Art – theplaceswe

August 30, 2017September 14, 2017

Oh NOLA!

We left our friend’s parent’s house in Naples and drove to Florida’s capital – Tallahassee. Yes, we didn’t know it was the capital either! We drove to a cinema, hoping to make the late night session of Dunkirk. We made it with a few minutes to spare, so after walking through the metal detectors and passed the police and security we decided to jump in line because who can go to the movies without getting popcorn and a drink? Probably lots of people but I am not one of them. This need to get popcorn and a drink did cause us to be late by a couple of minutes (oopps!) nevertheless, the movie was amazing and we were so glad we booked a hotel right across the road. Our excitement quickly evaporated as we checked in through what seemed like a bulletproof glass window and were watched by what we assumed was another guest. Once we got our room key we drove around to our room and started grabbing our things from the van. As we were doing this we noticed that the guy was watching us was walking around the corner with another guy by his side. It was at this point that I asked Mark to “maybe bring the axe inside the room”. To which he looked at me, looked at the guys and then told me to take our things inside. At first neither of us felt threatened but after spending a decent amount of time in the States we had watched enough news to see how quickly things could escalate. The guys eventually reached our room and because Mark was still outside asked him for a light. They stayed for a minute or so before walking away. Mark eventually came inside and we discussed how we both thought they were pimps for whoever was occupying the rooms a few doors up from ours. Our simple movie night turned out to be rather interesting as we fell asleep with an axe and two cans of bear spray beside the bed.

It’s safe to say we didn’t have the best sleep, you know, with the axe and bear spray beside our bed just in the backs of our minds which meant we were up early. Our destination for the day was New Orleans. We had been told to stay in the French Quarter so we booked another hotel and made our way there. The hotel was beautiful but we didn’t spend much time there as we were out exploring New Orleans or NOLA as the locals like to say. Our first full day we explored the French Quarter and found that although the city itself was pretty it was really dirty and smelt bad. The next day we ventured out to check out the surrounding areas of the French Quarter and enjoyed those parts of New Orleans a lot more. As we were walking along some small streets we noticed the blue sky had disappeared and been replaced with a light grey, within minutes this light grey turned to a super dark grey and all of a sudden rain started to fall. It went from blue skies to heavy rain within minutes so we ran to hide under a huge tree whilst we waited for our Uber to arrive. He eventually showed up in a black Jeep and when we jumped in I noticed that he had what I can only describe as a huge beanie on his head. This beanie was so huge because it was covering his mass of dreadlocks. He reminded me of the twins in 22 Jump Street that always say the same thing simultaneously. We went back to our hotel and hang out there to wait out the rain and once it stopped we ventured out to meet up with an old colleague of Mark’s. She had been travelling through America with her boyfriend so we spent the rest of the night hanging out with them, eating and drinking our way through New Orleans. To top it all off we ended our night with a visit to a blues and jazz bar. We figured it was a perfect end to our stay in NOLA.

17. THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-4 — Our night out began here at Brennan’s

We had treated ourselves to some nice hotel stays in Key West and New Orleans and with our next stop being Austin, Texas, we decided it wasn’t going to hurt to treat ourselves once more. Mark found an amazing hotel in Austin and we stayed for a couple of days exploring the city. Austin immediately become one of our favourite cities in America. We stayed in the South Congress part of Austin and it was brilliant. We were able to ride into the main part of the city and to the outskirts so we could explore even further. We walked down to a huge park by the river and thought it looked like such a nice spot to relax that we laid down on the grass and admired the sky. I’m not sure what is wrong with us these days but every time we look up at the sky it turns grey. And so while lying on the grass in a park in Austin rain began to fall just like it did in New Orleans. It was not all bad news though because I did manage to get this photo of Mark on my polaroid camera.

My souvenir from Austin? This photo.

