an adventure at the vending machine

We're staying in Yosemite this evening. It's very cold but you can see a lot of stars :)

We couldn't be bothered going far for dinner, so after we'd eaten our food court spaghetti bolognese, we decided to swing by the vending machine to see what kind of American candy goodness was available for dessert.

The machine was choc full of snacky goodness. There was a few of the usual - m&ms, skittles, oreo cookies, snickers bars. And then there were a few that we hadn't tried/seen before, so we were busy deciphering the wrapper descriptions to see which was the most palletable. Should we go for a Butterfinger bar with peanut butter and chocolate, or a Hershey's whatchamacallit? An Almond Joy? Or maybe one of the random things with mint... or even more peanut butter?

As we went down the list, peering at this brightly lit machine in the complete darkness (and very quiet surroundings), Niall innocently asks, "what about a... spunow?"

A spunow? huh? I'd looked at pretty much every single candy bar in this machine and I hadn't seen anything that sounded like that, but maybe I'd missed something.

And then, I look to where he's pointing. And I crack up laughing.



It's a Mounds bar.



At least he's not the first person to have done it.

(It's worth noting that I kept laughing so hard at this joke that he told me to write a blog post to get it out of my system. So here it is.)

slightly off topic – patagonia photos online

So a year ago, pretty much exactly to the day, I went to southern Patagonia in Chile for a photography workshop in Torres del Paine National Park. Afterwards I spent time in Argentina in Los Glaciares National Park.

And now I have finally finished the pictures and site, so go forth and check it out at http://www.patagonianreflections.com if you’re interested.

California is heaven on earth!

The first half of our trip, while beautiful and scenic, was rather cold. And wet. We were both kind of used to the weather since London afforded nothing better, however when we landed in California... wow. We were greeted with sunny blue skies and balmy 25 degree temperatures EVERY DAY. And it's been like that ever since.

I think I have actually tanned since I've been here. Our first night was spent in sunny Santa Barbara, by the beach. The place where we stayed had free bikes for rent, so the next morning we rode by the beach, amongst the palm trees.



We followed it up with a night along Big Sur, a dramatic coastline drive between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and had breakfast on an outdoor terrace overlooking the coast.



Unbelievably, San Francisco, Land Of Enternal Fog And Horrible Weather, actually felt hot while we were there. Locals flocked to the shoreline. We did all the touristy things and soaked it all up - walked the Golden Gate bridge, rode the historic cable cars (hanging off the side), visited Alcatraz and had a giant Ghirardelli hot chocolate sundae. Niall's cousin Mia and her boyfriend Pete were coincidentally in town, so we all caught up for a few drinks and an Alcatraz tour :)





Next we hit the Napa Valley wine country for some wine tasting and good food. The valley is well known for its Cabernet Sauvignon, and we were happy to taste! We decided to forgo the car and instead did a bike tour, visiting 4 wineries and cycling about 15 miles. At this point, we discovered that being a C# programmer is not very good training for a 15 mile bike ride, especially when wine is involved. I had sore legs that day, but it was really fun. I definitely recommend it.



We decided to round out the Napa Valley experience with a dinner at Bouchon, one of the local Michelin starred restaurants (and there are several here, including The French Laundry, which is apparently #4 on the list of the top 50 restaurants in the world). It's a charming little restaurant and feels just like a Parisian bistro. Worth noting however that the servings of pommes frites are definitely American sized. Neither of us had the steak and fries, but we saw them overflowing on other people's plates!

new york, new york, it’s a hell of a town

In our wanderings through New England, during which we drove 2000 miles in just under two weeks, we saw a lot of countryside. Perhaps countryside isn’t the best term. In Australia we have city and we have country. Country is sparsely populated, away from the coast, and the pace of life is slower. Where we travelled in Maine was still coastal, and we were never really passing through areas where simply no one lived. But the pace of life was slower and the people less rushed. So it’s still countryside to me, despite the big towns, enormous walmarts and biggest yet, the breakfasts.

