle And Bumbershoot 2012 – Part 1

We just got back from our annual trek to Seattle for the Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival (and more). I’ll post some pictures soon, but in the meantime here is a short overview of what we did. This year our friends Karl and Betty went too, first time for them. And of course our friend and festival veteran Linda Orozco went again with her friend Sam (first time for Sam too).

Maybe we’ll see you there next year…!!

Wednesday August 29

As usual we arranged for the Blue Van to pick us up. Karl and Betty came to our house to leave with us. We always allow for plenty of time to get to the airport in case something doesn’t go as planned. And this year, sure enough, the van was supposed to arrive between 7:25 and 7:40. Well, finally at about 8:10 the van finally showed up. This still let us catch our flight but it was more rushed than it should have been and pretty stressful. Shame on you Super Shuttle, I will be writing a separate letter to you. But anyway, it worked out and we had a smooth and quick Southwest Airlines flight to the Emerald City of Seattle. Did I mention that I love Seattle?


The 2012 Baseball Trip Pictures Are Now Online

2012 Baseball Trip Collage

As I blogged recently, I took a baseball trip with some friends, Larry, John, and Mike. You can read all about it here. But now it’s time to show and tell, so here are some pictures from the trip. As usual I didn’t take pictures of everything but I think you will get the idea. I’ve included my pictures, and also some taken by my friends Larry and John.

And to see the collage on the right at a bigger size, just click on it.

Click here to see the trip pictures. Take a look and then leave me a comment!

Thanks!


I Took A Baseball Trip – 2012

Baseball stadiumI took a baseball trip. And I’ll post some pictures soon. But yeah, I took a baseball trip.

What is that you say? Well, three of my friends (Larry, John Mc, and Mike D) have taken a few of these trips. They travel to a region of the country and see pro baseball games at a few different stadiums. They’ve asked me about going before and I didn’t go, but this time I decided, for various reasons, to go. For one thing, the trip was to Southern California so it wasn’t that far. In fact, we drove and made it a road trip.

Friday May 4

John got the rental car and picked up Mike and me, then we started south and picked up Larry in nearby Elk Grove. We had breakfast at an unremarkable place and then got on the road. Partway there we stopped at Anita’s Mexican Grill for lunch. As you may know,


A Quick Trip To Santa Cruz With Pictures

We took a two night/three day trip to Santa Cruz recently, taking along our two granddaughters. Our friends Larry and Robin graciously let us stay with them and we all had a good time there. We took the girls to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and they loved it! The forecast had been for rain, but it didn’t rain until late afternoon. What happened though, is that the crowds were small and so there was no waiting for rides. The kids could just get off the rides and then get back on, over and over and over and over and over and, well, you get the idea.

The pictures are here, check them out and feel free to leave a comment below.

Photo page

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The 2012 Sonoma Trip Pictures

2012 Sonoma Trip picture collageAs I blogged recently, we won a free (mostly) trip to the Sonoma wine country. You can read all about it here. But now it’s time to show and tell, so here are some pictures from the trip. As usual we didn’t take pictures of everything but I think you will get the idea…

First, to see the collage on the right at a bigger size, just click on it! I downloaded a free “collage” app for my phone and used it to group a few of the trip pictures that I took with the phone’s camera. Very cool and free too. I love technology (usually).

Second, click here to see the trip pictures. Take a look and then leave me a comment!

Thanks!

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A Quick Trip To The Wine Country

Vintner's Inn in Santa RosaRecently, we won a FREE trip to the Sonoma wine country. Yeah, that IS cool! It was a free night at the Vintner’s Inn in Santa Rosa (see picture), along with tasting passes at three nearby wineries, a small bottle of wine in our room, a $100 credit at the high-end restaurant, and a breakfast. We went earlier this month.

The hotel was really nice, including cookies in the room at bedtime, a fireplace in the room, large-screen TV, nice big tub, balcony, cushy bed, and more.But on the way there we stopped in Petaluma for a vegan lunch at The Sunflower Center that was pretty good even though it was in an office building. You never know, do you? Then, after checking in at the hotel, we headed to one of the wineries that we had passes for, Kendall Jackson. The wines were very good and the woman


San Francisco Anniversary Trip Photos Are Online

Hello again, family, friends, and everyone else too. The pictures from our San Francisco 2011 anniversary trip are now online! We had a great time.

