Rockstar second time lol

Drove three hours to get this small town for playing as a summer concert series opener. It is kinda weird to come such a long distance without Ken. On the way, I stopped by a recreation center. Beautiful!

My favorite singer just moved to this town and came to see us! She is like a Barbie doll 

The gig was child friendly, so we had to hide our skins as much as possible  We were even told not to do the devil song  But people loved us so much and the promoter changed his mind. He told us to do whatever we want. 

I think my sunglasses are too big  I hate day light pictures being old lol.

We played three sets. We had a great turn out from the second set. At the end, we had an encore. Radio stations sponsored the show. We took like 50 pictures with each fan in front of the radio station’s back drop. Mostly men 

After the gig, I almost headed home, but I decided to stay in a hotel room they provided. Each member got a private room. My car is right in front of my room so I don’t have to worry about my equipment. Still weird to stay in a hotel room by myself. 

I took a day off from work tomorrow. Might as well explore antique town here 

Just saw the posting from Fox News. Our show was on live 

Night night 

Big Tree Park

I needed a getaway badly. It looked like nice weather was lasting until today. I was pretty tired from work, but we’ve go to getaway today since Ken had a day off from regular Monday rehearsals. I guess it was too early to visit mountain. I didn’t expect snows there 

Visiters center was closing soon. 

Let’s explore!

Huge stump 

Reminded me of the size of Apollo

In summer time, you can go through inside the tree! My childhood dream! 

So this has been here over a century 

Trails were covered with snow and we got lost halfway in. My leg was caught. This is not my foot print. It was much deeper. 

We completed 1.67 miles! Walking on soft snow surface was like walking on cushion. It was easier on my legs. 

Dinner at our favorite restaurant!

And my favorite hotel. 

Speaking of snow, our house got snowed about a week ago. Hailed and it stayed until next day. Even neighbors who stay this area for 25 years, he has never seen it. It was on TV. Our gutter got broken  The below pictures are from March 10th. Power was out and we stayed at my work til midnight. Weird feeling because it was March 11th in Japan. Thinking about my hometown. 

March 11th, next day of hail. My fat cat was enjoying her first snow 

Last day of this cruise

Today is the last activity day of this cruise. We spent a day in CocoCay, Royal Caribbean’s private island. The ship was parked a distance away from the island and passengers took boats.  It was on construction. A big water park will be open in this May. 

As soon as we got off the boat, this iguana was there  So cute!

This island was kinda disappointing. Not very exciting. 

I paid for shore excursion, floating mat rental. We couldn’t get up early so I used it less than an hour. I rented two mats but Ken didn’t even use it. 

Somebody had to watch our stuff. Always hard to find a safe keeping place when it comes to water activities. I wish there were lockers. Although it was a short time, I had a great time floating on the mat looking the sky and relaxing.

Another one? 

I also purchased swimming pigs shore excursion. I was looking forward to it very much since I heard the pigs live there naturally. We rode a boat to get to another island. The driver speeded up. It was a nice ride. 

As we were getting to the island, I realized that I booked a wrong program. The pigs are kept in the barrier 

I heard another person asking the staff if there is an island that pigs live naturally. The guide said yes and it is two hours from there. This is totally fake! No wonder it was cheaper but I still paid close to $200 for both of us  Oh well, might as well enjoy it.

We just fed pigs apples in the water. They were so cute! Cameras were not allowed inside as usual. Petting pigs and we grew tired quickly. Then I saw poops in the water  Suddenly I didn’t want to be in this water. I feel somehow cleaner if it was a natural setting, but this is a small area  I couldn’t wait until the photographer took our pictures. I had Ken took some pics and I got out of the water quickly. 

This is a much nicer view lol

We saw wild stingrays from the boats: white one on the way and black one on the way back. 

I swam in the water until the departure time. I saw a lot of different kinds of fish and crabs near the rocks. Tiny fish prefers to stay in tiny areas. Just like natural aquariums! I forgot to bring a water proof cover for my cell phone. So no photos.

