MT's Travel Notes

Our footsteps around the world …

Mammoth Lakes Trip

Written By: moonie - Oct• 14•16

Fri Oct 14, 2016 – Mon Oct 17, 2016

Our first trip to find the autumn leaves since our now 3-year old boy William was born.

The weather forecast said the storm was coming to Mammoth Lakes on late Friday till Monday.  All we could do was to hope that the forecast would change.

We stayed at the Juniper Spring Resort, which is only a few minutes drive from the Mammoth Lake downtown.

We left our house around 8:30 AM; Our first stop on the way to Mammoth Lakes was Thien Vien Chan Nguyen (thienvienchannguyen.net, 20635 US-395, Adelanto, CA 92302), which is about 3 hours driving from Orange County.  The place is beautiful and quiet because there were only a few ladies who were kneeling and praying in front of those huge Buddha statues.

William loved it here; he ran around so fast that I had a hard time catching up.  Luckily the place is big and clean. We let William had lunch here because it was about 12pm.    After his lunch, we continued our little road trip.   After drinking his milk, he felt asleep very easily.

There was no traffic at all so by the time we got to Bishop it was about 4 PM.  Still a little bit early so we decided to check out the autumn leaves at the Rock Creek Canyon.  It was passed peak but there were still few places the leaves were still good with beautiful yellow color.  It was so windy though; so we took only a few pictures then continued our way to Mammoth Lakes which is about 40 minute more driving.

When we got to the hotel, the wind was stronger and it was so cold.  Looked like the rain had just stopped because the road were all wet.  Check-in was easy; we got the room in a different building than the main building which is in the back.   We had a little trouble with opening the parking garage gate.  Put in the room key but the door would not open.  I called the hotel for help, they said they’d come down but lucky for us someone was on their way out of the garage so the gate opened. So we sneaked in :).

The room was nice with a beautiful view of the mountain.  William loved the new place: he ran around touching this & that.  After a long driving trip I thought he would be tired but obviously he was not.

Posted in Bishop, California, Convict Lakes, June Lake, Mammoth Lakes, United States | No Comments »

Civil War Reenactment 2016

Written By: moonie - Sep• 03•16

civilwar

Beautiful day at the Central Library in Huntington Beach.  We met my family at the park and had lunch together. The kids didn’t like the sounds of the cannons though.

civilwar2 civilwar3 civilwar4

Posted in California, Huntington Beach, United States | No Comments »

Puerto Vallarta

Written By: moonie - May• 29•16

May 29, 2016 –  Jun 5, 2016

Another deal from AppleVacations.com, $800/pp for a 7 nights all-inclusive in Puerto Vallata; plus $200 discount per booking so total cost for two adults and one 2-year-old child is $1,545.00 which I think is a pretty good deal considering free round trip airport transfer (30 minutes driving from airport to the hotel)

The Grand Palladium Vallarta Resort is about 45 minutes driving from the PV downtown; it’s easy & cheap to take the bus to get to the downtown from the hotel; but if you rather take taxi, it’d cost about 420 pesos and up ( this is the price from the hotel but from downtown the taxi driver may ask for more so be prepared to negotiate: I paid 450 pesos to get a taxi from downtown back to the hotel).

This hotel is isolated on the hills so there’s staircases everywhere (there’s no elevators or escalators): 30 steps to go down to the pool from my room; 15 steps to go up to the main buffet; more steps to get to the beach, etc. After the 1st day, my legs are tired of walking up the stairs or up hill!

The hotel has 3 pools but they’re rather small: family pool, kids pool with some slides and infinity pool for adults only.

The food at the main buffet El Bosque is OK: same thing everyday; mostly Mexican foods. However I like the foods from the El Portofino (Italian food) and Bamboo restaurant (Asian food). The steaks at the Ribs & More restaurant is bad: very dry. We especially enjoyed the view from the Viva Mexico restaurant which sits on the high hill that we can see the beach below. Sitting outside in a hot summer day and feel the breezy wind, eat Mexican food and listen to Mexican music is the best. Guacamole is prepared at out table; I had some tequila and Fajitas for dinner. To me the food at this restaurant is ok but the scenery is beautiful.

The drinks from the lobby bars are much better than from the pool & beach bars. The lobby bar is also the place I got the big box of milk almost every day for William to drink.

William was scared of the water for the first few day: he’d hold on to me all the time, he would not want to be in the pool unless I hold him and stand in the water with him. 2 days before we left he started to like the pool and would run the the pool to play by himself.