Any questions, just ask. Take a look! Leave a comment if you want, I’ll be waiting….

San Francisco 2011 photos

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The San Francisco Anniversary Trip

Wow. Our 25th anniversary. Damn, that’s a long time, Petra B! I don’t regret it at all though.

And yes, there will be pictures here soon. But not yet!

We decided to take a short trip to San Francisco for our anniversary. We left Friday early afternoon and arrived a couple hours later at our first destination, a reuse/recycle store called Scrap. We found a few things there but not much, but it was still fun to look. Then we made our way through the traffic and rain to our hotel, the Galleria Park. It’s in a great location and close to a lot of things. We checked in, just in time for the free daily wine reception (translate: free wine). We were getting pretty hungry and luckily we had brought with us


Seattle And Bumbershoot 2011 Photos Here Now!

Hello again, family, friends, and everyone else too. The pictures from our Seattle 2011 trip are now online! We had a great time as usual. There are Seattle pix, Bumbershoot Festival pix, and just some other weird pix we took on the trip.

Note: These photos came from my cell phone camera. There may be other pictures posted later.

Any questions, just ask. Besides Petra and me, you might even notice a couple pictures of our friends Mama O and Liz. Take a look! Leave a comment if you want, I’ll be waiting….

Seattle/Bumbershoot 2011 photos

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Seattle And Bumbershoot 2011 – Part 3

Did you miss the first two parts? Read part one here and part two here. And there will be a bunch of pictures soon too…

Monday September 5

Last day of the Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival and the routine is familiar. A bit of food in the room and then we took the monorail over to the festival. Once there, we snacked at the hospitality room and pondered the myriad of possibilities for the day. At one of the booths we watched a song or two by Lemolo, which I didn’t really like. It was very low-key female vocal but much too low-key. Today we had decided to see some comedy too, not just music. Our VIP passes got us to the front of all the comedy lines so we wanted to take advantage of that. The comedy show we went to had a short funny introduction by Baron somebody (I think), didn’t catch the last name. But the main show was two fairly well-known comedians, Amy Shumer and Eugene Mirman. Seriously, Amy was so funny I barely stopped laughing for her whole set. Politically incorrect. Yep. Funny? Hilarious! And Mr. Mirman was very funny too. Great show. After that, we watched a four-person panel discussion about being vegan, featuring the Black Metal Vegan Chef. He is so cool, check out his videos on YouTube. The panel was humorous at times and informative.


Seattle And Bumbershoot 2011 – Part 2

This is the second part of the trip recap. To read part one, click here.

Saturday September 3

Mid-morning we took the convenient monorail over to the Seattle Center, the site of the Bumbershoot Music and Arts Festival. Today was the first day of this amazing event. Doors opened at 11:00 but we got there at about 10:30 and they let us in early! I took that as a good omen. We got our Starbucks pass, allowing us free coffee drinks for the entire festival. Can’t argue with that. Then we went to the VIP hospitality lounge for some food to get us started for the day. They were determined to provide vegetarian and even some vegan options too. We checked our schedules for the day and decided to start with a new stage this year (EMP Level 3) where Seattle’s Tomten was playing. They had won a competition to get a performing slot and were pretty good. Indie-type rock with a little more to the songs than some. Oh, and in case I forget, all three days of the festival we ate some festival food too. Eating is fun! But back to the music. The next act we saw was at the Main Stage (moved indoors this year), 90s act The Presidents of the USA. We watched about half of their set and they are still doing what they have always done. Of course they did their hit “Lump” and a bunch of others. Meanwhile, we realized that with our VIP passes we got some free drink tickets, so we went to one of the beer gardens and had a beer (or in Petra’s case, a glass of wine). At a nearby stage P.S. I Love You was playing but we didn’t hear anything that made us want to stick around. Not with so many other options. What are there, 12-15 stages?


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