On the way back to the cruise ship, I saw the horizon so straight without any obstacles. 

Back to our stateroom, the house keeper was creative again 

Beautiful sunset from our room.

After the dinner, we walked around to see night view of the sea. 

Night sea looked so scary. 

The moon was beautiful in red!

This is a great picture of three of us: Ken, I, and my mom (moon).

Atlantis, lost world (under water)

Reaching to Nassau, I woke up from a nice dream that Ryo Nishikido was in 

We got off the ship and walked to a meeting place for our shore excursion, dolphin encounter. 

Captain Morgan.

This is the meeting place. Ken has no visual sense. I had to climb up more than 6 feet to sit on this chair, but he took the picture horizontally

We took a boat to Balmoral Island.

It was so windy. 

We were not allowed to take dolphins’ pictures 

I was misinformed about free snorkeling. There was no place of renting the equipment. There were only three places on this island: a food to go place, a bar and a gift shop. We had to kill two hours until we met a dolphin. The water was so clear blue color, but the access was restricted to only shallow areas by ropes. Not deep enough to swim nor see fish, so I just swam in a pool. I have no pictures with our dolphin, Dixon. It looked like this. 

Love the sound of dolphins 🐬 

They sell a picture for $127  Even $27 is questionable to purchase a picture, but $127! I liked the picture of Dixon kissing me, but I didn’t purchase it. I don’t think this shore excursion was good. It took us over four hours.

On the way rushing to Atlantis hotel, we saw this pink building. Is this a famous Bahamas government?!?

We were able to catch a taxi to Atlantis. Cruise ships look like buildings. 

The driver was a real enthusiastic Christian. He preached in the taxi all the way and didn’t let us go until he finished his talking 

This hotel is huge  The most luxurious and biggest hotel I have ever seen! I was surprised the size of aquariums and fish 

What a luxurious place! So gorgeous  This is a ceiling. 

So luxurious! I think under neath of the hotel is mostly aquariums and almost all ponds in the garden have fish. 

I love the way stingrays swim calmly. I have never seen this big stingray before! 

Lost world! 

A view from the main lobby.

Rich!

Ken is Pegasus in animal character fortune telling. 

Nice to be able to see fish from the top, too!

The middle one is camouflaged stingray.

Gift shop

Finally we found the famous stature!

Huge 

It seems like never ending! The more we go, the more we find!

By the time we got to dolphin cay, it was already closed. I want to come back to this hotel and spend a week at least! 

We rushed to the ship an hour early before the departure time. Today’s house keeper’s art  Elephant! 

We didn’t get a chance to chill and eat at Nassau. The dinner was in the same restaurant. I think I posted enough pictures, so no more food pictures  The ship is shaking a lot. 

All day on the ship

Blog time! It is my travel routine now 

Nice sunrise.

Lunch at the same restaurant from last night. Dinner was way better than lunch.

We asked for the better table and got the perfect one! I like the picture!

All day long on the ship, it was a relaxing day but not much to do  High school brass band was playing, but they were so out of pitch. We couldn’t stay 

Watching ocean, drinking coffee, trying to avoid casinos  I am usually good at it, but it was tempting because cash rewards were visible instead of card points. I tried a key machine of $800 reward hoping to pay off this trip  I think the machine is fixed. I tried over 20 times  Oh well. 

No guitar players in any bands here  They are cutting cost I guess  

People like gathering and crowded areas. We like less crowded areas. There were many beautiful empty areas. 

Empty stages. Too bad they are not used. 

Watching the calm ocean flows thinking how grateful to be able to see the sunset. How many times more can we see the beautiful ocean and sunset like this in our lives? Everyday we are too busy to make living working and doing chores. 

House keepers are eager to come in and clean the rooms. They made a cute towel doll 

Until dinner time we saw a musical. I enjoyed watching one girl who danced very well. Ken was already drunk  It reminded him his old days playing for Marriott in the pit. 

