food trip

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Spain Vacation

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[11-22 September, 2023]

It’s been a while since I’ve posted on this Blog, even as I try to continue to do so as frequently as I can on Today, but this trip to Spain warrants a bit more words than just photos or videos.

This trip was originally planned for December, 2021 but due to travel restrictions because of COVID-19 (remember that?), it’s been pushed back almost 2 years to just this past month. The wait was worth it, though, as this was a whirlwind tour de force of Spanish culture and cuisine all packed in a short, 11-day vacation. Plus, it was time spent with my lifelong best friend and his family, and this has been the longest time that we’ve spent together in a very long time.

Madrid was the epicenter of this trip, with quick visits to the Centro attractions: Plaza del Sol, Plaza Mayor, the Palacio Real (Royal Palace), the main shopping district of Gran Via, and the modern museum, Reina Sofia, highlighted by Picasso’s masterpiece, Guernica. An evening of tapas, churros con chocolate from San Gines, a bocadillo de jamón Iberico, and a trip to the Real Madrid official merch store, we hardly scratched the surface.

‘Guernica’ by Picasso, at the Reina Sofia National Museum, Madrid.

Madrid was very quickly followed by trips to Toledo, a nearby neighbor city in the same Castille/La Mancha province as the capital city, then to Andalusia for the cities of Sevilla and Granada, and finally to Basque country, notably Spain’s foodie capital, San Sebastián.

Toledo was the former capital of Spain, a UNESCO heritage city with no modern buildings. We took a Rick Steves-prescribed “city walk” that took us to the Alcázar (Army Museum), lunch at Plaza de Zocodover, a wonderful tour of the amazing gothic Toledo Cathedral, delicious snacks of mazapán treats in Santo Tome, and finally a visit to the El Greco Museum, all in a very long, very packed day.

Toledo, Spain’s former capital city, sits on a hill surrounded on three sides by the natural moat of the Rio Tajos.

Next, a high-speed train to the Andalusia region in Southern Spain, for the cities of Sevilla and Granada.

Due to our limited time, we were able to visit only two of the most highly recommended sights in Sevilla: on day 1, the Sevilla Cathedral, the 3rd largest church in the world, after only St. Peter’s Basilica and London’s St. Paul Cathedral; and on day 2, the Real Alcázar, the 10th-century royal palace built by the Moors that’s been a lavish residence for Spain’s rulers for over a thousand years. In between, we were also able to visit Plaza de España, a popular filming location for Hollywood hits like Star Wars: Attack of the Clones (Episode II) and Lawrence of Arabia.

The unquestionable superstar in the city of Granada is the Alhambra, the last and greatest Moorish palace and one of Europe’s top sights. Attracting over 8000 visitors a day (!), it was pure luck that we were able to get exactly the tickets we wanted just a day before our planned visit. Nowhere else does the splendor of Moorish civilization shine so beautifully. The Alhambra is a mind-blowing place, truly one of the most beautiful examples of world architecture I’ve ever seen.

Basque Country (El Pais Vasco) is the culinary capital of Spain, and San Sebastián is the culinary capital of Basque Country, with more Michelin-starred restaurants per capita than anywhere in the world. Needless to say, I was in foodie heaven! Our three days in San Sebastián were a scandalous array of food adventures one after the other. From pintxos and raciones of the most exquisite examples of Basque cuisine paired with the best local hard cider (sidra) and sparkling white wine (txakoli), finished with delectable sweet treats like Basque burnt cheesecake, hopping from bar to bar in Old Town is a serious physical sport. Mixing influences from mountain, sea, Spain and nearby France, Basque food is reason enough to visit this corner of Spain.

This vacation was definitely one for the books, a shining example of what world travel can be: a soul-filling immersion of local culture and cuisine, experienced with dear friends in the most beautiful places.

The following videos capture my most memorable moments of the trip, with all the sights, sounds, and tastes of these amazing 11 days.

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Road Trip to Michigan

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[10-12 November, 2022]

I’ve written about Ryan before (see this post), and this past weekend, he, his dad (also Eric), and I drove up to the western side of Michigan for a campus visit to Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. Being that it was his dad’s alma mater, WMU had made it to his list of colleges to consider for a degree in Business. And having not been to that part of the state, I tagged along for a fun road trip.

