Ode to Southwest Airlines

While I could write about how much I hate American Airlines (which I do - particularly at this moment), I am choosing to write about how much I love Southwest. I am grateful every day that Jason works there, not only because he loves his job, but also because it truly is an amazing company. Thus, my ode to Southwest.

Thank you for my free flights, particularly when I get my three previous ones with American cancelled.

Thank you for your friendly service, it really made my awful night/day better. From the gate agents to the flight crew, it never ceases to amaze me how amazing your employees are.

Thank you for the yummy snacks :)

Thank you for not canceling ANY flights (no matter how late you had to work) and not stranding literally thousands of people. As a side note, I waited an hour and a half for a cab...just to give you an idea of how many people were stranded by American.

Thank you for picking up the tab IF flights get cancelled and not making people pay out of pocket.

Thank you for my free bags (and for not sending my bag to Boston...how can it get there but I can't. Hmm).

Finally thank you for creating a culture that makes people happy. Southwest customers are just so much nicer than any other I have encountered.

As a side note: Due to aforementioned cancellations, we are on our way to Denver this weekend! So thankful SWA got me out of Chicago and that I don't have to spend my weekend in O'Hare. My "confirmed seat" to Boston was supposed to be at 10:00pm tonight...no thanks. Hopefully my bag arrives in Denver by tomorrow!

Miami, FL

Quick update on my work travels - Miami was AWESOME! I honestly didn't really know what to expect. The city is just so full of life, it's contagious! It honestly reminded me a lot of the scene in San Juan, PR. I guess I just love latin culture!

After working on the latin american schedule (9:30-7), I got a little time to explore. I ate some great Cuban food and got a few lessons in Spanish (my favorite phrase was "gracias mami!")

The first night, I ate some awesome sushi at Doraku on South Beach. It was great people-watching! I went on a Monday night and there were honestly people everywhere.

Seriously, I cannot express HOW much I love Cuban food. My favorite dish is called "Ropa Vieja" and is essentially shredded flank steak in a tomato sauce with black beans, rice and sweet plantains. My mouth is watering even thinking about it. Hopefully I can find a place in Dallas that serves it.

I can't wait to go back when I can bring Jason and we will actually have some real time to explore.

Right now, I'm in the midst of my 5 weeks in Chicago. Hopefully I'll get some time to explore here as well.

Upcoming in the next month:

4 more trips to Chicago

College Station for the Maroon and White Game

Weekend trip to Boston

Annual Cinco de Mayo party at the Thompsons

Rangers Game

Weekend trip to Seattle

Whew! I get tired even looking at that :)

Look forward to the post on our trip to Boston in a couple weeks...

Sonoma and Russian River Valley, CA

Hello everyone!

We had it all planned out - we were going to San Diego. Seats looked great AND we would get in fairly early on Thursday. Well, as we were heading to the airport, I looked again and only 1 seat was open. WHOOPS! Frantic, I started looking for ANYWHERE that we could get to. Well, the only way we were getting anywhere was to first fly to Houston. Luckily when we go to Houston, we were able to make a 20 minute plane change and we were on our way to SFO! *Minor setback - getting thrown up on by a baby about 2 hours into a 3 hour flight. Sorry, but no kids for us any time soon.

Now, we've each been to San Francisco more than 5 times. Jason worked there during his E&Y days for a few months and it's probably one of my favorite cities in the US. I had actually been there 2 weeks before for work, so we decided to venture to wine country instead of hanging out in the city. We most recently went to Sonoma/Napa in July with John and Mallory and we absolutely fell in love with Sonoma.

Our first Golden Gate Bridge picture together

This time, we changed it up a little and went to Sonoma and the Russian River Valley. WOW. All I can say is that the Russian River Valley is THE place to go in wine country if you like Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The wineries are much smaller and the people are all very knowledgeable about wine. It's great for Jason and I since we love wine, but don't know much about it. It has a similar feel to Sonoma, but the views are much better. Napa is fine, don't get me wrong. There are a lot of great wineries there that we really liked (Mumm Napa, Cakebread, V. Sattui), but it's crazy expensive and everything just seems so commercial. 

The wineries we went to for those of you thinking about a trip:

Sonoma

St. Francis - Our second time here. One of our favorites. Great "French style" wine and friendly people.

Ledson - The wine was alright, don't know if we'd go back. The tasting room was in this crazy building.

Gloria Ferrer - Our sparkling wine stop of the trip. I'd skip this next time. Mumm Napa was WAY better.

VJB - Definitely a favorite. Good "Italian style" wine. A small, family-owned winery.

Russian River Valley

Gary Ferrell - Really good wine, great views of the river. WAY too expensive to ever buy. Known for their Pinot Noir's and Chardonnay.

Arista - Ok wine, great atmosphere. Only Pinor Noirs.

Matrix - Our favorite! The people there were SO great and the tasting was free! A Pinot house.

After the wineries, we spent some time in downtown Healdsburg (pronounced HEAL-dsburg) and then made our way to the beautiful coast. We had no idea that it was only a (very scenic) 30 minute drive away.

Overall, we had a GREAT time. We will be back again - I'm sure of it. There are so many more areas to visit. We've heard great things about the Dry Creek Valley and Alexander Valley areas as well.

As mentioned in my previous post, I'll be traveling a lot for work in the 5 weeks, so look forward to those posts as well! Thanks for reading :)

Work Travel = Fun Travel?

We're FINALLY traveling again next weekend! No idea where we're going yet, but that's the norm now. Somewhere warm would be best - maybe Orlando or San Diego?

