MAUI family vacation

This year, my family decided to spend Christmas in Maui, Hawaii! We went there last summer, and stayed at the same resort-- the Kaanapali Ali'i. I love this resort. This vacation was the perfect break after a stressful semester and four tough finals. Some of the highlights were whale watching and the Weston Luau (see pictures below). Other than that, we cooked a lot of meals as a family and spent some quality time by the pool and on the beach! Here is the photographic evidence:

Beautiful flowers at the Kaanapali Ali'i!

Maui sunset on our first day :)

On the beach 

Pool at the Ali'i

With Jules on the porch on Christmas!

Julie, Dad, Mom, me, Elaine and Sandra at the Maui Brewing Company

Julie and Mom at Gerard's Restaurant (AMAZING!)

WHALE! It came so close to the boat!

Family at the Weston Luau-- best luau ever!

Sunset at the luau

Me and Jules with the luau fire throwing man. His wife is from Marshalltown, Iowa!

Roadtrip part 5- Cole's House

Leanne belting it out

I stole Cole's favorite hat!

Cole's friends-- Chantz and Adam

At the concert

After our scenic drive through Teton and Yellowstone, we were off to our final destination on the epic roadtrip-- Sidney, Montana. Home of the legendary Cole Prevost.

This was my 2nd time in Sidney, since we roadtripped here around the same time last year. Cole's family is so sweet and so much fun to be around. Leigh (Cole's mom), his sisters Lexi and Ali, and his brother Beau were all there. Also, since it was the week of the Richland county fair and Beau's last week in Sidney before heading off to college, his aunt Nikki and her 3 kids (Cole's cousin's Tylee, Kade and Sayer) came to stay as well. I don't have any cousins (me and Jules have always been the only kids in the family) so it was fun to meet Cole's family and hang out with everyone!

I also finally got to meet Cole's friend Chantz-- after 2 years of hearing about him it was great to finally meet him! We hung out with him and his girlfriend Bridget a bunch of times, and also Cole's friends Matt and Adam who have their own place in Sidney now.

We went to the fair a few nights and hung out at the "beer garden" where everyone was drinking beer outside and 2-steppin' in the barn. Cole and Chantz taught me a little bit about 2-stepping but I don't think I was the greatest to say the least! It was lots of fun though.

The last night of the fair we also went to the Leanne Rhymes concert which was great! She sang some new songs and some oldies too (some that even I knew, haha). It was a really fun time!

After a really awesome week in Montana, we made the long trek back to Des Moines, and we finished the drive all in one day. What an epic roadtrip! Now its time for back to school...

Roadtrip part 3- Denver and Golden

On our last full day in Denver, me and Cole headed out to Golden, home of the Coors brewery, while Vanessa was doing some errands and TFA stuff. I had already been there once with Vanessa before but I figured Cole really needed to go too! And plus, why not take advantage of the free beer?

Post-tour we sampled some beers and went to the gift shop as well. Cole was pretty excited about the Coors Light grill kit he bought, complete with apron, mitts, and chef's hat!

After we left the brewery, Vanessa and Zach were out on a run so we made a quick stop at the mall. We perused Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie.... I wanted to stay longer because the mall there is pretty awesome, but I had to restrain myself.

Zach had to catch a flight back to Des Moines that night, so after Vanessa took him to the airport the three of us went out for Thai food. I had a noodle dish with tofu and veggies and it was delish! But also extremely filling and I couldn't even eat half-- which meant leftovers for lunch the next day for me. Cole, on the other hand, wasn't as happy with his dish and he claimed it smelled like "silage", or fermented corn feed. Gross. Anyways, after dinner we also grabbed some ice cream across the street. Vanessa wanted to take me there because they have vegan ice cream. I got the cinnamon roll ice cream and it was amazing. I'm going to try to recreate it sometime soon!

Roadtrip part 4- Grand Teton and Yellowstone

Old Faithful!

Elk

MOOSE!

Mr. Moose again

Buffalo

The drive though Grand Teton and Yellowstone was an EPIC JOURNEY. On the drive through Grand Teton, which was first on our path through the parks, we saw a little black bear crossing the road. It was so cute! We spotted it first from the car, but we didn't want to get TOO close... unfortunately, some other cars decided to drive right up to it and scare it away! I got a pretty distant picture, and even though we saw him closer up when we drove past, there wasn't another good photo op for the little bear!

That was pretty much all the excitement of Teton, except for a lot more beautiful scenery. Then, it was through to Yellowstone. Having already seen a bear, our goals for the afternoon were to see Old Faithful, see some buffaloes, and a moose. Needless to say we achieved all these goals, although the buffalo and moose were at the very end when we had almost given up hope... to be fair, the moose wasn't even in the park, he was just eating some grass by the highway on the way out!

All in all, the drive through was gorgeous and we saw some incredible views. Old faithful was pretty awesome too!

Roadtrip part 2- Mountains

After passing out early post-beer tasting, we got up early Thursday morning for a hike. I'm not really sure what me and Cole were expecting but I don't think we quite expected the intensity that was to come!

Vanessa took us along the Loveland pass (curvy cliff road to the mountains) and towards a hiking path she found in a book about the best Colorado hikes. I'm not going to lie, it was tough! But we were doing pretty well up the first hill (a long, steep climb). From there, there were 2 peaks to climb, one to the left and one to the right. The peak to the right was supposed to be steeper and harder, so we decided to do that one first then assess how we felt.

