Travel Blog Posts
Cara's 25th B-day Celebration in Cape Coral
Published: July 17th 2011North America » United States » Florida » Cape Coral
July 9th 2011
Matt's and my good friend Cara, decided that she wanted to celebrate her 25th birthday with fun in the sun during a Cape Coral weekend getaway. Directions We were more than happy to attend! From West Palm to Cape Coral, we opted to take I-75 which took us a little under 3 hours despite a mini detour of getting lost. From Cape Coral to West Palm, we took Southern the whole way. Southern is a much more direct route, but also posed some issues with drops in speed since it cut through several central Florida towns. In the future, I would probably always take I-75 for the steady speed limit alone. Lodging Cara did her research in advance and opted to have us all stay at The Resort at MarinaVillage in Cape Coral . We booked ... read more
Summer in NYC
Published: July 17th 2011North America » United States » New York » New York » Manhattan
June 17th 2011
Every trip to NYC Matt and I do is somehow always better than the last. This trip was no exception! Not only was this our longest NYC trip (Thursday night to Tuesday), but it was our first trip together during the summer months. Lodging: Per usual, Matt took the reins on booking the main aspects of this trip. He used Hotels.com Vacation Packages and between airfare and lodging at Hotel Penn , we paid a little under $1000.00 for the two of us. We had stayed at Hotel Penn once before in 2007 during the NYC trip when we were engaged. The good: Location is everything! Located right next to Madison Square Garden and Penn Station was ideal for our situation. We were easily able to hop on multiple subway trains and across the street is ... read more
Tempo Miami for New Year's Eve
Published: January 2nd 2011North America » United States » Florida » Miami
January 1st 2011
I'm going to start this blog simply by saying HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! I have a feeling that this is going to be the best year yet. :) Matt and I kicked off our New Year at the Tempo Miami, a Rock Resort (url=http://tempomiami.rockresorts.com/). I cannot say enough good things about our visit here. A few weeks ago, Matt and I decided that we wanted to do something a bit more fun for New Years Eve. The original plan was to stay in South Beach; however, all of the good hotels were filled up by the time we started looking. So, we thought of staying in Miami and just heading over to South Beach for the evening...enter: Tempo Miami. Yet again, we booked out trip via Hotels.com and paid $299 for the basic room. I called about ... read more
Another Night in South Beach
Published: November 29th 2010North America » United States » Florida » Miami BeachNovember 29th 2010
A few weeks ago, I learned that my friend Ashley would be in Miami for a day or so before leaving on her week long cruise. Since she still lives in Ohio, we were excited to be only an hour or so a part for a day! The original plan was just to come down for lunch and walking around Ocean Drive. As Matt and I hopped in our car ready to leave, we suddenly decided that it would be more fun to stay the night. So we did just that. :) Lodging: Sanctuary Hotel in South Beach Since we booked shortly before check in, there weren't too many options in our price range. I was pleased and a bit surprised to see the Sanctuary Hotel in South Beach for under $150. A year or so ... read more
November 9th 2010
We intended to have this trip be Business mixed with Pleasure; however, Business clearly won. Regardless, we were really impressed with the hotel we stayed at so it's worth a TravelBlog entry for future reference. Lodging Long story short, Matt had a Conference to attend at the Gaylord Palms in Orlando . The conference lasted from Wednesday-Friday and the Gaylord Palms charged $199 per night for a basic room. Obviously, that would add up very quickly and was a bit out of our budget. As a result, we opted to stay at another more "budget friendly" ($66.99 per night) hotel nearby and just commute to the conference every morning. After some research, we booked the Comfort Suites Maingate East due to affordability, location and Hotels.c... read more
October 22nd 2010
It really is amazing what can come from a really bad day at work. Or, in our case, two really bad days at work. On an evening midway through a random work week just a week or two ago, Matt and I concluded that we needed some form of intervention or rejuvenation from the burned out zombies that we were quickly becoming. Twenty minutes later, we found ourselves printing out the confirmation pages of a weekend getaway to none other than Sin City itself. Viva Las Vegas! I wish I could boast and brag about how we found an amazing deal, but no dice (pun intended). Airfare was around $350 per person for a direct flight from FLL to Las Vegas. There were in fact cheaper flights available but the times of ours allowed us flexibility ... read more
Discovery Cove Orlando
Published: September 26th 2010North America » United States » Florida » Orlando
September 19th 2010
WOW this has been a busy month of travel for me and Matt!!! For quite some time now we've had our eyes on Discovery Cove in Orlando . Trip Advisor had it ranked as the top attraction in Orlando and we had heard nothing but good reviews from numerous people. So off we went for yet another weekend getaway! Lodging: Yet again we stayed at the Hilton Orlando . We booked through Hotels.com and ended up paying $104 a night for a basic room before taxes and parking (parking is $12 a day). Although we also paid for this same room last visit, we did not get upgraded this time to the Executive Suites. :( The Executive Suites were about $150 per night. Regardless, our room was still gorgeous and the bed was the exact same ... read more
Labor Day Weekend in Key West
Published: November 29th 2010North America » United States » Florida » Keys » Key West
September 3rd 2010
As a semi spur of the moment decision, Matt and I headed off to Key West, FL this Labor Day weekend. I really cannot stress enough how much I love and appreciate having so many vacation destinations merely a hop, skip and jump away. We drove down Friday night and avoided much of the holiday traffic, only taking us 4 hours from West Palm. Unfortunately, we hit major slow downs and heavy rain on our voyage home Monday afternoon/evening. Regardless, this was by far one of our best trips yet (I feel like I say that about every trip. ;) ) Lodging: Through Hotels.com, we booked An Island Oasis Bed and Breakfast . We decided on this hotel mainly because of cost and location. We ended up paying around $470 after tax for 3 nights. Not ... read more
Exploring Attractions in Orlando
Published: September 8th 2010North America » United States » Florida » Orlando
August 1st 2010
After dozens of trips to Orlando, this weekend was our first where we didn’t visit any of the parks in Disney or Universal. This was also our first, and last, trip during the peak of summer! Between the sticky 100 degree heat and the massive crowds, we were flooded by memories of family summer vacations past. Regardless of it being peak season, Matt and I had a wonderful time exploring various attractions in Orlando. Lodging: Matt booked this trip via Hotels.com. There were plenty of great deals all over Orlando, but he decided on the Hilton by the Convention Center. For two nights after tax we paid $218.00. It should also be noted that parking is an additional $12 or so a day. This Hilton was relatively new and absolutely stunning and HUGE! The colors and ... read more
June 20th 2010
As an introduction to this trip, let me just say that we referenced my last South Beach post numerous times as a reference! Mission for this blog accomplished. :) Now for the down and dirty. As mentioned before, Matt and I vowed to take little getaways at least every 5 or so weeks to maintain our sanity. We had such a great time in South Beach last time and craved another go around. Luckily, summer time brings lower hotel rates. For this trip, we debated between 3 or 4 hotels: The Hotel of South Beach , The Blue Moon Hotel , The Essex House and the Beacon Hotel . After much thought and reading countless reviews on TripAdvisor, we opted for the Essex House. Hotel Review and Parking: We decided to park in the garage on ... read more
Tot: 0.095s; Tpl: 0.005s; cc: 12; qc: 86; dbt: 0.0626s; 1; s:notus w:www (50.28.60.10); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.8mb
