France Trip - Day 3 of 18 "Alsalce -Route de Vin"

Our third day in France we drove the beautiful Route de Vin which stretches from Strasbourg to just past Colmar (no more than ~20 miles). As we drove through rolling hills covered beautiful vineyards that were screaming to be harvested, we stopped at adorable German looking villages that had a distinct French flair. As we drove we made a game of spotting castles on the hilltops. What a unique place to visit! Each town was gorgeous and had plenty of local wine to try from Rieslings to Gewurztraminer. Beautiful colored flowers hung in baskets out each window of the German style houses. Kaysersberg had a cute craft fair with a meandering stream that ran through the town. We ate crepes in the most visited town in France outside of Paris, a walled city called Riquewihr. The main drag was full of small cute shops with German/French knickknacks to buy as souvenirs. It even had a Kate Wofhart shop (German Christmas Heaven)! We ended the day in Colmar. What a wonderful picturesque day!

Destination Idea - Kentucky

We recently visited our close friends who moved to Kentucky.
Continental was matching a 72 hour Southwest birthday special that ran at the beginning of the summer which allowed you to travel any where within 500 miles for $40 etc.
(Travel planning tip: Check out other carriers when someone is doing a special to see if there is a match that works better for you.)

Travel for Two Top Ten Reasons to Visit Kentucky at the Beginning of October:

10. Stay at an old historic hotel - Browns Hotel was known in the early 1900s as the place to be in Louisville. The decor and old memorabilia is quite interesting to see. The rooms are spacious too.

9.See a bit of history - tour honest Abe's birth place. It is amazing they don't have this little cabin preserved better.

8. The weather is ideal. It is nice and cool but lovely in the sun.
The leaves are starting to change color.

7. Drive through the beautiful rolling hills with the windows rolled down or better yet in a convertible. Beautiful birds and wildlife are all around - we saw cardinals, blue jays, and beautiful deer to name a few.

6. Its that time of year - Baseball play offs - Tour the Louisville Slugger museum - you can see the factory, which bats are about to be shipped out for the play off major league sluggers, and even get to hold some famous bats that have been used. We are Major baseball fans, but I think this museum is fun for everyone.

5. If it gets a little to chilly (or even if it isn't), take a bourbon tour to warm you up. Woodford Reserve is nothing short of excellent. Only $5 and you can tour this small distillery and taste this sweet buttery goodness from a bottle that the one and only Kentucky Derby calls its own. A souvenir bottle is only $43 with a personalized plaque.

4. Lyn's Paradise Cafe in Louisville - many food network stars have stopped by... I highly recommend the Cinnamon swirl french toast with bourbon custard topped with chocolate, strawberries and whipped cream. nuff said.

3. Horse races are starting up - Keenland is in Lexington quite beautiful track. Even if there is not a race scheduled for the weekend, take a stroll around the area and try to see the horses warm up between 6-10 am.

2. There is always another bourbon tour to go on...

1. Kentucky is perfect for visiting friends and making memories on a short weekend getaway!


 Top Ten Reasons to Visit Kentucky in Spring:

So I went back to good 'ol Kentucky in spring. This time my father was my companion.  so I decided to do a top 5 reasons for visit in Kentucky in the spring!
5. Churchill Downs is a must.  The perfect weather is ideal to take a tour.  You get the run down (no pun intended) on the fastest sport in the usa. From rules and legends to heros. Your apreciation on this fine taste for gambling will be enhanced guaranteed. I particularly enjoyed the glass replica of the track, the portrait wall of jockeys and trainers,  the long list of winners and thier stories (especially secraitariat), how the horses get thier names and most of all the view from upstairs. I told the guide what my favorite spot was and he told me that was the very place Queen Elizabeth stood to watch the derby! I always knew I had exquisite taste!
4. Baseball baseball baseball. Catch a college game if you can.
3. Appreciate that there is a starbucks and jimmy johns on every corner in loiusville. Some how I missed this the first go around.  ?
2. If you think you are missing out on the fall/winter weather ... you might get a taste like we did... freak ice and snow storm over night!  Woodford reserve bourbon (my favorite ) will keep you warm!
1. Bowling Green. Nuff said. "Your dreams are made in Bowling Green!" Pick up your custom corvette there! Warning: If you don't drive a chevy they might make you park a few miles away from the museum. VIP tour of the factory is a must as it is any gear head's Disneyworld! I talked to the guy on the line that puts on the steering wheel and the guide told me. .. "now you have meet the nut behind the wheel! " if you pay enought they will let you build your own engine!
Next is the museum. Speechless. Did you know the original vette logo had an American flag as the corvette is deemed as "America's sports car"! Turns out you can t claim the American flag as a marketing logo so they had to change it.
We just happened to go at the time that they were pulling out one of the most priceless Corvettes (black 62)  out of the sinkhole that swallowed 8 vettes two weeks before. Yes I think I was on the discovery channel as they were shooting live footage.  Don't ask me why they decided to build the nations best sports car facility in a sinkhole ridden area or the nation's gold reserves that matter.