Also, I just found out I will be doing a 5 week stint in Chicago, IL for work. While work travel isn't always the most fun, Jason and I have decided to make the best of it and travel a few of the weekends. I've taken off a few Fridays and since I will already be in Chicago, I can buy a ticket whenever we're going instead of a ticket back home to Dallas. This will make it easier since only one person will have to fly standby. We're thinking somewhere that's a little harder to get to would be perfect - Boston/Seattle/NYC.

No worries about our fur child (he's almost 2!) - Indy will be with my parents for 4 out of 5 weeks. He likes them more anyways :) While having a dog definitely restricts your travel opportunities, I wouldn't give him up for the world. His first ever doggy daycare/boarding experience will be next weekend - I hope that goes well. And of course, I booked a place that I can watch him play with the other dogs on a video camera - I'm crazy like that.

Thanks for reading!

Spring Break Woes

For those of you wondering how our trip went, we completely forgot to factor in Spring Break! You know you're getting old when Spring Break doesn't even cross your mind. Needless to say, there were literally no 2 seats open going ANYWHERE Southwest flies. And we were willing to travel anywhere...It worked out fine though. We ended up having a nice relaxing weekend at home.

Our next trip is in a few weeks - I'm getting super antsy though. I'm so spoiled by travel now!

Also, our big trip for this year is decided! Our good friends, John and Mal, are moving to PARIS (France, not Texas), so we're going to go visit them once they get settled in later this summer/fall. I'm SO excited about this trip! Jason's been to Paris for a work trip once, but I've never been (besides the airport). 

I'm really hoping that we can see a few other countries while we're there as well. Up high on my wishlist are Austria, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium.

Until next time!

I Went For a Run!

So, no travel this week, but it was still exciting since I ran my first 10K (6.2 miles)! My friend, Kelly, and I have been training for this for a few months and yesterday was the day that we tackled the Cowtown 10K!

My goal was to finish in 1 hour and 15 minutes. My secondary goal, which I really never thought would be possible on my first attempt, was to run the entire way. Well, we did BOTH! We finished in an hour and 12 minutes (11:30 mile) and we only took a quick hydration break (20ish seconds) at mile 4. Kelly was a great running partner - we kept each other motivated and at a good pace. Thanks Kelly! Thanks ALSO to Jason for coming out and supporting us at 7am (and being a great photographer).

This is us right about to finish!

So, I have asthma pretty bad. This made the first few months of training TORTURE. Once I pushed past it (when I started running around 4 miles), it actually became fun. I would definitely encourage everyone who can run to do it! It's amazing!

It's honestly a GREAT feeling to be so proud of something that I've worked so hard for. I'm not stopping here either! I'm looking forward to running many more 10Ks; the ultimate goal is a HALF-MARATHON! I'm thinking the Bryan-College Station race in December sounds like a perfect fit. I even think Kelly and her husband will be running it too!

Back to traveling in 2 weeks! We're thinking Key West, but who knows where we'll end up! Thanks for reading!

Washington D.C.

Our trip to Washington D.C. was in a word - exhausting! We did SO much in our 2 days there. I feel like we need to take another trip back to explore the city since we really only had time to do the touristy things. Jason and I were talking and I think we literally walked between 20-25 miles in two days.

We got in late on Thursday night after grabbing the Amtrak to get to Union Station in D.C. Taxis - The only annoying thing about our time there. First, they only take cash - fair warning! Second, everything is negotiable. They didn't have a meter and would just pull a number out of thin air. We used the fine art of haggling in these situations.

First thing Friday morning, we walked over to the Capitol area and made our way to the Library of Congress. This might be the most beautiful building we went to in D.C.

Next, we went to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum where we got to see the original Wright Brother's plane (with new canvas). This was Jason's favorite place we went, especially since he works for Southwest. They had everything from rockets to astronaut gear, airplanes to balloons.

This was the day that we walked to ALL of the monuments/memorials along the National Mall - Vietnam Veterans, Lincoln, Washington, World War II, Korean War, MLK, and Jefferson. This was my favorite part of our trip! We walked until pretty late on Friday, which might have been a bad idea. Our feet were SO SORE! The monuments at night were amazing though, so it was definitely worth it! We grabbed a quick dinner at Z's Burger where we had some great hot dogs and shakes - simple and delicious!

The reflection pool was drained for renovations

The Jefferson Monument at night

We woke up pretty early on Saturday morning because we had reservations to tour the Capitol. We got to walk around the old House of Representatives and Senate halls, so this was really cool! I don't know NEARLY enough about American history, but it was really interesting being in the place that so many important things were decided.

After that, we headed to the National Archives, International Spy museum, another Smithsonian - the Natural History museum, and the White House. We even got to see Obama's motorcade pulling into the White House :) One great thing about D.C. is that so much is free; all of the Smithsonians and all government buildings. We finished the day in the Penn Quarter area where we grabbed some sushi and champagne at a place called SEI. It was a great end to our time in D.C.

As you can see in this picture, we were SO bundled up. It was in the 20s with 30 mph winds. Our next vacation will be to a beach for SURE. One amazing benefit that I forgot to mention is that Southwest owns Airtran now. We can also fly standby on Airtran and go anywhere they fly. This includes the Dominican Republic, Aruba, Puerto Rico, Jamaica and more.

As a side note, we ran into our first standby travel problem. We got stuck in Houston for around 4 hours since one of the flights back to Dallas got cancelled. We were in the top 10 on a list of over 80 standby people...unbelievable! I feel really bad for those people further down the list. I'm not sure if they even got out of Houston that night.

Our next travel is in a month since I will be running my 10k during Jason's next available travel weekend. Not sure where we're going - any suggestions are welcome. Look for a few more posts between now and then. Thanks for reading!