Thanksgiving 2018: Chicago

My husband and I visited Chicago before we had a kid and when we were still living in Texas; we now live only three hours away. We have traveled to Chicago a few times since moving up here (twice for flights out of O'Hare and once for a work thing) but we were never there to visit the city. After our Thanksgiving 2017 outing to Louisville,KY we wanted to get something in the books for Thanksgiving 2018. We decided Chicago would be fun and it was only a short car ride away (but the longest car ride since kid-o has been out of diapers).

Since we were only going to be there for two nights we decided to be fancy and stay at the Ritz Carlton. The thing I loved most about the hotel was its proximity to all the shopping. There is a mall on the same block and The American Girl Store. We shopped at the AG store and even got my old doll's hair done and ears pierce (now she is Alana's doll). Then we enjoyed some pizza and hit up the Disney Store.

The next day was Thanksgiving Day and we headed to Uncle Dan's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Not knowing much about this parade, or parades in general, we positioned ourselves a block next to the block that was being televised. Turns out, that's the last black to see anything. So, we got there at 7:45, parade started at 8 and we didn't see anything until 9:30!! And it was 32 degrees! We ended up only staying for a few floats and balloons before we headed into a Subway to warm up. After spending some time in Subway, we headed to the Christkindlmarket, a replica German Christmas market. It is very cute and has great food and treats but the crowds make it not worth it. You could barely move around with a stroller and when crowds are that big I tend to just say, "let’s go." And that’s what we did. We pretty much relaxed in the hotel for the rest of the day and then headed out for Thanksgiving dinner. So much easier than cooking all day and then having to clean up!

We took advantage of our late check out on our last day and walked to Lincoln Park Zoo. It’s a really nice walk along Lake View Drive and has great views of the city. The zoo is great too and its free so that is always a bonus.

I loved seeing the city lit up in Christmas lights and it was good to explore parts of the city we hadn't seen before. 

South Side

Reykjavik | The Golden Circle | Northern Lights | Snæfellsnes Peninsula

On our last full day in Iceland we had scheduled a glacier hike. It was dark and rainy as we made our way to the Solheimajökull Glacier. Solheimajökull Glacier is part of the larger Mýrdalsjökull Glacier and sits between two active volcanoes, Katla and Eijafjallajökull (that’s the one that erupted in 2010 causing air traffic delays all over Europe). We booked out guided tour with Arctic Adventures via Marriott Moments (…because points…duh!). We had a great guide from Lithuania who was knowledgeable and patient with the people in our group that were taking too many selfies. The landscapes were pretty amazing, to see a glacier, lava rock, green mountains and rainbow all in one picture was astounding! It was also eye opening to see how much and how fast the glacier was melting.

After the hike we went to Reynisfjara Beach, Iceland’s deadliest beach. Its deadly because it has waves called “sneaker waves” that sort of come out of nowhere. A lot of people were taking their chances and my husband was just waiting to capture one on video. And we did! You can see me in the video with the purple rain jacket on. Someone had asked me to take a picture of their group and I just had a feeling I shouldn’t take my eye off the ocean. And I was right! There was a café here and pay-to-use bathrooms (when we visited they hadn’t been cleaned in a while so I was kind of pissed I paid to use a filthy bathroom).

To end our day of site seeing we swung by the famous Skógafoss and Seljalandsfoss waterfalls. Skógafoss was BIG! Its hard to capture a picture without anyone else in the back ground but we managed to get a few. There is a staircase where you can walk to the top and walk along the river a bit to see more waterfalls. Again, people were getting awfully close to the cliff’s edge to take pictures (upcoming post, “How to Die in Iceland”). The staircase was killer, I’m an avid runner and I thought it was tough! And I even saw people trying to walk up it heels; ladies lets forget the fashion statements for a moment wear something functional!

Seljalandsfoss

Skógafoss

Seljalandsfoss is cool because you can walk behind it. And the water just pours off the cliff! It started to rain on us here but we were prepared with our full rain gear, pants included! There is a gift shop and small café/food truck here. The café had really good soup and pastries! And hot chocolate! With the rain and cool temperatures, I needed a hot chocolate! You also had to pay to park at this stop. I’m not sure if they enforce it but we paid anyway.

