I was hoping to be sharing the first post of my vacation from Dominica. Instead I’m currently stuck in Miami after my flight from Seattle left at 2.50am when it was to leave at 9.50pm originally. What a ripple effect it’s caused! Therefore, I missed my connecting flight to Barbados and now have to overnight at home and book a new one way ticket to Dominica in the morning. Hopefully I won’t be rushing to the wedding that is to start at 3pm.
I was driving to pick up my husband from work yesterday when I received a call from American Airlines saying my flight was now departing at 10.30pm. I moved our pickup time down to 8 pm. At the gate, we learned that it’ll now be leaving at 11.15pm. Ok, no panic necessary, our connecting flight leaving Miami was to leave at 10.15am so we still had time.
No. We don’t have time. Nervous stomach sets in but is cut short by the sleep I’m fighting. The plane that we were to board for 11.15 has an engine problem and they’ll use the plane arriving at 12.15am. BUT we can put that thought to rest because this plane has a mechanical error and the agents are only rebooking people who have a connecting fight before 9.30am, and then they disappeared. But we were only given the announcement after 1am about the issues and now I know we’re not making it to Dominica tonight.
Considering all that went down at Christmas (we were stuck in Miami for a day and a half and left on Christmas Day because they gave up our seats even though they knew our flight was delayed) I just wanted a stress-free trip.
#2weddingsandaconference and #travelchronicles are two hash tags I’ll be using this trip on Instagram and Twitter. As you can tell, this trip is for two weddings that we have to attend and a conference, the location will be told closer to when I leave but I can tell you it’s not very close to the Caribbean or Seattle. There’s a lot more traveling to come so we’ll see of this is setting the tone or just one fuckup at the beginning.
Over the weekend, my husband and I headed to San Francisco for a little pre-birthday trip. I wanted to go. There was food to be eaten and places to be seen.
Seeing that this was my third trip there, I wasn’t as camera happy as I should’ve been but I did get some pics of stuff and I definitely didn’t get pics of things that I should have.
I wanted to visit a Benefit Cosmetics Boutique. Last time I was there and saw one, it was closed so that was priority on my list! You can read all about that visit here.
I wanted to eat at what I’m now officially calling my favorite restaurant: Cha Cha Cha. I wrote about it after my first trip to San Francisco. I did get a picture of the sangria, they’re known for it… I had to. I had four (short) glasses… I don’t remember the last time I drank like that, I’m a lightweight now lol.
Sangria!
So to sum up Friday: left early in the morning, slept in hotel for a few hours, went to lunch, then Benefit Boutique, back to hotel, slept/rested some more until dinner at Cha Cha Cha. The details after are a little fuzzy… I remember walking back to the hotel but for the life of me I can’t remember if we went somewhere else. Oh yes we did!! It was an open air bar! Lol! I remember some sort of night cap where I didn’t drink anymore but the location just popped into my head lol. I think it was called Jones. Yes Jones… Hahaha I love how it’s all coming back to me now.
Saturday, I originally wanted to go to brunch at Mission Beach Cafe again but we got up late and I just wanted tea. Yes tea. A little hungover and I wanted my Chai tea latte. Every one kept saying to try Peets so I ditched my usual (Starbucks) to try Peets Chai tea latte… This was my face after I first tried it:
Peets Masala Chai tea latte reaction
It was sooo bitter! I didn’t like it at all! I’m sorry for those of you who believe in Peets and think I’m crazy but that shit did not taste good! As you can see I was no longer in the coffee shop so I just threw that away. We headed to Burger Bar in Union Square because it’s my husband’s favorite burger place in Vegas and he wanted to try it in there. They didn’t have his lamb burger but he said it was O.K.
After, we were walking off our food and I realised I had a lot of air in my right shoe… my moccasin was beginning to unravel. So we headed to the Westfield mall for me to get some shoes and checked it out. Another must have was to finally get some artwork from the market in front of the ferry building so we eventually got there and I got my two pieces. Pics of those will come later. I also like collecting mugs whenever I travel somewhere. It’s not exactly working out for my cupboard but I think it’s important to have pieces that would be practical as souvenirs. I got it from the airport as I didn’t see any mugs down there.
On our way back to the hotel we had to get around all of the crowds who were gathering for the Chinese New Year parade. Wish I knew before booking our hotel it was going on. We had a reservation for dinner, but we were so tired from walking for the whole afternoon, I cancelled them and we got room service. We came to the conclusion that we’re the worst tourists. We don’t feel bad. You can’t always burn yourself out and not enjoy what you would like to because you’re so tired.
