Amanda!

One of my oldest friends, Amanda, made the trek out to England to visit me this past April. Since she would only be here for about 4 days, we decided to stay local and check out London, Cambridge and Bury. It was awesome to catch up with Amanda, and I really enjoyed seeing some new things in London. Some of the highlights:

-Sushi (yum)-Touring Westminster Cathedral--chatting up the head of cathedral "security" and getting to meet the Dean of the Cathedral

-Riding the bus around London. Usually we take the Tube (which is underground). It was really neat to sit on the second level of the bus and watch the city go by...

-Taking a running tour around Buckingham Palace and Hyde Park. We not only got a nice hour jog in, but we also got to see some of the best sights in London. Below is Amanda's excellent attempt of a self portrait in front of the Palace for your viewing pleasure.

After London, Amanda and I spent a day wandering around Cambridge. We peaked into a bunch of the college campuses and made our way around the River Cam. On Amanda's final day in England, we spent the day in Bury walking through the market and the abbey gardens. I realized that I sometimes take for granted that I live in such a cute and charming little town. I also realized that I have not posted pictures of Bury...so I've put some of those up too.
All in all, I had a great time hanging out with Amanda and being a tourist in England.

Fjord-tastic.

Jonathan and I just got back from an awesome 3 day trip to Haugesund, Norway. Having taken many gastronomic-centered trips around Europe in the past, Jonathan and I were really looking forward to an active, outdoorsy type vacation. We got our money's worth on this one. Despite some cold, rainy weather on the first two days of our trip, we still made the most of our time in Norway and went on lots of "walks" and hikes in Haugesund, Karmoy and Etne.

Karmoy is an island in Norway, and the location of the airport where RyanAir's worst pilot decided to "slam" our plane onto the runway (my fear of flying is now greater, thanks to him). It was a safe landing, just a very rough one. Even Jonathan made a comment about it. Anyways, Karmoy is absolutely beautiful and the home of the Vikings (you know, the guys that pillaged England and stirred up the gene pool a bit). We were able to walk around Viking ruins on Karmoy on a very rainy and cold day...despite the rain we still had a great time.

<---Avaldsnes (on Karmoy). Where the Vikings lived.

On our second day in Norway, Jonathan and I drove all the way around Karmoy making stops at various beaches and taking a walk through a fjord in the center of the island. It was still pretty rainy and cold, which ruined our plans to rent bikes, but the day still was pretty awesome! While we were hiking on Karmoy I asked Jonathan what kind of wildlife Norway had...somehow my mom has rubbed off on me and I feared that we would be attacked by a bear or some sort of wilderbeast. Jonathan, however, told me we were probably pretty safe and wouldn't see any large, dangerous animals on our hike. Well-he was WRONG. Check out this monster of a slug....next time I am bringing a flare gun (just to be on the safe side).

<----- Biggest slug EVER!

We finished our second day with a nice hike in the mountains in north Haugesund. The hike was pretty easy, but offered beautiful views of Haugesund.

<-----Haugesund is behind/below us

Our third day in Norway was definitely our favorite (and the weather was absolutely gorgeous). Jonathan and I planned a nice little drive to Etne; home of Norway's 5th tallest waterfall-Langfoss. The drive to Etne was a great start to the day. Jonathan had a lot of fun driving on the winding roads that followed along the fjords (I had a lot of fun being a back seat driver). After parking at Langfoss, we met a friendly Norwegian woman who showed us where the trail began so that we could hike to the top of the waterfall (which is some 600+ meters high).

The hike was beautiful. We spent about 6 hours hiking up the waterfall and around the backside of the fjord. We were the only tourists hiking the waterfall that day as tourist season starts in June in Norway.

After seeing how beautiful southwest Norway is, I wonder why in the world the Vikings would ever want to leave their home to come to England.

Best Birthday, Ever.

May 9th 2009 was an awesome day.  Jonathan came home from a business trip on my b-day.  Pretty cool present if I do say so myself.  Shanna took some awesome pictures of the return (thanks!).