Day 1 of Labor Day Road Trip

We started our week long trip in Omaha.  Why Omaha?  We have a credit card that gives us a $99 round trip airline ticket on US Air with a regularly priced fare of at least $250.  We wanted to get our money's worth and go someplace obscure so we chose Omaha.  The regular price was just over 250 so we got two tickets for around $350. We left the house really early, 4:45 AM for a 6:30 AM flight.  We had a 3 hour layover in Charlotte and we were lucky to be upgraded (free) to first class on our second flight so we were able to eat some lunch on the plane, saving us some time when we landed in Nebraska.  We had no chance for an upgrade on our first flight because there was no first class section! In fact boarding took place with stairs and carry on luggage for the most part could not be brought on the plane because of small overhead storage bins. We arrived in Omaha a little after 1, grabbed our mini-van, and headed to Walmart for some supplies for the week.  We grabbed a couple of cases of water, beer, ice, and some snacks and were on our way.

Boarding the plane

Load carry on luggage here

We were driving to Winner, SD for our first night.  It was about a 5 hour drive but we chose that particular location because there was a Holiday Inn Express there offering free nights for 5000 points rather than the normal 15000.  Our trip was fairly uneventful.  It took us through Sioux City, IA where there is a Hard Rock Hotel.  Of course we stopped for another magnet/bottle opener for our collection.  Driving was pretty easy for the first couple of hours, as the speed limit was 80.  Once we left the interstate we still made great time because there was practically no traffic and even on the two lane road, the speed limit was usually 65 or 70.

Hard Rock Casino

We stopped for dinner at one of the most amazing sushi restaurants we ever ate at, in Yankton, SD.  Who would have   thought that there would be good sushi in South Dakota of all places?  Not us, but we saw it in Trip Advisor and decided to give it a try.  We liked it so much that we were inspired to create a TripAdvisor account and write a review on the place! If you ever find yourself anywhere near Yankton, SD you have to try Tokyo Japanese Cuisine.

After dinner we continued driving west, adding more counties to our growing counties visited tally.  We stopped for a break at the Fort Randall dam, one of 6 dams on the Missouri River.  They had an interesting display on tipis.  We took a few pictures, stretched our legs and continued on.  We were able to see a great sunset and once the sun set the sky remained a beautiful red/orange for nearly an hour until we arrived at our hotel.

Our car for the week

Hotel for the night

St. Lucia

We spotted a great fare for a trip to St. Lucia many months back and without giving it even a second thought, we booked it.  The catch with this great fare was that we had an overnight layover in Miami on the way down, which during the middle of the winter, is not the worst thing in the world.  Our stay in St. Lucia would be 4 nights.  At the time we figured we would use some of our accumulated hotel points and stay someplace for free while we were there.  It wasn’t until we started looking for a place to stay that we learned that the nicest places on the island are all resorts, many costing upwards of $1000 per night.  Unfortunately none of our hotel points would be good there.  So we went for Plan B and did some digging.  We ended up with a reservation on a small plantation in the rain forest called Fond Doux Plantation and Resort.

After having dinner with some friends in Miami the night before, we boarded our plane for St. Lucia.  We did not get upgraded this time but we were fortunate to have one of only about 3 empty seats on the plane right in between us, giving us a little more room to spread out.  Just before landing we got our first glimpse of the island and one of the two Pitons, two steep mountains that seem to quickly rise out of the sea.  They are probably the two best known landmarks on the relatively small island that is only three times the size of Washington, D.C.

Upon landing we quickly cleared customs and picked up our rental car.  Our rental car was a slightly used (that is being generous) Daihatsu Terios.  While we had never seen or heard of this model of car it ended up being just fine.  Driving was on the left side of the road with steering wheel on the right side of the car.  There was a nice sign on the dashboard to remind us which side of the road to drive on.  Only twice did Chris turn on the wipers when he meant to use the turn signal.  After the first mile or two driving on the “wrong” side of the road became almost second nature.  We did quickly realize however, that there were virtually no traffic laws, or at least none that were really followed.  Drivers were polite but no one really paid much attention to signs, lane markings, or the speed limit.

