As I sit here this a.m. enjoying the quiet of the house, I am prepared to blog a bit about my trip to Washington, DC. Overall, the trip was quite interesting and I would enjoy going back for many reasons. The Guest House that we stayed in was part of the experience I enjoyed the most. The hosts were extremely hospitable, the food was delectable, and it was an overall nice experience. Part of enjoying a trip is always meeting "locals" and our hosts were from multi-cultures. Laura, the lady of the house, was born/raised in the DC area-she had MUCH insight to give about places to go, things to see, what to avoid, etc... Her husband, Raymond, was Arab. His perspective on the blessing of living in DC was very interesting-he said he would not live anywhere else in the U.S. and found it to be extremely welcoming. This couple runs their own contracting company in addition to 2 guest houses in DC. These houses were "restored" by them with the most elegant and usable of features. Even an "elevator" for luggage and such has been installed in the 3 story home. They were very vigilant in introducing everyone at the dinner table each morning and making sure everyone was included in conversation...it was a very personal type of stay and I really enjoyed it!
The weather in DC was HOT!!!! It was in the mid 90's and HUMID! We were not expecting that type of heat in May! Apparently, the heat/humidity did come about 3 weeks early...lucky us:( However, the heat didn't stop us, just slowed us down a bit. We were able to see a lot of the city and some things on the outskirts. There was only one thing that we were not able to see that I would love to have visited and that was the Newseum. It is a 3 story private museum about the print news. It has archives of papers from MANY years ago and you can go read the headlines from major papers from any day/time that may interest you. It also contains award winning photos from newspaper articles. When we arrived there was only 1 1/2 hours before it closed, we decided it wasn't enough time to enjoy the museum, so we chose instead to tour the National Gallery of Art instead.
The subway (metro) system in DC was very easy to use. MUCH easier than the one in NYC! DC was much smaller, less crowded, and slower paced than I expected...but then perhaps it's my perspective because I had been in NYC the week prior and things were ridiculously crowded and fast paced! DC was very beautiful, filled with gorgeous trees, flowers, etc... I never felt "unsafe" anywhere in the city. There were a few surprises on this visit to DC. First, I was surprised that they did not have "lockers" nearby the White House to put your belongings in while you toured. Because of this little surprise, Jennifer ended up taking the tour by herself through the White House-I stayed with the bags. She was disappointed and said there wasn't much to see-so it worked out o.k. and I decided not to go in after she came out. The Washington National Cathedral was VERY impressive. It certainly rivaled anything I ever saw while living in Europe and that surprised me. I didn't think we had such magnificent architecture here in America...particularly a gothic cathedral. It was a nice surprise and a gorgeous facility-well worth the journey to NW DC to visit/tour! The Capitol building was amazing as well. It is really beautiful with so much history. We saw several of the war monuments and even went on a boat tour to see them "in lights" by the Potomac River one night. However, to our disappointment, it wasn't yet dark and the ride really wasn't very impressive at all like the pictures made it out to be. We were disappointed in the boat tour. Of all of the monuments we saw, Arlington National Cemetery was certainly most impressive! Just an amazing humbling sight to see the graves of the thousands of men/women that have died in serving our country. The day we were in Arlington, there was actually a funeral occuring. It was so very sad seeing a coffin draped with a flag being pulled by a horse/cart. A beautiful sight to behold, but still so incredibly sad that so many do not appreciate or begin to understand the sacrifices our military make every day. The view of the city, from Arlington house, was just incredible! There was one other journey we took out to the NW of the city-it was to Hillwood Estate. Hillwood was the home of Marjorie Merriweather Post-heirress to Post (now General Mills) Cereals. At one point in her life (1937-38), she was married to the Ambassador of Russia and lived in Russia during that year, this was during the time of Stalin. Some of the things she brought back from Russia are just incredible and worth MILLIONS of dollars. It was much more impressive than the National Gallery of Art! It truly was a "museum" of artifacts that she collected and it rivaled any estate/manor house I ever saw in Europe! Definitely something worth visiting if you are ever blessed to visit DC.
