With the end of this mixed bag of a year, I am seeing all the Top Ten/Bottom Ten of 2021 lists in every part of the news. I usually read the ones about movies and photos (there are lots about the latest music but it makes me sad when I have never heard of anyone on those lists ?). If you have been following me for a while you know I love lists. I even have a page of nothing but lists I have made. Most were posts first and then added to the list page. Check them out sometime if you are new to the blog. You can expect these new ones to be added to that page as well.
This year I have decided to do my own set of Top Ten Lists. I am already doing my Top Ten Photos I Took in 2021 on Facebook and Instagram (I will post them here tomorrow). In that spirit I have decided to do a post about my Top Ten Things That I Loved About 2021. Then, when I started listing that Top Ten, I also thought about a bottom 10…or maybe 5. Then I started thinking about other lists from 2021 like my favorite meals or my favorite just about anything. But I decided that this could just go on forever. So I decided to do four lists (including my photos). First, the aforementioned Top Ten and then a Bottom Five of 2021. That leads us to this post, The Top 5 things I ate or drank in 2021. And I was going to do them all in one post but I knew that would get too long so I broke them into four posts (for today the next three days) so I hope you enjoy them.
Food, Glorious Food!
My top five things I ate or drank in 2021
You know I love food and drink so here they are in no particular order. I had two of them in one meal and three of them within two days and the other two in the same week (Did you get all that?).
Chicken Sandwich with slaw (Houstons restaurant in Irvine, CA)
Wood-fire grilled artichokes (Houstons restaurant in Irvine, CA)
Blue Coyote’s margaritas (Blue Coyote Grille–Palm Springs, CA)
Sango De Camarón (onboard Celebrity Flora in the Galapagos)
Fritada and Llapingachos (EB Hotel—Quito, Ecuador)
As you can see the first two things come from the same restaurant, Houstons. This is a small chain (11 outlets) of restaurants located across the US. I had first heard about them while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Armchair Expert. The expert himself, Dax Shepherd, raves about them and my brother and his bride had been wanting to take us to the Irvine, California location for a while but we didn’t have a reservation the first time we went. But in April when we went to visit them for a few days, we stopped there for lunch right after we got off the airplane and based on the recommendation from Dax, we ordered the chicken sandwich.
Then, based on the menu description, we ordered the artichoke appetizer as well. Suffice it to say, these were both AWESOME! How much did we like them? Well, six days later when they took us back to the airport we had an early dinner ordered the same thing and when we went down to see them in October, we had lunch when they picked us up and dinner when they took us back to the airport and we ordered the same thing all over again. Yes, they do have other things on their menu but when something is this good and you don’t live nearby, get it! If you are ever in a place with a Houstons, go have these two dishes. You won’t be sorry.
I mentioned that I had three of my top five things within just a few days time. Well the first two were at Houstons and the third was the next day after both our visits to Houstons. We stopped by the Blue Coyote for margaritas. Blue Coyote is a restaurant in Palm Springs (my and my brother’s hometown) and we first discovered it years ago and then took Steve and Jamie a few years later. When I was a kid if you wanted Mexican food in Palm Springs, you went to Las Casuelas. They are still there but the tourists have taken over the place and it just isn’t as great as it used to be…so now we go to Blue Coyote.
We used to just order a round of margaritas but the last few times when we have been there with Jamie and Steve we have started getting a pitcher…they are that good. I do feel a little sorry for Steve because he is always driving and that means he only gets one (but not too sorry ?).
The last two items in my list of food are both from our trip to the Galapagos in July. I had the Fritada and Llapingachos at the EB Hotel in Quito where we spent the night both before and after our visit to the islands. I ordered this the night before because it sounded good (it is a pork dish with potatoes and lots of other stuff) but it was so good, when we came back a week later I ordered it again—yup, still just as good and since I don’t know of anyplace to get it besides Quito, ordering it again was a no-brainer.