We made it back to our AirBnB and we were tired! We really just wanted to order pizza. Iceland does have Domino’s and I really don’t care what your opinion is on Domino’s, but I love them. But they wanted to test me a confirmation number to place my order and I didn’t have cell service, so we couldn’t order delivery. We decided to just walk there. And as we were walking we found a local pizza joint, Eldsmiðjan and ended up just popping in there and we were really glad we did. We had garlic break, pizza, beer and fresh Coke Zero (I LOVE Coke Zero by the way. And when I say fresh I mean from a soda fountain).

Over all, this day was just a really great day!

Snæfellsnes Peninsula

Reykjavik | The Golden Circle | Northern Lights

We started this day with high hopes of hiking to see the Glymur waterfall, Iceland’s second tallest waterfall. But since we didn’t end up going to be until past 2am the night before/morning of because we were watching the northern lights we were pretty tired…and decided to sleep in.

We started the day at Braud & Co. with some pastries and then headed out the peninsula. Its about a two and half hour drive to get out there and on the drive I literally couldn’t keep my eyes open! Thank goodness I was not the driver for the trip. We made it to Kirkjufell and Kirkjufellsfoss and snapped our pictures. There is not a lot of parking here so you may need to pull a few u-turns before parking, we did.

Drive to  Snæfellsnes Peninsula 

Kirkjufell and Kirkjufellsfoss

We continued driving along the coast through Snæfellsjökull National Park and parked at Djúpalónssandur Beach where we did some walking around and wave watching.

Snæfellsjökull National Park

Then we made our way around the peninsula to Gatklettur and Bárðar Saga Snæfellsáss Statue. It’s a long the coast with some pretty rock formations. After looking at the map again it looks like we missed some other cool rock formations off the coast. Nuts! Next time. 

 And the last thing I wanted to see on this peninsula was a “petite church in a picturesque locale” known as Búðakirkja. Its described on Google as a, “Tiny wooden church dating back to the 19th century in a scenic natural area with a lava field.” It’s a cute little church and it really is picturesque.

Búðakirkja

We made the long drive back to Reykjavik, changed and went out for some food. We didn’t really want to wait to get our food so we want to a place close by called Roadhouse Reykjavik. It was a burger joint that served you your food in record time. Seriously, they were frozen burger patties that were flavored up with extras to make them good. I thought it was just okay but after a long day anything would have been good.

You can click here to hear the pronunciation of Snæfellsnes.

The Golden Circle

Read about our arrival and soak in the Blue Lagoon here: Day 1; Reykjavik. On to day two... 

We got an early start to our Golden Circle day. The Golden Circle is made up of a bunch of iconic Icelandic sites and the roads you take to see them sort of makes a circle.

Our first stop was Þingvellir National Park. We arrived around 8:30 and it was misting. We got out at the visitor center took some pictures and hoped back in the car and headed to parking lot 5 further down the road. By this time it was raining and we both said that given the option we would rather not start a hike in the rain. And the parking payment station was out or order so we didn’t know how to pay for parking.

Þingvellir National Park

Next, we stopped at the Geysir Geothermal Area which was awesome! It was the first time either of us had seen a geyser and it was just so cool to see it go off ever few minutes.

 After the geyser we stopped to take part in Horsepetting at Margeiri, Bru's Farm. And that is exactly how you type it into Google Maps to find it! It was 200isk to get some “candy” for the horses and pet them. They weren’t really in the mood to be petted and just wanted some treats.

Waterfalls were next! Gullfoss Waterfall and Faxifoss. We had our packed lunch at Gullfoss before we hit the road for Faxifoss (packing our own sandwiches is a way to keep the budget on track!). 

Top pictures: Gullfoss Waterfall, bottom waterfall is Faxifoss

After the falls was viewing and hiking into Kerið. There is a small fee associated with visiting this site. Kerið was formed about 6,500 years ago and lies at the northern end of a row of craters known as Tjarnarholar, It is oval, about 885.8 ft long and 557.7 ft wide and 180 ft deep: the depth of the water at the bottom varies between 23 and 46 ft deep.

And last on our list for the Golden Circle was Raufarholshellir Lava Tube. They give tours every hour on the hour and it’s a good idea to get there about 30 minutes prior to get in on the tour as they only take about 20 people in at a time. This too has an entrance fee since it is on private property and requires a guide.

Left: Raufarholshellir Lava Tube; Right: Kerið

There were a few sites on the Golden Circle itinerary that we did not get to see: Bruarfoss Waterfall, because, per Google maps, the only way to get there was by using a private drive that was closed off by a gate. And I did not know this and didn’t know if there was another way to get there. And Laugarvatn Fontana, a geothermal bath spa. We didn’t stop here because they were not open when we passed by, they open at 11am. I really wanted to stop here because they also bake bread in the ground using geothermal heat…something for next time!

