Turkey Day Camping Adventure

HOLLLAAAAAA.

This post will be all about the adventures of Amanda and Marissa at the Grand Canyon. For Turkey Day!!

We came, we saw, we froze to death.

So, let me back up a bit. Why the FERK did we decide to go camping for Thanksgiving? Well, we figured it was a nice, long weekend and it's so close, Why not?! Plus we could swing by the family we used to babysit for, who moved to Arizona, on the way. WINWIN. My parents weren't too happy that we ditched them buttttt they got over it. Yolo mom, yolo...

THE PREPARATION 

As one might recall from my previous post, Amanda likes to plan...

Ohhh and this doesn't even include all the handwritten food lists we had.

I drove down a couple of days early so I could do the last minute shopping. We thought it would be difficult to prepare a Thanksgiving meal by campfire, so we decided to prep and bring one with us! The day before we left, I spent hours slaving away in the kitchen whipping mashed potatoes, preparing brussel sprouts and roasting a turkey.

THE DESCENT INTO THE DESERT

The majority of the road trip to Arizona I spent asleep. I was catching Zzzz's while Amanda did most of the driving. And by most I mean all of it. But it's ok because I drove the whole way back. Oh fun fact. When you are figuring out how long it will take to get somewhere make sure you take into account a time change if there is one. And going to Arizona, unbeknownst to us, THERE IS ONE. Which means you will arrive at your destination an hour later than originally planned. 

Since it was sorta on the way, we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to visit a family we used to babysit for - it had been two years since we last saw them. We ended up arriving an hour late to the Corely's house (damn time change) and unfortunately it meant we had an hour less time with the kids. It was fun seeing them all again after they MOVED AWAY AND ABANDONED US. It was great being able to catch up and play with the kids. After a fantastic game of hide and seek and a trip to the park, Amanda and I had to give our hugs (with some extra hugs, and someone even snuck in a piggy back ride from each of us) and then we set off for the Grand Canyon.

Dawww. The little munchkins (baby not pictured)

We still had three more hours until we reached the campsite and we were already prettttyyyy worn out from the kids, so we had to sing show tunes to stay awake.

We arrived at Mather Campground after the sun went down so we had to set up in the dark. We left the headlights on so it wasn't bad at all. JUST FRICKEN COLD. That night, we put on 3 pairs of pants, 4 sweatshirts and bundled up for bed. Periodically throughout the night, Amanda stuck her finger under my nose to see if I was still breathing. I guess she was having dreams I was dead and I didn't move all night, so she wanted to make sure I didn't freeze to death. How thoughtful.

THE CAMPSITE

Ok I won't bore you with my ramblings. Here are a bunch of photos.

Our tent. The rocks we used for decor purposes. 

MMMMMBACON

Just hanging out

Even though we each had our own hammock, Amanda had to bother me in mine.😒 

CORNHOLE

And I won, obviously. 

Cards. Amanda won... 😒

Wild nature animals and stuff

We spent most of the day hanging out and playing games. And eating. Lots of eating.

Oh man. That egg mess thooooo

Chef Amanda. But just remember I did all the hard prep work already. 

OH SHIT. THOSE SPROUTS. YAS GIRL YAS.

I highly recommend fire roasted sprouts when camping. It was the most magically delicious part of the trip.

Our Thanksgiving Dinner. Sprouts, Cranberry Sauce, Green Beans, Rolls, Mashed Potatoes and Turkey. And lots of wine.

Yes, I added some fancy table decorations I found on the ground. It was a fantastic meal. I highly suggest making a thanksgiving meal next time you go camping. 

THE GRANDEST CANYON OF THEM ALL

Ok enough about the campsite and food. Time for the Grand Canyon!!

