Two More Days of Paradise

Things sure do move slowly down here, but the scenery, weather, and people are very friendly and wonderfully welcoming. Wednesday, after a slow start at the house, we headed down to the Tropicana for a really good lunch. They have something called the lava bowl which is something like our Fajita plates back in the States - down here, the lava bowl is just so much cooler. I will say one more thing about the Tropicana too - they have the best margaritas we have found so far. I don't want to say two of them is too many, but in fact two of them is one too many - but boy, are they smooth - imbiber beware.

On Thursday, LaDawn and I had a really nice walk around the neighborhood. I did my thing with the camera while LaDawn held the flash. We got some really great images which you can see in the slide show below. Yesterday evening we had a wonderful dinner at on of the locals favorite restaurants - Guacamaya's - real Mexican food that was delicious, and didn't break the bank either. Open the link and read down for a visiter's comments. We had dinner with a lovely woman, Elsa, who runs a Christian school for about 300 of the kids here in San Jose. With eight teachers and her assistant Debbie, they really have their hands full. That's Elsa's son Kiki in the slide show and arm wrestling Lindsay - LaDawn's daughter - in the slide show.

We finished the day strolling the Art Walk - there were some pretty cool objects d'Arte on display in the galleries. It was a nice way to wrap the day. Friday, we are heading into Cabo San Lucas for lunch at "The Office" and a sight seeing day in the big city. I'll give you wrap up on that over the weekend as we head out early on Saturday and get into Cincy kind of late that evening. Until then, Adios! Dave and LaDawn

Monday and Tuesday

Not much stuff going on for the first of days down here - I think everybody was just "vegging out".  Anyway the break is well needed.  The funny thing is that we spent a good part of yesterday shopping for goodies down here.  Let's see, we hit Costco, Sam's - yep they are all down here.  We also hit Mega - the grocery store with a view.  Monday was off to a slow start too, but we ended up at Sunset Mona Lisa - the best place to watch a sunset in Cabo. 

Tuesday we headed of to the Hilton Hotel, best pool and beach in Cabo. The LaDawn, Lindsay, Sarah, and Kent headed for the spa and I hit the beach to get some photographs. WE were back to the house, relaxed with a glass of wine and hit the sack early.  Enjoy the slide show of the sites below.  Today we are going to explore the cool little town of San Jose - nice art community and good restaurants. That's it for today.  --Dave and LaDawn

Sunday Morning in Cabo - Good Morning Sunshine

Well, we are back on the ground safe and sound after our early morning flights yesterday via Chicago - the airport was even decorated for the holidays - then to Cabo San Lucas on good old American Airlines. The flight was uneventful, but the 3:30 a.m. early morning wake-up call was a "killer". I think I started coming awake about 10 in the morning - but heck we made it. Our friends and hosts for the week - Kent and Sarah Smith were delayed with bad weather going through Houston - Kent was calling the flight a free roller ride thanks to Continental Airlines.

So what do you do when you arrive in Cabo and your friends are 1-1/2 hours away from landing, well as they say, "When in Mexico...." - so had a Margarita at the local airport bar. Anyway, our friends came through the door about 2 p.m. - it was good to see them.

We headed for the taxis, loaded up and were on our way. Man, all we wanted to do was crash - seems all of us were working to hard the past week and we all needed a little R&R - what better place than Cabo.

After settling in, and a brief rest we were on our way. Kent and Sarah know this wonderful gallery owner - Dana Lieb, owner of Pez Gordo Art Gallery - who was having a showing of well known Mexican artist, Alejandro Martinez-Pena. You can check out his work right here. The work was amazing - my favorite was one of the most expensive pieces in the show - good taste I guess ;-) After the gallery visit, we headed to Local Eight for dinner. This is a wonderful little restaurant owned by a neighbor of Kent and Sarah's. Great meal as always, and who can forget the Calamari.

A good time was had by all - heck, we even tried some "Carrot Cake" lighting. You have to head over to DigitalProTalk.com right here for a description of the lighting technique. I showed Kent how it was done - check out my pic of Kent. Then he gave it a try with Sarah and got a very nice result because of some very nice backlighting. Oh-oh, am I talking photography here - slap my face - we are on vacation.

We wrapped up dinner, said good night to Marissimo, our server, and Jeff, the owner, made it back to our Cabo home for the week and hit the sack early. We are getting ready to head on out to a little Christian church Kent and Sarah are involved with so we will fill you in all the day's happenings tomorrow.

Have a good one, Dave and LaDawn from the road.

