Birthday celebration in Arizona

We were supposed to go to San Miguel De Allende in Mexico for my birthday, but some plans fell through, so we had to be flexible and in the last minute, Jason suggested Arizona, and I was all for it.  We booked the Westin Kierland Golf Club in Scottsdale and just did it!

We ate at wonderful restaurants, we golfed, we played tennis, we hiked, we lounged at the pool and we sipped on cocktails.  Just what the doctor ordered!

 

Quick trip to San Fran

This year's December miles trip was to San Francisco! (See other December miles trips to New Orleans and to Maui) and I'd never been, but Jason always said I would love it, so we finally went!  I could probably split up the trip into 3 highlights: 1) Alcatraz, 2) Biking Trip and 3) Around San Fran.

1) Alcatraz - we did the requisite trip to Alcatraz and I wasn't really expecting to learn so much or find it so interesting, but it was a real highlight of the trip.  The idea that these prisoners could hear the partying happening on the shores of San Francisco from their tiny cells was chilling; seeing all of the escape attempts were mind boggling; and learning how the prison system was run was so interesting.

Ferry to Alcatraz island

Tiny cells...

...stacked on top of each other

The only way to see visitors

One escape included a fake head and tunnel out.

2) Biking Trip - probably our favorite part of the trip was the 5 hour bike ride across the Golden Gate Bridge, into Sausalito, through Old Mill Park and along the beautiful bay to Tiburon where we took the ferry back to San Francisco while watching the sunset over the bridge.  It was absolute perfection! 

We're off to bike across that bridge.

Reward for our hard work, lunch in Sausalito :)

The beautiful bay back.

Waiting for the ferry.

Sunset on the ferry back... 

3) Around San Francisco - We really loved just walking around the city and seeing all it had to offer.  We did everything touristy and didn't care.

The food was delicious everywhere.

What a beautiful Christmas tree.

Quick Getaway to New Orleans

Sometimes, in December, Jason and I have to take a quick trip to earn those last few miles Jason needs to keep his status with American Airlines.  This year, we decided on New Orleans!  I've never been and I love jazz music, so I just couldn't wait!  It really was everything I expected.  Great food, great music, beautiful architecture, friendly people, lots of fun!  The only thing we didn't expect was that there really isn't much to do during the day.  It was a little too cold to do a swamp tour or anything like that, so we pretty much exhausted anything else to do.

Here are lots of videos of great bands and cool bars (where we drank quite a bit).

During the day, we took lots of walks through neighborhoods and parks (and drank a bit).

And we visited The National WWII Museum on a rainy day, which was surprisingly really cool (and we dried out a bit from all the drinking).

Great food was everywhere, but a highlight was, of course, Commander's Palace.

Sundance Film Festival

My business partner, Kathryn, and I decided to check out the Sundance Film Festival as a sort of "market research" for our event planning business.  We plan to take on more festival work and since my father lives just outside of Park City, we made the trip!

It was a quick one, but filled with lots of Winter beauty for sure.  This is not a full trip report, but just some highlights.

The view from my father's house is stunning.

At the end of every film, the filmmaker and actors came on stage to talk.  This was after Southside With You. 

Some fun between movies.

Getting from one venue to the next on crowded busses was not ideal.

Between movies, we would visit one of the many 5 star resorts.  We saw Gabrielle Union here.

We also did some shopping, where I bought this mink hat.