Our campsite was about half a mile from the South Rim. We went to a few different lookouts along the South side. The lookouts were about 0.5 miles from the campsite. Even though we could have walked... we drove. It was cold ok!! I think we spent more time circling the tiny parking lots looking for a spot than we did looking at the Canyon. Even though we went during the off season, it was still busy and parking was horrible. If you are planning a trip, keep that in mind, and get there early.  On our last day, we woke up extra early to catch the sunrise before we took off. It was worth it. (Plenty of parking spots before sunrise.)

Look at the majestic bird flying over us 

And that was it! I drove us back to LA and the next day I embarked back home in the holiday traffic. Side note: I wish the 5, between the Grapevine and Sacramento, was the autobahn. Get your damn mini van going 55 mph OUT OF MY WAY.

Overall it was a fun, but freezing trip. Highly recommend going and camping. I also highly recommend camping with Amanda and I because we are so much fun. 

Alright. The End. Catch ya next time.

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Humahumanukanukaapuaa

Aloha,

So after traveling all around Europe, I seem to have been bit by the travel bug. Amanda asked if I would be down to go to Hawaii and I said HELL YA.

Traveling with Amanda and Erin is much different than traveling with my Europe friends. Everything I did abroad was pretty much last minute or like let's go to this city andddd we will figure out the rest when we get there. 

Oh no. That's not the way these two OCD girls roll. We had excel sheets and plans out the wahoo. 

But in the words of Amanda, " If you are going to do it you might as well do it right."

Also, If anyone wants the PDF version of these feel free to call Amanda for it.

She even packed me some snacks for the plane ride. Basically all I did was show up. 

SOOOOOOOOO 

After our 5 hour flight, we did what we do best... we went to Taco Bell... 

Once we checked into our hotel we were ready to PAAAAAAAARTAYYYYY. 

But we were still on CA time so we went to bed at 8. 

Day One
Fourth of July! 

We woke up and had a nice 7am sunrise yoga session (a free hotel activity) out on the back lawn by the beach. Our yoga instructor/ part time concierge was dressed in head to toe Lululemon and took his yoga very seriously. The picture below was taken right before he asked Erin if she was in a working pose or a resting pose. She was like BITCH I'M IN A VACATION POSE. He clearly wanted us to work hard. But we were more like we did this for the insta, sir. #yogaonthebeach #hawaiianwarriorpose #namaste

After our yoga class we explored the cute little town of Kapa'a down the street from our hotel. It had a bunch of cute shops and restaurants. 

We spent the rest of the day chillin' out, maxin', relaxin' all cool and getting drunk layin' out by the pool.

Day Two

Barf Boat

If you memorized the schedule posted above, you would know that on Tuesday we went on a 7 hour snorkeling tour. Now for those of you who have been on a snorkeling boat tour you are aware that it isn't a yacht ride. Erin, however, did not. She expected a nice, relaxing yacht ride while drinking champagne in a big floppy hat.

After the 7 hour tour, Erin described it as more of 7 hours of Coast Guard training.

The boat left from the southwest side of the Island at 7am and headed for the north Napali coast. During the ride to the coast they served us breakfast. It was great. It was just hard to drink coffee out of a mug while traveling at 30 knots.

 It's so prettaaaayyyyyyy

Please take note of Erin's waterproof outfit. She didn't want to get wet...

You can see a little boat back in the cave.

After the cruise of the North coast, we boated over to the island of Niihau to snorkel. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of us snorkeling. The coolest thing we saw underwater was a seal! It was pretty rad. We also saw dolphins, turtles, a mermaid and lots of tropical fish. 

After serving us lunch, we headed back towards the mainland and that's when the captain announced that everyone should use the restroom and find a comfy seat because the ride back might be rough. And rough it was. I decided now would be a good time to feed the fishes. The AMAZING staff of this tour were at my side with barf buckets and ice chips. Little do they know I am an expert vomiter. But getting sea sick, while having sea mist blown at your face and flying off your seat as the captain went FLYING over waves, was not enjoyable at all.

Erin and Amanda spent the ride back pep talking to themselves saying you're ok, don't get sick, you can do this, don't vom. And luckily they didn't.