That's It for This Trip

We had a great time in Las Vegas - very busy, and a great time in NYC seeing some of the less touristy parts and just enjoying the more quiet parts of the city - Yes Virginia, there are quiet areas in the city.

Our next trip is to Florida to photography a 4 day wedding . We will be leaving around October 15th. And then, after that, on to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico for a little R&R.

See you then, Dave and LaDawn

A Quick Hit of Brooklyn Heights One More Time

Thursday in Brooklyn Heights and Broadway.

What a nice day today. It began with beautiful weather and a great visit to Brooklyn Heights, America's first suburb. Getting there was quite an experience, too. We decided to take the subway, and upon our getting settled in for a fairly short trip, 5 "performers" jumped on too and serenaded all the passengers with some great 5 part barbershop harmonies, asking for a little "support" for their services. They were pretty good, so we made the donation to the future performers of America fund.

What a wonderful little detour from the hustle and bustle of the big city. Quiet streets, nice restaurants, and great views of the Financial District of New York City from the Promenade. We just relaxed here for a few hours before heading back to our hotel. Check out some of the images in the slide show below.


After getting back to the hotel, we changed for dinner and headed off to Trattoria dell' Arte for a wonderful Italian dinner. Turns out we were seated in the booth seat John Travolta was recently in. David Letterman and Paul Shafer, we find out, are also frequent guests. This was one of our best dining experiences for the week.

After dinner we headed over to see "Hairspray" at the Neil Simon theater. WOW! What a show! This is one not to be missed if you ever make it up to the city. It was truly a non stop performance. Great songs, great staging, terrific cast. Hey, a play that wins 8 Tonys has to be one of the "must sees" when you hit the big Apple. Here is a clip of one of the performances from the today Show.

LaDawn's daughter, Lindsay, had suggested we check out P.J. Clark's Bar on 3rd and 55th Street. We grabbed a bicycle surrey ride to travel the 7 or 8 blocks only to find upon arrival the place was jam packed. Standing room even spilling out onto the sidewalks. Looks like a fun location that we will check-out our next visit to New York City.

That's about it everyone. We will recap over the weekend. We are heading back to Cincy in a few hours. Got to get the bags packed. --Dave and LaDawn

A Walk in the Park - Central Park

We started out at 57th and ended up at 97th and then back again. Add to that a few more blocks back and forth and an additional 10 block walk to the theater later that eveningt evening and you can be sure... "my dogs were barking." - about 120 blocks in all. OK, so stop griping you say, you're right, because what a great what walk is was. We covered just about all of Central Park. I personally had only seen small pieces of the park in years past and LaDawn, only slightly more. But today, we took it all in.

There is only one way to describe the Central Park experience. It is a wonderful island of beauty and tranquility in the middle of one of the busiest cities in the world. But once inside the park, the entire city drifted away - no horns, sirens, no road noise in general. Just a slight breeze, kids running, playing and laughing, people walking their dogs, reading, skating, biking - or just relaxing. Can New York City and "relaxing" exist in the same sentence? In Central Park - an emphatic Yes! All the park info is right here.

The park is big which makes for all kind of activities going on - including softball, soccer, carousels, amusement parks, row boating, hiking, biking, jogging, picnicking, gift shops - the list continues to go on. The weather was a perfect 75 degrees with white clouds and blue skies - A Perfect Day! Check out the slide show which shows the many face of the park. Enjoy!



We wrapped the day by seeing "Legally Blond" - the movie made play. Great light entertainment with some wonderful singing voices and a fun story. Sorry no pics here but check out the play's website right here. That's it for today. We plan to head to Brooklyn Heights tomorrow.

See you then, --Dave and LaDawn

Tuesday in the City

This is suppose to be a week devoted to some R&R for David so again we are slow to get the day started.
Tuesday in New York City started with rain in the morning that decided to continue throughout the rest of the day. It stopped later in the afternoon .

All day you couldn't help but think back to six years ago and the terror our country felt on this day. From Kentucky we lived through 9-11 via TV. In New York City they lived the horror first hand. The memories still remain so raw and vivid in our lives. We feel the changes every time we board the airlines. May we never forget but learn to forgive!!

We have been blessed to have spent several vacations trips to the city and have already visited many of the “touristy” locations. On this visit we decided to check out some of the other areas of the city. So off we went cabbing it down to China Town. Even in the rain the streets were filled with visitors from around the world. The street fare atmosphere is fun. Very colorful with booth style store fronts filled with handbags, watches, scarves, jewelry, oriental fans……just to name a few items. Fresh fish stales fills the air with aromas that can’t be found anywhere else in the city.

