After the Thanksgiving holiday in 2021, Alex and I took a couple of days to visit Moab, Utah and the "Needles" district of Canyonlands National Park. We drove over from my parents' house in Kanab via SR-12, going through Red Canyon, Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef before arriving in Moab.

In August 2021 we finally went on our long awaited Alaska cruise. While in Alaska, we visited Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay National Park, and Ketchikan.

For our five year anniversary, we decided to take another Caribbean cruise. This time, instead of the eastern Caribbean, we went on the western route. This took us on the following route: Port Everglades, Florida → Princess Cays, Eleuthera, Bahamas → Falmouth, Jamaica → Georgetown, Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands → Cozumel, Mexico → Port Everglades, Florida. This was a seven day cruise aboard the Regal Princess. Like our previous two cruises, we thoroughly enjoyed it.

For our anniversary in 2018 we decided to head up to the Sierra Nevada mountains for a week of fun hiking and enjoying nature, capped off with a snow mobile ride at Lake Tahoe.

In 2017, Alex and I had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to basically pick any vacation we could dream of, and actually do it. We chose to take a cruise with Princess in the Norwegian Fjords. The short version of the story: it was amazing!

We went up to Lone Pine and Death Valley in March of 2017 to celebrate our three-year anniversary. It had been about 7 years since we last visited, so it was time. We were hoping that since we got a lot of rain this winter there would be an excessive amount of flowers and/or water in the valleys. Sadly, neither was the case.

At the end of 2016, to cap off what has been a somewhat disappointing year, we decided to take a trip to the national parks of Utah. Due to the holidays, we only had about 5 days to visit, so it was somewhat of a whirlwind tour. Caution: This post is very media rich!

Having not been to Hawaii since 2012, it was time to go back. This time, it was just me and Alex for a nice, relaxed vacation with no schedules to keep or other people to please. Knowing that September was going to be a stressful month dealing with things like birthdays and weddings, I planned a vacation to Maui...

In March 2016 I headed to the Phoenix, AZ metro area to partake in a little springtime baseball. It was an annual tradition to go to a Dodgers/Mariners game at least once each spring. Due to various small life events, like getting married and such, for the past two years we were unable to attend. Alex and I (Dodgers fans) went with our good friend Ryan (Mariners) to see them play at Peoria Sports Complex.

As an early anniversary trip, we headed back to some of our favorite places in the world, Bryce and Zion National Parks.

Hungering for another vacation, Alex and I decided to use our extended Thanksgiving weekend to visit Petrified Forest National Park in eastern Arizona. We left early Friday morning. While others were out shopping on Black Friday, we jumped on I-10 headed east...

It was August. Sure, we just got back from Lake Powell a few weeks ago, but the new school year was coming up quickly. We needed one more getaway before my job's imposed vacation blackout took place.

For our long summer vacation, we made our way up to Lake Powell in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. This is probably my most favorite place in the world. This year, instead of trying to find a comfortable hotel for myself and Alex, along with my parents, I decided to rent a house called the Red Rock Retreat in Page. It was probably one of the best vacation decisions I've ever made.

The first lake trip of the summer! Now that we are proud parents of both a Waverunner and Sea-Doo, we like to take at least one trip per summer month out to the Colorado River, and more specifically, Laughin and Lake Mohave.

In March of 2015, Alex and I celebrated our one-year anniversary by visiting Monterey and the surrounding area. This is one of our favorite spots to vacation, we've been many times before. Our trip was just a stretched out weekend, leaving our home on Saturday morning and returning Tuesday evening. On Saturday, we left the SGV early Saturday morning. The plan was to get to Pinnacles National Park in the early afternoon...

In January of 2015 we visited Sequoia National Park in California for a quick weekend getaway. Since it's fairly close to us in southern California, we drove up Friday after work and stayed until Sunday morning. Since it was a winter trip...

We decided to do a big road trip of various state and national parks including quite a few canyons. The whole trip would consist of the following stops: Joshua Tree NP, California; Amboy Crater, California; Grand Canyon NP, Arizona; Glen Canyon NRA, Arizona; Coral Pink Sand Dunes SP, Utah; Bryce Canyon NP, Utah; Grand Staircase-Escalante NM, Utah; Capitol Reef NP, Utah; Otter Creek SP, Utah; Zion NP, Utah; and finally, Lake Mead NRA, Nevada. In total, the trip was 1777 road miles, and included over 20 miles of hiking and biking.

