wanderlust wednesday : north fork, li

The forecast looks prime for an outdoor adventure this weekend.  And with the start of strawberry season, there is no place I would rather be than exploring the North Fork farms and vineyards on the east end of Long Island.  Here's what I think a perfect day on the North Fork would look like:

U-Pick Strawberries

It turns out one of my favorite strawberry places is closed for u-pick this year but Garden of Eve Farm in Riverhead is a pretty sweet place too (pun always intended).  I prefer my farms organic whenever possible but there are other u-pick farms in the area if that’s not your jam (I can’t help myself).

Bike Ride through Mattituck

I mean there is a road called Lovers Lane with bookstores and a little café.  The adorableness is almost too much to handle.  Also, the bicycle is the ideal way to mosey about the east end.  You avoid the traffic and get to take in the sights and sounds of the farms and sea shore.

Sunset Booze and Blues

Ok, so there isn’t actually an event called this but there should be.  My ideal evening includes sitting in a vineyard and listening to some live music while probably eating way too much cheese.  Some of my favorite places to do this are  Pindar, Martha Clara, and Lieb.

 Where are you dreaming of escaping to on this wanderlust Wednesday?

notes:

- to get to the north fork from nyc, take the lirr to mattituck.  if you are bringing your bicycle (highly recommended) be sure to get a permit to take it on the train.

- the vineyards listed are for their live music... not necessarily their wine.  i usually enjoy what paumanok has to offer.

- these photos are from grace's and my very own north fork adventure last summer. we need to repeat that this year and add in some wine tasting. just saying. ​

on the road again in the lone star state

After 3 canceled flights, a 1+ hour delay, and some wicked turbulence (thank you, Mother Nature), I made it back to my humble abode 36 hours after my ill-fated journey began.  I have never been so happy to be in this hot and hazy city I call home.  Let's rewind a bit though because all-in-all it was definitely worth it.

The last time I was in Texas, Beth and I got to talking about doing something (anything) for my then upcoming decade transition.  We don't usually make a big deal out of birthdays.  It's a good year if we remember to call each other within a week of our respective birth dates.  Most years it ends up being an 'oh right that happened - how was that?' kind of thing.  But this year we decided to mix things up. 

Throughout our teen and undergrad years, we went to see a lot of bands.  Emphasis on a lot.  Like this band is playing and it's only a 10 hour drive away and we can totally just drive back home over night to make it to work the next day a lot.  This was also a period of our lives where we both displayed some pretty poor decision making...  no harm, no foul?  So what better way to ring in a new year/life transition/we're (sort of) officially adults than to go to a show. 

The easy way to do this would have been to fly into or at least base ourselves in the city where the band was performing.  Instead our itinerary looked more like this:

Day 1 - Fly into Dallas.
Day 2 - Drive to San Antonio.
Day 3 - Drive to Austin.  Try not to get struck by lightning.
Day 4 - Drive to San Antonio.  Try not to get swept off road by flash flood.
Day 4.5 - Drive to Fredericksburg. Try not to fall off of giant pink rock.
Day 4.75 - Drive back to San Antonio. Try not to get run off road by semi.
Day 5 - Recover from Day 4.
Day 6 - Drive to Dallas.  Attempt to leave Dallas.
Day 7 - Actually leave Dallas.

Writing it all out makes it look much worse than it felt.  At least up until that whole flying snafu I mentioned at the beginning of this post.  I mean it wholeheartedly though when I say it was worth it.  There are good people in Texas.  I mean there are good people everywhere but some of my people are in Texas.  And they make my life better.  (Full cheesiness intended.)  Also, with these people I managed to have a weekend full of adventures which is the very best kind of weekend. However, in the interest of keeping this post to a reasonable amount of words, here are some of my favorites:

Exploring the Medina River Natural Area in San Antonio, TX

It's mostly paved but it is beautiful and if you time it right there are wildflowers to accompany your walk.  Definitely one of the easier, if not the easiest, routes my hiking buddy and I have conquered but we enjoyed it nonetheless.  Besides which it had its own excitement when we were caught in a torrential downpour on the way back.  The weather changed from what you see above on the left to the right in a matter of minutes.

Reliving my teens at Mohawk in Austin, TX

So many lessons were learned during our evening at Mohawk.  Namely, that it is in fact an outdoor venue.  There’s a small indoor space but check the weather and your ticket when heading to a show…I really should have picked up a poncho.  Remember those flash floods I mentioned?  Soaked us to our bones.  Also, mohawks are not just a hairstyle.  Who knew? (Lots of people.  Apparently.)  Perhaps most importantly, the venue is a pretty sweet spot and the band did not disappoint.