From China Town.we walked through Little Italy. They are preparing for a large street fair this weekend so the streets were full of trucks and construction teams assembling booths for wonderful Italian dining treats.

From Little Italy we walked through several streets of Greenwich Village. The small little trendy shops and "free spirit" feel of the area transcends you back to the sixties only updated. We ended up taking in dinner at one of Dave's favorite Mexican restaurants, Panchitos. The rain had subsided to just an occasional sprinkle so we were able to enjoy our killer pitcher of Margaritas from the sidewalk seating area as we people watched. We had walked several miles and the much needed rest felt great.

We headed back to Mid Town and our hotel to veg-out in front of the TV before turning in. A nice easy day. Play the slide show to see a few of the sights. --LaDawn

Monday in NYC

We had another easy day today. After taking care of a few things back home we headed out to the Museum of Modern Art. Again, we were only blocks away. It looked a bit like rain so we ducked into a little gourmet shop that had all kinds of good things on the menu for lunch. We made a couple of quick choices, settled on a nice table outside, and watched the newly arrived rain splash the street. The rain quickly let up lowering the temperature to a very comfortable level, and we continued on to the MoMA.

This was the first time either LaDawn or I had been to this MoMA - and we are museum "nuts" to some extent. I had just read about this unbelievable exhibition by Richard Serra. He is a sculpture who works in really BIG spaces. This exhibit included pieces that weigh upwards of 200 Tons! Unbelievable! Check out the link here for his exhibition. This was the last day of the show so the link won't last long.

We continued visiting all the displays, but I was particularly fascinated by the work of photographer Josef Koudelka. Every one of his photo journalistic images was a beautiful study in composition. I plan to check out his books on Amazon.

That's about it for today. We walked the city a bit, and headed back. Enjoy the slide show of NYC and MoMA views below.

Sunday at St. Patrick's

We slept in a bit on Sunday morning and felt quite a bit more refreshed after our non stop stint in Las Vegas. We were only abut 6 blocks away from the world famous St. Patrick's Cathedral, so we headed there for Sunday services - what a magnificently beautiful church. The sanctuary was full as expected, but we found a seat, after a very long walk up the center aisle, in the fourth row. The singing was just beautiful, and the thunderous and beautiful sound of the pipe organ gave you "goose bumps" as you listened.

After leaving St. Pat's, we found a street fare just a block or two away. These are pretty popular in New York. You can find an amazing eclectic collection of goodies - from falafel to underwear - colors and delicious food smells everywhere.

Check out the slide show of our walk through the street fair. We didn't want to rush into our New York experience to quickly though, so we headed back to our hotel, caught up on about three days of emails, enjoyed a nice Chardonnay, and called it a day.

Across to Country to NYC

We were up way to early on Saturday - 4 A.M. - to catch the flight to New York. We had to fly through Cincinnati, Ohio - our home town - on the way east. The down side of the flight was that we had to take all our convention gear with us - and extra 3 bags at about 60 pounds each - whew! The good news - we got upgraded to first class - the only way to travel.

We arrived at our hotel - the Manhattan Club - about 7:30 P. M. The Manhattan Club is right around the corner from the world famous Carnegie Deli on 7th Avenue, named after Carnegie Hall which is also right across the street on 56th Street. We are right in the middle of everything. We had a great dinner at Red Eye Grill and then "hit the sack."

Off to Las Vegas

Yep, LaDawn and I are on the road again - this time to Las Vegas, NV for the huge Photoshop convention. We are two people who happen to love to visit the city though. It's not the bright lights, the whirlwind activity, the gambling - it's the great restaurants (yes, we are both motivated by food), wonderful shows, but most importantly, the majestic, beautiful quiet areas around the area.

That would include the Valley of Fire - our favorite; Mt. Charelston area - our second favorite, and many other beautiful sites that make for wonderful day trips.

This trip had no time for any such casual site-seeing pleasures. We hit the Luxor and it was non-stop till we left on Saturday. We did have a chance to catch up with our friend Kent Smith of Kent Smith Photography and also Jason and Julie, his assistants. We spent the last night in the city at one our favorite restaurants, Piero's - best Osso Bucca in the world.

Please head over to our sister blog Digital ProTalk and check last week's posts for more info and pics on our activities at Photoshop World.