The climb we did wasn't really a straight climb-- there were lots of steep ups and downs, and lots of rocks to climb too! We were feeling pretty beat by the time we got to the final peak, which was a short climb but pretty much straight up. Vanessa and Zach went right for it, but me and Cole sat down to take a short break. As we were sitting there, we noticed a ton of clouds rolling in. After feeling a few rain drops, we decided to forgo the last short climb. We waited for Vanessa and Zach for a bit, but once it really started pouring we headed back.

Cole the mountain man

Just a little SNOW at the top of the mountain! In August!

MARMOT! Or some other kind of woodland creature. 

Still laughing--this must have been before the HAIL started.

On the way back, which wasn't short or easy at all, it was basically thunderstorming around us. The rocks and ground were wet but we managed OK. It also started hailing at one point, since we were at 13,400 ft!!!! And we were completely frozen.

When we finally got back an hour later, we hopped in the car and drove a few miles down the road to Idaho Springs for some grub. However, since we were frozen and wet, me and Vanessa went to a store and I bought a new long-sleeved shirt, and changed into that and some of Vanessa's long underwear she brought along. I felt a million times better!

The four of us went to a place in Idaho Springs called BeauJos Pizza. Luckily for me, they had a vegan tofu pizza with soy cheese, and it was amazing. Dry clothes + food made my day so much better after getting soaked and hailed on during the hike!

Roadtrip part 1-- Denver & Ft. Collins

Even though we just got back from Paris, me and Cole decided to take a 2 week roadtrip before we head back to Iowa City and start school again.

Our first stop on the roadtrip was Denver. We caravanned (is that a word?) out there with Vanessa and Zach since Vanessa had to move back out there anyway. We drove most of the day on Tuesday and passed out as soon as we got there. On Wednesday, we woke up and got some food at Parsley, a place in Denver that has absolutely delicious chai tea blueberry smoothies (with chat tea, soy milk, blueberries, agave and even some mint thrown in there) and salads too.

Post lunch we drove out to Fort Collins to hit up some breweries. The most famous brewery out there is New Belgium, but went to Odell's brewery first. We had a quick tour and some samples. When we went to New Belgium, they told us it would be basically impossible to get on the tour, but they put us on the wait list anyway and gave us some tokens for free beer samples (!!!). My personal favorites were the Mothership Wit (an organic beer), Triple, and Ranger IPA.

As we were debating some purchases at New Belgium, we found out that we got on the tour! That was really exciting for us since we had been looking forward to it. The tour was awesome. We sampled some great beers throughout (including the Abbey beer and Fat Tire, both of which are ridiculously awesome) and learned about their brewing process. I have to say I was really impressed with their commitment to conservation and the environment! They use a lot less water and energy than other breweries but they still make delicious beer. The other impressive part of the brewery tour was that they had a SLIDE. Breweries with rides are awesome-- like at Heineken (but the Heineken ride was still better). I did end up making some purchases there, including some cool metal signs for my apartment, and a growler with Mothership Wit!

Once we got back to Denver, we went out for sushi at Hapa. I had been there before with Vanessa last time I came but we brought Cole and Zach along this time too. It was tasty but I don't think we enjoyed it quite as much as we should have, probably because we were already full from drinking beer all day.

Last week in Paris

So, we got home from Paris 2 weeks ago but since then I have been trying to relax AND am now currently roadtripping through the west with Cole, so I will try to remember some things about my last week in Paris!

First of all, we were completely and totally exhausted after our trip to Amsterdam, but we couldn't stop talking about how much fun we had! On Monday back in Paris, Cole went to Versailles (without me) but we had a picnic near Trocadero afterwards which was really fun! Cole whipped up some pasta salad, a green salad with avocado, and we brought a bottle of white wine along as well. It was delicious and lots of fun! I was sort of sad we didn't have more opportunities for picnics during our stay, but it was a great way to start off our last week there.

As it turned out, Wednesday was Bastille Day (July 14th) so everyone had the day off! We wanted to head to the Champs Elysee for the parade and to Trocadero for fireworks afterwards, but it was POURING all day! So, we got to sleep in for once and lounged for a few solid hours. It was pretty nice to just relax, no work or sightseeing.

On Thursday night we finally made it to the Musee d'Orsay. Since we went at night, it was only 5.5o each (they keep the museum open on Thursdays from 6-10 pm). That was definitely one of my favorite museums-- some Van Gogh, Monet, and lots of other awesome art, plus the museum itself is really interesting.

On Friday night we decided to go all out at hit up the Louvre which we hadn't been to at all yet. It was also cheaper on Friday nights, plus some random guy gave us a free ticket on the way in! So 6 euros wasn't bad at all for both of us to see the most famous museum in Paris. We saw the Venus de Milo and the Mona Lisa and all that good stuff. It wasn't my favorite museum of the trip, but I was glad we got to see everything!

Saturday was also our last day in Paris. We packed up everything and cleaned the apartment. We also went to the post office in the morning to send my umbrella and our posters home (wrapped up in bubble wrap and tape). Finally, after our cleaning session we went out for a nice dinner nearby the apartment. Chez Paul was a pretty darn fancy French restaurant and it was delicious-- especially the creme brulee which was AMAZING!

Anyways, we headed out on Sunday morning pretty early and caught our flight to Chicago through Montreal. Everything went pretty smoothly and I watched 4 movies over the course of the trip since it was daylight the whole time and I didn't sleep at all.

So, we are back in the USA with plenty of A/C everywhere we go!