August 28, 2017September 6, 2017

The Sunshine State

Driving to Charleston was really straight forward and we arrived in the afternoon to find a town that we loved immediately. The architecture and vibes were amazing and we sat down at a bar to relax and enjoy the atmosphere. When we first arrived we thought we would definitely stay the night, how could we not? but after spending a few hours there the novelty began to wear off and we agreed that yes it was a cool city but we didn’t want to stay there just for the sake of it so after dinner we drove through to Savannah. In the van it was nice and cool with the air conditioner on so I convinced Mark that we would be totally fine to just pull into a Walmart and sleep there. A couple of hours later I woke up feeling like I couldn’t breathe so moved to the front of the van to open the door and get some fresh air. The stuffiness inside just didn’t seem to go away which was when Mark woke up and told me how hot it still was outside. Neither of us could sleep after that so we drove around looking for a hotel to stay in. We ended up finding a really dodgy looking one, got a room and slept in our clothes on top of the bed linen for a few hours before we woke up and left straight away. Safe to say that will be the last time I try so hard to convince Mark that we will be ok sleeping in the van in that heat.

THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-2-9 — Pink house in Charleston

Our next stop was Florida, Daytona Beach to be exact and what we found there was just like what you see in the movies. It just so happened that there was a huge truck convention going on across the road from where we were staying so there were all of these trucks (Utes in Australia) with raised suspension, intense looking paint jobs and flags flying out the back. Walking along the boardwalk in Daytona was my favourite part of our stay there. The weather was still warm, there were rides and carnival games, music playing everywhere and people galore, walking around enjoying the summer. But like a lot of places these days, one day was enough there so we left and headed straight for Cocoa Beach. Along the way we stopped at this small independent surf shop where Mark bought a surf board and we met some really nice locals who gave us some tips on where to go. We booked a stay at a camp ground right on the beach and made our way there. After we had set up camp we ate dinner and Mark went out to surf before it got dark. I decided to enjoy the alone time to read. Mark made his back back just before it got dark and his answer to my question “How was it?” was simply “Someone stole my thongs.” I laughed and couldn’t believe it. Who wants someone else’s old thongs when they already have the foot groves worn into them? Luckily we were in Florida and finding a new pair of thongs wasn’t going to be difficult. On our drive the next day we stopped off at Melbourne Beach to check it out before continuing on to a small inlet. Along the way we stopped at 4 different surf shops and none of them sold Havaianas. After the first 2 shops we had to ask for them specifically because the first 2 directed us to a wall of “flip flops”, none even remotely looking as comfortable as Havaianas do. We gave up on the search for new thongs and just chilled by the beach for a couple of hours. Again, Mark surfed while I read. We drove along the Florida coast and pulled into our hotel in Miami Beach late in the afternoon. After sorting out the van and all of our stuff we went out for the night. Miami was just as I expected but also completely different. I was shocked with the amount of different types of people there. Most other places we had been to there were only a handful of different types of people, but not in Miami. In Miami you can find people from all different nationalities, from all different walks of life. I was definitely pleasantly surprised and more so the next day when we were riding around on bikes and finally found a Havaianas shop! Mark walked out with a huge smile on his face wearing his brand new thongs. As much as we enjoyed Miami we had more plans down south. We were going to Key West.

10. THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-2-6 — After we bought Mark his new Havaianas

The drive down south was uneventful and along the way we stopped off at a local golf course where Mark played 9 holes of golf for $10 and then went back to play the holes he liked a second time. The golf course itself was just a piece of land amongst some houses that anyone could walk onto. Their club guidelines were some of the most relaxed Mark had experienced.

We spent a relaxing few days in the southern most point of the USA. Cuba was just 90 miles away! Each day we would wake up, sit by the pool, walk around for a bit and then I would go and sit by the pool again to read usually while Mark went out to play more golf. On our last night in Key West we went to the boardwalk by the water to watch the sunset and were amazed at how many people were around. To top off the amazing sunset we bought homemade lemonade, pina coladas and guacamole from food stands and sat by the water to eat and drink as the sky got darker and the crowds thinned out.

THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-2-12 — We listened to buskers whilst watching the sunset.

On the drive back up north the next day we stopped by a wakeboard park where Mark spent half an hour on the water. When he got out his arms were killing him so I took over the driving. Our aim was to make it to our friend’s parent’s house in Naples, Florida. We arrived just in time for dinner and sat down to home cooked BBQ ribs, corn and coleslaw. Their plan was to give us a “typical American meal” and it was amazing! To further relax we spent 3 days in Naples just hanging out and also because Mark’s arms were still so sore he could barely move them and we thought long hours of driving probably wasn’t the best idea!