My friend, Jennifer, did not feel so well during our trip to DC-so we didn't move as quickly as Rebecca/I had the week before in NYC. But this was quite o.k. with me, I was still running low on energy from the 10+ miles I had logged each day the week before! It was a nice trip and we did see many wonderful things. A city definitely full of history and has something for everyone. I'm sure I will most likely be returning to DC sometime in the future as this is a trip my husband has always wanted to take. Being amidst so much of the political climate that week, certainly made me appreciate that I am an American and it also helped me understand how precious it is to protect that freedom.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Monday, June 13, 2011
Travel, Travel, and more Travel
Yes, it has been 6 weeks since I last blogged and I am sad about it. For a gal that LOVES to travel, I have to say that I have missed blogging so very much. Blogging helps to keep my head clear-much like journaling once did. Of course I'm sure those that know me well will totally understand my need to express myself on the page. Well, the title says it all and I don't know how much I will be able to blog about my recent travels before time gets away from me, but I will do my best to cover as much ground as I can.
Well, the last time I blogged, it was shortly before my slew of travels began. The last weekend of April, we drove to western KY to youth bible retreat weekend. Due to all of the recent rain/flooding, we thought that perhaps we may have trouble arriving...but alas, God blessed us with safe travels coming and going. The retreat weekend was somewhat surreal for me-I actually realized that '11 summer camp will be my last at western KY...I was sad:( But, knowing that I may possibly be blessed to attend the fall and spring retreats of the coming year-I tried to put aside my sadness for the weekend. The weekend was very rainy/wet so a lot of our time was spent indoors. We had several good lessons spoken to us about "the devil" and the way that he is always in our backyard trying to mess things up. While I listened to the wise words being spoken with the scripture, I thought about how difficult it is to live in this world. There are so many temptations everywhere. They abound and are prevelant through movies, music, computers, cell phones, etc...just difficult to escape it all sometimes. I suppose that's what I love so very much about youth camp/retreats. Seeing everyone disconnect from the world and just come away to "focus" on the Lord and His purposes for us is truly the most encouraging experience of my entire year. It was a wonderful weekend spent with dear God peeps that I've been blessed to know and love over the last few years. I pray that I will find a youth camp that I can be active with when we move to Arizona. I want to be used by the Lord and I want to be available to these Christian young people that desire to serve the Lord.
My lovely daughter, Rebecca, attended her last day of H.S. on May 5th. She was so relieved that this time in her life is completed and that she is now moving on to a new stage in her life. Her graduation weekend was very hectic. My daddy, 3 little brothers, and my brother/his wife came to spend the weekend. None of them had ever been to a graduation with so many Sr.'s in such a big arena. They were astounded at the amount of people that were in attendance for a H.S. graduation. The ceremony was actually very impersonal and not very memorable, at least that was my perspective. Following the graduation, we came home and crashed. Saturday a.m., we had a small reception here at our home to honor Rebecca's accomplishments and were so pleased that so many were able to drop by and congratulate her. It was a special day finished with a celebration meal at Texas Roadhouse with our family that was here visiting. Saturday evening, I decorated for a second graduation celebration-for the 7 young people in our congregation that graduated from H.S. and college this year. We had a potluck celebration lunch and cake at my friend's home on Sunday after a.m. services. After the celebration potluck-Rebecca and I headed home to pack for our week long trip to NYC.
Oh, our trip to the big apple...what an adventure that was! We had an absolutely lovely time-the only thing that could have made the trip better would have been if it had not been raining. We arrived early Monday afternoon and arrived at our guest house about 3:30 p.m. After getting settled, we headed out to purchase subway tickets for the week and to use the subway a bit so we would know what we were doing! Sure glad we did...wow, that was a subway system to figure out! The most frustrating part was the fact that we could not find a "map" to carry in our hands to look at...so we weren't sure if we were heading in the right direction! Needless to say, we got lost a LOT those first 3-4 hours trying to figure the subway out. But, we made it to our location for the food tour that we were to go on Tuesday a.m., so it all worked out. We walked the city/rode the subway, took pics of Times Square at night, etc...and didn't arrive back at our room until about 10 Monday night. Tuesday-we took our food/culture tour in Greenwich village. It lasted