Staring at the stars on top of Enchanted Rock

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Do this.  If you do nothing else when in the San Antonio/Austin area, go here and spend some quality time under the night sky.  It is breathtakingly beautiful.  I may also have a thing for stargazing but trust me on this one; you don't want to miss out.  The area is designated as an International Dark Sky Park meaning that when you have a clear night you can see the Milky Way.  Their website has a dark sky monitor so you can check the conditions before you make the trek.  A note of warning - hike up and down the Summit Trail at least once while it is daylight before you attempt it at night.  I had been there before and we still got a bit confused on the way back down. 

Wandering aimlessly in some of San Antonio's best and worst markets

To be fair, the majority of this adventuring wasn't started until the afternoon which I have since learned is well past the prime shopping hours. The people watching and festivity partaking alone were worth the entrance fees. Bonus points: we managed to make it just in time for the Mexican wrestling match finale at Traders Village.  Yes, that's a church facade behind them. 

All in all an amazing weekend in the Lone Star State.  I still have dreams of making it to Big Bend.  Time to start planning for another Texan getaway.

notes:

- even with the rains, it was still hot in texas.  be sure to bring ample water with you on your own adventures.  we brought our water bottles with us as an afterthought to enchanted rock and it was very much needed when we reached the top.

- i had some good food (mainly pancakes, a taco, and some homemade chili) but no amazing-i-must-share-with-everyone food while i was in texas this time around.  suggestions anyone?

wanderlust wednesday: airport diaries

Walking through the airport, ever wonder what it would be like to hop on a different flight? Pull a whole Home Alone move? Scratch all your plans and wake up somewhere new? Go some place without expectation of what you "should" do and just chill out? I do it all the time. 

Playing with the idea of going anywhere at the snap of my fingers feels free. After spending a long weekend at home with my family, I had European thoughts on the brain. I'd love to go stroll around Paris or Croatia or Italy for several days. To be in a place where I didn't know the language- and therefore wouldn't be required to talk to lots of people- seems so relaxing. (I guess you could say I got plentyyyy of family time.) I could sleep when I wanted to, eat when I wanted to, stroll around for hours and get lost in a new place. I would love to spend hours sitting in a little outdoor cafe writing and day dreaming. With no stress of meeting a deadline. Oh, and I could wear sundresses the whole time. (Hey, it's my dream.) I wouldn't complain over island life in the Bahamas or off the coast of Nicaragua either... 

But alas, I hopped on my very delayed flight back to NYC, and we're back to reality this morning! But hey, this kid hit the jackpot when he hopped on the wrong flight and ended up in the city that never sleeps... so maybe we're in for our own surprises. 

old croton aqueduct, ny

Oh little bloggy blog, you've been neglected lately. My life pretty much revolves around three things at the moment: school, work, running. Not exactly something to write home about... You know more than I already have here and here. Oh yea and here too. 

This is not to say that I am completely embracing hermitage values but when I am being social I want to focus just on that and not how I am going to write it up per se. Actually, in the short life of this blog the 'how' of it has never been a focus. We just really like to write. So life gets a bit messy and other things come in to focus and that's fine and dandy but I enjoy this space so I need to figure out a way to squeeze it in to the rotation. 

For the past couple of weeks I have been running on what is affectionately called the dreadmill. It is/was a necessary evil that enabled me to study for my exams while crossing off my marathon training to do list. My last exam was Monday so when on Tuesday the sun decided to make its appearance after a very cold, drizzling, and foggy start, I made my way out to a trail near work. I generally avoid in and outs but being outside with the sights and smells and the dirt once again under my feet put a silly grin on my face. Well when I wasn't trying to convince myself that 80 degrees and high humidity will not actually kill me. The intensity of it really surprised me, especially since I ran about twice the distance just a few days prior. 

Towards the end, I started playing the just-make-it-to-that-tree game. Right when I was about to stop at my designated foliage, there was a small boy standing by himself while his mother called for him from down the path to a get a moving. So I did what anyone would do and challenged him to a race. Little man ran fast and I had a burst of energy to help me make it the rest of the way back. 

Sometimes I just need those little things to motivate me along. Just a short break, a friendly face, a kind word. They just brighten me up and let me feel all the warm, squishy good things in life. Next week's goal: be that for someone else. It's easy to get lost in the day-to-day grind and focus in on oneself but it is so much better when I take advantage of the opportunities around me to engage with others.  Especially footraces with 4 year-olds acting their age.

notes:

- i realize that this post has absolutely nothing to do with actually running along the old croton aqueduct. thoughts + feelings > logistics. sometimes. 

- if you would like to challenge your own 4 year old friend to a foot race, check out how to access the trail here. i entered near the a&p in hastings (street parking) and just ran out 20 minutes and then turned around. fyi, there are many street crossings in this section and cars don't yield for pedestrians.  including when you are in crosswalks. 

