Gatlinburg, Tennessee Road Trip! 🚗

Hi there!

Two weekends ago, we took a family trip to Gatlinburg pretty much up in the Great Smoky Mountains. It’s winter so obviously there isn’t greenery everywhere, but we were lucky to see some! And we also got to see snow very high up in the mountains.

The trip started on Friday when we left at 5am. I wasn’t even tired when I was getting up that morning, I was too excited for this trip even though I knew we had a long 7 hours ahead of us. We spent those 7 hours talking about random stuff and looking at the things we were driving past. My dad had some cool stories for us if we drove past something he remembered when he used to be a truck driver. The hours flew by and by the time we knew it, we were already approaching Gatlinburg. I forgot that this place was high up in the mountains and I got a little scared because my dad was driving – he’s not a bad driver, I just only trust myself when it comes to driving up in high elevations.

It took about 45 minutes to drive up to our cabin and when we finally got there, we couldn’t believe the views! It was a bunch of cabins built by each other, but far enough in between each other where you had your own privacy, so it was perfect. We found our cabin and as soon as we parked, I walked over to look at the views. There was some snow at the top so I was taking a bunch of pictures and everyone wanted pictures with that in the background. We had a little photoshoot and then started bringing our stuff inside.

The place was beautiful, so nicely decorated. I felt like a little kid running around saying “wow” to all of the stuff in there. I was super excited about the pool table and the jacuzzi because I already knew we’d be spending a lot of time with both of those. I took out my camera and started recording everything and everyones reactions. I think the first thing we did after unpacking was chilling in the jacuzzi and drinking some wine. It was so relaxing! It was a little chilly outside, nothing too cold, but perfect for the temperature of the jacuzzi. The views were great and the wine was great. My dad had a cold and was on medication and he couldn’t drink wine so we had to get him sparkling juice without alcohol. That was the funniest part since he is a huge wine fan! He still enjoyed it though.

We spent the next day exploring and driving around to see what cool stuff we could find. We went to a wine store and bought some really good wine and drove into this park that had a pretty river. We spent our nights playing pool and being competitive in UNO. UNO was so much fun and it was hilarious to see my parents play it as well. My sister was the sassiest one there, so we had to watch out for her! On our way back home, we stopped in Nashville to try some BBQ. It was good, but Texas BBQ still has my heart!

This was a great trip where lots of memories were made and lots of fun was had. Anytime with my family is a great time!!

Here are some pictures 🙂

Planning for my Tennessee trip! 🌲

I love planning for trips, it’s one of my favorite things to do. Even if it’s a short trip, I still like to plan out the stuff I’ll bring and the stuff I don’t want to forget. So even though this trip is only 3 days, I still go all out 🙌🏼 I’m hoping for this weekend trip to be very social media free, I want to just unplug and relax. I think all of us need this so the only time I would be using my phone would be to take pictures and videos, in which I will also be using my camera.

So, the weather is saying there is a chance of snow/rain and I already am thinking about what shoes I’m bringing. Probably my duck boots, since those are great in the snow and rain. And since it’s a short trip, I don’t have to bring too much clothes!

The list of stuff I’m bringing:

Clothes

Pretty much just comfy clothing like:

  • leggings
  • undershirts
  • hoodies
  • hats
  • gloves
  • scarves
  • fuzzy socks
  • my slippers

What am I packing in my little book bag?

  • my camera
  • camera charger
  • phone charger
  • a good book to read
  • my iPad (only for movies at night if we’re bored or during the car rides)
  • a healthy snack
  • my notebook and a pen
  • my chapstick
  • deodorant
  • a body spray

Something random I might bring along is a couple board games like Sorry and UNO. That might be fun to play with the fam if we get bored (which is probably not going to happen because there will be amazing views and a nice jacuzzi to go along with them).

That’s what I usually carry when I travel anywhere. A smaller book bag is easier for me than carrying a purse. I’m not bringing any makeup for this trip because I feel like it’s pointless since it’s such a short trip and also, I don’t think I’ll need it 🙂

So yeah, that’s pretty much all I’ll be bringing! The car ride is 7 hours long so let’s hope it goes by super fast. It will be a good trip!

West Coast Road Trip Pt.4: Yosemite!

After SFO, the next stop was Yosemite. We let ourselves sleep in, got up, had breakfast, and started our road trip to Yosemite. So it’s about 3 hours and 20 minutes to Yosemite and we got there pretty fast.

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Last year when we went to Yosemite, we came from Lake Tahoe so it was faster overall. The side we came from last time was very pretty, but this time there weren’t a lot of good views. There were some parts that were cool, but mostly it was just trees and dead trees from the recent fire. Some parts were scary to drive through, but nothing like the first time we went!

When we finally made it to the part where it has two road options, we decided to go towards the beach side because our Airbnb was that way anyways and Mirhad just couldn’t wait to see that. We didn’t have time to go back and see the falls on the other side, but that’s for next time! It took about an hour to get to the beach area and when we got there, Mirhad fell asleep right away on the sand.

