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Since I said it would go up on my blog…

I didn’t take any photos of it, but on Monday we biked the 17 mile drive. It was overcast and kinda cold, so we didn’t get any picturesque photos of the Lone Cypress. But then again, I don’t really get that tree anyway. It took us about 1 hr 50 minutes to bike out; on the way back Wilmot and I rode back to get the car to pick up Kolina and Lucy. Took us just 40 minutes (although I was pretty beat after the ride back) :)

Anyway, some photos! We spent an hour or two collecting kelp for our once dug-out hole in the ground. I was sleeping when all of the activity occurred, but awoke to take the photo:

From Sunset Beach Camping July 2010

Sunset at Sunset Beach

From Sunset Beach Camping July 2010

Fire at night

From Sunset Beach Camping July 2010

We drove back on Tuesday morning and since we made it back early, I came into work. Haha! Can use my vacation day some other time…like when we go to Washington D.C. in August!

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Sunset Beach

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

We also visited the Getty Villa. Roman art/sculptures aren’t really my cup of tea, but the villa itself is really pretty. I still think I prefer the Getty center, though.

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

For fireworks, we found a spot at the LA Coliseum. The fireworks were a plenty and really close. We got a lot of ash raining down on us and so much smoke made it tough to take photos. At least one kinda turned out:

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

What’s funny in retrospect is that someone forgot to turn off the sprinklers in the field. So, throughout the fireworks show (random parts of the crowd would suddenly disperse when the sprinklers went off. One went off right behind us, which soaked our towels. A fast-thinking guy next to us immediately stood on the sprinkler, which resulted in a huge pool to form. After giving most folks a fair warning that he was tired of standing in water, he ran away, which caused the sprinkler to again start to spray the audience. More chaos. Eventually another kind fellow took his cooler and sat on the sprinkler.

On the way back to the Bay Area, we stopped at EOS. Their wine was actually more expensive than what you could get at BevMo (thank you FroYo for working in the middle of nowhere), so we held off on their muscats. However, we did end up with 6 bottles of wine so the trip was worth it. We also took jumping photos!

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

From Los Angeles 4th of July 2010

Okay, picture dump over. Rode into work twice this week so I’m hoping to keep up that good habit. It’s the start of our third quarter so there’s a lot of opportunity for me to do some cool new stuff. I’m excited. Plus, my calendar isn’t nearly as full these days with meetings. I can get so much more stuff done without meetings I’m excited. Just bought tickets to Maroon 5 in October! Okay randomness over.

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Fourth of July!

Heading back to California tomorrow and will land around 2PM. Can’t wait! I always seem to miss the food when I’m gone. Is it sad that I’m craving Taco Bell?

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This week in Dublin

Like I mentioned, Wroclaw has small dwarf statues that you can find around the city. I took a detour on the way to work a few days ago and found a few more!

From Wroclaw 2010

From Wroclaw 2010

Maybe I’ll find more tomorrow – got a free day in the city before flying out to Dublin on Sunday. A full week there before flying home next Saturday! 7 days left!

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More Poland!

Usually jetlag doesn’t get me this bad. Darn you, Poland!

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Horrible jetlag

We walked about 45 minutes from the train station to the lake, where there was a small beach.We spent some time in the sun,

From Nysa

padded a boat out and back,

From Nysa

ate zapekanka (and kiebasa),

From Nysa

walked back, saw a disappointing fort,

From Nysa

and took the train back. Overall, enjoyed the beach, a relaxing Sunday, and getting to know my coworkers better.

Lots of walking on this trip – more than I’ve done in awhile and my shoes aren’t really great for walking. Guess that’s what I get for buying fake, stylish, Nike sneakers. One funny thing that happened on the ride back was that when our initial train was around 30 minutes late, we hopped on the next available train to get to Wroclaw. Turns out we were on a slower train that was cheaper and not as nice. The conductor looked at our tickets and realizing that we had more expensive tickets, asked us to get off on the next stop. Even though this train had space and was cheaper, we had to wait for the ‘correct train’ to come. Seems silly if you ask me – I also noticed almost nobody jaywalks here and prefers to stand at the redlight with no cars in sight for the full duration. I’ve caught myself from crossing a few times unless what I think is a local goes as well. Too many rules. Maybe a holdover from the communist era?