Despite from the differences throughout New England, it was all thrown into stark contrast by our arrival in New York city. Quite simply, New York runs on raw energy, and nothing is done half way. If it’s small, it’s tiny. If it’s big, you can fit your whole head inside it. People are generally really switched on and quite engaging. A bit contrary to expectations, I found more extroverted, friendly and cheerful people than I found angry, impatient and rude. I’d have to give them the prize for most zealous car horn users in the world, though.

Food was generally pretty good, and there was so much to do. Daph had organised us an apartment downtown on 14th street, which was a great location, and we spent more time wandering around and soaking it up than we did hitting a tourist checklist. We still managed to cover quite a few tourist highlights without feeling like we were following a Lonely Planet itinerary.

One of the things that hit me is that this place never sleeps. London is in the list in ‘I still call Australia home’ as one of the cities that never close down, but that’s a blatant lie. It closes down early and hard. New York just changes shifts and keeps going. Bars, restaurants, cafes, shops – they’re all open late. You don’t get the impression of being around when people are trying to wrap things up, it’s just non stop. Speaking of which, the subway runs 24 hours. Hello TFL, are you reading?

Walking through the city on the first night to find the election plaza, I was staring around like a wide eyed kid in a lolly shop, and when I think back to Manhattan now, I still feel the same way.

snow? in the white mountains? who’d have thought…

I’m currently on a flight from New York to Los Angeles, where they are expecting a heat wave, with temperatures in the mid thirties (in the nineties if you speak foreign degrees). So it seems appropriate to write about the opposite end of the scale, which we encountered in the White Mountains in New Hampshire, and the Adirondacks in New York State.

I mentioned foreign degrees, which I have slowly been getting used to. New York has been mostly high fifties and early sixties, which is mid teens in non-gibberish. 32 foreign degrees buys you a flat zero degrees outside the States.

We had intended some hiking in the mountain trails in New Hampshire, Vermont and New York, hopefully through autumn foliage. As it turned out, the foliage up north had definitely turned a lot earlier than in Maine, and most of the vivid colour was gone. Instead, we had an unusually early snow storm, with a foot of snow falling and daytime temperatures around 25 in the mountains.

In normal person degrees, that’s… well, it’s cold. Less than zero just fits in one category: cold. Definitely cold when you’re not skiing.

We were driving through low mountain passes that were being repeatedly plowed as the snow fell. We mostly kept to the car, it wasn’t the most pleasant weather for hiking. The White Mountains and Adirondacks are popular holiday spots for the locals, especially in summer and the fall. They have old covered bridges, which I never did find out the story behind, but they’re a nice sight:

Covered bridge at Albany, New Hampshire

In winter, people come to ski. Lake Placid in the Adirondacks has been host to the winter olympics twice. Of course, if we’d known this, we might have been prepared for the snow…

Kancamagus Highway near Franconia, New Hampshire

We arrived in Old Forge in the Adirondacks on Halloween. We coughed up a few dollars more for a room with a view, and we got a lovely one:

Old Forge, Adirondacks NP - the tiny white spot in the red haze is a slim crescent moon

We headed into town, which was small and sleepy. But even here, people were out in costume everywhere. We spent the evening doing our washing and swimming in the pool…

maine lobster direct!

I was looking at an email for phil’s comment on the lobster lobster lobster post, and google’s advertising came up with a link to lobster dinners from Maine Lobster Direct. Check it out! See if they ship internationally…

PS: Late breaking news - there's more of them! I just got this on gmail - lobster guy.

election day

So in an exciting coincidence, we arrived in Manhattan on election day! A lot of news crews had set up outdoor studios to mingle with The People, so after we had dropped the car off and hiked into Manhattan, we hightailed it up midtown to see what was happening.