about 3 1/2 hours...we had some excellent food, the tour of the area was very informative, our tour guide was incredibly funny, and it was just a very good day. This was the day we enjoyed the most. Greenwich village is primarily the old Italian area...so lots of yummy food. Rebecca does not prefer the NY style thin crust pizza-but I thought it was delicious! After the food tour, we actually spent the evening heading down to the shops on 5th Avenue-we weren't too impressed. Lots of high prices, but fashion wise, we just didn't "get it"! We were also able to go to Grand Central Station and FINALLY locate a subway map-after this, we had no problems using the subway system. Wednesday, we headed down to Broadway to get tickets for an afternoon matinee. Rebecca really wanted to see Phantom and alas, they were 50% off that day...so we were blessed to get 2 tickets to the Phantom that afternoon. It was a lovely theatre, old, but very quaint and suitable for the Phantom. Even knowing the story, I cried at the end...I always feel bad for the Phantom:( Again, we walked to see some of the various sites and things of interest that evening and didn't arrive back to our room until about 10. Thursday was the only "clear" day we had while in NYC...it got a bit warmish-about mid 70's w/sun blaring! But, the temps had been highs of mid 60's w/drizzle and occassional rain showers to that point-no sun-so we were feeling a bit warm on Thursday. We met our Big Apple Greeter, Michael Pollack, for our tour of the day at our room about 9:30 a.m. It was a VERY long, packed day of touring. We walked the Brooklyn bridge and toured old Brooklyn neighborhoods, went to the Top of the Rock (69th floor of Rockefeller center) to view the city, went to Central Park, rode the Staten Island Ferry to view the great symbol of our nation's freedom-the statue of Liberty, went to ground zero, went into a few museums, etc...it was a very hectic last full day. We finished that night by meeting up w/my dear sisterchick-Ginger-and her family, at a bakery in Chelsea where we were staying. They were just arriving in the city for a long weekend as we were preparing to leave the next day. I had not seen Ginger in 4 years and it was SO good to see her smiling face and visit with her even if only for a short while:) We left NYC mid-morn on Friday to arrive at the airport and find our flight to be cancelled due to weather in Dallas. After 3 hours, we were finally rebooked on a Delta (yuck) flight and headed to Atlanta later that afternoon. Unfortunately, when we arrived in Atlanta-we didn't think that flight would EVER leave the airport! We ended up arriving home at 1 a.m. Saturday morning...our flight was due to arrive at 5 p.m.! Needless to say, LOTS of time spent in the airport in NYC and Atlanta that day...sure made us grateful to get home to our own beds! Besides the airline trip and the weather...the trip to the city was absolutely amazing! We had a great time and made some wonderful memories. I loved traveling to NYC for the first time w/Rebecca. We walked our legs off...wish we'd had a pedometer to actually register the miles we'd put in...my guess would be at least 10 miles/day. Every day, we would get up/ready/have b'fast and be "going" full strength by 9 a.m. We would come back to room about 2:30 in afternoon to rest about an hour, then would hit it again full strength til about 10 pm each night! We walked, and walked, and walked some more! We really saw a LOT of things...actually everything we wanted to do/see...the highlights! We'd both love to go back...I think it would be amazing at Christmas time! The city is VERY busy, fast paced, and you can't "stroll" or you will be run over! We never felt "unsafe" at anytime we were in the city at all. The people were very friendly/helpful. The room we stayed in was actually outside of "Manhattan" in Chelsea. It was in a residential community, a brownstone, it was VERY quiet, very private, and our room even had a back door that opened into a garden. It gave us the "feel" of living in NYC for the week. Very nice indeed. The taxi rides to/from the airport were an experience in themselves and one that is amusing to say the least. At times, I just had to close my eyes and pray:) We ate real NY cheesecake at a bakery-amazing stuff...VERY different than any I've ever had before-the texture was amazing:) We had a real NY hotdog from a stand in Central Park-eh-just tasted like a hotdog to me!lol We did spend some $'s to eat at a nice culinary restaurant w/professional chef one evening. It was absolutely delicious and quite a dining experience. We both enjoyed the Chelsea Market VERY much...it was a foodie's delight! We enjoyed real Italian gelato there one evening for our treat. So, in the end, I would say that NYC is a great place to visit...but definitely remember to wear some comfortable walking shoes and be prepared to "keep moving" because there are very few places to just sit/relax once you are in the city. I would also recommend staying at a place "outside" the hustle/bustle of downtown Manhattan. Rebecca spotted 4, yes 4, movie stars during our time there. She really wanted to meet Hugh Jackman as apparently he is known to hang out/visit a bakery in Greenwich village daily. We never saw him, but we did see Brad Garrett (Robert from Everybody Loves Raymond) in a pastry shop we were eating at on Wed a.m.:) It was a fun week and we made loads of memories. This was our first ever mother/daughter trip and certainly I pray it isn't our last...it's actually very enjoyable to go on a trip when your child becomes a young adult and can be responsible for themselves:)