France Day 1 and 2 of 18 "Alsalce -Strasbourg"

So I haven't blogged in a while, but with good excuse.... We took our trip to France!
Unfortunately my family has a traveling curse. This curse involves weird things happening on trips, but things usually end up good.
This trip started off shaky as I got in a car accident with a little ol' lady the day before we left when I went to get luggage...
It was super hot outside and the old lady turned out to be a real pill.
Needed less to say it took a couple days to unwind.
We had a friend take us to the airport which was nice not to have to pay parking for 18 days. The flight there was not bad at all.
We flew direct to Frankfurt via Lufthansa on points. They include a bus ride to Strasbourg. We like Lufthansa since they are very clean, detailed, and know where your baggage is at all times.
Our tv didn't work, and after trying to reboot a few times, the airline attendant offered us some euros to spend on the in flight magazine.

We took advantage of our brief time at the airport by going to our favorite chain German pastry place, Kamps. Germans rock at making the yummiest pastries. My hubbie snuck in a pretzel too. We slept on the bus which was a "no no" making our time adjustment a bit harder.

Strasbourg was absolutely beautiful and cute. We walked all around France's "little France." I enjoyed this town much more than I thought I would. After seeing ornate churches all over Europe, I was not expecting to enjoy Strasbourg's church as much as I did. It had an interesting astronomical clock inside.

We picked up our car and headed for Obernai which is the first town on the Route de Vin. This adorable walled city had a beautiful square, church, and well where we took lots of pictures. We learned here that The French like carosels in their towns. This cute town even has a WWII plack explaining when it was liberated. The Alsace region has been fought over by the French an Germans for centuries. The Germans specifically spared some towns from war destruction on the Route de Vin because they liked them so much. These towns resemble German towns, but have a French flair.

To end the day, we were referred to a restaurant called "Tete du Lard."
I told the waitress,"it was funny since your restaurant name translates to "fat head."
She told me that was their specialty... Pig's head....
And so our French adventure began......

Bidding Goggles

If you have ever bought a hotwire.com hotel you should be pretty familiar with the how the system goes, but I will explain it for everyone else.

As Hotwire.com ad's mention when hotels have unsold rooms they give them to Hotwire to liquidate at reduced prices.

So 4 star hotels in New Orleans for 2 star prices.

But where is the Catch? If everyone knew that great hotels would drop their prices in half weeks before a check-in the entire supply-demand principal would collapse.

So yes there is a catch....

Below I have shown some of the zones that hotwire uses in New Orleans. You are given the choice of a hotel in La Place, New Orleans East, Airport Area, Downtown / French Quarter and last Harvey. Assuming you are a tourist you would like to probably stay in the French Quarter, but the French Quarter, Business District, and the Garden Distric are all in one zone. (Some cities are better zoned).

Once you have chosen a location they will make 2 or 3 offers for either a 3 star, 4 star or 5 star hotel with a higher price as you work up to the 5 star level. They will tell you just a couple of key facts about your hotel such as if it has a restaurant, gym, pool or laundry service to name a few and sometimes they will tell you if the hotel has a high approval rating on Tripadvisor.com (one of my favorite websites for all travel needs.

That's it, a 2 - 4 sq mile proximity, hotel class, and a few amenities. Once you have given them your money and agreed to the price they will reveal your hotel to you.

Hotwire is a good way to save 20-50% on hotels prices on any other website. I recently used them multiple times in Paris because due to conventions the city was really booked and rooms were very limited driving prices of a 3 star hotels to ~ $300 a night. Using hotwire I was able to go up a category (4 star) and save some money as well, have a safe, nice, clean upscale hotel room.

Although I like hotwire, sometimes not all hotels are created equal, It would be really nice to know what hotel I was agreeing to before they took my money. You could get the hotel on the far side of town away from everything that just got downgraded to a 3 star ect... so I came across a great website that fixes that for you. http://www.bidgoggles.com/

By going to this website and launching their application, it will open http://www.hotwire.com/ along with a decoder screen. Put in the City, Dates, and Star Level, then Hotwire will provide a "nameless" 4 star hotel with certain amenities (pool, gym ect.) put that data into bidgoggles.com and they will give you a short list of hotels (hopefully 1 ) that meat that criteria. Once you have the short list go to http://www.tripadvisor.com/ compare the "tripadvisor rating" from hotwire and tripadvisor.com to see if you can find a match. If you like the hotel BOOK IT. This is a great way to get great rooms for a lot cheaper then anywhere on the net.

Baggage Claim

This past week we were thinking about which baggage we wanted to bring on our trip to France, and I thought this would be a good topic for blogging.
We have tried every which way of baggage.... let me give you a recap.

Tahiti: Packed one huge cloth bag with wheels - we waited at baggage claim for a long time and never saw our bag?!?, but we did see a garbage bag that was duct taped up that no one had claimed. After everyone picked up all the bags, we went over to the garbage bag and duct tape ball, opened it up and sure enough it was our bag inside.

