Brandon O'Brien

Friday, November 28, 2014 @ 7:18 AM in 2014 Asia

The agenda for today was to head over to Lantau Island and visit the Big Buddah, Po Lin temple and then hit the Cheung Sha beach on the southern side of the island. We took the MTR to the island then got on a tram up to the Buddah and Temple area. Fortunately we read some tips that said to buy our tickets online instead of at the tram station and that paid off really well. We saved 10% and also avoided an hour and a half ticket line.

We opted for the glassed bottom tram on the way up. It was pretty cool but probably not worth the couple dollar upgrade. It was nice and sunny at the base of the tram but after the 20 minute ride up to the top we got into more and more clouds and haze. It was still nice up at the top and it made for some cloudy backdrops for the Big Buddah. The Big Buddah used to be the largest buddah in the world until a few years ago. I think it's still the largest bronze buddah in China.

We climbed the 260+ steps up to the base of the Buddah which wasn't too bad. There were some people that were really suffering on the way up though. We walked around and took some photos before heading over to the Po Lin temple area next to the Buddah. The temple must have been freshly painted really recently because all of the colors were really bright.

Once we got to the tram base station we found a bus that would take us around to the southern side of the island where the beaches were. The road between the port/MTR station and the beaches was extremely steep. The buses were having major issues getting over the pass. Fortunately it only took us about 20 minutes to get to the beach.

Trip Advisor said there was a restaurant in town but we couldn't find it. We ended up going down to the beach and found a little tour company that had a convenience shop. We got some beers and some chips since that's about all they had and spent some time on the beach. It started off being really nice but as time went on the clouds rolled in and it got a little more gross.

We got back on the bus and headed back to the station and then got off near Kowloon to try and find the goldfish market. We couldn't find it but instead we found a bunch of street markets and a giant flower market. We walked around a little more before heading back to the hotel. We're getting ready to head out for dinner now. Unfortunately we forgot the restaurant we wanted to go to closed earlier than we thought so we'll have to find something else to eat.

Teaser photos:

Big Buddah on Lantau Island

Incense at the Po Lin temple

Po Lin Temple

Cheung Sha beach

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Tags: hong kong, traveling, buddah

Posted from: Hong Kong

Thursday, November 27, 2014 @ 6:56 AM in 2014 Asia

Today was planned to be dedicated to beaches but unfortunately it rained pretty much the entire day. We started out by heading to Repulse Bay which was actually a pretty decent beach. We hung out there for a little bit until it started to rain. After moving under some tents we decided to head out and visit Turtle Cove Beach via Stanley which supposedly had some nice markets.

We took a minibus to Stanley which was interesting. The minibus drivers seem to go flying through these little narrow and windy roads. It's definitely a little on the sketchy side. Once we got to Stanley we walked around a little bit but it was pretty touristy and the market wasn't really anything special. It was still raining so we ducked into an Indian restaurant that had some really good lunch specials and had some good food.

Turtle Cove beach was next on the list and was definitely worth it. It was a much smaller beach and there were some really good shells that were surprisingly not picked over. It started pouring down rain again so we came back into the city to shower and change. We took a little nap and did some research to figure out where to find dinner and we found a lot of recommendations for Delicious Kitchen.

We went there and got the vegetable rice with fried pork chops and some "mock chicken" which is some kind of rolled tofu. Both were really good. They sat us at a table with an Indonesian guy who comes to Hong Kong a lot. He gave us a lot of helpful info about the city as well as some tips on other places we're going to visit.

After eating we went to the Wan Chai district and saw that it was really just a red light district and nothing like we were looking for. We took the MTR to the Central station and found a bunch of bars and people walking around. We hung around there for a while but the bars were all pretty expensive so we came back to the hotel to get some sleep.

Teaser photos:

Repulse Bay

Stanley, Hong Kong

Lunch in Stanley

Dinner at Delicious Kitchen

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Tags: hong kong, traveling, beaches

Posted from: Hong Kong

Wednesday, November 26, 2014 @ 8:50 AM in 2014 Asia

Day 1 in Hong Kong went really well. Mike and I got a full night of sleep and started the day with breakfast at the hotel. After eating we headed to the Ocean Park amusement park on the south side of the island. It took us a little while to figure out how to catch the bus down to the park. We were misreading the instructions Google gave us which mean we spent quite a bit of time wandering around before we found the bus. We didn't realize we had to catch a subway trail for a few stops before we were supposed to get on the bus.

We finally got to the park and it was extremely empty. We were able to get on every rollercoaster without having to wait in a single line the entire day. After riding every coaster and ride in the park we went and toured the aquariums and various other exhibits. The park actually wasn't that bad but a lot of it was under construction.