That's all I can blog today-I have a few other things that must get done-though I'd love to spend some more time just rambling. Next time-I'll write about my next travel experience-to Washington, DC:) For now-hope you enjoy reading about our experience in NYC:)
Well, the last time I blogged, it was shortly before my slew of travels began. The last weekend of April, we drove to western KY to youth bible retreat weekend. Due to all of the recent rain/flooding, we thought that perhaps we may have trouble arriving...but alas, God blessed us with safe travels coming and going. The retreat weekend was somewhat surreal for me-I actually realized that '11 summer camp will be my last at western KY...I was sad:( But, knowing that I may possibly be blessed to attend the fall and spring retreats of the coming year-I tried to put aside my sadness for the weekend. The weekend was very rainy/wet so a lot of our time was spent indoors. We had several good lessons spoken to us about "the devil" and the way that he is always in our backyard trying to mess things up. While I listened to the wise words being spoken with the scripture, I thought about how difficult it is to live in this world. There are so many temptations everywhere. They abound and are prevelant through movies, music, computers, cell phones, etc...just difficult to escape it all sometimes. I suppose that's what I love so very much about youth camp/retreats. Seeing everyone disconnect from the world and just come away to "focus" on the Lord and His purposes for us is truly the most encouraging experience of my entire year. It was a wonderful weekend spent with dear God peeps that I've been blessed to know and love over the last few years. I pray that I will find a youth camp that I can be active with when we move to Arizona. I want to be used by the Lord and I want to be available to these Christian young people that desire to serve the Lord.
My lovely daughter, Rebecca, attended her last day of H.S. on May 5th. She was so relieved that this time in her life is completed and that she is now moving on to a new stage in her life. Her graduation weekend was very hectic. My daddy, 3 little brothers, and my brother/his wife came to spend the weekend. None of them had ever been to a graduation with so many Sr.'s in such a big arena. They were astounded at the amount of people that were in attendance for a H.S. graduation. The ceremony was actually very impersonal and not very memorable, at least that was my perspective. Following the graduation, we came home and crashed. Saturday a.m., we had a small reception here at our home to honor Rebecca's accomplishments and were so pleased that so many were able to drop by and congratulate her. It was a special day finished with a celebration meal at Texas Roadhouse with our family that was here visiting. Saturday evening, I decorated for a second graduation celebration-for the 7 young people in our congregation that graduated from H.S. and college this year. We had a potluck celebration lunch and cake at my friend's home on Sunday after a.m. services. After the celebration potluck-Rebecca and I headed home to pack for our week long trip to NYC.
Oh, our trip to the big apple...what an adventure that was! We had an absolutely lovely time-the only thing that could have made the trip better would have been if it had not been raining. We arrived early Monday afternoon and arrived at our guest house about 3:30 p.m. After getting settled, we headed out to purchase subway tickets for the week and to use the subway a bit so we would know what we were doing! Sure glad we did...wow, that was a subway system to figure out! The most frustrating part was the fact that we could not find a "map" to carry in our hands to look at...so we weren't sure if we were heading in the right direction! Needless to say, we got lost a LOT those first 3-4 hours trying to figure the subway out. But, we made it to our location for the food tour that we were to go on Tuesday a.m., so it all worked out. We walked the city/rode the subway, took pics of Times Square at night, etc...and didn't arrive back at our room until about 10 Monday night. Tuesday-we took our food/culture tour in Greenwich village. It lasted about 3 1/2 hours...we had some excellent food, the tour of the area was very informative, our tour guide was incredibly funny, and it was just a very good day. This was the day we enjoyed the most. Greenwich village is primarily the old Italian area...so lots of yummy food. Rebecca does not prefer the NY style thin crust pizza-but I thought it was delicious! After the food tour, we actually spent the evening heading down to the shops on 5th Avenue-we weren't too impressed. Lots of high prices, but fashion wise, we just didn't "get it"! We were also able to go to Grand Central Station and FINALLY locate a subway map-after this, we had no problems using the subway system. Wednesday, we