August 25, 2017September 5, 2017

You’re joking right?

After spending a few days in cities we were looking forward to getting out to the Great Smoky Mountains. The mountain range there is something else. the huge contrast between the cities and nature was amazing and we really enjoyed just driving through, admiring the scenery and breathing in the fresh air. We did spend a day hiking and through the first part of the hike we were talking and laughing, trying to make as much noise as possible to scare away any bears that may be nearby. It started to rain towards the half way point and didn’t seem like it was going to stop. On the way back it was a lot harder to talk as we were hiking on an incline most of the time. So because I was unable to talk as much while walking up hill we clapped a lot. At the beginning Mark was doing most of the clapping but then I took over. It was probably a good 15 minutes of solid clapping before Mark turned around and said “You know you probably only have to clap as we are approaching corners or coming up to blind spots in the path” ohhh thanks for that late bit of information. Definitely could have saved my solid clapping skills instead of wasting them on a solid 15 minute performance. The hike became more difficult because of the amount of rain that had come down as there was big puddles of mud, and any rocks we had to walk over had become slick with rain. I started to get excited once the rain stopped and I noticed we were getting close to the end without seeing a bear. Pretty sure it was all thanks to my brilliant clapping.

THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-2-7 — Chilling out, waiting for the rain to stop.

Leaving the Great Smoky Mountains wasn’t too bad because the weather had started to bother us already – where was the sun? As we were driving we noticed that the van wasn’t doing great uphills but we just figured that was because of how many hills there were but while Mark was driving the ‘check engine light’ came on so once we got to the next town we pulled into the first mechanics we saw and asked the guy there to check it out. He checked it using the diagnostic tool he had and told us that it was showing a “solenoid b” issue. He wasn’t sure exactly what that meant but told us it had to do with the transmission. That was not something we wanted to hear but we had places to be so we said thanks and continued driving. We were aiming to get to our friend’s parent’s house in North Carolina which at this stage was 2 hours away. Mark continued driving while I googled what the issue could be. We established that best case scenario it needed the solenoids in the transmission replaced, which would take a few hours to fix but wasn’t as bas as a whole new transmission. We called a transmission specialist workshop near our destination and they told us to stop by if we made it before they closed at 5pm. We got there at 4.30pm and told the mechanic there what was going on. He thought it sounded strange so drove the van up the road to see for himself. His first thought was that it was our clutch because of the issues we were having with the van struggling in reverse. It was probably our bad luck that all of these issues were happening on a Friday afternoon but after chatting with him for a while we booked in to drop it off the next day so that he could look at over the weekend or on Monday morning. We did just that and while we didn’t have our van to get us around it wasn’t a problem because we spent the weekend hanging out with our friend Chris’ family. Mark shot BB guns with Chris’ brother and went fishing. On Sunday morning we were up early to go to church with them. The church itself was so big and the amount of people was something else. Over 2000 people were there and that was small because it was summer and most people were away, the usual attendance rate was around 4000. Mark and I sat there through the service and then sat in on a bible studies group which meets weekly after the service. We were introduced to the group and so many people came to welcome us. Neither of us had ever experienced anything like it and it was very interesting to sit and listen to people talk about how their beliefs help them through their day to day lives. Sunday night after dinner we went on our own private plane ride where Mark even got to fly for a bit. Chris’ dad is a pilot and he was generous enough to organise a small flight for us which was something neither of us had done before. It was the perfect night for it as well. Monday afternoon I was sitting on the bed folding our washing when Mark came in and sat at the end of the bed. “We need a new transmission” he said. He had such a serious face that I thought he was trying to trick me. “You’re joking right?” “No” So I laughed at how well he was keeping a serious face, he normally isn’t that good, but a few seconds later I remembered that, yes normally he wasn’t that good at tricking me so he must be telling the truth. “You’re serious aren’t you?” He just nodded. “How much is it?” “$3500… US.” and at that point I just cried. That was so much money and there was simply nothing we could do about it. After sorting out a few things Mark called the mechanic back and told him to go ahead with it. We had to get on with it. So the rest of Monday was a bit of a downer but everything picked up again on Tuesday, we both did something we love to do – Mark played golf and I read. We really enjoyed staying with Chris’ family and were sad to be leaving but we had places to be once again.