Lastly, Sango De Camarón is a traditional seafood stew with a plantain base and I ate that onboard the amazing Celebrity Flora while we were cruising through the islands. One afternoon Kathleen and I were looking at the menu for that evening outside the dining room and I told her I was sad because there were no real Ecuadorian dishes on the menu that night. I had learned on the four previous nights (plus the night at the hotel) that I LOVE Ecuadorian food. The maitre’d overheard me saying this and asked if I really liked the food from Ecuador. I said, “Yes I do!” So he said he would see what he could do. That night when we went to dinner—still no Ecuadorian food on the menu ?. But the next night…I had already told our waiter what I wanted when the maitre’d walked up and said he was cancelling our order (of an octopus dish I knew I would love) and the chef had made a wonderful surprise for me. Being an idiot and looking a gift horse in the mouth, I told him that this sounded great but I loved octopus and I really wanted to have that entrée. He said to wait a few minutes and he would see what he could do.
About five minutes later he was back with an appetizer that was not on the menu. It was a big salad with a HUGE portion of braised and broiled octopus on top and tons of avocado (the avocado in Ecuador is amazing!). After eating that he brought me the regular octopus entrée I had ordered and set it down in front of me and then brought a huge bowl of something that smelled amazing. He set that down in the middle of our table (there were four of us) and said, “This is sango. It is a traditional Ecuadorian dish that is a seafood stew with a plantain and rice base.” So I had to taste it and it was AMAZING. If there was a kind of local seafood that was NOT in there, I would like to know what had been left out. There was shrimp, clams, mussels, different kinds of white fish, calamari, scallops and…octopus. The stew/sauce part reminded me of a very good risotto.
Sadly, because of Kathleen’s allergy to shellfish, she couldn’t eat any of it. And the better half of the couple we were eating with (Jamie and Catherine) said she couldn’t eat anything with tentacles. So it was up to Jamie and I do make that chef happy…and we did. We ate it all.
One of the main reasons I want to go back in 2024 is to have this dish again. The taste and texture were delicious but I think the thing that really made it special was the fact that just because someone had overheard me talking about my new love for Ecuadorian food, the chef had made me this wonderful dish that represented his homeland. Food experiences don’t get any better than that.
Eating is not merely a material pleasure. Eating well gives a spectacular joy to life and contributes immensely to goodwill and happy companionship. It is of great importance to the morale.
First, I know that I promised this post almost three weeks ago when we cancelled our three week trip to Europe. I really was going to write it fairly quickly after that, but I got so depressed about not going, the state of the world and the pandemic, that I just kept putting it off. But since I know that many of you may have to do some cancelling of your own someday I wanted to show you how, as of today we have cancelled four flights, one cruise, three tours, lots of land transport and event tickets. In all cases we have either received refunds or vouchers for another trip at another time within a certain time frame so I feel I really have a handle on this. That means we had already paid for this and they had our money. If it says No then we had not paid anything but they had our credit card they could charge if we didn't cancel.
Things to Cancel
At Risk
Amount at Risk
Outcome
Viking Christmas Market River Cruise
Yes
$15,000
Cancelled and voucher/rebooked 2023
Car Service to SEA
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
British Air Flight to Lisbon, Portugal
Yes
$1,500 plus 120K miles
Cancelled and Refunded
British Air seat reservations
Yes
$785
Cancelled and Refunded
Talixo Limo Airport to Hotel in Lisbon
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
Hotel Portugal, Lisbon
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
Lisbon Food Tour with Eating Europe
Yes
$150
Cancelled and Refunded
Sintra Tour
Yes
$200
Cancelled and Refunded
TAPP flight Lisbon to AMS
Yes
$325
Cancelled and voucher
Talixo Limo Airport to Banks Mansion
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
Banks Mansion hotel in AMS
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
Reservation at Pantry Restaurant
Yes
$100
Cancelled and Refunded
Reservations at Restaurant Zaza
Yes
$100
Cancelled and Refunded
Boom Chicago Tickets
Yes
$75
Cancelled and Refunded
Tour with Tours by Locals around AMS
Yes
$420
Cancelled and Refunded
Van Gogh museum tickets
Yes
$80
Cancelled and Refunded
KLM flight from AMS to Prague
Yes
$720
Cancelled and voucher
Delta flight from Budapest to SEA
Yes
$3782
Cancelled and voucher
Car Service home from SEA
No
$0.00 paid in advance
Cancelled
As you can see we were not able to get all our money refunded but we were able to get vouchers that we could use on future travel. Some of that future travel has expiration dates but as much as we travel we have been or will be able to use it.