Once we finished up at the park we went over to Aberdeen to check out all the fishing boats. We were planning on eating there but we got there too early and didn't feel like sticking around for a few hours to wait for all the boat restaurants to open. Instead, we walked around through some of the city and got to see some local markets that had a lot of fresh vegetables and seafood.

We headed into the Tsim Shai Tsui area and Temple Street and walked around for a while. Open container laws don't exist in Hong Kong so we had a few beers while exploring the city. We did that for a couple hours until the light show on the Tsim Shai Tsui Promenade at 8. It was pretty cool except for how foggy it still was.

Once the show ended we headed back to our side of the island and started searching for food. We found a local place near our hotel that was a little like a dim sum restaurant except you ordered it like sushi. The food was good and extremely cheap. For both Mike and I to have 4 dishes and tea the total was only $10USD.

Tomorrow we're planning on heading out to visit some beaches although the weather is calling for a 60% chance of rain. We're hoping it holds off long enough for us to get a little beach time in.

Teaser photos:

Pandas at Ocean Park in Hong Kong

Ocean Park in Hong Kong

Laser show on Hong Kong

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Tags: travels2014, hong kong

Posted from: Hong Kong

Sunday, July 27, 2014 @ 1:00 PM in General Travel

Brandon and Erin asked if I wanted to join them on a camping trip this weekend out into the Jemez. The area they were planning on camping is somewhere I'd never been before. The road out there is awesome. It passes through some tunnels and follows a river for quite a while.

We found a campsite that was a little hike off the road. It took a while and a decent effort to carry all our stuff from the car down to the campsite. It was pretty steep getting down to the area where the camping was. We got everything set up and got a fire going and then started dinner. I made some green chile cheese burgers with some roasted corn on the cob for dinner Friday night.

On Saturday we had breakfast and waited for the sun to come up a little bit more then started hiking up and through the river while drinking some beers. I was pretty amazed at how well Canyon and Wicket (Brandon and Erin's dog) did in the water. I was expecting Canyon to avoid it like the plague but after a while she was pretty happy to splash through the water following us.

We stopped a couple times to have a drink and just after the 2nd stop, Brandon went to put Wicket on some rocks since he was getting pretty cold and tired from the water. There was a huge rattle snake chilling there and Brandon didn't see it until he had almost set Wicket on top of it. He flew himself and the dog backwards into the water, fortunately avoiding any kind of bite. Erin and I could hear it going crazy with its rattle after that. The crazy part was that Canyon had just ran through there which is why we assumed it would be fine.

After that little shake-up we decided to turn around and head back to camp. Once back at camp we made some sandwiches and snacked. Dark clouds were rolling in and it started raining so we just hunkered up under the canopy and played a dice game called Farkel while we waited out the rain.

The rain eventually stopped and we started collecting some firewood for the evening fire and dinner. For dinner tonight, Brandon made some lemon chicken, beans caesar salad and some sausage. We were all pretty tired from being in the sun most of the day so we were all passed out around 10pm.

It stormed a few times through the night but it wasn't anything too extreme. We got up, ate a quick breakfast with eggs and some of the leftover hamburger meat and started packing up the campground. The hard part was carrying everything back up to the cars. Even though we had drank most of the water and ate a lot of the food, the coolers were still heavy and awkward to carry back up.

On the way out we stopped at one of the cliff tunnels and took some photos before heading back to Albuquerque. Back at home, Canyon is passed out and is in desperate need of a good wash and grooming. I'll be looking for a place this week to take her to.

Teaser photos:

Canyon enjoying some river hiking

Happy Camper while hiking in the river

Chilling by the camp fire

Highway 376 through some cliffs

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Tags: jemez, camping, canyon, new mexico, river

Posted from: United States

Monday, July 7, 2014 @ 4:18 PM in General Travel

I'm writing this post a little late since I just uploaded all the photos from the trip. Scott called a few weeks ago to see if I was doing anything the weekend of June 28. I didn't have any plans yet so we decided we'd head up to Vail, Colorado and try some downhill mountain biking.

Scott booked a flight on Southwest to Denver which arrived on Saturday night. I drove up and picked him up from the airport and then we drove out to Vail. We didn't get into our hotel until around midnight since Scott's flight was delayed about an hour. One nice thing about driving that late was the complete lack of traffic on I-70 through the mountains.

We woke up pretty early on Sunday morning and headed into Vail to purchase our lift tickets and mountain bike rentals. We found out that we could buy a full day lift ticket that came with a half day mountain bike rental included for $73. The guys at the bike shop said they didn't really follow the half/full day rental schedule so as long as we returned the bikes before 6:00pm then we'd be fine.

