Reunion Part Duex
Since everyone was still in town we planned another night out to party plus a perfect night to celebrate Laurel’s birthday as well. A few of us had dinner at Nobu downtown and afterwards got together with everyone else. We had a date with the IVY rooftop with bottles. Multiple bottles. We rolled in 20 people deep and it was just a great night from start to finish. Ill let the photos do the talking. Afterwards we headed back to TK’s condo at the Sé Hotel for another night of pizza and after partying. Who knows when the next time we will be all in the same room together but we definitely made this a weekend to remember.
MCHS Class of 2001 – a Sundevil forever.
Post Reunion Brunch
After our reunion, a handful of us who had a hotel in downtown met us for brunch at Cafe Chloe. Besides their delicious bacon and wheat pancakes, our conversations about what the hell happened the night before were hilarious. It was like putting a big drunken puzzle piece together. As a matter of fact, it was exactly like the movie Hangover, take you pick, 1 or 2 since they both had the damn same plot, but no monkey or baby in this story. The best story telling came out this morning and it was definitely awesome to share sobering laughs with old friends.
10 Year Reunion
We, the MCHS Sundevils Class of 2001 had our reunion at the Se Hotel in downtown San Diego party planned by Tk and Taylor. With a graduating class of 700+ we had 150+ people attend which is a large amount for a reunion.
I had friends fly in from Chicago, Dallas, San Fran and talking to about 5 people that flew from NY. It was crazy but most definitely good hearing about classmates successes across the board. Plus a few of the most favored teachers came also. Profe Michel said he always gets reunion invites but this was the 1st one he actually went to because his invite had TK’s name on it.
After the reunion, TK made an announcement that we were having an after party bottle service at the IVY. So most of us moseyed a couple blocks and got the party started. It was like a high school dance but without any damn chaperones, oh and the lights weren’t on.
Who knows maybe we might have yearly reunions? Definitely a night to remember but this was only the start of the weekend…
NEX-5 Test at Miramar Lake
I finally found a point-n-shoot camera i like. These are the first shots with my new Sony NEX-5 camera and I love how they came out.
2011 Chargers Training Camp
Went to a exclusive Chargers Season Ticket Holder training camp practice yesterday. It was the 1st day FA signed players could suit up for practice. Lets go through this real quick… Bob & Eric in the backfield is gonna be scary. Antonio Garay is a fun loving BEAST who loves to plank. It was Luis Castillio’s b day yesterday (1 of the guys who didn’t sign my helmet). Jammer pick 6. VJ in camp looks amazing. Charger girls look gorgeous. Ryan Mathews didn’t sign my helmet – DISLIKE. Barnes dented the stand up bags with his forearms. Gates was getting reps. Sperry ia an amazing #2 TE. And thats all. Enjoy the pics…
Padres & Dodger BP
Yesterday we had a special season ticket holder batting practice invite. Got down to the stadium pretty early and pretty much watched the end of the Padres BP and the beginning of the Dodgers BP. Alex (Padres) also dropped by to say whats up to his peeps. Really cool to see the players so close. We hung around downtown for some basic pizza and kicked it in the park…
I also used my new Canon S95 camera.
Chicago/Soldier Field
I was in Chi-town overnight to film the Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicago 1/2 marathon course coming up in a couple of weeks. After I had dinner at Gino’s East I decided to walk and see the city. I ended up closer to my hotel and decided it was pointless to call a cab to I sucked it up and walked back to the hotel in the warm muggy night just right before a big storm hit overnight.
The next day after filming the course I went by Soldier Field to check out the stadium. As I was limited on time I just gave myself my own tour around the stadium. Definitely a cool looking stone stadium.
Chicago was nice and short. Back to San Diego I headed…
Gino’s East Chicago
You can’t visit Chicago without eat authentic deep dish pizza and from the recommendations of my Chi-town peeps, Gino’s East was the place. It was almost 10 years to the date the last time I had Gino’s. I easily slipped right through the line and went straight to the bar where I learned this tip from Yelp.
Started out with the homemade mozzarella sticks. Yes they were dee-licious. They were puny little cheese sticks, these were beefy, thick and perfectly breaded.
They give you a 45min warning when ordering a deep dish. I got the small meaty legend all to myself. I think it is easier to eat if you let the cheese cool down for 5 minutes. The pie crust is AMAZING. The bacon in this sucker was so delicious.
When in Chicago, Gino’s East is definitely a MUST.
Hodads!!! (Yes Again)
When you have cravings you just can’t fight it sometimes and you just need to fulfill them so we did. Bacon cheeseburger with extra bacon FTW!!! They have by far the best bacon on a burger EVER. Yes quote me.
Dream Hotel South Beach
Im a sucker for review websites such as yelp to find good restaurants. In this case I ran across tripadvisor.com in the process of staying over in South Beach for a day and one hotel caught our attention, the Dream Hotel South Beach. Rooms silhouetted in blue mood lighting, hallways nicely lit and most important… #3 out of 201 on tripadvisory.com, this had to be good.