Dinner at the same restaurant, same waiters. Food was good. It was a formal night. Ken didn’t bring any formal clothing so we almost bought a super expensive shirt. Glad we didn’t. They still let us come in. There were other people totally undressed, too. 

Tomorrow we are arriving at Nassau  I will have much more interesting things to write about 

On the Sea

First time cruising  Because of the last minute booking deal, our room is on the deck three. Probably one of these windows?!? Huge objects that move mesmerize me, such as rockets and ships. This ship is small though. 

Check in procedure was easier than I expected so we got here too early. We had to wait for two hours until our room was ready. I just happened to find this beautiful empty Orpheum Theater on the way.

Departure was four o’clock so we thought lunch wasn’t included. We were already full from the hotel breakfast, but lunch buffet looked so good. 

Finally checked into the room. Small cabin, but efficiently designed. Mirrors make the room look bigger. 

Ken was sleepy

I had to wake him up because I wanted to explore the ship. Then there was an announcement. All the passengers had to gather on Deck 5 for evacuation drills. If I didn’t wake him up, he would have been sleeping! It would’ve been so embarrassing  It is a federal law now. 

It was almost departure time. We walked around to find a good spot to see how the ship accelerate. 

We figured this wouldn’t move forward  so we went to the back. 

The ship was turning. We went to the front again. People were not crazy to take a good spot. 

Cape Canaveral Air Force launch pad there?!?

The ship is slow 

Already sunset time. 

Red sun peaked between clouds. 

Dinner time! Lunch buffet wasn’t good, so we didn’t expect this restaurant to be good. 

Escargot 

The prime rib was so delicious 

After dinner, Ken went to bed already. Since crowds died down, I went to swim in Solarium, the adult only pool. I was only one stayed until the closing time. It was a nice quick exercise  The life guard was standing there whole time just watching me  The depth is deeper than my height.

Our cabin is one of the front. I feel the movement unless I lay down. Cruise is a money sucking place. Watching TV costs, too! The channels are limited and mostly trying to sell something. One of the few TV shows I can watch free is so old! I watched Doogie Howser  Look now I am watching 

I enjoy this cruise as the first timer, but now I know why this ship wasn’t expensive. There are big differences between the modern expensive one and dated small ship. 

KSC

Seeing a rocket launch is in my bucket list. This time we came here a week early hoping to catch a launch. There were three launches scheduled in mid Feb, but all postponed as usual  We planned to spend a couple of days at KSC originally, but we visited only one day since our hotel was in Orlando. 

Let’s explore! 

We skipped Atlantis because it was super crowded. Last time when we came here was a weekday. At that time we were able to do most of the things including a shuttle launch experience, which was amazing! 

We arrived here in the afternoon without any plan. It was hard to find convenient show times but we managed to take a bus tour to Apollo Saturn V center, my favorite. On the way, we were able to see a big alligator 🐊 from the bus  Also very interesting birds of many kinds were there.

 I totally forgot about the introduction movies before we went to the rocket area. Since the year I was born is the first moon visit of mankind, I was touched by this film.

We couldn’t see Vultures area in the back of the building. Maybe it was removed?!?  I think this show is new.

I bought a bunch of my favorite astronaut’s ice cream. I wanted this t shirt, but I probably never wear it. Look like my cat 

Oops! Too quick shot.

After the bus tour, we were back and forth trying to catch movies. Not good timing... so we looked for real capsules that the bus driver suggested. Then we found a 3D experience that wasn’t listed on the daily schedule at Heros & Legend building. It was so good! I felt this was better than Disneyland! 

This guy was signing autographs in the souvenir shop! He looked way older 

Fly me to the moon movie guy

Mom moon and rocket 

Plus me

Dinner at Zarrella’s Italian restaurant. So delicious  good service, and good price!

So sleepy. Night night 

Hanging out in Orlando

Today we were taking it easy. We'd rather hanging out free tourist areas to visiting overly crowded theme parks. We spent a couple of hours at ICON. I think it is new in 2015?!?

But still needs some excitement, so I decided to do StarFlyer. 

