http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Royv1/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Royv1 en-us Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:52:19 +0000 Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:52:19 +0000 Today was the last day of our New England trip. We left Boothbay Harbor early to ensure we would be able to fit in a stop in Salem to visit some of the witch related attractions. There definitely was not enough time spent here in Maine to fully appreciate it all. In all we were probably only in the state less than 24 hours Before leaving we stopped by the harbor to take a few photos but the bon http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Massachusetts/Salem/blog-453023.html Going to bed last night we thought it just might get cold enough for a chance of snow. Still we were quite surprised when we looked out our hotel window to a fresh blanket of snow. Since we had a lot of ground to cover today we had another early start to our drive. Snow flurries were still falling when we hit the road around 7am. Not having ever driven while the snow was falling I was a little http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Maine/Boothbay-Harbor/blog-448513.html With a long travel day ahead of us we set out early in the morning for our drive across Massachusetts and into Vermont. Up until today we really had not seen much of the changing fall colors. The drive through Massachusetts changed all that once we started driving through the western part of the state. Closer to the coast most of the trees along the highway had still not changed colors. As we d http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Vermont/blog-447402.html This morning we left Boston and headed off to Cape Cod. First stop this morning was the coastal town of Plymouth which is where the Pilgrims landed back in 1620. Once we secured parking for our car we got out to do a little exploration of the area. Our first goal was to locate the Plymouth Rock an important symbol in American History. The location of the rock was quite obvious from the moment w http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Massachusetts/Cape-Cod/blog-446248.html It was a drizzly morning today as we made our way over to Penn Station to catch our Amtrak train to Boston. It was only a 4 hour trip and we were excited to get out of New York and start exploring Boston. The first half was rather uneventful as we crossed through various small towns in Connecticut. The train didn't seem to be going as quickly as I thought it should and every now and then it would http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Massachusetts/Boston/blog-446213.html Our flight to New York was a redeye from LAX to JFK on the new airline Virgin America. Since I had been impressed on my two flights with Virgin Atlantic I thought this new airline must be just as great. Immediately after a full days work Shea Kevin and I headed straight to the airport to catch our 925pm flight. Kevin's sister Wendy drove us to the Van Nuys Flyaway where we would catch a s http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/New-York/New-York/blog-446154.html Initially this long weekend trip to Zion was supposed to be with a group of friends. Since none of them were able to make it I changed it to a family camping weekend. My mom sister and her boyfriend all came along. For my mom this would be her first camping experience. It will be quite interesting to see how well she deals with it. I picked up our rental car for the weekend a Chevy HHD on F http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Utah/Zion-National-Park/blog-439001.html Having a rental car for the past few days while my car was in the shop has definitely inspired me to take a mini roadtrip. I had thought about a long weekend in San Francisco but settled on a quick day trip up the central coast to the Cambria area. Always up for a spontaneous adventure Shea was more then happy to tag along. We left home in my rented Toyota Yaris at the reasonable hour of 7am fo http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/California/San-Simeon/blog-418623.html These days my getaways have been relegated to day trips to nearby destinations close enough for a day trip. The economic realities of the day have all but put an end to the usual 2 week European trips that I have been used to since 2000. For the past few weeks I've had a burning need to get away but when my pocketbook was consulted any possible ideas were quickly dashed. So at the very last mi http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/California/Death-Valley-National-Park/blog-382973.html This morning was our last morning here in Zion. With nothing really planned today we just slept in and took our time dismantling our campsite. Prior to leaving we decided to do one last hike. Since we didn't want to get a late start on the road we picked a rather easy trail. We picked Weeping Rock Trail which is a very short trail making it quite a popular trail. The trail wasn't very steep ho http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Utah/Zion-National-Park/blog-342852.html Thanks to the old fart in the next campsite abruptly putting an end to our night I was able to get a full night's rest in my tent. Unfortunately the same could not be said for Kevin. Unable to sleep he apparently got out of his tent in the middle of the night and was spinning around. That morning when we went to the bathroom he went into a stall and proceeded to vomit the contents of his http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Utah/Zion-National-Park/blog-328075.html After a long day at work and a 3 hour class afterwards Kevin and I set off at around 11pm Thursday night for a long drive to Utah. For the past few weeks we had been planning out a long weekend trip up to Utah's Zion National Park. Our goal was to do 2 of Zion's famous hikes up the Virgin Narrows as well as to the top of Angel's Landing. Throughout the night we drove across California's http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Utah/Zion-National-Park/blog-326896.html Driving all night from Washington DC with the only stop in Mount Jackson Virginia for dinner at Denny's we arrived in Memphis in the early morning. We made a brief stop to check out Graceland home to Elvis Pressley. After finding out the only way to check it out was to go on a guided tour we decided to just leave. We explored Beale Street for the rest of the morning before having lunch at http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Louisiana/New-Orleans/blog-294264.html We left New York City that afternoon and drove back down to Washington DC. Later that evening Van made plans for us to meet up with a high school friend who was working in the area as an urban planner. Our plans were to meet up at a Cuban restaurant called Citron in the Dupont Circle area. Dinner was great and I discovered a wonderful Cuban drink called a mojito. After dinner we just walked http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/District-of-Columbia/blog-293818.html This morning Kevin and I left at around 9am for a drive up to Las Vegas to watch the FIBA America Basketball tournament. The weather here at home was going to be a scorching 105 degrees and was probably going to be the same up in Vegas. I still had my little rental car from the recent car accident that I was in so I figured that I would put some miles on this car. Once we passed Barstow my r http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Nevada/Las-Vegas/blog-293802.html A few weeks ago my coworker Van approached me with an idea to go on a cross country road trip to New York City and Washington DC. She had to drive back to her hometown of New Orleans and decided to make an entire road trip out of it. She offered to pay for the rental car and gas. All she needed was somebody to help drive with her. Of course I jumped at the idea of going on a cross country trip http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/New-York/New-York/Manhattan/blog-293737.html Call me crazy but who gets up at 130am and drives 5 hours just to hike around and drive back Only I would do something as spontaneous as that. At 1000pm Saturday night I was just lounging around telling myself that I should go on a mini road trip. Since it was already pretty late I doubt anybody would have wanted to tag along on such short notice. I decided that I would drive up to Mamm http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/California/Mammoth-Lakes/blog-291014.html Today was Patrice Christina and my last day in Cancun. We would be flying back home early tomorrow morning while Vern and Bill stayed on for a few extra days. Our last full day was spent about an hour south of Cancun in the small town of Puerto Morelos. We had signed up for a snorkeling tour of the offshore coral reefs. After changing into our swimming gear and getting our snorkeling gear http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/Mexico/Quintana-Roo/Cancun/blog-279943.html We woke up this morning at around 5am to meet our tour guide who was going to drive us over to ChichenItza to tour the ancient Mayan archaeological site. All of us went except for Bill who just wasn't interested in anything besides the beach and club scene. It was still dark outside when we began our 2 hour drive deep into the heart of the Yucatan. Tours to ChichenItza usually start very ea http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/Mexico/Quintana-Roo/Cancun/blog-279933.html After a night where nobody was able to sleep comfortably we woke up pretty early in the morning thankful that nobody tried to murder or rob us in the middle of the night. When I moved the balcony curtains to see our view I was amazed at what I saw. For only about 40 dollars our room had an amazing ocean view. It was definitely the best view I had ever had from a hotel room During my morn http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/Mexico/Quintana-Roo/Cancun/blog-279925.html