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Day in Nysa

• The airport is tiny. Like, one baggage carousel and parking on the runway small. I happily got a passport stamp from the Frankfurt airport, but didn’t get one entering Poland. Boo!
• The city is quite walkable and the size of the city on the map is deceiving. I thought I’d have to cross two long bridges to get to work. Turns out it’s about 1km from my hotel to office. Really easy.
• Lots of churches and old looking buildings here. I went on a tour on Saturday and it turns out a lot of the city was destroyed in WWII and they rebuilt the city to look old, even though buildings are 40-50 years old.
• Haven’t had any great food yet. Spiz beer, which is made in the center market, was really good. They serve honey beer! I’ll be heading back to try their caramel beer this week.
• Definitely noticing a lot more dyed hair and “European style” dress. That makes sense of course. Luckily not seeing any hipster fashion, which is a welcome relief.

I’m starting to dump my photos in a Picasa album, so subscribe to my photos and you’ll see more!

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Wroclaw, First Impressions

For Memorial Day weekend, Vignesh, Sophia, Mark, Kolina and I went to Yosemite. We only had one full day and since it was Vignesh’s first time there, we hit up the highlights.

Bridal Veil Falls:

From Yosemite 2010

Lower Yosemite Falls:

From Yosemite 2010

Inspiration Point:

From Yosemite 2010

We then took Glacier Point Road, which had just opened that same day (we got really lucky) and hiked up Sentinel Dome. I did the hike around September of 2006 the day before I climbed Half Dome and since it was only about a mile, it seemed pretty doable. The area was actually covered in the snow though, so we spent a lot of energy running around trying to find the actual trail. Of course that also meant time for snowball fights and other shenanigans (if you ever want to hear about getting hurt throwing a large stick with your non-dominant hand, please ask one Mark Ewing). Since Yosemite was packed for Memorial Day Weekend, the snow acted as a natural barrier from most of the visitors, meaning when we got to the top, the view was only shared with a few people.

From Yosemite 2010

From Yosemite 2010

We spent a good hour and a half up top, enjoying the view and company. We got back to the parking lot in about half the time it took to get up; when we got back Vignesh realized he had forgotten his wallet on the top of the mountain! So, he climbed to the top of Sentinel Dome…twice! He may be the only recorded person who decided to walk to the top of the dome twice in the same day.

After spending so much time atop Sentinel Dome and fighting huge lines and crowds at Glacier Point, I gotta admit that the views from Sentinel Dome are much more desirable. I just might skip Glacier Point altogether next time I come to Yosemite.

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Yosemite Sentinel Dome

We flew into Calgary, got a rental car, and drove up to Banff. We spent the next two days exploring the Canadian Rockies, primarily by car but also through a few short hikes. We then made our way to Jasper for two nights and then back to Banff and then on to Calgary. This area is great because a bunch of sites are accessible only a few minutes from the major highway. Although the speed limit was in kilometers and currency was different, it really looked a lot like the United States, with the exception of people saying “about” in a Canadian accent and Sportscenter being spelled Sportscentre.

Unfortunately, since it had rained/snowed a lot this winter, lots of the popular attractions were still frozen over. Lake Louise, for example, was only beginning to melt:

From Banff and Jasper

What this meant, however, was that the parking lots were empty and there weren’t many people to compete with for views. Even better, instead of taking a boat onto Maligne Lake, we got to walk on the lake instead:

From Banff and Jasper

And, making the best of the situation, we did get to see snow-capped mountains and a lot of snow, which will be gone in a few weeks. I’m sure if we had gone a little later, the water rushing down the falls would be even greater (but even then it still looked really awesome):

From Banff and Jasper

From Banff and Jasper

We also saw animals! Wildlife! Bears!

From Banff and Jasper

From Banff and Jasper

From Banff and Jasper

From Banff and Jasper

From Banff and Jasper

The rest of my photos are here. I had to play around a bunch with the photos in Lightroom – I made the mistake of shooting in ISO 400 instead of 200 so everything was brighter than it needed to be. Oops – what a fail. Up next, Wroclaw and Dublin!

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Oh Canada