Next stop – Charleston!

August 23, 2017August 21, 2017

You ain’t nothing but a hound dog

Moab was pretty dull but extremely hot so it was a huge contrast once we got to the Rocky Mountains National Park. It was cloudy and the air had a chill to it, so much so that we had to get our trackies and hoodies out! We only stayed there for a night but we set up camp and sat around our first fire of our trip – it’s been too hot to sit by a fire every other night! It was a really relaxing night and in the morning we drove to check out a lake in the park. We had our camera and bear spray on hand whilst we waiting for the sun to rise. And as the sun was rising all of the animals were beginning to wake. The edges of the lake were covered in mist and behind the mist we could see small deer edging towards the water. We walked around the lake back towards our car and out of the corner of our eye we both saw movement so we stopped and turned to see a huge elk, and then there was another, and another. One smaller one stared at us and didn’t move while we stood there watching it. Slowly Mark crept away and jumped the fence so he could try to get a better photo but by this stage the elk were bored of us and so they began to leave. The elk themselves were more impressive to us compared to the lake itself which wasn’t such a huge issue because we had decided to leave at this point anyway.

On the drive from Cleveland to Memphis we booked a site at the Graceland RV Park and made our way there. We set up our van for our stay and then headed out to see Memphis. We first walked next door to Graceland, the home of Elvis and bought tickets for the following day. Then we thought “what do we do while in Memphis?”. The list seemed quite long so we decided to get a start on it. First stop, Gus’ Fried Chicken. We put our names down on the waiting list and then went for a walk before heading back to eat the most amazing fried chicken we’ve ever eaten. The chicken came with a heap of sides – coleslaw, mac and cheese, fried pickles and slices of plain white sandwich slices of bread which we found to be quite comical. Although the sides had nothing on the chicken we ate them all except the bread, we left that because if we were hungry for plain white bread we could always just go to the supermarket. Our next stop was a cool part of town away from most of the tourist hot spots. We walked around and then found a bar to chill out at. After staying for a while we met a guy who used to live in Memphis and was in town for the weekend. He offered to show us around so we spent the next few hours checking out Beale St, the main street in Memphis filled with blues bars. We spent most of our time at BB King’s, listening to some old school blues music before calling it a night. The next day we were up early, ready to check out Graceland, the home of Elvis. Well, wasn’t that a huge disappointment. We had bought the basic tickets which were meant to be self guided. There was nothing self guided about being there. We stood in line to get our photo taken in front of the Graceland sign, then we stood in line to get on a bus which took us across the road (it would have been quicker to walk), and then once we arrived at his house we stood in another line to wait to get in. Once we got to the front door we were told about the entrance and told to “enjoy our time”. Inside everyone put on their headphones and had their iPads ready to go to listen to all of the information, this caused everyone to stand in line once more, but just around the house. Each room was filled with a single file line of people waiting to get to the next ‘feature’ to then click on that feature on their iPad so they could listen to the information about the said feature. Mark and I didn’t use ours. Neither of us were that interested and so we looked like 2 rude people trying to cut in line constantly because all we did was follow the flow of the people of the house but moved 10x as fast. We finally finished the tour and were so underwhelmed with the whole experience we didn’t know what to do. In the end we just left. Our ‘self guided tour’ ticket only allowed us access to his house and his plane collection, the rest of the museum was off limits to us. Memphis itself was a really cool city in regards to music and history so we figured that our next stop Nashville would be just as cool.

