Tag: vacation

Bicycle Jeju Island in 7 Days

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Angela and I just spent the week bicycling around the South Korean island of Jeju. This was our first self-supported bike trip in which we carried all of our luggage on the back on the bike. Jeju was the perfect location to do this for the first time as it is really well set-up for biking, and navigation was mostly simple. There are some things we would definitely do differently, so make sure to read that part if you are considering this trip yourself. Overall though, it was a fantastic trip.

Day 1 – Jeju to Hallim
Distance: 30.3 km

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Jeju City to Hallim

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August/September 2015: Back in Shanghai

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Angela and I are back in Shanghai and getting adjusted to being on a normal working person schedule. Although it would be great to be on vacation all of the time (and some of our relatives think that we indeed are), it is nice to be back into a routine. Angela has all new administrators, and is adjusting to a newly implemented schedule. I no longer teach any guitar classes, and get to teach just band without having to share the band room anymore. It is a tremendous relief for me to stay in the same room all day, every day, and get to teach band for every class. I am finding myself much more comfortable at the start of this year than in previous years. Angela is the lower school specials leader this year, and I am the 6th grade team leader. That means we are both extremely important people. Overall, it has been great getting back to our apartment and our life, and seeing all of our wonderful friends.

We recently did something that I have wanted to do for a very long time. It was our friend Juliet’s birthday, and for her birthday she wanted to go to a classy afternoon tea. Being an American, I have never been to afternoon tea as a meal or activity, so I was excited to try it. I was also excited that afternoon tea was going to take place at the Fairmont Peace Hotel. This is a really old, classy hotel on the Bund, and also home to the ‘Old Jazz Band’, which is Shanghai’s oldest jazz band. All of the members were in their 80’s, and had been playing together for many years. I have wanted to hear them play since we arrived in Shanghai.

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Angela and I enjoying our very first afternoon tea.

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The Summer of 2015: Back in Iowa

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After spending a week exploring Chengdu and Shanghai with Angela’s brother and sister-in-law, we flew back to where our hearts are:

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Iowa, USA! It is always such a pleasant feeling to exchange big city life with rural Iowa for a month. My dad met us at O’Hare, and took us home from there. It worked well, and probably saved us some time rather than trying to fly to Iowa from Chicago (although it cost my father some extra time…). We spent the first few days enjoying some of the things that we miss most about our home state. We will often talk with our friends about the meals that we have to eat while we are home. Below is Angela’s staple must-have, purchased from That Place near Marshalltown, Iowa.

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The Return to Paradise: Cebu, Philippines

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 Angela and I have been reflecting on the fact that we are awfully spoiled. We were given a week of vacation in celebration of the Chinese New Year. We are in the year of the sheep. A group of 11 teachers and friends from my school, including myself and Angela, decided to take a trip together. We had done a similar trip last year in the Philippines, and had a wonderful time. Angela, being the booking whiz that she is, booked us at a beautiful place called The Granada Beach House, which I could not recommend highly enough.

We left our place of work at 3:30PM sharp, and traveled to the Pudong International Airport with our good UK friend, Jules. Our flight was delayed several hours immediately after we had made it through security. We were supposed to fly to Hong Kong, then to Manila, and then catch a flight to Cebu island. Due to the delay, we missed our flight out of Hong Kong and had to rebook for 7:50AM the next morning. We also knew that this would cause us to miss our flight to Cebu, so we had to totally rebook a different ticket. Angela and I decided that we have had such incredible luck so far in our many travels that we were due for some nonsense. Our track record is still pretty good. We spent a cold and delirious night on the floor of the Hong Kong airport while we waited for our 7:50 AM flight. Manila has a strange airport, with different terminals spread many miles apart from one another, so we were a little concerned about making our new flight, but it turned out we arrived and departed from the same terminal in Manila. That part was a breeze, and we arrived to our gate with time to spare to purchase some necessities not readily available in China, such as A&W root beer and Combos.

We arrived in Cebu City around 5:00PM, and met our friend Brian who had arrived just shortly before us. The four of us had booked a van to shuttle us to The Granada Beach House. The traffic was bad, so it took about four hours to reach the house. We arrived around 9:00PM, exhausted from our trip. It was hard to see much of the place in the night time, and we were ready for bed anyway. The friendly and very helpful owners Jacques and Keira greeted us upon arrival and fed us dinner. We passed out soon after.

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Christmas in Mui Ne

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After a fun night in Saigon, we headed to Mui Ne with our friends John and Catherine (aka the GKs)We had arranged a car through our resort to take us on the 4hr trip! The price wasn’t bad since we split it 2 ways but if you are looking for a cheap option, the bus is always better!

For the 1st three nights we decided to stay at a fancy resort! The resort was on the edge of town and far from the main strip. It did have a nice pool and beach front. However the drinks were overpriced and service medium. I guess we can’t handle fancy things! On Wednesday, we rented a scooter and explored the area! We stopped for coffee and later met up with the GKs for lunch. Since it was Christmas Eve, we planned to have dinner together at our resort later that night. After lunch we rent to the Forester Spa for massages. This place is great! It’s right on the beach and you can hear the waves as you get a massage. Jason and I both got relaxation massages. This was Jason’s first full body massage…lets just say he didn’t like it! After the massages I was feeling good so we decided to meet the GKs for drinks at Pogo. Pogo was also right on the beach and had big beds to lounge in by the water. We had some drinks and watched the sunset before headed to our place for Xmas eve dinner.

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Summer in Iowa!

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We have started our summer break back in the USA!   Our flight from Shanghai was a little rough and we ended departing 1.5 hours late and then at a standstill in Chicago.  After some running in the airport we made our flight to Minneapolis and ended up getting in around 11:00…we were supposed to land at 8!   A few of my cousins who were staying near by even stayed and waited with my parents!   We had a 2hr drive to get to Lake Osakis and didn’t get to bed until 3 am…so needless to say it was a long day!

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