For instance, we have already rebooked the Viking River Christmas Market Cruise. We really do want to go on this cruise but we had to push it off to 2023 because we will already be in Europe in fall of 2022 and we really can't afford to get home in September and then go back in November.
I also need to point out that we got really lucky with the British Air seats. Normally we would have had more of a problem with them. They were for a one-way ticket from Seattle to Lisbon, Portugal via London Heathrow. Our original flight left here at 6:45 pm, arrived at Heathrow at noon the next day and then we had a 2.5 hour layover before our flight to Lisbon. About two weeks before we were scheduled to go we got a note from British Air (and Alaska Air—we booked the tickets through them using miles) that they had cancelled our Lisbon flight and moved us to one that didn't leave Heathrow until almost 8:00 pm and did not arrive in Lisbon until close to midnight.
When they move you that much you can cancel and rebook elsewhere at no cost...so when we cancelled with them, we just cited the change of schedule as the reason and Alaska Air cheerfully handed us back the miles and the taxes (Heathrow taxes are outrageous—$750 each)and British finally (last week) refunded our seat reservations. We have hopefully taken our last flight on British Air. We love everything about them except for the high taxes at Heathrow and the fact that even though you have Business Class seats, you still have to pay $750 each to choose your seat prior to check in the day before the flight. That's just wrong.
Some of the other expenses we were pleasantly surprised to get back were the Boom Chicago (an improv show in Amsterdam, done in English, where Jason Sudekis, Seth Myers and other US comedy folks got their start) and the Van Gogh museum. Both state on their websites that there will be "NO REFUNDS." But when I wrote them both a nice e-mail explaining that we just had to cancel due to COVID, they both said they understood and gave us full refunds. It should be noted that both of those are in Amsterdam and Amsterdam is locked down today so there is a good chance we might not have been able to go to either anyway.
Other tours (Sintra and the food tour in Lisbon or the Tours by Local tour in Amsterdam) we knew in advance were refundable right up to a few days before the tour. The same with the restaurants. I should note that this was the first time I did restaurant reservations that I had to provide a credit card and they charged me a refundable (up to 24 hours before) deposit of $25 per guest. And this happened at all three places we were going to eat in AMS.
Almost everything was completely cancelled and refunded within...3 days. The only things that we waited on were the British Air seat reservations and the Boom Chicago and Van Gogh museum tickets. And I only had to make a single phone call. All of the rest were either cancelled with an e-mail or by filling out a web form, except for my calling Alaska Air—which was super easy.
All-in-all I am VERY pleased at how easy this was to do. But even saying that, I would NEVER want to do it again. When you are a travel freak like I am, there is no bigger downer than cancelling a major trip like this. It put me in such a rotten mood that we had to quickly (like within three days) get refunded and get something booked for January. Now if Omicron would just get over itself so that doesn't get cancelled, we are all set. I promise to come back and tell you all about it soon.
One last note about a date I missed. Last Thursday, December 16, was the third anniversary of this travel blog. The post you are reading is my 199th so I think I have done just a "fair job" of writing an average of two posts a month. If we had been traveling like we normally do (damn you pandemic) then it would have been a lot more. With three major trips planned in 2022 I truly believe that there will be a lot more in the year to come. Stick with me.
Cancelled isn't a bad word because it happens everyday.
If you are here because you like reading about travel, skip this post. Come back in 18 days when I will give you an early morning tour of Lisbon, Portugal...if all goes well. This post is personal. It is kind of about travel because we went someplace so I could experience it but it isn't about travel, it's about me.
Two weeks ago tonight was my 50th high school reunion. I graduated from Palm Springs High School in Palm Springs, California in June 1971 and with COVID we finally got around to holding the reunion. Also, because of COVID this reunion included the class before ours (1970) as they had missed theirs.
As you may have seen from earlier posts, I was really looking forward to going to the reunion and to spending a few days with my brother and his family as well. BTW: That part of the trip was great. We had our usually awesome time with Steve and Jamie.