Off to New York. --Dave and LaDawn

Final Thoughts on our Trip

Wow! What an experience! With 118,127 steps over 56 miles of exploring on foot, many more miles by car, and 4658 photographs later, we could reach one conclusion - the beauty of this country continued to amaze us. That includes the beautiful art we saw in the unbelievable museums, which in themselves are magnificent. Versailles still continues to astound us as we revisit the images from our tour. The beauty of Paris and then later the small towns of the Provence area just continued to take our breath away wherever we adventured. The architecture from hundreds and hundreds of years ago, the cobblestone roads and bridges, real wood shutters that they actually use, bikers, fields of lavender, vineyards for miles and miles, terracotta roof homes, window boxes everywhere, prams filled with children and dogs on leashes nearly everywhere you looked. Truly, it was a walk back through time.

LaDawn and I were constantly astounded as to how they even built these amazing palaces, churches, and towers – nearly everything we saw. The French live in their history – everyday!

The pace of the people is quite a bit slower than what we have in our go – go – go American lifestyle. I “swiped” my credit card into and out of a ticket machine for one of the tours – nothing happened – I did it again – nothing happened. Then the attendant said the Americans are always in a hurry – he showed us how, in a much less hurried manner, we could acquire the tickets. No wonder their heart disease rate is so much less than the Americans – it’s not just the wine, it’s the lack of stress too – something to be learned here. Being there makes you want to slow down a bit too – and “stop and smell the roses” now and then.

The main thing that struck LaDawn and I were the people themselves – how friendly, how helpful everyone was - how just plain nice they were – that included just about everyone we met. At one point while reading a map, we had a couple just walk up to us to volunteer help. Heck, even the language barrier was not a problem - we all just picked through the words we knew and eventually got the help we needed.

People have asked, “Why were you blogging on your vacation?” The main reason is this. Vacations are something we all enjoy, and we all enjoy sharing the stories when we get home. But sharing the stories day by day via our blog, along with the interesting links, was a way for us to relive the day and also a way for you, our family and friends, to journey with us. We hope you all enjoyed the trip.

Au Revoir, Dave and LaDawn

Heading Home

The alarm went off way too soon, but we were up and out the door in 45 minutes. We wanted to get to the train station early so we could drop the rental car, organize all the bags, and find out where we needed to be to catch the right train to Charles de Gaulle Airport around 6 a.m.

We arrive at 5:00 a.m. but the gates are locked shut – the guards tell us they don’t open till 5:30 a.m. – 30 minutes before we needed to be on the train! Nothing we could do but just sit there. LaDawn kept telling me to practice the “P” word.

Once those gates opened, it was a whirlwind to get in, drop LaDawn off with all the bags, return the rental, get 5 bags muscled through the station, find the train, and prepare to board – remember, there are no skycaps around to help with any of this – you are on your own. We even managed to keep another American couple from boarding the wrong train. Anyway… we made it, saw a nice sunrise in the south of France, and the beautiful farm lands as we headed north.

Airport check-in was a breeze. As we stood in line, we struck up a conversation with some other passengers standing with us in line. This is where the “small world thing” popped up. The young lady we visited with was returning from her third business trip to India – she lives in Independence – not 5 miles away from us. Another gentleman was just returning from the West Bank, Lebanon, and Israel – he reports directly to the Vatican in Rome about the conditions of catholic elementary schools in the mid east. He lives in Cincy, but was going to spend a day or two in Dry Ridge, again right down the road from us – like I said, small world.

An hour later we were in the air. Yep, That's the Great American Ballpark and Paul Brown Stadium from the air as we were coming in for a landing at CVG.

Avignon – Palace of the Popes

On Thursday we left Crillon le Brave and headed back to Avignon to spend the night. We had to catch the TGV bullet train about 6 A.M. That meant a pretty early wake up call and we wanted to be close to the train depot.

We arrived Avignon about 1 p.m., got settled in at the Avignon Grand Hotel – a very nice place – heck, they even upgraded us to a suite – “clean living” I suppose. We still had one more day in the country and the Palais des Papes was walking distance away.

Avignon is a very old French city that sits right on the Rhone river. It’s claim to fame it that it housed the Popes for about 100 years from the early 1300’s – so of course, we had to tour the Palais des Papes. This was one very “cool”, and very big palace. All the treasures have since been looted, but it was quite an experience walking the space the popes walked 700 years ago. You look at the size and breath of these medieval structures, and you just marvel at the engineering that must have gone into these building projects.

We settled in for our last meal in France – you won’t believe where – it was O’Neill’s Irish Pub. Please no emails. It was prepared in a French style, very delicious, and heck, it was happy hour too. After that, it was back to the hotel and set the alarms for 3:45 a.m.