It was scary because swings were little off-kilter. I don’t usually get scared because I believe a machine. If I trusted it enough, it would have been a more enjoyable ride. 

Then we visited SeaLife aquerium. Ken calls my coworker, JabberJaw 

It brags it’s 360 degree view of the water tunnel. It was very short. 

This fish has the same tooth problem as mine? 

Then we headed to Disney Boardwalk hoping to have nice dinner by the water. 

Epcot

We didn’t find any restaurant interesting. We call it BoredWalk 

Then we went to Universal City walk. A nice looking sushi restaurant was crowded. On the way to the restroom, we found funny art on the wall. I can’t even translate it into English 

This is funny, too!

Before our table was ready, we changed our mind and ate at Bob Marley’s restaurant. I don’t care about Reggae but Ken likes Bob Marley.

We were too early for the live music 

The food wasn’t good and super slow Jamaican time service  The atmosphere was good. You need to be a fan to enjoy this place. This is curry, but it tasted like gravy.

Actually City Walk is nice! I think it got more venders since we came here last time.

Famous Hard Rock Cafe.

We both played a left handed guitar lol 

Happy 18th at Pandora

It’s been a few days since we are in Florida. Today we celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary in Animal Kingdom 

We were hoping less crowds on Valentine’s day in this unromantic place  But we spent over two hours in line to ride on Flight of Passage. This is our second time in Animal Kingdom, so I was happy just spending time in the brand new area. 

Maybe this was the most interesting in the exhibit  It wasn’t really impressive. 

It was a cool flight simulator ride, but I don’t know if it was worth waiting over two hours  We were too late to book fast pass for any rides. 

Then we did our anniversary lunch at Tiffins restaurant. It was a dinner package for premier seating for River of Light show later.

The mushroom soup was salty 

Food was good since I was super hungry from last night.

Over $200 we spent on lunch. Well it is our anniversary  Then we spent another one hour in line for the new river ride. 

The ride was super short and kinda disappointing!

Then we tried to catch the Dinosaur ride before River of Light, but someone dropped something on the trail of the ride and it was stopped for a long time  We gave up and left for the show. 

The show was probably the best of today.

After the show, there was no wait for the Dinosaur ride. We finally did it! We felt like this was the typical ride in Disneyland. Fast, dark and a lot of drops. We liked it! 

This was the last ride today. Fast and old timey uncomfortable ride. We liked it 

With one day admission pass, we did five things. Quite expensive. It is impossible to see everything in one day. Good thing was that we got tickets almost free by applying for Disney credit cards 

Last time we saw many animals and felt like it was a zoo, but this time we saw no animals  Today we were placed on either front rows or number one spots on all rides  After Chinese buffet, we are ready to go to bed. Happy 18th  Night night! 

Cute Lisa chan & house hunting

Woke up with a dislocated shoulder  It is getting easier and easier to be dislocated. I just prayed for it to be back in right away. I would have been so embarrassed to be carried by an ambulance from NAMM show  Luckly I learned a technique to put the shoulder into the position in Finland. Shortly after, it went back in. Whew. I got so exhausted after this so we went to see only Lisa X’s playing today. Lisa chan was so cute  Anazing playing! 

Megadeth’s Kiko guy’s sound was way louder than hers. I saw the same thing on last year’s demo on YouTube. Too bad... a little Japanese girl like her can’t say anything to a soundman to adjust the volume. 

 

On the way back to the parking, Billy was leaving, too. We never miss this artist at NAMM. We happen to see him every year no matter what 

Before heading back home, we tried open houses in a different area. This time we drove around rather than checking online. Then we found this house 

The view from the house is amazing! It is the same price as the last house we checked in Corona. It has a swimming pool, too! So tempting.... inside is kinda awkward, but this view is hard to let it go! 

Driving back home listening to Lisa X’s album. Quite impressive! I love all the songs except the first one lol. Then I researched about her father who is also a guitarist/ producer. Maybe he was next to her when I took a picture with her?!? 

I definitely go to her concert if she comes to my town.