But the reunion itself wasn't that great. Or maybe I should say that the reunion (the event) was just fine. It was just not great for me. For a lot of reasons. Some external and some internal. I have been trying to decide if I wanted to write about it for the last two weeks. Each day when I walk I kind of plan out my posts in my head before I write them. Never had one perplex me more about how I feel about it.
Things I had almost no control over
One of the big things we (Kathleen and I) were really looking forward to was seeing my best friend from high school, Randy. She and I have known each other since elementary school and we became very close in high school. We were never boyfriend/girlfriend, just really close friends. I spent some of the best times of my life with her. We lost track of each other after our third year of college but we reconnected when I met Kathleen (my first wife did not like her) and we have been rebuilding our friendship ever since. Kathleen and I have visited Randy in Arizona and she and I communicate via e-mail, text, Instagram and FaceBook on a pretty regular basis.
Kathleen was only going to come to the reunion if Randy was going to be there because she wanted to at least know one person. I didn't blame her. I doubt I would have really wanted to go if I didn't know anyone. Especially being married to Mr. Extrovert who would be running around talking to everyone else.
On the day before the reunion we had planned to get together with Randy for lunch but early that day she texted that due to a medical problem she was headed home to AZ and would miss the reunion. She was crushed. We had been talking about doing this for more than a year. I was sad (more than sad) because when I look back on it now, I really only had only two or three people who I knew were going to be there that I really wanted to see. And she was definitely one of them.
When Randy let me know she wasn't going to be there, I let Kathleen off the hook and told her to go have dinner with Steve and Jamie. They would drop me off at the reunion site and go get dinner and pick me up on their way back to our vacation rental, two hours later. I figured that with Randy not there, I could easily see the two or three other people I wanted to see, say hi to others and be ready to go. The reunion did include a BBQ dinner and a single drink ticket for everyone attending but food was not why I was still going.
When the family dropped me off I have to say I was not impressed with the site. I fully get that this is what the group could afford and still keep it affordable for everyone. It was held at a stables that is within a couple of miles of downtown. The place has a clubhouse kind of building and patio behind it where there were tables set up. Inside the building a lot of people were congregating and there was a bar, a place to take pics and some old high school photo stuff including a display honoring those in our class that had passed away. Guess what comes with a stables...horses (they were a pretty long way away) but that means they also bring...horseflies...and they were pretty close. So was that wonderful aroma that cowboys know well.
Now let's get to something I was really uncomfortable with. I know I am partly to blame for my being uncomfortable and to be honest, I can't believe I did what I did. When I got out of my brother's truck, I had a mask on but when I walked up to the registration table that was in front of the building, I took it off because not a single person had one on. Yes, we were outside, but people were close together. Yes, I am vaccinated (three shots) but still, for the safety of myself and my family, I should have kept mine on. But I bowed to the unspoken peer pressure and shoved mine in my pocket.
After checking in, I immediately ran into someone who I had been friends with more in elementary school than in high school but our mothers had been VERY close. It was great seeing her and that was nice. But it was pretty much downhill from there until about 90 minutes later.
I headed into the building so I could get out onto the large porch area in the back. As I went in, I noticed a big sign stating, "By order of the City of Palm Springs, only vaccinated guests may be inside these premises and all must be masked." Of course not a soul was...wearing a mask. Not sure about the vaccination status but of course after I got through the building and wound up outside in the back the first group of people I ran into was four men (I didn't know any of them so I am assuming they were from the class of 1970) who were talking about "all those sheep who are vaccinated." Needless to say I avoided those folks like the plague (no joke intended). Most of the rest of the time I was there was spent outside and trying as hard as I could to socially distance.
Internal stuff that I should have controlled
Looking back on the experience of that night, I have come to some sad truths about myself. The first being I realized I was neither liked nor disliked in high school. Most of my classmates, other than my closest friends, didn't care one way or the other about me. Sadly, it took me going back to this reunion to realize that. I blame my job of 39 years in the yearbook industry for this. Writing, speaking, teaching yearbook advisers and staffers how to preserve memories for all those years has made me romanticize how "great" high school was. But to be honest, it really wasn't. I, like most people, had a few close friends (some of those were in the class of 1972 and not there) and everyone else was just an acquaintance. Someone who had passed through my life for a few years.