This hotel was recently remodeled and once called The Palmer House, that was built along with the art deco era. This hotel resides on Collins St which is parallel to Ocean Blvd. It is about a 5 min walk from the doors of Dream to the waters of the ocean. Collins St is laced with shopping, shopping and more shopping.
The interior room is lit with blue mood lighting. Windows are covered and stay covered. I opened the shade covering the window and there was absolutely nothing pleasing to view other than a wall from the building next door. There is a small chandelier in the corner, the mirror has a light in it, the shower/sink/closet area can be blocked off with heavy auto-closing doors. The shower and closet are beside each other and both have glass doors both lit in blue also. The shower has a direct blue light shinning on the water which makes it feel like you’re showering in a enchanted place. The bed is huge and comfortable!
The service was great and they made you feel very welcomed. I definitely recommend this place and is worth their #3 ranking.
Atlantis & Cabbage Beach – Paradise Island
So we headed over to Paradise Island via ferry. In order to get to the famous Atlantis resort we had to walk through the marina that docked incredibly huge yachts! We found our way into the Atlantis resort and sat at the sports book room and watched the 2nd half of the US Women’s Soccer vs Brazil game. Atlantis reminded me of a Las Vegas Hotel with casino’s, sports book rooms, beautiful pools and so on.
Afterwards I felt the urge to see some kind of beach so we asked for directions and walked about a mile in the blazing heat and humid weather. Then all of a sudden, at the end of this walkway surrounds by trees was this cliff and all you would see are crystal clear waters. This was Cabbage Beach. When I thought Coco Cay had amazing beaches, this just topped every single beach i’ve ever been too in my lifetime. Sand that felt like powder on your feet, water the temperature of a heated jacuzzi, and the clearness of the water. I was seriously in awe the whole time. Right when we got to the beach there was this man that asked if we wanted to go wave running and we said no but 3 word he said thereafter will always stick in my head… “Welcome to Paradise.”
We had to catch the boat before it headed back to Miami so we headed back to the ferry. On the way to the boat was this house on the dock and it was actually used in the James Bond Casino Royale movie. First thing we did was get pizza (all you can eat) and laid out on the pool deck as the boat set sail and while they were having a Sexiest Man Award.
Goodbye Nassau and Paradise Island…
Nassau, Bahamas
On our second day we ported on the island of Nassau. As we got off the boat it was nothing but hot and humid weather. We took what seemed to be a short walk around their little downtown walking into stores based on their air conditioning. They had a Señor Frogs restaurant, souvenir shops and surprisingly a whole bunch of high end shops like Coach, Breitlng, Rolex Etc. Getting off the boat and walking into the downtown seemed like a cluster as locals hassle you for hair braiding, moped riding, and the list goes on and on. One lap around their downtown was enough and we had two options 1.) head back to the boat or 2.) find a way to get to Paradise Island a parallel island home to the Atlantis Resort. We were headed for Atlantis…
A few facts we found out about Nassau:
- 20 minutes away from the airport is where Anna Nicole Smith and her son are laid to rest accompanied by 24 hour security.
- James Bond’s Casino Royal was filmed in part of Nassau
- Nassau has also been the setting for several other recent movies including After the Sunset,Into the Blue and Flipper.
Coco Cay, Bahamas
Our first destination was a small private island called Coco Cay. This island is privately owned by Royal Caribbean and only people aboard our ship could step foot on this island. We boarded tenders to transport us onto land. We first found a spot on one of the busier beaches just because we didn’t know better. All that mattered was that I step foot into the clear teal waters, the whole reason I wanted to cruise the Bahamas. It was like a dream come true.
The forecast all weekend was scattered thunderstorms and every now and then it was drop huge drops of rain and then stop 5 minutes later. It was kinda good it was raining because everyone bailed out of the ocean. To us it was better to be in the water when it rains. Had lunch as our ship supplied a BBQ to everyone but since it was raining there were no protected picnic tables because everyone took shelter. As we found a spot, these ruthless birds that are spoiled by foreigners feeding them food, just attacked Heather and stole one of her ribs right off her plate. If only I had a BB gun, heck, why not just a shot gun.
After lunch we started to walk around the island and noticed a whole other side of the beach that had been not discovered by everyone else as they were so eager to get into the water. This side of the beach had empty beach chairs and the waters were wide open! I just simply sat in the water all afternoon trying to soak up the moment. Every now and then the sun would peak through the clouds and hit the water and turn it into a neon green color. This was the ideal beach you can ever dream of.
After hours of making the beach our home, you can see haze of rain in the distance just get closer and then all of a sudden just ruined the fun and drop buckets of water from the sky. It was time to head back to the boat…
Miles of clear teal waters, silhouettes of palm trees, elegant shapely clouds and warm weather, I just wish I can bring you home.
Setting Sail With Royal Caribbean
After boarding my first cruise it was pretty over whelming with what you can fit on a cruise boat. We left the Port of Miami in the afternoon with the other barrage of cruise ships all headed for the Bahamas. As we headed out to sea, there was a great view of Miami from the deck of our Royal Caribbean ship…
