Trip to Seattle

Two factors caused this trip to happen:

1. Adi's daycare was closed on June 12 for staff development day
2. It had been a couple of years since we visited Seattle, and our friends out there

We flew on June 11 with free tickets thanks to frequent flyer miles. The flight was delayed for a couple of hours, and instead of reaching at 10 pm, we reached around 12 midnight. After all the renting and collecting baggage, we reached Vivek's place at 2 am. I had thought Adi would follow his regular schedule of sleeping at 9 pm, but he was all excited at 2 am to see new people and would not go to sleep, until we did at 3 am.

Next day we went to Snoqualmie falls. The falls had plenty of water and was fun to b We spent the evening at Kirkland waterfront and waverly beach park with Arpit, and headed to their home thereafter. Adi had an adrenaline rush seeing new people and had a lot of fun. Watching Ariv and Adi play with each other was also interesting.

On June 13, we went to Discovery Park. We packed a bunch of food and played frisbee and did some hoops. Adi and Ariv enjoyed the tot lots. In the night, we chatted and played Modern Art till around 4 am.

It was time to fly back on June 14, but we had lunch with a Gaurav and bunch of our juniors at Inchin Bamboo Garden. It was a fun trip and good to meet up with friends and Adi thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it.

Seattle.. yet again.

I visited Seattle after 3 years to meet my NCSU roomies and school buddies. The group came around full circle with our better halves! I always like to goto Seattle for its scenic beauty. Anu likes cloudy skies(spoiled by the California sunshine I think) and I love the greenery.

The inbound flight was late. We spent a bunch of time playing UNO at the airport. We were flying in on a Thursday to make the most of the trip. Both Arpit and Vivek came to pick us up at the airport. The next day, I worked from the Seattle office and we met up for dinner in the evening at Inchin's bamboo garden. Its the best Indian Chinese I have experienced in the USA with all the dishes catering very well to the Indian palate. Kalmady joined us for dinner, coffee and the San Juan trip. Ravi met us for dinner too.

On Saturday, we went to San Juan Island from Anacortes by ferry. The whale watching trip was a lot of fun. I enjoyed it more for the rain and sea than watching the actual whales. The return was eventful. Arpit's car had a problem that it wouldnt open up. Meanwhile Anu and Shweta taught the owner of an Espresso coffee shop how to make Pav Bhaji. Finally AAA helped us out and we were on our way back.

We met a bunch of old friends from VJTI on Sunday, just reliving the nostalgic days. Quite a population of VJTI'ites, NCSU alumni and HMPS alumni is in Seattle. We stayed at Arpit's house which is really well decorated/furnished/painted.

Arpit, Komal, Vivek, Reshma and Kalmady were at the airport to say goodbye. Now thats what I call royal treatment.

Christmas Trip to Tahoe

We had a group of 10 ppl going to Tahoe for snowsports. We went to south lake tahoe and stayed in this nice 3 bedroom house we rented for 3 days. We went to Heavenly to ski for the first day, and 6 of us were taking lessons as they were first time skiers/snowboarders. Anu and I went skiing and joined the beginners around 2 pm. We took them to the mountain and gave them some tips. Everyone really enjoyed their first day.

Next day, we went to snowshoeing while some of the first timers went for the snowsports again. We went to Kirkwood for snoeshoeing, and I really liked the trail. We made golas out of Gatorade and well, snow and went up to neat creek.

The next day, we had lunch and came back to San Jose. Anu discovered the hot tub on the last day and we made the most of it!

4th July Weekend to Yellowstone NP

Anu, Me, Karan, Nimish, Vivek and Reshma decided to meet up for the 4th July weekend and goto Yellowstone NP.

We decided to stay at a different place every night to make sure that we cover both the loops, and our hope was to catch some animals (ppl were most excited about viewing a bear). We did see bear, deers and bison. We rented a minivan with DVD player, which turned out to be really handy.

We went on this wonderful trail and it started raining followed by hail towards the end of the trail. I havent seen icy rain/hail many times and I was really excited despite all the hurt due to the hailstones.

P.S. This post needs more flesh, and since I did not blog this trip right after we went, I have forgotten a lot of it.

Trip to LA and San Diego

Friends met up and made a trip to LA-SD. We went to San Diego zoo and beach. We also went to Universal Studios, City Walk, and Santa Monica beach. We ate at Monsoon in San Diego which has very spicy food.

Seattle, Mt Rainier- May 2004

We went to Mt Rainier, and ate at a nice cabin just below base camp. Its pretty beautiful out there. We also went to the Kirkland waterfront, and its pretty neat too. I just love the greenery in Seattle (reminds me of North Carolina), which is not to be found here. That said, I hate the speed limits, and the need to follow them :). I did not experience any rain, so I can't complain about that.

Lonavla - Impromptu trip

Monsoon of 2000 I think.
Decided in the morning, with Vivek, Furkan and Niraj.
Very memorable, lashing rains.. went to Walvhan, Bushi dam.

Wangni - 2000

Pretty much impromptu.. pretty good though, as far as I remember.

Goa - 2000

This was a trip I made with school friends. A bunch of us decided to goto Goa.
Its a 16 hour bus drive to Goa. We stayed at a house owned by Mayuresh's relative, I think. We went to Calangute beach and lit a campfire. Drunk locals came screaming after us and beat us when we lit a campfire on the beach. I think a couple of us got a whacking. We also played cricket amongst coconut trees. Fun times.