So this led me to ask myself, why had I wanted to go if I really was only hoping to run into two or three people who I really wanted to see? Here's my second hard truth: vanity. When I was in high school, I was a pudgy guy (to be real–I was fat). And I was a little nerdy. I was president of the Forensics Club for god's sake. I wasn't in sports. I was on the student council and I did help out with the yearbook (but wasn't on the staff) because Randy was the editor but I wasn't one of the "in"crowd.
Today I weigh about 15 lbs less than I did when I graduated. I am in so much better shape today than then and I work hard to get that way. And unlike about 65% of the guys in my class, I still have hair on my head as well as on my face, in my nose and my ears?. To be honest, I look a lot better than I did in high school and I really wanted to have someone who knew me then be impressed. Talk about a bad reason to go and setting myself up for failure. Yes, I guess I am that shallow. The entire night, one person (just one) mentioned how "young" I looked. That's it. And how sad am I that I feel this way.
Once I got past my motives for going, my other reason this was not the best reunion ever was my interaction with people. In all but three instances seeing someone I had known in high school went like this:
Me: "Hi (their name here)! I'm Jim Bellomo Remember me?"
So all I am saying is that it would have been nice if someone had asked me anything about what I had been up to in the last 50 years. I mean after just being there for two hours I can tell you about a guy who was a flight attendant for TWA and he quit when they were bought by AA and that he hates AA but his wife still works there. Or another person who owned a pool cleaning business for years and was now working in construction (I can even tell you about his truck and the people he works with). And someone who was a graphic artist and worked at Disney Animation in the 80s and 90s. Or someone who worked for a transportation company in a far off state. I know so much about so many others but was most impressed about how long they could talk about themselves without ever taking a second to ask a question.
It wasn't all bad
Enough boo-hooing, I do want to make it very clear that the reunion wasn't all bad. I did catch up with an old friend from elementary school who has had quite the life and wanted to know about mine as well. And someone who I had known in high school but we really hadn't been friends then who I now hear from all the time on Facebook. She is a traveler like me and we have been corresponding about travel, so it was good to see her in the flesh, so to speak (that's her on the left at the top of this post).
I was also thrilled to see one of the other three people I had been really close to in high school–Teresa (that's her on the right at the top of this post). She and I were always great friends (she was my Senior Prom date--as a friend) but had completely lost track of each other after high school. The last time I had seen her was on the morning my son was born in 1979 when the doctor kicked me out of the delivery room (after my wife had been in labor for more than 14 hours and he wanted her to try and rest) and I went to find something to eat. Teresa was working in Palm Springs then as a letter carrier and happened to walk in the door of the restaurant to deliver her mail as I was standing there.
She got to the reunion late so we didn't have as much time as we would have liked before the family was picking me up and she too was crushed that Randy hadn't made it but it was great catching up with her. In communicating with Randy and Teresa post reunion, I realized that we three should have just had our own reunion. Those were really the only people coming who I had really wanted to see. Not that I didn't enjoy seeing some of the other people who were there, but deep in my heart, I wish I had skipped it.
When you have expectations, you are setting yourself up for disappointment. —Ryan Reynolds
As I write this I am sitting in an AirBnB in Palm Springs. Tomorrow night is my 50th high school reunion. For those of you who don't know me personally, I grew up in the tourist-haven of Palm Springs way back in the 50s, 60s and 70s. So here I am back in my hometown with my bride, my brother and my sister-in-law. And I am kind of bummed out about the reunion because my best friend from high school that had been planning on being there had to turn around and head for home to deal with a medical problem ?.
But we actually have been on the road since Wednesday. We flew down from our favorite airport, Everett, Washington (PAE) to John Wayne International in Santa Ana, CA where my brother picked us up. We got to see a bunch of friends we had cruised with (who just happened to be my niece and my sister-in-law's sister and her husband and daughter and my niece's boyfriend) when they all came over for dinner. We had a great time and my sister-in-law is an awesome cook and an award-winning baker and I may gain back all the weight I lost for the reunion before we go home.