It was as beautiful as the last time we were there. We stayed at the beach for a good hour, soaking up some sun and just relaxing after our long drive. After chilling for a bit, we decided to explore the area and take some pictures since we couldn’t drive to the other side. We got some cool pictures though using the self timer on our camera so it was fun to click the button and run quickly to get in a good pose.

We got hungry after a while and went to this gas station to eat. We had a REALLY good burger, we were actually shocked as to how yummy it was. This was also the same gas station we went to last time we were in Yosemite so it was cool to reminisce on those memories. After we ate, we grabbed some snacks and we started driving towards our Airbnb. I didn’t expect the Airbnb to be SO nice. We had mountain views and everything we needed. Although, we didn’t really spend time outside when we arrived… we went straight to bed as we knew we had another day of driving ahead of us. Next up, Vegas!!!

West Coast Road Trip Pt.3: San Francisco!

Hello hello!

Continuing on from my previous blog post, we woke up super early to go catch our flight to SFO. It was a short flight (yay) and the most craziest thing happened before we tried to land. So from the start, they were saying the plane that was supposed to take us to SFO was running late due to weather conditions back in SFO. I was worried right away about how this flight would be and it really wasn’t all bad until we were about to land. So all of a sudden it got super cloudy and foggy for a good 5-10 min. You could see the mountains and then a layer of clouds. All of a sudden after a couple of minutes of traveling through these clouds, we just see the ocean lol. It was a little bit scary and then we landed 5 seconds later! Anyways, finally in SFO and it’s SUPER cloudy. We had to go find the place to pick up our rental car and then we’d be on our way.

The first stop we made was to In n’ Out of course, it was soooooo good. We’ve tried it before and the mistake we always made was adding animal sauce or whatever it was and it didn’t taste good. But this time we just got regular burgers and fries and it was delish!

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After we ate, we found out that they didn’t even clean our rental car, it was so filthy in the back so we went and returned it. They gave us a different better car and then we were on our way to go see the Golden Gate Bridge! It took maybe 30 min to drive there from the airport which wasn’t too bad, but we were trying to avoid those traffic times. The bridge was beautiful and the scenery surrounding it was so nice, but it was sooooo windy and cold! You could barely keep your eyes open for a picture!

After taking some pictures, we started driving towards one of our friends houses since we agreed to stay at their place for the night. It was about an hour away and we went through a lot of hills. It was a cool drive over there! When we arrived, their dog was waiting to greet us and ran back inside so we could meet her in there. She was so shy in the beginning, but got so comfortable with us that she was sad to see us go! Our friend Elvira got off work around 6 so we chilled with her brother Eldar until she came home. After that, we just went to drive around and explore downtown and saw some cool places. We got to see that cool street that’s super curvy, it was at night, but it was still awesome. We also went somewhere to a very high hill, but it was so foggy you couldn’t see anything. 

So after a quick day in SFO, we woke up the next day refreshed and ready for our road trip down to Yosemite! More in the next post 🙂

 

 

Dallas, Texas Trip 2018

Hey there!

Earlier this week I promised a Dallas blog post and I am here to fulfill that promise 🙂

So this Dallas trip was meant to be a short, weekend trip. It was my birthday last Wednesday and we decided to leave on Thursday after I got off of work. One thing I will never do again is wait last minute to pack… I literally came home at 3pm and we wanted to leave at 5 so that left me 2 hours to pack everything I needed and also take a quick shower. It was lots of pressure to get out of the house by 5, but we did it and had to go grab some food and go to Walmart because we forgot something. So we actually ended up leaving around 6 lol. For a second I was annoyed because that means we have to drive until like 3-4am, but I got over it because after all IT IS a weekend trip 🙂

We had lots of fun on the drive, lots of good music, some good snacks, and just the open road. Honestly, I feel like there really is no better feeling in life than taking a trip, driving out on the open road, blasting your favorite music, and forgetting about all of your worries.

We arrived at our Airbnb around 3-4am, I was a little scared of walking around so late at night in a new city, but it actually ended up being perfectly fine and safe. Our garage was right next to the Airbnb so we checked in with security. As soon as we got into our room, we knocked out. Woke up the next morning ready to explore. We swam a lot on the rooftop pool, ate lots of BBQ, and explored what the city had to offer. I didn’t take lots of pictures, but I took some and they are good memories to me.

 

It was a very fun trip and for the first time in my life, I heard Mirhad say “that was fun, we should do it again, I’m excited for the next trip!” Literally have never heard him say that, so I was so excited to hear it and that means many more weekend trips to come 🙂 and also going back to Dallas because we had so much fun and it’s not that far!

His birthday is coming up so I am trying to figure out a cool city to visit, we want to take a train this time so it can literally be anywhere. Maybe Houston? He was saying he would like to visit Houston, but we’ll see. I think I’ll take off that Wed-Fri so that gives us some more time to enjoy his birthday week/weekend 🙂

Anyways, I recommend visiting Dallas if you haven’t already. It’s seriously a beautiful city, I mean all of Texas that we saw was super nice. Also – Southern Hospatality is so real, this is the first time I’ve experienced it and PEOPLE ARE SO NICE HERE! It’s so different compared to St. Louis and the people are so different and much nicer lol.

Go visit Dallas!!!! You won’t regret it.