In March, after Alex and I were wed, we went on our honeymoon. It was a Princess Cruise from Fort Lauderdale, Florida to St. Thomas and St. Maarten, in the Caribbean. The cruise was also supposed to include Princess Cays in the Bahamas, but due to weather conditions, we were unable to ride the tenders to shore, and so we had an extra day at sea. We set sail aboard the Royal Princess, which was the newest ship in the Princess fleet at the time. It was the first time cruising for both me and Alex, and it was amazing.

In September Alex and I joined my parents on the Island of Hawaii, or more commonly known as the big island. We did all sorts of fun things like horseback riding, visiting the volcano, and of course, going to the beach. Since we had our own car, it made it more fun because we weren't restricted to doing what my parents wanted to do on any given day. It was a pretty awesome, and much needed vacation!

In April we went to Yosemite National Park. I forgot my camera, and ended up taking pictures with my new cell phone. They don't look that great. It was a good trip. We stayed at the Mariposa Lodge, which, oddly enough, is in Mariposa. We visited the park twice, once on Sunday, and once again on Monday before heading home.

In 2012, our yearly February trip took us to Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah. I decided that we are going to visit enough national parks this year to warrant the purchase of the America the Beautiful pass. It is a pass that allows you access to pretty much every National Park in the United States, as well as most of the recreation areas managed by the National Park Service.

This year in September we visited the island of Maui in Hawaii. I went with my girlfriend, Alex and my sister. The trip to the airport was uneventful, and quite easy, since we had Primetime Shuttle service pick us up at 5am PST. Once we landed in Kahului, we spent about an hour hanging out at the Hertz waiting in line for our rental car. It ended up being a Subaru Forester, which is kind of a hybrid between an SUV and a car. I kept trying to shift on the steering column instead of in the center console.

In February, 2011, Alex and I decided to go on a weekend trip to Zion National Park in Utah. The trip started out with a long drive from our home in the San Gabriel valley all the way to St. George, UT, with a "quick" stop over in North Las Vegas.

Alex and I traveled to the big island of Hawaii in August 2010 with my parents. We visited many places on the big island, and tried to see as much as possible in the week we had there. On the first day, we arrived in around mid-afternoon, so we didn't have much time to go out and enjoy the scenery.

In February of 2010 we made a trip up to the Owens Valley in CA. We visited the town of Lone Pine and the area around it, including Owens Lake and Whitney Portal. The weather was clear and warm, perfect considering the back drop of the Sierra Nevada mountains covered in snow.

For Christmas of 2009 the whole family went up to Kings Canyon and Sequoia National parks. There was tons of snow on the ground, and it was cold, but it was still a great trip. We stayed in the John Muir Lodge which is in the Grant Grove area of Kings Canyon National Park.

In November of 2009 I went on a weekend trip with my awesome girlfriend. We visited two of the area's most notable attractions, Sea World and the San Diego Zoo. It was a good trip.

In July of 2009 I again visited the very beautiful and exciting Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, and more specifically Lake Powell. It is an awesome place to go for any length of time. On this trip, my most excellent girlfriend Alex accompanied me, as did my parents. There is nothing like being out on the lake with family enjoying the great outdoors.

In May of 2009 I visited Iceland. I spent two weeks in the country enjoying every aspect from the city life in Reykjavik to the serene natural landscapes throughout the island. I saw geysers and hot springs as well as icebergs and glaciers. It truly is "the land of ice and snow, with the midnight sun, where the hot springs flow" to paraphrase Robert Plant and Led Zeppelin.

In April of 2009 I went to Las Vegas, Nevada for my brother's wedding. After the trip, on the way home, we decided to go see Hoover Dam, on the border of Nevada and Arizona. It is about half an hour outside of Las Vegas via interstate 215. Construction is in progress at the dam site where they are building a bridge to bypass daily traffic directly over the dam.

