icedlatte.com

So, after dropping off the dog, (Thanks, Aunt Diane!), getting a ride to the airport, (Thanks, Judy!), we were finally off to Oakland, California.

We flew Southwest Airlines for this leg, and I have to admit, I’m back in the Southwest fold.  Now that most airlines charge extra for, well, pretty much everything, Southwest is a nice refreshing change.  The big switch for us, though, was when they changed boarding procedures.  It used to be a mad rush for the “A” group and such when they called it.  Now it’s a ‘mildly orderly’ boarding due to boarding by range of numbers.  Oh, and yeah, I’m glad they stuck families after the ‘A’ group.

Another nice plus?  Paying $10 extra a person (Okay, I guess they do have a few other fees) to get an early ‘A’ boarding pass.  This was great, in that we were able to board early enough to A) have space for our carry-on’s, and B) get exit row on the plane, giving us “Southwest First Class”.  Totally worth it.

In San Francisco for a few days, we were able to do a few things.

The Walt Disney Family Museum

Let’s get this out of the way, right off the bat.  I enjoy Disneyland.  I like going to Disneyland.  But it goes deeper than that.  I think Walt Disney was an amazing person.  When you see what he accomplished in his lifetime, and the legacy he left behind, it’s very cool.

Having that out of the way, why is the Walt Disney Museum in San Francisco, you may ask?  Walt’s daughter, Diane, lives in the Bay Area, and her and her husband, Ron, have a winery, the Silverado Vineyards in Napa Valley.

Unfortunately, you’re not allowed to take pictures in the museum.   (If you’d like to see some pictures of it, mouseplanet.com was allowed to do a review of it with pictures.)  The museum is very cool, though, in that they have a lot of interactive exhibits and a lot of multimedia as well.

It follows his life from World War I to the end of his life.  The way they ended it with his passing was very touching, and handled very well.  All in all, it was pretty cool.

The next day, we had plans to see Alcatraz.  In the years that we lived in the Bay Area, we never made it out to the Rock, as Sean Connery and I call it.  I guess it was one of those things where when you live there, you never even think about doing the ‘tourist’ stuff.

“Where’s Sean Connery?”

As if that wasn’t enough for the day, we booked a GoCar.  A GoCar is almost like a go-kart, but street legal.    They hold two people, and have built in GPS that tells you about what you’re driving by.

Always wear a helmet when riding in a GoCar

It took us on a tour of the city, and was pretty cool.  The only snag was that the gas gauge didn’t work correctly, so we were worried about running out of gas.  We pull over into a gas station, and put a grand total of 59 cents of gas in the tank.  I guess we weren’t even close.

A few different people even had us pull over and asked where we rented it, and some people on the road pulled out their cameras to take pictures of it.  If you’re looking for an interesting way to see a city (They also do them in San Diego, Miami, and a few international cities.) the GoCar is a good way to see it.

So, we’re back from our vacation, and it’s back to work. That is always a suck, but what are you going to do?

I thought it would be good to have a travel blog about our trip. We did a lot of interesting and fun things, and I wanted to document it for posterity, and to get comments on what other people did, and maybe ideas for our next trip.

Continue reading to read all about it!

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…and it’s good to be home.

The trip to Maui? amazing. San Francisco? Fun as always.

Of course, I have to go back to work on Monday, so I have a few days to decompress.

Look for a trip log (trilog?) and tons o’ pictures soon.

..and it was a good time.

We told our friends we were there to see their baby, and they believed it.

We were there for the food.

And it was good.

From the most awsomest Taco Bell in the world, to the great drinks at Cha Cha Cha, to the delicious ice cream of the Toy Boat.

Of course, I’m lying, though, in that we enjoyed hanging out with our friends, and their new kidlet, Harvey.  Almost made me wish I had one.  Then I noticed them waking up at 2 in the morning, and I thought, “Well, a dog is nice too.”  Just kidding.

All in all, great.  Pictures should be arriving soon. (ie: when I get around to downloading them off the camera.)

…including, it seems to a point, Alzheimer’s.

So it looks like the icedlatte.com team is going to be heading to that city by the bay, San Francisco.  It’s always good times to head there.  In case you didn’t know, I was born there, (well, a suburb of San Fran:  San Bruno.), but I have to say I’m glad we moved.  I like to visit, but wouldn’t want to live there. (Never say never, though.)

So we’re going to visit some friends, have some food, probably play some games, and instead of breaking bread, probably sharing a bag of candy with Steph.  “While in Rome.”)