First off we stumbled on a Fox news crew broadcasting outside the News Corp headquarters. That was pretty exciting to see, but nothing compared to just around the corner at the Rockefeller Center. The NBC studios are located here and they had a really huge and sophiscated getup. They had set up the whole outdoor area in Rockefeller Plaza in red and blue, with giant screens broadcasting NBC news out to the crowd. They had made badges and other election paraphernalia, like coffee hugs with Election Day 2008 on them. The best part was a tally on the side of the Rockefeller building showing the number of electoral votes each candidate had won. The current tally total for each candidate was represented by two guys in a window cleaning platform painted either red or blue. As each state was declared and its electoral votes won, the guys would move the platform up the building. Pretty funny.





They also had a huge map of the US painted on to the outdoor ice skating rink, and as each state was declared it got painted in red for a Republican win, or blue for Democratic.



It was clear that the crowd was very pro-Obama, and there was lots of cheering on the night. Any time that he moved closer to the magical 270 electoral votes, the crowd cheered wildly. Any time that someone mentioned something pro-American about freedom or democracy, the crowd cheered wildly. When New York was declared a Democratic state, the crowd cheered wildly.

I think the US is much more electronic with their voting systems, because as each state closed its ballot, the results for that state could be announced almost immediately, so when some of the swing states critical to the McCain campaign fell to Obama's side, there were big cheers.

At 11pm Eastern time, when California and other western states closed their ballots, Obama was declared the next President of the United States.



The winning tally at about midnight:




We stayed for the speeches and finally took ourselves home at about 1:30. We decided to snack in a diner to celebrate, and every five minutes some random person would run in and scream "Go Obama!!" or "Yes we can!!!" followed by cheers in response from the customers.



On the whole, a very unusual and exciting experience!

lobster lobster lobster

Maine is known for its seafood in general, and lobster in particular. You can get it just about any restaurant or take away joint, in all sorts of forms.

Our first taste was in a lobster chowder from Bob’s Clam Hut on the side of the road in Kittery. The place was pretty much just a shack, but the food was good!

The best part, though, was the day we managed to have lobster for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Breakfast was lobster scrambled eggs at the Blue Hill Inn, lunch was a lobster bisque, and dinner was lobster linguine for daph and lobster in a herb butter sauce for me.

Scrambled eggs with lobster

After all that lobster, you might think we’d be sick of it, but nope! It was good stuff, and tastiest when done simply I think. And it was not expensive at all, so it felt a bit ridiculous to be eating so much lobster all the time.

What is ridiculous, though, is the lobster worship you see around the place. Daph had to claw me away from taking photos of everything lobster (yes, that was a pun, just for you, Phil). There is lobster paraphernalia everywhere, and we got more than a couple of strange looks while we took photos.

But who could let these photos go?

Maine number plates have lobsters on them!

We got strange looks for taking this photo, but it’s a lobster in a taco!

Daph chilling with Pinchy

ice cream, apples and cheese

A little while ago we drove through Vermont! Land of charming little villages, beautiful foliage, gourmet foods and the Ben and Jerry's ice cream factory :) We decided to visit on a whim and take a break from driving. The factory is open to the public and they run tours to show you how they make a quarter of a million pints of ice cream a day... and they also give you a free sample of ice cream. How can you say no?

This is me doing an impression of an ice cream:



When you first walk in, you get a big impression of "very cute". It looks like a little wonderland aimed at five year olds, with bright colours and cartoons painted all over the halls. The first stop on the tour is a short video where they explain the history of Ben and Jerry's and how they select new flavours. Next comes the actual production factory, and you get to see the ice cream floor from a top viewing platform. The scale of production is pretty impressive for such a small place. They run the operation 24 hours a day for 3 days making just one flavour, then they clean the machines for 12 hours and run a different flavour for the next 3 days.

Our tour guide told us that every employee gets 3 pints of ice cream for free every day. Surprisingly, they weren't all obese. ;p

Last stop on the tour is the samples room! Our free sample was a small scoop of strawberry cheesecake, and it was *delicious*. I've never tried that flavour before, but it was a good way to make me a convert.

Then of course, you're herded out to the gift shop where there's all manner of cute merchandise to purchase. We restricted ourselves to a postcard, but it was a pretty fun experience.