In February of 2009 I visited the Monterey Peninsula with my awesome girlfriend, Alex. We stayed in the city of Salinas, CA for the entire visit, and visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium, the Steinbeck Center in Salinas, and drove up to the Santa Cruz boardwalk. It was a great long-weekend trip over Presidents Day.

In January of 2009 I went on a weekend trip with friends to San Francisco, CA. We stayed at the Nob Hill Motor Inn which had tons of broken items in the hotel rooms, but they were clean. We visited places like Fisherman's Wharf and the Crookedest Street in the World. We also went on a crazy long walk from our hotel across the Golden Gate Bridge and back, without eating.

In August of 2008 I re-visited the big island of Hawaii. This time my brother and grandmother accompanied me and my parents on the trip. We did a trip around as much of the island as possible to share with them the awesome landscape and reefs around the island. We also visited the southern most point in the United States. It wasn't much more exciting than the rest of the island, except maybe the larger surf due to there being no large land formations between it and thousands of miles of Pacific ocean.

In August of 2007 I visited the big island of Hawaii. I have to say that the big island is my favorite of the Hawaiian islands, followed closely by Maui. The big island has crystal clear water, and some amazing beaches, including Maniniowali, my personal favorite. You can often see turtles swimming around the rocks in the water, right near the white sandy beach and shore-break. And there aren't many people here. Sometimes there might be a small crowd, but the parking lot is never full, and it's not even a very large parking lot.

In July of 2007 I went on a trip across Southern England for two weeks. It was just me and my friend and our backpacks, and we covered a lot of terrain in those two weeks, but still only saw a third of the country. Our route took us from London, through Windsor, Bath Spa, and on to Bristol. Then we headed south towards Penzance in Cornwall. From there we rode along the southern coast through Plymouth, Exmouth, Salisbury, Southampton, then down to Brighton. After that we headed back to London for the night, finding out that there was nowhere to stay more than one night, and headed off to Canterbury to finish out our trip, including a day trip out to the white cliffs of Dover.

In January of 2007 I wanted to test out my new RX-8, so I decided to do a weekend road trip. I didn't have anywhere specific in mind, so I headed east on interstate 10 to Arizona. This trip resulted in a very expensive ticket speeding ticket. I did a loop from La Verne, CA, through Prescott, AZ, up to Page, AZ and back down interstate 15 to return home. I stopped over in Flagstaff, AZ, where it was stormy, snowy, and cold. It hit -9°F while I was there.

In August of 2006 I visited the Hawaiian islands of Kauai and Oahu. The majority of the visit was to Kauai, but I did a day trip to the island of Oahu. Oahu is like the Los Angeles of Hawaii. There was a substantial amount of traffic, and a limited amount of friendliness on this island. Although the scenery on the island was just as spectacular as on the other Hawaii islands, I would not go back there myself. I go to Hawaii to get away from the crowds, and there are just too many of them on this island.

In March of 2006 I went to Washington, D.C. for a business trip to demonstrate a product to some members of DHS. Before and after a few meetings and demonstrations, myself and a few co-workers were given free reign of the city. We visited most of the major monuments in a single, grueling hike around the capital, starting north of the White House and working our way around to the Capitol building, and then down the national Mall hitting the monuments along the way, including the Jefferson Memorial, Washington Monument, Reflecting pool, FDR memorial, and the Lincoln Memorial before walking back around and back to our car.

In December of 2005 I visited Chicago, Illinois, for a business trip that extended into a personal trip. The original purpose of the trip was to demonstrate a product to the government of Chicago. Due to the bureaucracy that is inherent in large cities like this, our demonstration was pushed back from the day after my arrival in Chicago to the end of the same week. This gave me and my co-workers 4 days of free time in the city.

In July of 2005 I visited Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, or more specifically Lake Powell. America's Playground. It was the first time I had been at Lake Powell in at least five years, and it was as awesome as I remembered it as a kid. Plenty of places to beach the boat and swim for hours, an excessive amount of canyons to explore, and of course the gorgeous Rainbow Bridge National Monument

In June of 2005 I visited Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California. This was a "practice trip" before heading out to Lake Powell a few weeks later. In June, the snowmelt is at its highest, and the King River was rushing. There was significant water flowing down the main river, and many small streams contributing to it. Every few hundred yards along the road there was a waterfall flowing down the rocks.