We were given two Trek Fuel Ex 5 29ers to take up the mountain. The bikes are full suspension and seemingly ran over just about anything without a problem. We did a couple runs including some pretty steep blacks then went back to the car to make some sandwiches for lunch. Scott had a little trouble with his rear brake not working too well so he had to take it in a couple times to get it tightened up.

Our favorite run of the day was Radio Flyer. It had some really nice smooth curves, jumps and dips. It's basically what both of us were imagining when we booked the trip. Several of the other runs were a little too rocky or just plain too steep to feel comfortable on.

After a full day (9:30am-5:45pm) we decided to turn the bikes in and head back to the hotel to shower and find some food. All the riding really wore out my wrists... I think due to the vibration of flying down the hill. My right knee was a little banged up because it kept hitting the top bar of the bike and I think I smacked my left ankle on the pedal once. Other than that, it was an incident free experience!

For dinner we went to a place called Yellowbelly that did a modern take on soul food. I had some roasted chicken, citrus quinoa salad and "smashed potato fries". They also had some natural cane sugar sodas that were all pretty good. There wasn't much to do in town so we tried the hot tub and sauna but both seemed to be broken. The hot tub was cold and the sauna never started steaming. We were both pretty wiped out so we ended up just heading to bed.

I think both of us slept really well considering we didn't even wake up until our alarm went off around 8:30am. Our plan for the day was to check out of the hotel, head to Copper Mountain and take advantage of a lift ticket deal and do some hiking at the top of the ski area before dropping Scott back off at the airport.

We had a quick breakfast and then drove to Copper Mountain. The deal was if we showed up with a receipt that showed we spent $10 in the Copper village then we'd get a free lift ticket for the day. Rather than buying any unnecessary junk, we sorta scammed the system and each bought $10 worth of gas for my car. They didn't seem to have any issue with it so we got our free lift tickets and jumped on the lift.

We only had about an hour to spend up there before we needed to start our journey back to Denver. The hiking was nice and the air was thin. We were up over 11,000 feet and there was still plenty of snow around from the ski runs.

We hit a bunch of traffic on the way back to Denver since they're doing some major construction on one of the tunnels near Idaho Springs. It slowed us down by about a half hour but we still got Scott to the airport with plenty of time to catch his flight. After dropping him off I had the long 7 hour journey home. I stopped in Colorado Springs along the way to check out a liquor store called Coltrains. I always like to pick up some beers I can't find in New Mexico when I'm up in Colorado. Coltrains was right off I-25 which made it really convenient. I bought a bunch of stuff I'd never had and then drove home.

It was a lot of driving for such a short trip but I definitely want to do some more downhill mountain biking. Scott and I definitely made the most of our time on the bike but we both agreed that it would be nice to do a couple days and take our time and not ride all day. It was just too draining.

Teaser photos:

On the gondola up to the trails

Vail ski runs in summer

A black run at Vail

Hiking at Copper mountain

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Tags: vail, colorado, mountain biking, downhill, copper

Posted from: United States

Tuesday, June 10, 2014 @ 3:15 PM in Miscellaneous

The garden in my front yard has been hit or miss the last few years due to the amount of sun I get (hint: it's a lot). Rather than have another year of poor return from my garden I decided to build a sun shade out of 3/4" PVC pipe and some screen.

The cost of the materials was pretty cheap and it only took about a half hour to get it all put together. I also put some chicken wire around the garden to keep small animals out. This year rather than planting a big mix of vegetables I stuck with 6 Big Jim Green Chile plants. I'm really hoping that this fall I can roast a batch of my own green chile.

Teaser photos:

Shade box

Garden

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Tags: garden, green chile

Posted from: United States

Saturday, May 31, 2014 @ 2:48 PM in General Travel

Callie text me on Wednesday and let me know that the New Mexico Off Highway Vehicle Alliance (NMOHVA) was doing their annual meetup in Sipapu this weekend. It's a huge group of adventure riders that get together and do various rides, time trials and races. I wasn't planning on participating in any of that but I thought it would be a good excuse to get out of town for the weekend and also get a nice motorcycle ride in.

Rather than participate in some of the group rides (since they were pretty much all extreme off-road stuff), I said I'd go up for Friday night to hang out and camp. Callie and I met in Pojoaque around 4:30pm and rode the High Road to Taos up to the Sipapu camping area. The views along the ride were amazing and fortunately the roads weren't too crowded.

We got to the campground and met up with a bunch of other people who were there for the event. I got my tent ready and ate some food that I had brought up. All of the other people had tons of food so I got to sample a bunch of theirs as well. After a few beers and sitting by the campfire for a couple hours I was tired and got ready for bed. It was extremely cold and took me a while to fall asleep.

