theparkerfamily.org

Tag: Travel

  • travel: seattle, washington

    [Underground Seattle Tour, Seattle, Washington]
    [Underground Seattle Tour, Seattle, Washington]
    oddity. after a 19th century fire destroyed some 25 blocks of old seattle downtown, the city took the opportunity to (literally) raise the city out of the puget sound by passing an ordinance mandating the streets raised eight feet (or higher) during the reconstruction.

    unfortunately, it seems like certain business owners downtown didn’t take the law too seriously. they opted to rebuilt at the old (lower) street level only to have the city come through in the next couple of years and turn their first floors into basements.

    oops.

    See Slideshow of the Photos on Flickr:
    underground tour, seattle, washington state

  • found photo: space needle, seattle, washington state

    [Space Needle, Seattle, Washington.]
    IMG_0346, originally uploaded by [ecpark].

  • hike: mirror lake, oregon

    [Photo]
    IMG_7035, originally uploaded by [ecpark].
    Explore the Photo Set:
    hike: mirror lake, oregon

  • travel: crooked river national grasslands, oregon

    [Photo]
    IMG_6877, originally uploaded by [ecpark].
    Explore the Photo Set:
    travel: crooked river national grasslands, oregon

  • found photo: killer hand dryer, eugene, oregon

    [Killer Hand Dryer, Eugene, Oregon.]
    IMG_0341, originally uploaded by [ecpark].

  • hike: enchanted rock state park, texas

    [Photo]
    IMG_6080, originally uploaded by [ecpark].
    after three days in austin for a non-profit technology conference, i headed for the hills today for a hike around enchanted rock state park near oxford, texas. it’s a giant monolith in the middle of the texas hill country, and completely unlike anything else around.

    of course, when you are on a rock with no identifiable markings (you know, like a trail or something) one tends to get lost. but fortunately, one also tends to have a brand-spanking new iphone with gps integrated google maps to bail oneself out. again.

    but i still added about two hours to my hike by unexpectedly coming down the backside of the mountain, but the sky was blue and the weather was freexzing cold (by texas standards) so no harm, no foul.

    Explore the Photo Set:
    Hike: Enchanted Rock State Park, Texas

  • wedding of the century: international edition

    we spent the weekend in Dallas for a dutch-indo-pakistani-mexican-middle eastern-american wedding … oh, where to begin.

    the weekend began with a traditional ceremony where the families exchange gifts, the groom is forced to pay-off the brides cousins (they hypothetically hold the groom down and demand money in small unmarked bills, though in this case the pressure seemed to be more mental than physical) and the ladies get henna tattoos applied (the lady sparkler included).

    saturday saw two events, the “big one” early in the afternoon and then a formal dinner later that night. the bride had two spectacular dresses (see below), the first reception had a Mariachi band (which rocked the hiz-house), and the rest of the day saw us hanging out with one of the most spectacularly great groups of people ever assembled.

    i always forget that good friends typically have good friends, but this was a special bunch.

    explore the photoset:
    hutchins/kazi wedding, dallas, texas

  • found photo: cotton bowl, dallas, texas

    [Longhorn, Cotton Bowl, Dallas, Texas.]
    IMG_0219, originally uploaded by [ecpark].

  • first attempt at anniversary fails, couple reshedules for friday

    it’s our anniversary, and the lady sparkler and I packed up Saturday for some light camping along the Delaware shore (cape helopen, near rehobeth).

    the first problem is that she’s been fighting a cold, and it seemed to take up residence as the weekend went on. second problem was that the beach town was packed with old white people and their funny accents (the origin of which we never did figure out).

    but besides side-stepping octagenarians, we had a good lunch (authentic, takeout fish and chips) at the beach before heading bailing for the quiet serenity of the nearby state park.

    turns out that the economy really is in the toilet, because while every motel had bountiful vacancies, the campsite was quite literally packed with miserable looking middle-class white people. we checked in, and found our allotted 8 foot square patch of sand surrounded on all sides by kids, dogs and cars.

    our site seemed to have the special designation of being the dog run for the neighbooring sites, which would have been about 2 feet from our tent once pitched. i am pretty certain that I have never seen such a small “campsite” before, and (we decided) hope to never again.

    so, given the illness, the kids, the dogs, and the funny accents, we decided to take a long walk around the cape, eat some cheesy-so-bad-it’s-good Mexican food (Chevy’s) along the highway home and call it a day.

    in full disclosure, the day was by no means a wash … we had gorgeous weather, a beautiful hike, and a wonderful day trip. we’re going to celebrate our anniversary on Friday instead, with a meal at our favorite-est fancy restaurant in the world — Acadiana — like good affluent, married white-people should.

    hopefully we’ll have less sickness, and we’ll definitely have less funny accents.

  • return from the northern kingdom

    it’s the beginning of fall travel season, and we kicked it off with a trip to visit the Vermont Parkers, outside Burlington.

    I’m certain we did stuff — we have pictures as proof — but mostly we kicked around and relaxed. I remember something about mini-golf (tho we didn’t keep score) and food / deck / backyard, but mostly I remember relaxing.

    my iPhone is the personification (electronic-device-ification?) of *awesomeness.* I can’t believe I didn’t get one of these sooner (oh, wait. AT&T … that’s why.)

    next up is Dallas for our second consecutive “wedding of the century.” it’ll be an Anglo-Dutch-Indo-Pakistani-Mexican-Middle Eastern affair, so should be fascinating.

    Explore the Photo Set:
    Facebook: Long Weekend in Burlington, Vermont
    Flickr: Long Weekend in Burlington, Vermont