On arrival Thursday mid-afternoon, we walked about the main campus and made a few stops in several buildings (student services, bookstore, rec center, etc.). The main tour was on Friday morning and we wanted to get an early peek at the newest notable additions to campus (at least since his dad went there in the early 90’s).

Dinner that night was at Principle, a nice classic American restaurant tucked away in an old renovated brick building in downtown Kalamazoo. Food was good, but not unforgettable; a solid 7.5/10.

On Friday, after a quick stop at Maggie’s Cafe, an old campus haunt with an impossibly long breakfast menu, it was time for the main campus tour: an enthusiastic dog-and-pony show complete with an hour plus-long, 2-mile hike across campus. It was capped by a detailed introduction to the Haworth School of Business, which was what interested Ryan the most. Overall, it was a fruitful visit, Western was an excellent school, and I think a good match for Ryan. Was it the one for him? That remains to be seen.

The trip’s bonus for me, though, was what happened afterwards. Eric’s brother, Jason, invited us for a tour of the Holland, MI seat plant operated by his employer MillerKnoll, famous for its midcentury modern classic line of home and office furniture by Herman Miller and Knoll. Anyone who knows me (and has been to my house) knows that being at a MillerKnoll showroom is like me being a kid in a candy factory, When even the factory’s men’s room is furnished with the George Nelson platform bench, I know I am in the right place!

After a quick but informative tour of the company’s seat assembly factory, Jason took us to the Company Store where several price-discounted company products were sold “as-is”. Unfortunately, I didn’t find either of the couple of things I was looking for, and ended up leaving empty-handed.

It was sushi dinner at the end of this busy and very exciting day back in Grand Rapids where we had booked an overnight stay before the drive back home on Saturday. But not before a stop in Ann Arbor, my own favorite Michigan city, for an obligatory pilgrimage to that temple of fine foods, Zingerman’s. But we ended up just buying a few sweet treats to take home; the wait for deli sandwiches was at 100-110 minutes, perhaps due to the home game that day, and a bit too much even for a die-hard Z fan like me. So it was Korean lunch for us instead at Miss Kim, a Zingerman’s-owned restaurant next to Kerrytown.

In the end, it was a fun-filled, packed, multi-faceted weekend road trip with good friends, all 700-plus driven miles of it. Hopefully, it was as memorable and rewarding for Ryan, wherever his future college plans may take him.

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1500-Mile Road Trip

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[24-30 May, 2022]

This was the first true long-distance road trip in the MDX (the Chicago trip earlier in the spring notwithstanding) and it couldn’t have come any sooner.

First stop was Hesston, PA where I spent a couple of nights at the Hills’ (old friends Drew and Stacy from back when Drew used to work at Honda in the late 90’s/early 00’s) vacation cottage near the Raystown Lake Recreation Area. Unfortunately, due to the cold and rainy weather, we were unable to partake in any water recreation activities. There was lots of good eating, though!

We then drove to the Hills’ primary home in Ellicott City, MD, a suburb of Baltimore where more eating and imbibing took place.

From Baltimore, it was off to see the Hsu’s in East Setauket, NY. Jim and I were old roommates back in our old Ann Arbor days, where we both went to the University of Michigan. His eldest, Peter, began studies in Neuroscience at the Ohio State University in 2015 so we ended up seeing each other more frequently during their visits while Peter was in Columbus, up to his graduation a few years ago, just before the pandemic. Of course, a visit with them in NY is not complete without a trip to Flushing for some of the city’s best dim sum.

After a couple of nights with the Hsu’s, it was on to Brooklyn to meet up with an old friend from high school, Lito from this 2018 Colorado adventure and this 2018 Ireland Bro-cation. It was a day-long gallivanting walkathon in the Chelsea, Flat Iron, and Hudson Yards districts, with a final stop at K-town for some K BBQ.

And finally, on my last day in Manhattan, it’s time to drive back home but not without first stopping by the Washington Heights area to pick up Lenin who just left his job of 6 years at Columbia University for a new (and better) one at Washington University in St. Louis.

And so ended my 1500-plus mile roadtrip through West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and New York with neither traffic incidents nor speeding tickets. The next road trip is still on the planning board.