I woke up, made some coffee and had some instant oatmeal while everyone was getting ready. Everyone hung out for a little while and gave me some advice about how I should get home. Rather than backtrack the way I came in yesterday they said to take NM Route 518 to Mora and then cut down to Las Vegas. From there, I'd take I-25 for about an hour before getting on some more back roads and cutting over to the Turquoise Trail. The idea sounded good so I packed up my tent and got my motorcycle ready before having a breakfast burrito and heading out.

The ride from Sipapu to Mora was amazing. It reminded me a lot of riding in southern Colorado with all the trees, streams, winding roads and amazing views. I lucked out again and avoided any real traffic so I was able to enjoy the ride a lot. I fueled up in Las Vegas, NM and then hit I-25 until I reached US 285 and took that down to NM Route 41 to Galliesto where I caught NM Route 42 to take me to the Turquoise Trail.

I stopped a few times for photos but wished I would have stopped earlier in the day between Sipapu and Mora since the views there were even better. I made pretty good time and got home around 1:30 this afternoon. That ride really made me want to get out and do more day trips around the state!

The entire route I took can be found here: https://goo.gl/maps/taf3f

Teaser photos:

A small group of motorcycles

My Triumph Tiger 800 on NM Route 42

My motorcycle on the Turquoise Trail

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Tags: sipapu, nmohva, motorcycle, camping

Posted from: United States

Wednesday, May 28, 2014 @ 9:09 AM in General Travel

I spent Memorial Day weekend up in Portland, OR with Luiz, Bethany, Seth, Ashley and Marjorie. We all got on the same flight up there on Friday morning. Once we got to Portland we had a beer in the airport then met up with Mike who took us out to a really good breakfast place, Pine State, that's known for their biscuits. I had a chicken biscuit with cheese and bacon, a beer and a cold brew coffee.

After breakfast the weather cleared up and we started exploring the city. We hit up a few places for drinks and food and also checked out the rose garden. One of the cool places we checked out was the Portland City Grill that's located at the top of the largest building in Portland. We had some really good views of the city from up there. After a few more stops we went to a place called Hair of the Dog for some Chuck Norris duck wings. They were extremely spicy but tasted really good.

The next morning we got ready to head out to Mosier to camp. Along the way we stopped a few places along the Columbia River Gorge to take photos. We stopped at the Vista House, which I'd been to before with Ryan on our huge motorcycle trip in 2012, but it wasn't nearly as crowded this time. In Hood River we stopped at a pub to watch a soccer match and eat lunch before heading to meet with a bunch of people for the campout.

The place we camped in Mosier has some amazing views. There was a lot of beer, food and relaxing. It was nice being able to sleep in a tent without having to worry about it getting filled up with dust like you do here. The next morning we made some breakfast burritos for breakfast then went to check out a winery called Analemma. They had four different wines to sample, one of which was a really dry Gewürztraminer that was great.

Back in Hood River we stopped for lunch and a drink at an up-and-coming local brewery called Pfriem. The food and beer were amazing and the brewery itself was very clean with a really nice location near the river. I think the general consensus was that it was one of the best stops on the trip.

We got back to Portland and set up for a big cookout at the place we were staying. We did some food shopping then had a little down time before everyone showed up. While we were out we wanted some coffee to wake us up so we stopped at a place called Coava. Whenever you order a coffee they grind your beans on-demand and heat the water up to a specific temp and individually brew your coffee. It was definitely one of the coolest places I've had coffee at. Before the party we did another wine sampling at a place right around the corner from where we were staying. The party was a lot of fun and there was more food/drink than we knew what to do with.

The next morning, Seth, Ashley and I got up early and walked down to Voodoo Donuts. The line wasn't too bad so we ordered some donuts then got some coffee and came back to the house. When we got back we found out we were heading to an early lunch at a Vietnamese place that only has two soups per day. After breakfast we went to the Mississippi neighborhood to meet up with some other people and have some more drinks. The area was really nice. There were more restaurants, bars and breweries in one place than I've seen in a long time. We spent several hours in that area before we split off to a soccer bar called 442 to watch the end of the game we started watching on Saturday in Hood River. The game went into overtime and we had to get to the campout so we weren't able to finish it then.

The soccer bar had some really good Bosnian food. I had some sort of meat sandwich and fresh cut fries along with my bloody mary. We walked around a little more before we all decided all the beer we'd been drinking over the last few days was way too filling. We stopped at a place called Coopers Hall for wine and had a great time there. We went through several bottles sampling various reds and roses. After that we we went for dinner at Nostrana, a really good Italian place a couple blocks from where we were staying. They had a late night happy hour with food marked down to really low prices. I had a margarita pizza and some of the other people split some other food. The restaurant was really nice inside with low lighting and wood everywhere.