We made it home with just over an hour to spare before our northern lights tour!

Thanksgiving in the South: Louisville, Kentucky

As I get back into this whole blogging thing and I was looking over my past blogs I realized I did not post about our Thanksgiving trip to Louisville, Kentucky. Back in the day I had just a travel blog, travel mi amor. And then I got pregnant and realized that maybe I couldn't just focus on travel anymore because my brain and life were shifting in a major way. So I created the spotted bulldog; a mix of travel and lifestyle blogging named after my sweet Lola.

SO....about Louisville...

As many of our friends know my husband and I are really into travel hacking...you know collecting hotel and airline rewards points and getting to travel for free...In late 2017 we only needed three more nights to keep our Platinum status with Marriott so we decided to meet family in Louisville, KY for Thanksgiving.

Louisville is abut a 7.5 hour drive for us so we left the day before Thanksgiving and arrived at the Marriott located downtown and settled in for the night. Our daughter, who was 2.5 yrs at the time, traveled great! We were on the cusp of potty training so when she wanted out she would tell us she had to potty. But we learned quickly that she was playing us! Once we arrived we were pretty surprised that a lot of restaurants were already closed for the holiday. We finally found found some burgers and went back to the hotel.

On Thanksgiving day we headed to the Belle of Louisville Riverboats for our Thanksgiving lunch cruise. It was nice not to have to cook and the food was good for what it was. However, the scenery wasn't all that great, that part of the Ohio River is pretty industrialized, but you got a little history about the city. Later in the evening we drove to the Mega Cavern to see the Christmas lights. The Mega Cavern is a man made cavern that was created by a massive limestone quarry. Now its used as a storage facility, adventure park and during the holidays, a light display.

The next day we headed to the Louisville Slugger factory and museum. As an engineer its always fun to see how things are made and we all really enjoyed the entire facility. After that it was off to the races at Chuchill Downs! I had never been to a race track before and I have to say it was pretty fun! My mother-in-law and I took Alana into the Kentucky Derby museum and the guys started to place their bets. I wasn't a fan of the mint julips but it was super fun to place bets and win a little.   

Saturday we were back on the road headed north. It was a short trip but it was fun! Before we had kids we would travel over Thanksgiving every year, hitting up Key West and Hawaii twice. And after doing it again in 2017 we remembered how much we enjoyed it.

Is there a holiday you like to get away for? 

Nashville + 13.1 Miles

WOW! It’s been a long time since I have been on this little blog of mine! I feel like every time I get on here I say that because I don’t post often anymore. I would really like to change that and maybe start posting once a week to keep those of you who read updated on whats going on in Wisconsin. 

I recently got back from a girls trip to Nashville where I participated and completed my first half marathon. I did not get the time I wanted (9 fucking minutes slower) but I completed it and didn’t die (well maybe I almost did). But it wasn’t hard enough to keep me from wanting to do a destination race once a year.

So…Nashville… It’s always been on my list (because everywhere is on my list) but it’s never been high enough up on my list to really make me want to go. Except maybe when I was 18 and tried and failed to get my parents to take me to CMT Fest. So, when some of my MRTT (Mom’s Run This Town) ladies suggested doing a race I immediately thought of Nashville’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series. The planning commenced and before we knew it we had all registered and booked the hotel.

We decided to drive because a 10 hour road trip without kids is very doable. We arrived around 6pm and even though we had been up since 4:30am we rallied, cleaned up and hit the honky tonks of Broadway! We hit up Tin Roof and Nudies Bar. Both were good but I liked Nudies better; they had this awesome peach drink. It seems Nashville is similar to the French Quarter in New Orleans, people are partying ALL THE TIME! Seriously, these bars were busy from 10am to 3am! We finally headed back to the hotel around 11 or midnight (remember, we had been up since 4:30am!).

Nashville Night Life, Drive, MRTT Shoe Pic, Grand Ol' Opry, Night Out on the Town

The next day was the day before the race so we woke up and went for a 3 mile run and I could tell from this run that the half was going to be hard. But after we freshened up we headed out to see the outside of the Grand Ol Opry (sorry, not paying $27 to see some dressing rooms and maybe stand on the stage) and then we headed to a mall to shop for some cute southern clothes for our daughters. After all that was done we ate a dinner of brick baked pizza from The Stillery. The pizza was very good but get there early to get your name on the list!