Nashville was so busy once we arrived because it was the 3rd of July, the day before America’s Independence Day. The whole city was getting ready for the huge celebrations and the biggest fireworks in the country. The difference between Memphis and Nashville could simply be described with the type of music being performed at bars. Where Memphis was mainly blues, Nashville was filled with country music. What we loved about Nashville was that while walking along the street you could stop and listen to bands play at different bars because they played at the front of the bar and often had huge windows opened so that passersby could stop to listen. We did this a couple of times before we started to get really tired and went back to our hotel. The next day we were overwhelmed with the amount of people out on the street celebrating the 4th of July. The entire city was out and we enjoyed walking around, drinking Jack Daniels and listening to all of the bands playing. Towards sunset we headed up towards the bridge over looking the Cumberland River. We set up there waiting for darkness to descend over Nashville. We had about an hour before the fireworks were due to start so we began chatting to the people around us who were completely shocked we were from Australia. They couldn’t get over how far away we were from home and they wanted to ask all of the usual questions.
“Do you see Kangaroos on the street?” – “Well it depends where you live, but generally not close to the cities”
“Does it get hot in Australia?” – “Yes really hot, but it does also snow in some parts of the country”
“Is it weird driving on the other side of the road?” – “We are used to driving on the right side of the road now, but we learn to drive on the left so the left is normal for us”
We were also asked some unusual questions.
“Do you celebrate Christmas?” – “Yes we celebrate Christmas on the 25th December and we also celebrate Easter”
“What cell phone companies do you have in Australia?” – “We have different companies to you here in the US”
We had begun to find that while we were in the southern states, people knew of Australia as a country far away but didn’t know many other things about it, and while most people were too embarrassed to ask some questions, some people just went straight for it and asked whatever came to their mind. Which seemed to please the other people around them because they would nod in agreement and repeat the question. We also found that people seemed too polite to ask where we were from. They could tell straight away we weren’t from there but they always stopped themselves from asking so we would always volunteer the information early into a conversation.

THEPLACESWE_2017_USA-2-4 — Nashville on the 4th of July

The fireworks eventually began and went for just over half an hour! They were quite spectacular but by the end we were checking our watches to see how much longer. Once they did finish though we made our way to our hotel to drop our camera off and grab some food. It was getting late but we figured there would still be people out and about so we went back out only to find that the streets had emptied almost completely save for the cleaning crews and the groups of late night stragglers. We assumed everyone had either left or gone into bars or clubs so we walked around to see if anything in particular caught our eye which was when we noticed a huge group of people yelling and crowing around, with police standing by trying to get them to move along. Not sure what was happening we stood for a bit and watched until we realised the crowd was moving towards us. Not wanting to get caught up in what we thought could become violent we began walking away quickly. We found that there were a few other people in the same situation as us – they had been walking around, noticed the crowd, stopped, and then found the crowd heading towards them. We made it back to the street our hotel was on and just as we turned onto the street the crowd continued walking past, heading in the direction of the park. We figured that was the sign that the night was over.

November 25, 2016

New York, New York

After an easy flight from Iceland we arrived at JFK Airport in New York and I was pretty excited but also trying to act cool… Customs officers always make me nervous; I never know if I should smile or frown, look at them or look away but while I was being pre-occupied with my internal struggle of if I was smiling too much the officer handed us our passports and through we walked into America. We grabbed a cab and waited patiently for the drive to end so we could get to our apartment and start exploring. If you were to look up the definition for rush hour traffic you would find New York City there which meant by the time we got to our apartment the time difference from Iceland had started to hit us and we were getting hungry. All we did for our first night in NYC is eat and then sleep, which was probably a good thing considering the mood New Yorkers were in after the election results. The next day however we were up early and our first stop was Washington Square Park to check out the archway and fountain. The archway was there as was the waterless fountain. Not to worry though because we were in NYC and nothing could ruin our mood. That first day we quickly became familiar with the NY Subway system and also become very familiar with all of the interesting people, smells and sounds that can be found below the surface of NYC.

We’ve learnt to get up as soon as the sun rises, if not before to start our days when we are in heavy tourist areas so we got up early and made our way out to Brooklyn for our morning walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. We were lucky enough to experience Brooklyn Bridge with the locals while they all started their days with their morning routines; walking, running, or riding. We decided to spend the morning doing our laundry because we knew if we left it any longer we would be exploring NYC in our summer clothes so we picked up our bags of dirty clothes, grabbed a coffee (hot chocolate for me) from our new ‘local’ cafe and made our way to the laundromat. 2 hours later we had bags full of clean clothes and were ready to start our real exploration of the city that never sleeps.