It had been another long day so all of us came back to go to bed. In the morning we packed everything up, ate breakfast at a place called Zells and then got on our way to the airport. At the airport we lost track of time walking around and got on the plane after general boarding so we got some pretty bad seating, but I was so tired I slept pretty much the whole way to Las Vegas where we had a short layover before landing back in Albuquerque.

All of us had a great time, we had a lot of good food and drink and experienced some amazing weather. All-in-all, the trip was a great success!

Teaser photos:

Columbia River Gorge

Camping in Mosier, OR

Voodoo Donuts in Portland

Freshly brewed coffee at Coava in Portland

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Tags: portland, coffee, green, camping, mosier

Posted from: United States

Tuesday, May 6, 2014 @ 4:07 PM in Miscellaneous

Erin and I had planned on doing the La Luz hike today. La Luz is a trail that goes up/down the Sandia mountain in Albuquerque. It's about 8 miles each way with about 5,500 feet of elevation gain from the bottom. Since I can't take Canyon on the tram and she loves the exercise, I told Erin I'd meet her at the top and hike down with her (since that was Erin's plan). I got to the La Luz trailhead around 8:30 this morning, paid my $3 parking fee and then started hiking up.

The hike up went fine. I only saw a few other people along the way and Canyon got to run around and even got to play in some snow that was in some shade near the top of the trail. As always, the mile and a half of scree fields was pretty monotonous but we made it through.

We got to the tram station a little before 11:30 and had lunch. I made some quesadillas in the morning and also brought some food for Canyon. The only people up there when I got there were some construction workers who seemed to be working on the new tram station. I text Erin and told her I was up there but it didn't seem like the trams were running. Apparently the tram is closed every Tuesday, which we didn't know about.

Without anyone to wait for now and the cold winds that were blowing really strong at the peak, Canyon and I started the hike back down. We made really good time on the way down, but by the time we were about 3 miles from the car it really warmed up. I kept giving Canyon water and pouring it on her to help cool her down.

My total moving time for the hike today (up and down) was 5 hours and 2 minutes. I think that's the fastest I've done it so far. I was hoping to finish in under 5 hours but didn't quite make it. I'm sure I'll be doing the hike several more times this summer so maybe one of those times I'll break the 5 hour mark.

Now that my legs are completely worn out and Canyon is passed out it's time to think about dinner and a shower.

Teaser photos:

La Luz trail

La Luz trail

Canyon at Sandia Peak

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Tags: la luz, albuquerque, hike

Posted from: United States

Wednesday, April 30, 2014 @ 4:49 PM in General Travel

Last May I dropped my motorcycle off with Ryan up in Denver so he could keep it locked up safely in his storage unit while I was traveling around Europe. I thought I'd be moving up there right after I got back from my travels but due to the housing situation I wasn't able to get rid of my place, so I'm still here in Albuquerque.

That created a little dilemma when I wanted to ride since my bike was still up in the storage unit. Between my schedule and Ryan's schedule we were both pretty booked through early June so rather than wait until then I decided to do a mid-week one-way flight up there to get my motorcycle and ride it back.

The tires were in pretty bad shape so I had to order some of through a bike shop up there so they could install them before the ride back. I took care of the ordering last week and then on Monday I got on a flight to Denver. I actually found out I can take buses from my house all the way to the ABQ airport for $1. Much better than trying to park my car at the airport and then figure out how to get it back later.

I got up there on Monday night, rode my bike (for the first time in almost a year) from Ryan's storage unit to his house. On Tuesday morning I had an appointment to get the new tires installed so I had that done, then rode around Denver and up to Red Rocks to make sure there weren't any issues with the bike before a 7 hour ride back to Albuquerque on Wednesday morning.

Everything went fine even though it was extremely windy up in Denver. I was on my motorcycle by 7am on Wednesday morning, in the freezing cold, but I was on my way back home. It never really got warm for the duration of the ride back to Albuquerque. I hit a lot of wind, a lot of cloudy skies and even a little rain and snow north of Santa Fe.

The roads were basically empty since it was the middle of the week so I made pretty good time. I'm back in Albuquerque now and I'm just crossing my fingers this crazy wind stops soon here so I can get out and enjoy my motorcycle again!

Teaser photos:

My motorcycle at Red Rocks in Denver

My motorcycle at Red Rocks in Denver

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Tags: motorcycle, red rocks

Posted from: United States