headed down to Broadway to get tickets for an afternoon matinee. Rebecca really wanted to see Phantom and alas, they were 50% off that day...so we were blessed to get 2 tickets to the Phantom that afternoon. It was a lovely theatre, old, but very quaint and suitable for the Phantom. Even knowing the story, I cried at the end...I always feel bad for the Phantom:( Again, we walked to see some of the various sites and things of interest that evening and didn't arrive back to our room until about 10. Thursday was the only "clear" day we had while in NYC...it got a bit warmish-about mid 70's w/sun blaring! But, the temps had been highs of mid 60's w/drizzle and occassional rain showers to that point-no sun-so we were feeling a bit warm on Thursday. We met our Big Apple Greeter, Michael Pollack, for our tour of the day at our room about 9:30 a.m. It was a VERY long, packed day of touring. We walked the Brooklyn bridge and toured old Brooklyn neighborhoods, went to the Top of the Rock (69th floor of Rockefeller center) to view the city, went to Central Park, rode the Staten Island Ferry to view the great symbol of our nation's freedom-the statue of Liberty, went to ground zero, went into a few museums, etc...it was a very hectic last full day. We finished that night by meeting up w/my dear sisterchick-Ginger-and her family, at a bakery in Chelsea where we were staying. They were just arriving in the city for a long weekend as we were preparing to leave the next day. I had not seen Ginger in 4 years and it was SO good to see her smiling face and visit with her even if only for a short while:) We left NYC mid-morn on Friday to arrive at the airport and find our flight to be cancelled due to weather in Dallas. After 3 hours, we were finally rebooked on a Delta (yuck) flight and headed to Atlanta later that afternoon. Unfortunately, when we arrived in Atlanta-we didn't think that flight would EVER leave the airport! We ended up arriving home at 1 a.m. Saturday morning...our flight was due to arrive at 5 p.m.! Needless to say, LOTS of time spent in the airport in NYC and Atlanta that day...sure made us grateful to get home to our own beds! Besides the airline trip and the weather...the trip to the city was absolutely amazing! We had a great time and made some wonderful memories. I loved traveling to NYC for the first time w/Rebecca. We walked our legs off...wish we'd had a pedometer to actually register the miles we'd put in...my guess would be at least 10 miles/day. Every day, we would get up/ready/have b'fast and be "going" full strength by 9 a.m. We would come back to room about 2:30 in afternoon to rest about an hour, then would hit it again full strength til about 10 pm each night! We walked, and walked, and walked some more! We really saw a LOT of things...actually everything we wanted to do/see...the highlights! We'd both love to go back...I think it would be amazing at Christmas time! The city is VERY busy, fast paced, and you can't "stroll" or you will be run over! We never felt "unsafe" at anytime we were in the city at all. The people were very friendly/helpful. The room we stayed in was actually outside of "Manhattan" in Chelsea. It was in a residential community, a brownstone, it was VERY quiet, very private, and our room even had a back door that opened into a garden. It gave us the "feel" of living in NYC for the week. Very nice indeed. The taxi rides to/from the airport were an experience in themselves and one that is amusing to say the least. At times, I just had to close my eyes and pray:) We ate real NY cheesecake at a bakery-amazing stuff...VERY different than any I've ever had before-the texture was amazing:) We had a real NY hotdog from a stand in Central Park-eh-just tasted like a hotdog to me!lol We did spend some $'s to eat at a nice culinary restaurant w/professional chef one evening. It was absolutely delicious and quite a dining experience. We both enjoyed the Chelsea Market VERY much...it was a foodie's delight! We enjoyed real Italian gelato there one evening for our treat. So, in the end, I would say that NYC is a great place to visit...but definitely remember to wear some comfortable walking shoes and be prepared to "keep moving" because there are very few places to just sit/relax once you are in the city. I would also recommend staying at a place "outside" the hustle/bustle of downtown Manhattan. Rebecca spotted 4, yes 4, movie stars during our time there. She really wanted to meet Hugh Jackman as apparently he is known to hang out/visit a bakery in Greenwich village daily. We never saw him, but we did see Brad Garrett (Robert from Everybody Loves Raymond) in a pastry shop we were eating at on Wed a.m.:) It was a fun week and we made loads of memories. This was our first ever mother/daughter trip and certainly I pray it isn't our last...it's actually very enjoyable to go on a trip when your child becomes a young adult and can be responsible for themselves:)
That's all I can blog today-I have a few other things that must get done-though I'd love to spend some more time just rambling. Next time-I'll write about my next travel experience-to Washington, DC:) For now-hope you enjoy reading about our experience in NYC:)
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