All in all, we liked the tour and the staff. However, we wish that the boat didn't travel so fast causing half the boat to hurl. It really felt like coast guard training. 

In the evening we enjoyed a nice hula show and free mai tais at our hotel.

Day Three
Beach of Death

On Wednesday we were all fired up and ready for a day of adventure.

Introducing Erin, for Target.

We rented bikes and went biking through a jungle to a waterfall. The guy we rented bikes from warned us that it was going to be preeeettttyyyy muddy. And we were like shhh we're adventurous, we can handle it.

The guy insisted on taking a "before" picture of our clean bikes and bodies. 

And we took off! And then we stopped about 3 minutes later to take pictures.

           

ANDDDD they still got it!

YAY Adventure

Enjoy all these neat nature photos. Nature is Neat. NEATURE!

LOOK AT ALL THAT MUD.

It's like, Jungle Narnia

Mango Trees

Wild horses. Or someone's pet. idk

And then we parked our bikes and walked to the waterfall!

This bridge was perfect for a photoshoot

Had a rope swing and swimming hole too

Gettin' all zen before our bike ride back

On the ride back Amanda and I were already pretty muddy so we just embraced it and went as fast as we could through all the puddles. While Erin, still all clean, biked everrrr sooooo carefully back. In the end, Amanda and I ended up looking like this...

#nerdshoes

Some crazy local cut open a coconut for us to try. It wasn't as good as Whole Foods.

I would like to take this moment to point out my shoes in the picture above. Amanda's too. These are straight up nerd shoes. BUT they were amazing. I highly recommend these shoes for Hawaii. They are perfect for the wet, muddy terrain. We both got ours from Amazon because that's where they were the cheapest. I got the mint/grey ones because I wanted the #chic ones. But fun fact, once they are muddy you can't tell the colors. Amanda got the ones with the velcro back instead of the slip on. Velcro!! How nerdy. And Erin, being Erin, thought the Keen's were too nerdy so she got just a cheap pair of waterproof shoes. Which by the way she had to throw away because they are ruined. Our keens however are still in tip top shape.

Ok back to my story.

The bike shop owner told us that there was a secret beach down the street we could drive to and rinse off.

You think this is where our adventurous day ended??? WRONGOOOOOOO

I don't have many pictures of the last half of our day because I thought I was going to die. So I'll just have to explain it. This "secret beach" was on many blogs that I read and it said, "The hike down is a little tough but the beach is worth it." A LITTLE TOUGH??? It was a straight up vertical slip and slide!! More like a SLIP AND DIE! We had to remove our shoes, my beloved keen shoes that were made for this type of terrain, mind you, so we could dig our toes into the muck to try to find any sort of grip. It was like walking on snot. I made the mistake of starting the death hike with a pineapple frosty in my hand. I immediately fell and slid a good 5 feet on my ass. I saved my frosty though so that was the good news. The bad news was that we were supposed to be hiking to this beach to RINSE OFF. I was now COVERED in even more mud.

These pictures don't do it justice

Amanda fell right after I took this picture

After I fell, Erin was like AHHHH HELL NAHHH. She turned around and went back to the car. BYE!

Amanda and I continued down to the beach as we were slipping and sliding around grabbing onto whatever branches and shrubbery along the path that would aid us. We passed a couple people going the other way telling us words of encouragement and giving us "it's worth it" speeches. Like oookaaaayy.

AND THEN WE MADE IT!!!! ALIVE!!

It really was worth it.

We pretty much had this entire secret beach to ourselves. Eventually Erin, feeling left out, made her way down too. And let me tell ya, she was deffffff not happy about the hike of death. I feel like Kim K gifs best explain her opinion of the hike.

After our crazy biking trip and hike of death we figured tonight was the night for some frickin hula pie and a few drinks.

       

Emphasis on the HULA pie.

Day Four

Embrace the Mud

The fun continues.