One thing that bothered me the most is the sale reps.  They were trying to have me sign up for their Travel Club. They would stand around on the main roads every morning to try to talk to you.  On our very first day, after check in,  the hotel desk told me to talk to this lady so that she could show us around.  I had no idea she’s the sale rep from Travel Club.  At first she did talk about the hotel map, where things are but then she went on and on about the benefits of the Travel Club.  My 2 year old boy was crying because he was tired and hungry after 3 hours flight.  I had to told her to cut it short, and finally she let us go.   Personally I don’t think it’s good time to convince people to buy  stuff when they’re tired!

Overall this hotel with natural settings is not as beautiful as the other ones that we stayed in Cancun but it’s a good place to relax.

Posted in Mexico, North America, Puerto Vallarta | No Comments »

Atlantis Paradise Island Resort, The Bahamas

Written By: moonie - Aug• 26•15

Aug 26, 2015 – Aug 30, 2015

More Photos of the Trip

The travelers are:
– Mom
– Chị Hương, anh Thân, Danny & Tracy
– Dương, Tim & William (1 year old)

We flew to the Atlantis resort from Miami, U.S.A on the Bahamas Air in the morning. We arrived to the Lynden Pindling International Airport after 1 hour; went thru the custom using the Self Check Kiosks.
To use the kiosk, we need to scan the passport and take the picture using its camera, then it’ll print out a confirmation paper which you will give it to the attendant standing on the exit door.
If necessary you’d need to adjust the camera so that it’ll take the picture of your face only, using the arrows on the screen. I did not know that so the first time it took a horrible picture of my face so I tried to retake the picture. Because of the 2nd try that it put a big red X on my print out. Whenever the attendant sees a big red X on the confirmation paper, they’d redirect to the custom booth; otherwise they’d let us exit which means we’re done with the customs.

Afer clearing the custom check, we had to go thru the luggages check. We brought some fruits from Miami; they took the fruits from us because they don’t allow bringing fruits into Bahamas. The machine did not detect the fruits; they found out only when they randomly asked us to open the big carton box where we put some fruits. I put some more fruits in other suitcases also but they didn’t ask to open them so we got to keep these. So it’s just a matter of luck.

Upon exit the airport door, we waved for the taxi; it was raining really hard! To my surprise, the taxi fare for 7 people cost only $60 total (the shuttle from Atlantis resort costs $33.00/pp round trip). It’d take around only 15 minutes driving from the airport to the Atlantis resort.

The check-in process was very easy, the staff was super friendly, they let us check in early.

The resort was so crowded with tourists; and this time of the year is the storm season!

First impression: the resort is so beautiful and huge!

Posted in North America, The Bahamas , , , , , | No Comments »

Miami, Florida

Written By: moonie - Aug• 21•15

Aug 21 – Aug 26, 2015

More Photos of the Trip

This is the beginning of our Florida-Bahamas trip: we stayed in Miami for the first 5 days then flew to the Bahamas and stayed there for the next 4 days.

In Miami, we stayed at the beach front Alexander Resort Hotel (5225 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach, FL 33140, Unit 1109) which is only 10 minutes drive to the South Beach with the price of $1,234.00 (Rental $1,000 + Cleaning fee $175 + Property Damage Protection $59).

It’s a nice suite with 2 rooms and a full kitchen.  1 room has a bunk bed and a twin bed, where Danny, Tim, me and William who was 2 years old stayed in.  Another room has 2 queen beds where Than, Huong, Tracy and Grandma stayed.  Both have private bathrooms.  There’s a small living room area which has a couch; and small dining area which has a table with 8 chairs. There’s also a small TV in the living room.

I booked the hotel from VRBO, a week before our arrival date, the owner (who owns several suites at this resort) sent us the Mobile invitation code which to be used in the VRBO mobile app, that has all the information that we need regarding accessing the suite.

There’s a Walmart near the Miami airport; and a Target is only 5 minutes drive from the hotel; where we bought most of our foods for the next few days. We also went to FoodTown Supermarket (6431 Stirling Rd, Davie, FL 33314) where they have all the Vietnamese stuffs and fresh seafood.  Next to FoodTown is Pho 79 which is really good, their Bun Bo Hue is good also.

We drove about 1 hour to visit a Vietnamese Fresh Fruit Farm Mai Trinh ( 27750 SW 177 Ave, Homestead, FL 33031
(305) 967-5621).  There were not that many fruits though; and the price is not cheaper than in Orange County; they’re just more fresh.  We bought some rambutans (Chôm chôm), longans (Nhản),  Custard Apple  (Mãng Cầu Na), mangosteen (Măng Cụt).  The owner said they import some fruits from Thailand. We bought some extra fruits to bring to Bahamas.

Another day we plant to visit Key West but we didn’t have enough time to get to the end; we stopped at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park for some Snorkeling and submarine to see the Molasses Reef but the sight is not that beautiful as in Cancun.

Posted in Florida, Miami, United States | No Comments »
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