Fish and Chips

Be it fly fishing or the old fashioned fishing, Alaska is a haven for fishermen, one and all. On a cruise, you are bound to see fishing boats reeling in fish in abundance. We roamed around in an RV, which meant that we cooked most of our meals during the trip. But when in Alaska, savoring some local fresh fish is a must do, if you are a meat/fish eater.

Fish & Chips

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Kincaid Park, Anchorage, Alaska

We had an evening to kill in Anchorage and chose Kincaid park to cook dinner in the RV and if "mosquito free" head for a gentle walk. The Kincaid park was the chosen location for Winter Olympics. You can see the ski slopes in the park and in the Winter, the entire park turns into a Winter Sports Arena. We saw a couple of moose in the park. The younger one had absolutely no inhibitions of the human presence and was sitting close to the trail on the grass.

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Portage Pass, Alaska

The hike to the Portage pass takes you up to the snow in the mountains. A great hike and the view from the pass was fabulous. Not sure if its appealing factor increased immensely due to all the effort we put in to get high up in the mountain. This was one of the hikes we did without the kids. After our hike we took the kids to the starting point of where the snow/ice began so they could play with the snow for a bit.

A great view of Whittney, Alaska, a popular port destination for cruises.

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Ulu Factory, Anchorage, Alaska

I highly doubt if anybody comes out of Alaska with out an Ulu knife. It looks something like your cilantro/parsley chopper but can be used to cut anything that you would other wise use a regular knife for. We bought a couple of those ... yet to put it to use.

You can buy the knife anywhere in Alaska for $8 in Walmart to $17 in a National Park gift shop to one with the chopping board, knife et al from the Ulu factory for close to $50. We went to the Ulu factory, where you get to see how the knife is made.

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Crow Creek Mine, Gridwood Alaska

Our first destination on this vacation was Anchorage, Alaska. On the way to Whittney, we stopped in Gridwood to peek inside the old mine. Panning for teeny-tiny pieces of gold is still a popular past time in Alaska. You can see quite a bit of gold panning type reality shows on T.V too. We used the RV rest area in the Crow Creek Mine. A whole another post is waiting on RV, so I will leave the details on this.

We woke the following day and walked down the trail to the creek, where people were panning for gold. To go on a hike in Alaska, you do not have to look too far and it does not matter where you are. Another hike and we were out of Gridwood.

The mine is family owned and have retained the houses and some part of the mine to how it was very many years ago.

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Paris Baguette, Palo Alto, California

My dad is turning 70 this year, so the entire family met to celebrate his birthday a tad bit earlier. His cake was from Paris Baguette. Located at Palo Alto, downtown, this baked goods chain offers not-too-sweet-cakes. We stopped over here after our trip to Stanford. 

Nothing too fancy, but the coffee bun & coffee were my favorites !!!

Me and my sister-in-laws sneaked out on our own while the men and the kids were happy to browse through the Apple store near by. No points for guessing what we did - window shopping !!!

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Stanford, California

This place needs no write up. Every time we visit California, we usually visit a university or two. We went to Berkeley on our previous visit. Don't you sometimes wish people slowed down and took the time to built architecturally appealing and intricate designs as these.

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Ox Bow Public Market, Napa Valley

Looking for a nice farmers-market-type eatery with lots of good choices? Ox Bow Public Market in Napa Valley is a good place to get something to eat after all the wine tasting. You can find anything ranging from cheeses, wines, olive oils to spices, tea and some good coffee.

The "Poor House", certainly caught my attention. Vintage style home furnishings with lots of character and I hear most of the products sold there are designed by the lady who owns the store.

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Yosemite, California

Three hikes in a day were all worth it. The easiest hike was to the Mirror Lake. I was expecting a huge lake, but surprisingly it's a small lake with little water, but the water is so clear with absolutely no disturbances that it reflects everything around it. We saw a deer near the Mirror lake. Also this trail is paved, good for folks with strollers and such. Below is the equestrian trail that we took on our way to the lake. This trail could be smelly for obvious reasons, the paved trail is better way to reach the Mirror lake.

Vernal Falls hike was a good one, a moderate to slightly strenuous hike. You hike up to the waterfalls to get a good view of it. The kids hiked with us, no points for guessing the one who not panting or huffing was my daughter and my brother. Below is a picture of the falls. 

We also saw a beautiful blue bird near the falls.

I do not do hikes well, if you have to go down first and then climb back up. This hike down the mountains led us to these giant sequoia.

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Napa Valley, California

 

There is no shortage of places in California to take a new car on a spin. My brothers, Mahesh and I drove up to Napa Valley for an afternoon of wine tasting. Beware, you may think you are simply sipping small quantities of wine, pretty soon it all adds up. It's certainly a good idea for one to be assigned a designated driver.

A couple of wineries, a few ounces of wine, amazing views of the vineyards and a lovely time with brothers and hubby was well worth soaking in the July California sun. As for goody bags we came back with a wine chocolate sauce and some magnets sans wine bottles.

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New Orleans, LA

Good memories linger longer when you journal it, taken verbatim from one of the TED talks. Yep, TED talks are my latest obsessions. We were in New Orleans during the month of January celebrating my husband's cousin's 60th birthday. It was an all adults party and the kids stayed with my cousin. An apt location for jazz lovers.

Marsh lands, French architecture with lace balconies, culinary haven, jazz, parades, Mardigras, beads and a city that needs no excuse to party. We went to a couple of Jazz bars. A few are truly for the young with loud music blasting from all over, while some are true musical gems.

Too bad I left my camera at home and these pictures are from my cell phone.

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