Exploring the White Mountains

Hey!

There is nothing better than getting a nice hike in before 12 in the afternoon. Last week Sean and I did a little bit of hiking to help prepare us to hike Mt. Lafayette in the White Mountains. We are planning on hiking it next week. It will be exciting because it will be my first time hiking such a large mountain. The mountain has a nine mile loop trail that we will be doing but the mountain itself has several options depending on how you want to tackle it. The summit is 5,249 ft above sea level. Mt Lafayette is one of the more popular mountains to hike in New Hampshire.

So in preparation we did a couple shorter hikes to get us in the swing of things. Well mostly for me because I am not the most graceful when it comes to even walking so I need all the practice I can get. The first hike we did was Zealand Falls. This was a beautiful hike that was almost 6 miles round trip but it was a very steady incline so it was pretty easy. The trail was beautiful with a lot of variety. We walked along a river, through a bridged pond with bull frogs greeting you with their croaking, and up through the woods to the falls, and then it opens up at the top of the falls to see the surrounding mountains.

Zealand Falls. This is before you get to the top but this is the main waterfall

I love these flowers called Pink lady slipper

A view from one of the wooden bridges that are built above this pond/wet land area

A beautiful butterfly that let me get up close and personal to take a picture

The view from the top of the falls

More of the falls behind us. It was such a beautiful hike.

View from the bench at the hut/top of the falls. Ps. They sell the most amazing chocolate chip cookies. We got one freshly baked out of the oven still warm and melty.

Our next hike later that week was Indian Head/ Mount Pemigewasset. This hike was a nice change from Zealand because it was steeper but shorter so it averaged out to about the same amount of time to do the hike. My grace managed to drop me in one of the small streams you have to cross along the path but luckily I dried off pretty quickly. The hike up was worth the view from the top. I love the reward of hiking and the magnificent views you get to experience. Even if you’re all clouded in at the top it’s still awesome because it’s the journey that matters the most.

You can see the town of Lincoln/Woodstock down below

Another view from the ledge. Nature is so cool, I love how there are little trees growing out of solid rock. So neat.

Another beautiful view from the ledge.

Well now I’m off to relax. Enjoy th rest of your week!

My little herb garden

Life is so simple when I can spend the morning in the garden. This morning I spent a little bit of time weeding around my herbs and just loved it. I also planted two habanero plants and a cayenne pepper plant. Our plan is to make hot sauce with the peppers we get. My herbs are just exploding right now. I planted six little cilantro plants back in the middle of May and the cilantro is EXPLODING. I have already cut it back twice and froze the harvest. It’s just so much fun.

My garden consists of Italian Basil, Lemon basil, Thai basil, flat leaf parsley, curly parsley, oregano, sage, rosemary, thyme, and lavender. So far I have made a yummy garlic bread with and herb butter on it that had parsley, oregano, basil, and a touch of rosemary and of course garlic. It was so delicious with the fresh herbs! The pictures below are what I have planted and some of the other plants/herbs around the yard. I thought they were beautiful so I wanted to take some pictures.

Lemon Basil. It has a very nice lemony fragrance to it. It would be great in a salad dressing or pasta salad.

The curly parsley is on the left and the cilantro is on the right. You can tell the cilantro is growing like wildfire!

My Italian basil.

The rosemary is in the top left corner, oregano is the top right and the thyme is the bottom middle.

My lavender plant 🙂

My flat leaf parsley that needs a little bit of picking.

Some nice mint on the other side of the house that is back again without fail. Mint is extremely difficult to mess up and kill if you don’t have a green thumb. I do want to say it can be invasive so plant it somewhere you don’t mind it taking over.

A pretty morning glory. I love how the one in the background is poking through the fence.

Some more mint and a chive blossom. Chives also like to pop up all over the yard if you’re not careful.

Some green blueberries just waiting to ripen.

I forget what these are called but I love the unique look of them.

A beautiful peony that was almost touching the ground but still attached to the plant.

I loveee these heart shaped flowers. They are just so dainty.

Buttercups just make me smile. It reminds me of when I was younger and my mom said that if it shined under your chin it means you liked butter. 🙂

These are another flower that just make me smile.

I hope you all enjoyed my little garden feature today 🙂

Exploring Vegas!

Heyy!

Wow, so what a trip we had. It definitely didn’t go as planned but was still just as fun even if it was more relaxed.

Let’s first start with our first night there:

We hung out by the pool for a bit and made friends with a couple from Australia. They were great and we all decided to go out for the night together. We all went zip lining down Fremont Street which was awesome! Zip lining above the crowd was such a thrill! Then we went to a microbrewery on Fremont. The brewery didn’t serve food so the boys were able to go get us the best 2$ tacos I’ve ever had. They tasted so fresh and flavourful. So if you see 2$ tacos in downtown Vegas on Fremont don’t ignore it, they are delicious!

Fremont street, This is one of the starting points for zip lining.

Then the next day consisted of resting all day with Sean because the poor guy came down with a nasty bug later to be diagnosed (when we got home he was still super sick) as pneumonia. So that night we treated ourselves to room service and just enjoyed our time together. The next couple days just consisted of hanging out by the pool at our hotel the Golden Nugget. I really liked it there, it was big enough to not have to leave the hotel if you needed something but small enough to not get lost in like you can in the hotels on the strip.

The Golden Nugget pool area

This pool was cool because it also had a water slide that went through a shark tank. The slide was fast, it was surprising how much speed you actually picked up by the end. When Friday came along we hit Mandalay Bay on the Strip to see Sublime with Rome. But before the show, we adventured to the High Roller which is a giant ferris wheel type of thing. We were able to see beautiful views of the strip and the surrounding desert mountains.

The view from the top of the High Roller (a giant ferris wheel)

Then after the ride we hiked it up to Mandalay Bay to see the concert. One thing I have to say is that Vegas requires a lot of walking if you don’t want to pay for cabs every time you want to go somewhere. Then, we grabbed dinner with Sean’s cousin and his cousin’s wife at the restaurant by the pool before the concert. The show was awesome!

We saw Sublime with Rome at Mandalay Bay

 

The next few days of the trip we went to the Punk Rock Bowling Music Festival which was quite the interesting experience  but was a blast none the less. Sean was able to see one of his favorite bands Turbonegro. They are a Norwegian death punk band that has quite the following around Europe and around the US. Some fans even flew in from Europe to see them in Vegas.

Over all Vegas was an awesome experience but next time I would not go back on a weekend or on one of the busiest three day weekends of the year for any vacation destination. I also realized I am not a fan of crowds and get a mini panic attack on the inside with soooo many people around me. Well that’s all I have for today. Have great week!

Kelly 🙂