We left Sunday morning and I slept for over four hours after we got back. Today is the birthday and I have a massage booked and I don’t plan on doing much. I actually want this to be a pretty laid back celebration. My husband has to plan anything he wants me to do as I am not planning shit. Lazy much? Don’t care. I feel like I need to just rest. I’ve had too much going on recently and a low-key celebration is still a celebration of which I won’t be even more tired after and that sounds pretty good to me!
Trips home are never about relaxing. One would think so but that’s never the case. Days after I return to Bellevue from a trip home, I’m guaranteed at least one person telling me off and asking why they didn’t get to see me. You have no idea how much this irritates me.
I currently live over 3000 miles away from Barbados and every other trip we try to stay by each other’s parents. Sometimes we have a car, sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we do not want to do anything because we’re simply no longer used to the heat and are extremely exhausted and other times you just don’t make that list of people we have to visit. We’ve discussed the option of sneaking in and staying somewhere for a few days of relaxation (not even immediate family would know) and then alerting people that we’re here after feeling a bit refreshed. But it just hasn’t happened as yet.
On the trip we just came back from, the primary purpose was for our best friends’ wedding. We were home for 12 days and I can tell you it wasn’t enough. The first week was spent helping them out and simply hanging with them (they live in England now) and then we used the last week to stock up on stuff to bring home and spend time with a few people. They had a mini-honeymoon in one of the top resorts in Barbados (The Crane) and the views from there made us want to find out the staycation rate (of which I forgot to get before leaving the property and the island). It was simply amazing, beautiful, peaceful and breathtaking. Yea, I just used all of those adjectives because they are exactly what come to mind when I think of it. I posted a picture in my last post from the same hotel. Yep! That one!! Wasn’t it lovely? Here’s another view.
Anyway, I would love that one of these years David and I can return home and not feel obliged to go and see anyone except our grandparents. That everyone would come to us. Would this mean not getting a car again to use an excuse? But then we’d not have our own transportation when we need to get somewhere… I told him, we have to have a date night while home to just calm and enjoy ourselves from the mad rush, but again, that never happened. It’s not that we do not like seeing our friends or anything, but everything is such a mad dash that it becomes exhausting and we feel like we need another vacation after to relax from that one! I know there are plenty people out there who know exactly what I am talking about. And I hope that this doesn’t offend any of my friends because we always see the ones that really matter or they make an effort to come and see us, which is always appreciated. Hey, I’m just keeping it real…
Now on to promoting Barbados! I really wanted to visit Harrison’s Cave this trip and as you can tell from that line I didn’t. It was to be something touristy for Dave and I to do but we never got there. We’ve both been as kids but they have since remodeled the cave and it would be nice to go and see it again. So mark that as something to do when you visit as I have to as well.
Dinners are a way of us meeting up with groups of friends that we can see all one time and every time we go home, we’re trying different restaurants and enjoying some amazing dinners. This trip, we went to two new restaurants: Lemongrass (Thai food) in Limegrove mall (with hubs’ parents) and to Shakers (a bar; with a bunch of our school friends that we are still very close to). We had breakfast a few times from The Coffee Bean, a coffee shop I had the privilege of working at for three weeks yeeears ago and David was just wreck when he found out in the last 3 days of the trip that they had Jamaican patties (his favorite). So I can tell you with confidence that if you visit, pull up this post and look for these places to eat. And how can I forget Chefette? Just go there, I demand you do!
On our final night, my parents took us to Oistins. For the whole night David kept saying we should’ve gone earlier in the trip because it was truly the highlight and it would’ve been nice to go twice (hehe nice rhyme!). By day, Oistins is a fish market, but on Friday and Saturday nights, the party truly comes alive. You can buy arts and crafts from local artisans, dine of fresh seafood and other meats, enjoy the ballroom dancing to oldie goldies by Lexi’s Bar, or go over by the stage with the more modern music and everyone is up on the stage dancing. It was so much fun to see the characters and enjoy some grilled mahi-mahi and sweet potato pie.
All in all, it was a good trip even though we were dying from the heat. Our friends had a beautiful wedding; it was nice to have my nephew request that we pick him up from school at least twice and my niece actually came to me when I picked her up from the nursery (she can be indifferent sometimes :(). We spent some time with our grandparents, and again got a chance to meet up with those who really matter and meet new people. Trips aren’t guaranteed to be relaxing but I still get excited knowing that I’m going and whom I will see. Family first and fun after!
Barbados will always be homeno matter where I roam.
Just a Dash 