On Thursday we signed up for a kayak/ hiking trip to a secret waterfall. As long as it wasn't a secret beach... we were chillen. #toosoon

Our tour guide was pretty funny and entertaining. It was another muddy hike (sigh) to the waterfall but he taught us how to properly walk in the mud. 

Lesson 1: Step in flat spots and holes

Lesson 2: Most flat spots are at the bottom of a puddle, so step in puddles

Lesson 3: Embrace the mud

And guess what? We embraced it. AND NO ONE FELL!

#embracethemud

I was the only one who swam.

Just like the day before, we tried to squeeze as many activities into one day as possible. After our kayak tour we stopped for a quick shaved ice and headed up to Queen's Bath.

I think Queen's Bath was one of my favorite locations. The hike down was easypeasylemonsqueezy because by this point we were pros at hiking in the mud. We were like step aside you slow tourists. We know what we are doing. FLAT SPOTS AND HOLES BITCH!!

It was so refreshing and nice. I could have stayed there forever. But a crab pinched Erin's behind and she freaked out so we left. It was hilarious.

We passed a scenic overlook on the drive home. 

Day Five

Hobo Shower

Our last day WAHHHHHHH.

We wanted to have a nice, relaxing last day at the beach. I really wanted to snorkel. I had bought a snorkel from target and hauled it to hawaii and gosh darn it I wanted to use it!!

But first, coffee.

And what better place to get coffee than at the Kauai Coffee Plantation???

They told us how many acres of coffee trees there were but I was too hopped up on caffeine to remember.

Coffee beans. Didn't know they looked like that!

This is how big the beans get if you leave them unpicked!!! WTF!!!

The plantation was great. The free samples were greater.

Off to the beach!

I was finally able to snorkel. It was pretty sweet. Once I got out of the water, I didn't realize that it was super windy and Amanda and Erin were getting sand blasted up on the beach. It was painful instead of relaxing sooooo we decided to relocate back to the hotel pool. Since we had a night flight we figured we could finish off the afternoon lounging by the pool with a few drinks.

After our pool day, we had already checked out of our room that morning (we couldn't do a late checkout) so we basically had to take a hobo shower using the outside pool showers. You know the ones you rinse off in? Ya we pretty much shampooed and all outside in our bathing suits. We were smart and stole the mini toiletries from the hotel that morning in preparation for our hobo shower that afternoon. Hey girls gotta do what a girls gotta do so we weren't all sandy and gross on the plane.

Sadly, we grabbed our last meal and headed to the airport. I wasn't ready to leave! I had embraced my inner aloha. 

We landed at LAX at 5am tired and hangry. Ubered home, went to bed and slept the rest of the morning.

All in all we had a FABBBB time. We had great adventures, experiences and food.

So in conclusion, these are my tips to anyone who wants to go to Hawaii: invest in Keens! The ugliest shoe in the world? YES ( sorry Uncle Jeff. I know this is your daily shoe of choice). BUT THE BEST FOR HAWAII. Mud, rain, water, sand, rocks, dirt, you name it! They can do it. Yes you will look nerdy. But if you want to embrace the mud, you need to embrace the nerd. Secondly, make an Excel sheet with all your activities and food recommendations. Or have someone else you are traveling with do it for you, like I did. Lastly, eat as much fresh fish, poke, acai bowls, fruit, shaved ice and hula pie as you possibly can.

I'll be posting a secondary blog to this, eventually, that will have a list and links to all the places we visited and the restaurants we went to. That way you or I can reference it in the future.

So what now?

I'm now back home in good ol' Shangle Sprangs. 

The good news? I'm no longer unemployed!!! 

I am a Design Assistant at a small start up sign design company in El Dorado Hills. I'm working part time for now. I only started this past week so it's all still new and I don't have much to say about it. I'm pretty much just learning the software right now.

The bad news? Part time= living at home.

Here's to praying that I will be full time soon. In the mean time I will enjoy the free rent, food and laundry.

Mahalo.  

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