My sister-in-law is also a great activity planner. Yesterday we drove two hours through Los Angeles traffic to visit the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. For a film buff like me, it was awesome. It is fairly new (opened just a few weeks ago). Lots of great stuff about how movies are made, about the Oscars themselves, about just everything and anything about movies. We spent three hours viewing all the exhibits as well as having a quick bite in their cafe and checking out their rooftop viewing area. It was wonderful. There were a lot of artifacts that you would know from movies.
On our way into the Academy Museum
A little further in, the screens got even bigger
The mask worn by Russell Crowe in Gladiator.
One of the many mermaid costumes made for the movie Splash
One of the original R2D2s
And of course C3PO.
The view from the top of the museum's theater
Then we did a very cool drive up Hollywood Blvd and back down Sunset Blvd while waiting for our dinner reservations at the historic Musso and Franks. It was an outstanding dinner. Great bread, great drinks, 1050's stuffed celery, pasta, steaks and the nightly special, chicken pot pie. The real reason to go to Musso and Franks is the experience. You sit in booths that have appeared in movies and books for years. Who knows who has sat in this booth before us.
Dinner at Musso and Franks
Today was all about getting to Palm Springs. We headed out about 11:00 am and have been here since 1:00. Stopped for a quick lunch and then it was off to head out and hopefully see my old nephew Sean who owns a vinyl record store in nearby La Quinta. Unfortunately, he was off on a record buying trip to Los Angeles so we missed him. Finally after a pretty long wait we were able to check into our AirBnB. This particular AirBnB experience has not been a great one so far. The place looks great in the pictures but not so much in reality. Tomorrow night is my reunion. More later and maybe some desert photos.
Just dropping in with a couple of things I have seen in the last few days that I wanted to share…and a comment on my writing.
Follow up to my Seattle post
If you read my last post you know that I am really unhappy with the state of the city we live closest to—Seattle. This morning this was in The Seattle Times:
If you have been here, you know that the number two (after the Space Needle) tourist attraction in the city is Pike Place Market. It’s now a haven for drug users, panhandlers who are aggressive and lot of other problems. This happened yesterday (October 4). Everyday brings new reports of problems. If you are coming to Seattle in the next months, be VERY careful.
Cruising is the safest way to travel right now
Earlier this week I saw an excellent article by Gene Sloan about cruising. Gene used to be the travel editor at USA Today. He now writes for the website, The Points Guy. (If you aren’t familiar with The Points Guy—the site is all about the best way to use points and mileage rewards but also covers major travel stories.) The story he wrote is all about why cruising is probably the safest way to travel right now. His reasons include the fact that most cruise lines are requiring everyone on a cruise to be vaccinated. They are, in many cases, requiring masks to be worn as well. The people who are on these cruise ships have agreed before sailing to these rules. There’s no discussion about vaccinations and no fights about masks. If you are onboard, you have already indicated you will comply. If not, they put you off at the next port.
Contrast that with some places in the USA where many are unvaccinated, won’t wear masks or think COVID is a government conspiracy. Or airplanes where people who won’t wear masks fight with the flight attendants. So I get where Gene is coming from and I couldn’t agree more. You can read the entire article by clicking HERE.
It’s October!
Of course you knew that, but it is really exciting to us because now we can say that we are traveling this month…and next month…and the month after too. Sadly not until the very end of October and November but we are still traveling.
Later this month (on Kathleen’s birthday–October 27th) we are off to Southern California for a few days. The big reason we are going is my 50th high school reunion in Palm Springs on October 30th. Happily, it also means we get to see my brother and his family as well as spend a couple of days with them in Palm Springs.
Then on November 30th (see what I mean about the end of the month) we are flying to Europe! First up, five days in Lisbon, Portugal. Never been there before but can’t wait to go. Then we fly to meet my brother Steve and his wife Jamie in Amsterdam to stay at our favorite hotel in the world…The Banks Mansion. We stayed there in 2017 when we did a British Isles cruise and can’t wait to go back.