The next morning was race day! We crossed the start line around 7:30am and it took us just over 2 hours and 30 minutes to complete. I really needed a lot of time to come down from the race that was 40 degrees hotter than what we trained and had much more elevation than what we trained on. Once we got back to our hotel rooms to shower and change we decided to head out to visit Five Daughters Bakery and Reese Witherspoon’s shop Draper James. The doughnuts were delicious and Draper James was having a huge sale that I took advantage of! We then headed back to the hotel to walk to an early dinner at martin’s BBQ. I am glad we went early (like 4:15pm y’all) because the line was already out the door! Luckily the rooftop bar had seating and we were able to get our drinks and food fairly quickly. We didn’t stay out too long after that because we had our 10 hour drive back to Wisconsin the next day.

We woke up and headed out the next morning. Stopping at Mammoth Cave National Park (gotta check that shit off the bucket list). We did not get to go into the cave because there wasn’t a tour at that time but we took a 2 mile hike around the park for a MRTT monthly contest. And when we finally rolled up my house and I got all my bag inside around 6:15pm. I unpacked and then tried to get my daughter ready for bed…over the weekend she became very clingy to daddy, so I was told to, “go away, I don’t love you! I want daddy!” Aww, gee thanks kid, I missed you too… can I just go back out of town?!

Post Race Activities

Have you ever been to Nashville? What did you like about it?

Day Trip to Door County

Over Labor Day weekend we took a day trip to Door County, Wisconsin. Door County is the peninsula that jets out into Lake Michigan. Its full for small harbor towns that seem to be stuck in time. My favorite was the Swedish Restaurant that had a grass roof, in classic Scandinavian style, that had goats on top to "trim" the grass!

{Al Johnsons Swedish Restaurant}

We decided to go all the way to the tip of the peninsula and take the ferry to Washington Island. The ferry ride is short one, never more than 30 minutes. Once on the island we hopped on the Cherry Train. Its really a few trolley cars attached to a truck and it drove us around the island giving us a little bit of history and making a few stops along the way.

We stopped at the island's Art & Nature Center, Schoolhouse Beach Park, their Wisconsin Farm museum, and the Nordic Church. The island is FULL of other things to do such as their lavender farms and little tourists shops.

{Schoolhouse Beach, Washington Island}

We would LOVE to go back and take some bikes and bike around the island and/or take some camping gear up there for a weekend!

Hope y'all are having an amazing week!!

Toddler Road Trip Essentials

There were a few products I wanted on hand for our cross country road trip and temporary living.

First there are the diaper bag essentials of disposable bibs and placemats.

Then we purchased a ez pz suction plate, a Go Anywhere Booster Seat and I cleared an old iPhone downloaded with Fisher Price apps for those moments when nothing else would calm her. And of course a Pack-n-Play.

I love the ez pz plate, it just sticks to a flat, even surface and your kid doesn't pull the plate up and throw their food all over the place!

The travel booster seat came in SO handy when we were staying at the in-laws and its great in our extended stay hotel.

I love the Fisher Price apps because I know they are geared towards kids her age and she loves the music and tries to sing along :)

The Pack-n-Play is good but for her it doesn't compare to her crib, she misses her mattress. I even bought a foam insert for the Pack-n-Play and that didn't work either. So we have begun to let her sleep on the bed and we have bought a bed rail so she doesn't fly off the bed.

What travel essentials have you found that work great for you?!

Thirteen Hundred

1,300 miles was just about the ground I covered on my drive from Texas to Wisconsin with a 15 month old. Luckily I had my dad along for the ride to help.

We made 2 over night stops along the way; one in Arkansas to visit with my in-laws and then one in Springfield, IL.

Our visit is Arkansas was great, we actually stayed two nights just to relax a little before the long next 2 days. Alana got to hang out with her grandparents in the country and my dad got to see my in-laws place (after 6 years of being family).

Then, the next leg of our trip was from AR to Springfield, IL. We drove through St. Louis and got to see the Gateway Arch. We didn't stop because we really just needed to push through and be on our way. We made it to Springfield, unpacked the car, ate dinner and called it a night.

The next morning we only had about 5.5 hours of driving so it was the shortest of the 3 driving days. Driving cross-country with a 15 month old is no easy task. She was well behaved for about 3/4 of each day. She could have taken about an hour less of driving a day.

But the important thing is - we made it!