Lesson Learned: Don't trust cheap cloth with a big bag in an overseas flight, and never underestimate the duct taped bag that keeps going around and around....

Italy: Decided to pack 2 smaller bags. Took an Air Italia Flight (only 40 min flight from Rome to Nice...) Bags never made it. Still not sure how that happened. I don't think they even were put on the plane! We ended up backpacking across Italy not intending too (I think it was 14 days without our bags?)... I spent hours arguing with the baggage claim lady in Naples, who did not feel like helping. She kept telling me " you are American so you must call the US office to help you." Wow. My husband had to hold me back. I ended up just saying calmly, "Let me see the lost luggage room." She finally showed me and it wasn't there, so I asked to see the next room. It wasn't there either. I asked to see the next room, and she answered that was all of the rooms, but after seeing the lost luggage line, I insisted that there was another room, and sure enough, she finally showed me.... and there they were. After months of negotiating about the cost incurred while backpacking across Italy, I finally got a check for ~ $128.32 from them. I think I still have it, and am going to frame it.

Lesson Learned: There is always another lost baggage room in Italy!
Also, I have small carry on bag that can be worn on the side, as a back pack or actually put around me in front. I keep all essentials in this bag I need to survive if my luggage never comes. This bag can be unloaded during the trip and used trekking around for anything anywhere.
Consider taking a picture of what is in your luggage before you zip it up. This is easier to have proof if something happens.


China: I packed a bag that can zip up into a small 5" square patch into my larger bag. I put all of my travel treasures in this bag and bring it on the plane with me home to ensure nothing brakes.

Lesson Learned: Pack a carry on collapsible bag for souvenirs. Make a copy of your passport especially if you are going to a country that would like a passport. Never have your passport and your copy in the same bag.

Verona, Italy: We went to see a opera in an old Roman Colosseum. My hubby went to take a picture of the beautiful site, and when we went to go inside... no tickets.
He had put them in his back pocket to take the picture, and ... gone that fast. Never felt a thing. I think we ended up buying the same exact tickets twice. :(

Lesson Learned: Front Pocket Wallets - This is a must for guys. They are shaped like a front pocket to make wearing them comfortable as well as safe while still organizing things you want to keep on you with you.
Money Belts: Tried this too... This is just for emergency because we could only fit one paper bill in there!

Los Cabos: We bought a souvenier ceramic tequila decanter in the airport thinking we would carry it on home to ensure it was safe. What we didn't know was since we had to switch planes and we were coming from a different country, they make you go through customs at the stopping airport, and they insisted that we had to check the decanter since it had a small bit of tequila in it. We smelled our luggage before we saw it...and my beautiful decanter was broken.

Lesson learned: Tequila smell eventually comes out. Down your tequila before going through customs.... Then you can bring your decanter with you, and you will know your tequila will be in good keeping too.

Chile: My hubby wanted to maximize the amount of wine he wanted to bring home from this famous wine region of the world. When he came home he only had (4) bottles in a wine carring case (the max they would let him bring). I told him I was sorry he couldn't bring more home. He just smiled and opened his luggage. I took out a very heavy rolled pair of pants. Sure enough there was a bottle of wine in them. We ended up with (20 bottles).

Lesson learned: My husband is lucky and strong. I would have not risked my wardrobe on some wine, but I am sure glad he did. Oh, and clothes can be used as bubble wrap substitute. (Note: this was attempted before the tequila incident.)

As you can see, we are still figuring the whole baggage thing out.
I did have a fear of checking luggage for a while (tried to pack every thing in carry-ons), but after seeking help at Carry - Ons Anonymous, I am getting better.

Good luck packing!

Destination Idea - Tolum, Mexico

Destination Idea

Tolum, Mexico (Just south of Cancun)

Beautiful Beaches, and Mayan Ruins
This is a great place to visit some Mayan Ruins, without the crowds at Chitzeniza (one of the largest and most popular Mayan Ruins). Bring a bathing suit as you might want to go swimming in the picture purfect waters below. No wonder the Mayans set up camp here! Wouldn't you? Travel tip: If you pack your own lunch with lots of cool water- which we reccomend, beware of bold Mayan birds who will try to take your food right out of your hand!

Destination Idea - New York

So with all the talk of debt, and financial crisis I thoght I would point out a picture from a trip a couple years ago to New York City.

Southwest just opened a new route to Newark from Houston, so there are lots of sub $200 flight deals out there which is especially good for a summer fare.

Tip: Reserve a ticket ahead of time, to go inside the statue liberty, otherwise you will just have to wonder the grounds till the next ferry comes. Link

Food: Grimaldi's pizza under the Brooklyn Bridge, worth the wait Link (p.s. there are locations across the US including (Arizona, Flordia, Las Vegas, & Texas so you can get a sneak peak before you go)