- there is only one picture from this trail because i was running and may have been entirely focused n heat + thirst so you get a bonus picture of the sunset from my post-run walk once i made it back to brooklyn. the city can just be so stunningly beautiful. and i will never tire of the sun. 

- related to above, this was on loop in my brain during said run: birthdays were the worst days, now we sip champagne when we're thirsty. dehydration motivation fo sho. 

wanderlust wednesday: pfeiffer beach (big sur)

Oh, do I have Big Sur dreams. I've been lucky enough to tag on an extra day or so in this part of heaven the last few years when traveling for work. It served as a sort of "spring break" and I didn't get one this year!! Thus, my wanderlust is hitting me a little harder than ever. 

The perfect day would include some wandering around scenic Highway 1 (perhaps hopping out for some tree hugging and hiking down to McWay Falls)...

...and then finding our way to Pfeiffer Beach with a bottle of local wine to enjoy the last few hours of sunshine breathing in the fresh air, watching the surfers, and digging all sorts of beach vibes. Harmonicas are helpful too. 

This beach in particular is pretty f-ing magical. I mean, there's purple sand. Yes, purple. And the locals are pretty awesome too. When I was there last spring with a good friend, we were invited over for dinner by a man we met on the beach who lived in a house his father built in the 1960s on the cliff above. Actually he lived in his own house next to it that he built complete with a long outdoor dinner table and open air fireplace. We sat with him and some friends and exchanged stories while he cooked us a homemade meal (his friend from Spain made paella from scratch), we climbed on top of his green roof which was full of kale he was growing along the perimeter (dreams!), we checked out his green building next door where he was designing furniture but also allowed the space to be used for local yoga retreats... I mean you wouldn't believe all of it if I told you!  Oh yes and there may have been a natural hot tub that we all swam in during which I saw at least 5 shooting stars. Magic, I say! We learned that our new friend recently moved back home to Big Sur after leaving a prestigious tech career in San Francisco - making a choice to find meaning in a simpler life. Instead of spending the rest of his life designing software and logos for Apple or Google (which one I don't remember...they're the same, right?), he wanted to make something that mattered to him. He wanted to get his hands dirty and get back to actually creating. I was basically drooling while listening to his story; Big Sur has always been one of those fantastical places I imagine quitting my NYC life for. How could anyone complain waking up and falling asleep in a place like this? It's green, it's beautiful, it's grounded. I mean it is the definition of a good quality of life. 

I did return to NYC as planned, and went back to the grind. However, it was such a breath of fresh air to taste a different pace of life and mentality. What a dream it was to walk on purple sand and tell stories about what we dream of creating with our lives around a camp fire. We're due to taste that again soon, right? In the meantime, we've got Wednesdays.

notes:

- pfeiffer beach is a little bit hidden, and they only allow a certain amount of people in at the same time. we checked out other people's directions and pointers on yelp, and they were pretty helpful! we knew we wanted to see the sunset, so we got there several hours before to hang out and brought layers.

- i really wanted to go to the hot springs, but it's pretty expensive to go. however, they do have public hours for $30 from 1am-3am here that seem like quite the experience. our local friends said they used to sneak in there all the time as teenagers. even though we didn't make it here last time, we still got lucky with a natural hot spring under the moonlight with shooting stars! 

wanderlust wednesday: big bend national park

It’s been a whole six months since I last step foot inside a National Park and with my annual pass about to expire I’ve been plotting out where I would like to venture out to next.  On the short list for this upcoming year is Big Bend National Park.  Not only does this locale boast mountains, canyon, and hot springs (a necessity at this point), it’s close to some other pretty sweet sights.  Here’s what I would be up to if I could escape finals and head on over to the Lone Star State:

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Do

- Kayak or canoe in the Santa Elena Canyon

- Watch the sunrise over the Chiso Mountains

- Afternoon lounging in the Langford Hot Springs (always necessary after a couple days of hiking)

- Hike, explore, and dust off my backpack for some backcountry adventures via the South Rim or the Outer Mountain Loop.  Lost Mine Trail looks awesome too for a day when schlepping isn't as enticing.

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See

- Stargazing and a Star Party at the McDonald Observatory 

- Get inspired by some minimalist art in Marfa

Stay

- These cottages in Terlingua are making me think about trading in my concrete jungle for waking up to the Chiso Mountains

- This hideaway or this adobe look like the perfect place to relax after a day of exploring Marfa

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Eat

- Two words. Food Shark.  This food truck has been favorably written up from the Garden and Gun to the New York Times.  How could it not be all sorts of amazing?

- The Starlight Theater Restaurant in Terlingua makes horseback acceptable transportation and encourages impromptu music on the porch - two of my favorite things.

Where would you go on this Wanderlust Wednesday?