That part of our trip is on our own—not a cruise ship or tour group in site. But after we leave Amsterdam we come under the care of Viking River Cruises as we fly to Prague for a three day pre-cruise visit. Then we move on to Nuremberg, Germany for another one day pre-cruise visit.
Then the cruise starts. We board the Viking Long Boat Atla in Regensburg, Germany for an eight day cruise to visit the Christmas Markets in the cities on the Danube River. We stop in Passau, Germany, Vienna, Austria, Krems, Austria and then finish in Budapest, Hungary. Of course I will be blogging it all so you can follow along with us as we go. Expect a whole lot of Christmas!
Being verbose
A while back my best buddy Bob told me that I was verbose. I answered him in a post that you can read by clicking HERE.
If you don’t feel like going back to read it, here’s the definition:
Why do I bring this up now? Because I know I write that way. I mean this post was supposed to only be a quick look at three topics. And here I am at 713 words so far (WordPress keeps track of it). But about three months ago I heard a great quote about being verbose and I had to share it for those of you who read my ramblings. It is below. I had originally heard it attributed to Mark Twain but I found that it wasn’t but it does sound a lot like me.
I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time. —Blaise Pascal
As you can see the first two things come from the same restaurant, Houstons. This is a small chain (11 outlets) of restaurants located across the US. I had first heard about them while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Armchair Expert. The expert himself, Dax Shepherd, raves about them and my brother and his bride had been wanting to take us to the Irvine, California location for a while but we didn’t have a reservation the first time we went. But in April when we went to visit them for a few days, we stopped there for lunch right after we got off the airplane and based on the recommendation from Dax, we ordered the chicken sandwich.
Then, based on the menu description, we ordered the artichoke appetizer as well. Suffice it to say, these were both AWESOME! How much did we like them? Well, six days later when they took us back to the airport we had an early dinner ordered the same thing and when we went down to see them in October, we had lunch when they picked us up and dinner when they took us back to the airport and we ordered the same thing all over again. Yes, they do have other things on their menu but when something is this good and you don’t live nearby, get it! If you are ever in a place with a Houstons, go have these two dishes. You won’t be sorry.
I mentioned that I had three of my top five things within just a few days time. Well the first two were at Houstons and the third was the next day after both our visits to Houstons. We stopped by the Blue Coyote for margaritas. Blue Coyote is a restaurant in Palm Springs (my and my brother’s hometown) and we first discovered it years ago and then took Steve and Jamie a few years later. When I was a kid if you wanted Mexican food in Palm Springs, you went to Las Casuelas. They are still there but the tourists have taken over the place and it just isn’t as great as it used to be…so now we go to Blue Coyote.
The last two items in my list of food are both from our trip to the Galapagos in July. I had the Fritada and Llapingachos at the EB Hotel in Quito where we spent the night both before and after our visit to the islands. I ordered this the night before because it sounded good (it is a pork dish with potatoes and lots of other stuff) but it was so good, when we came back a week later I ordered it again—yup, still just as good and since I don’t know of anyplace to get it besides Quito, ordering it again was a no-brainer.
Lastly, Sango De Camarón is a traditional seafood stew with a plantain base and I ate that onboard the amazing Celebrity Flora while we were cruising through the islands. One afternoon Kathleen and I were looking at the menu for that evening outside the dining room and I told her I was sad because there were no real Ecuadorian dishes on the menu that night. I had learned on the four previous nights (plus the night at the hotel) that I LOVE Ecuadorian food. The maitre’d overheard me saying this and asked if I really liked the food from Ecuador. I said, “Yes I do!” So he said he would see what he could do. That night when we went to dinner—still no Ecuadorian food on the menu ?. But the next night…I had already told our waiter what I wanted when the maitre’d walked up and said he was cancelling our order (of an octopus dish I knew I would love) and the chef had made a wonderful surprise for me. Being an idiot and looking a gift horse in the mouth, I told him that this sounded great but I loved octopus and I really wanted to have that entrée. He said to wait a few minutes and he would see what he could do.
If you are here because you like reading about travel, skip this post. Come back in 18 days when I will give you an early morning tour of Lisbon, Portugal...if all goes well. This post is personal. It is kind of about travel because we went someplace so I could experience it but it isn't about travel, it's about me.