Since we were in Food Mode, we went to the Cold Hollow Cider Mill up the road that is famous for apple cider and cider doughnuts. As soon as you walk in, the most amazing fried and doughy smell wafts over you. Mmmmm... doughnuts. They're nicely cinnamony and have a subtle apple taste, crispy outside and soft on the inside. Especially good with hot apple cider. :)





Of course, as we were munching on the doughnuts we found a pamphlet for Cabot's, which is a local cheese shop with a famous reputation, so off we went to pay them a visit. A sign above the shop says it serves "the world's best cheddar", and while I was skeptical walking into the shop, I would have to say I agree. I've never tasted something so creamy yet sharp at the same time. We decided to buy a block of it for dinner, accompanied by Her Majesty's endorsed Carr's crackers and some Cabernet Sauvignon. Dinner of Champions :)

Niall gets down with his bovine side:



I prepare dinner. Hurray!

more than words

One thing that I’m still adjusting to over here is the friendliness and attentiveness of the service over here. Maybe this will change in New York, but so far it’s been pretty good. People seem to really want to go the extra mile to help you. When you walk into a shop, they’ll always say hi. I guess a lot of it is to do with the tipping culture, but usually it doesn’t feel like they’re only doing is so you’ll pay them more.

It’s quite a difference from the UK, where getting service from people requires skillful manipulation or clear and obvious signs of wealth. It is a bit odd sometimes when people want to help you with things you’re pretty capable of doing yourself, like picking your size off a rack of clothes.

But the first prize, the championship cup, must go to the toll collector we passed on the bridge near the US-Canada border at Niagara Falls. In a stark comparison to the situation we’d seen so far, where any odd request you might have was quickly pounced upon as an opportunity to help, this guy was not going to let his job get between him and a good read.

I pulled up to the booth and wound the window down. The guy was reading a newspaper. After a few seconds, he was still reading the newspaper. A few more seconds inspection revealed that, yes, he was still reading the newspaper. After some careful consideration, he turned to his left to address us… silently. I handed him the money, which he took… silently. The change came back, and despite his continued muteness, I couldn’t stop myself from saying “thank you”. I really wish I hadn’t, because like a British Palace guard, he kept his iron strong demeanour and simply turned away.

Daph and I were just watching a poker tournament on tv. Maybe we’ll see this guy on the next episode. I think he’d be an ace hand.

niagara falls

We're staying in Niagara Falls today, just a hop over the Canadian border. Check out the awesome view from our hotel room!

(tee hee, I'm so funny aren't I?)

Seriously it's quite tack-tastic over here. So many chain restaurants and breakfast buffets and stuff open 24 hours.... The Canadian side is undoubtedly the better one to get your "I was here!" photos from. And mysteriously, we couldn't see any signs to get over to the Canadian side unless you were literally about to cross the bridge over into Canada. Is it a conspiracy to keep the tourist dollars over in America?

harvest

It's harvest season in America, which means lots of pumpkins and scarecrows and apples. The yanks really go all out with decorations - in little towns and villages, the majority of houses have a pumpkin or three out the front, plus a zombie or ghost or witch or something scary for Halloween. It's really festive, and the colours look really lovely against the backdrop of the yellows, oranges and reds of the season.

These couple of photos were taken through Maine. I think a lot of the decorations come down quickly after Halloween so I'm not sure if we'll see much else, but it was definitely nice while it lasted.

autumn leaves

We were hoping to get to see the vivid colours of the fall as we drove through New England, although we knew we were arriving towards the end of the season. While the trees in the mountains have been largely bare, we were lucky enough to catch Maine still in bloom, so to speak.

The variety of colours is really amazing – bright reds and yellows, deep oranges and crusty orange browns of leaves that have almost finished for the season. It’s really nice to be driving under such a colourful canopy. Sometimes when the wind picks up, you end up driving through a thick shower of falling deep orange leaves.

Catching good photos of the leaves can be tricky, but here are a few we prepared earlier:

On the road through Acadia National Park

One of countless beautiful houses in Maine

The entrance to our hotel in Bar Harbor, Maine

Driving through Vermont