We are lucky enough to have a couple of friends from Melbourne living in NY so we caught up with them to get their recommendations on what we should do while there. Because of them we were able to eat some amazing food and visit some amazing sites free of charge thanks to their memberships. Thanks also to the US Election we were also cut off from many roads and access paths due to protests. I found the protests themselves quite uneventful to be honest except for one where a lady started yelling at us to join in. At this point I thought about trying to tell her that we weren’t American but didn’t think she would actually care and sure enough after about 30 seconds of yelling she was back walking with the crowd. These posts I write are never meant to be about politics, they are only meant to be about our trip but I’ve learnt a lot throughout our travels so far and I believe I am quite well versed on the world these days. One of the main things that has stood out from our travels for me, and I know Mark feels the same, is that a lot of people never see how deep a scar runs. People living in cities all over the world who have jobs and can support themselves rarely think about the indirect affect a government’s policy can have on their own population and on those who were already doing it tough. I don’t think any country is perfect in the way they do things but I strongly associate myself with the government and social systems of Scandinavian countries. The sense of pride and gratefulness shown by so many Scandinavians about politics is truly unbelievable and I hope that in the future Australia heads more towards the Scandinavian way of life instead of the American. There are simply too many people hurting in America that are being left behind and forgotten about thanks to the media. There are many places I would like to live in this world, American is not one of them. I find this feeling of mine hard to handle when I absolutely loved New York.

After 3 full days of exploring it was Sunday so we slept in and then went and treated ourselves to brunch. After brunch we went back to our apartment to pick up our bag and while Mark sat down to do a bit of research on where we should go, I did some research on tattoo shops that take walk ins. I easily found heaps but after a bit more research I found one I liked and showed Mark. We had already agreed on what tattoos we were going to get but once we looked at them again there was something that just didn’t feel right so I began researching new ones and quickly found ones that we felt worked better – bind runes symbolising love. We sent photos of them to our phone and off we went to see if the tattoo shop could fit us in and within minutes they were leading us through to meet our tattooist and get everything set up. I went first and it was over so quickly with minimal pain. I don’t understand though how people could sit there for hours. Mark went after me and after an hour the entire process was done and we were walking out of the shop with our new tattoos – Mark’s second and my first. Now we’ll never forget NY. We spent the rest of the day with one of our friends as she showed us around the Chelsea Markets. We ate the most amazing lobster and tacos that we vowed to be back there before we left for Canada.

Monday was the start of another week and thankfully talk of the election was slowly (and I mean at a snail’s pace) starting to die down. The weather was starting to go downhill on Monday so we tried to fit in a few of the last things on our list and before we knew it the day was over. Our days in NY just went by and before we knew it we only had 2 days left. Our second last day was met with pouring rain so we hung out inside and began organising ourselves for our trip to Canada. We applied for our ESA’s and mine came through straight away that it had been approved, Mark’s however came back ‘pending’. This caused Mark to go into slight panic mode but within an hour he was all smiles after getting his ‘approved’ email. To further lift his spirits we went to Chelsea Pier Driving Range where I agreed to let Mark try to teach me how to hit a golf ball. It wasn’t quite as boring as I always imagined it to be but I can’t say I could stand there and hit over 100 golf balls. Leaving the driving range we walked past a sign for the bowling alley so we turned and went and played 2 games of ten pin bowling. Mark won the first game but I won the second so I was happy to leave it at that… I hate losing. Before we knew it we were back at our apartment packing our bags getting ready for our last day in New York.

For our last day we decided to head out of the city and drive up state to Storm King Art Centre. The drive up there was really nice and we were able to see so much of New York. The first thing we noticed when we arrived at Storm King was the fresh air thanks to the large open space. To make the most of our day and to see as much as we could we rented bikes and rode around. It was so peaceful compared to NYC that at some of the art installations we stopped and sat down on the grass just to take in the tranquility. Of course driving back into NYC took some much longer than it did to get out so by the time we dropped the car off we were happy to be done with it and jumped back onboard the subway to head to Soho and then Times Square just one last time.

325cc975-0fe3-4f92-90b8-77bb8bfda94d — Getting that pout on at Storm King.

I loved New York and although I’m looking forward to the several weeks, I can’t wait to get back to the city and next time it will be for New Years Eve.

And now, off to Canada we go!