On that first afternoon less than a two minutes’ drive from the airport we stopped near the ocean to snap some pictures.  We also hit up the local supermarket to grab some food and something to drink for later.  We ended up grabbing a 3-pack of local beer as well as some wine to share later on.  We then made the roughly 45 minute drive to our plantation where we were greeted by smiles and a rum punch (seems to be the drink of choice on the island).

Our room, called the Hillside Papaya, was high up on the hill, completely within a lush rainforest.  Our shower was outside (although completely private), we had a small pool right outside our front door, and we were surrounded by all kinds of fruit trees (and a bunch of small lizards pretty much everywhere).

Looking out through our bathroom to the shower.

Before going to bed we took a walk around the property and discovered a steep trail that led us through the rainforest to a great view of the Pitons.  We had the trail and the viewpoint to ourselves but we didn't stay long because despite it being very much daytime it was getting dark really quickly in the forest.

Some plants and trees along the trail:

The next day, our first full day on the island, we decided to get out and drive a bit.  We were staying on the southern part of the island wanted to go to the northern part of the island where there seemed to be a lot more action and touristy stuff.  Before leaving we enjoyed a great continental breakfast which had been included with our room.

The drive to the far northern part of the island was only about 40 KM (20-25) miles in a straight line but with all of the twists and turns, it ended up being about a 65 KM drive (40 miles) and took upwards of 2 hours without stops.  We had been unsure of what to expect in terms of road conditions before renting our car but the road did end up being paved the entire way.  It was mostly very narrow and there were some stretches where maybe dirt would have been better than paved (lots of deep crater like potholes) but it was well traveled and driving was really not an issue at all.  We passed through some banana plantations on the way up and promised ourselves we would buy some fresh bananas before we left from some of the people selling them on the sides of the road.  We also passed a rum distillery that we knew we would return to another day.  We made our way almost to the most northern part of the island, past the capital city of Castries, and had lunch at a bar on the beach.  Being that the northern part of the island is where cruise ships dock; there were a lot more people, shops, and things to do.

After lunch, we headed out to a place called Pigeon Island, which today is not an island at all.  Pigeon Island was originally an island but was connected to the main island of St. Lucia with a causeway back in the 70’s.  The island had a fort on it in the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the remains of which are still there today.  The fort was located on the smaller of two peaks on the island and can be reached by a small trail followed by a short but steep climb up set of stairs to the top of the fort.  The higher of the peaks could be reached by a steep trail which was completely unshaded.  The views of the island from the top as well as the views down to the smaller peak made the walk to the top worth it.  We then explored the island and the ruins on the island a little bit more before heading back to the car for our drive back towards the plantation.

Ice Castle

We saw a clip on the news about an ice castle that was being built not too far from home earlier this week and we thought that we might go check it out over the weekend if the temperatures stayed cold enough for it to survive.  The castle is just under 2 hours north of us in Lincoln, NH and the temperatures at home were forecast to stay in the 20’s throughout the week so we figured the castle would easily survive.  We left home at about 2:30 Saturday afternoon figuring that the castle would be much nicer lit up at night.  We made only one quick stop on the way up at a rest area and we found ourselves approaching the exit just after 4:30.  Traffic was backed up in the right lane of the highway for about a mile before the exit so we stayed on the interstate for one more exit, then backtracked via back roads to the entrance.  It was immediately clear to us that the parking lot for the ice castle was pure gridlock so we parked across the street at McDonald’s, bought a coffee to make us a paying customer, thus giving us a legal spot to park.  We then walked a quarter mile or so to the ice castle.  Traffic heading into the parking lot was not moving at all and once in the parking lot there were not really many parking spaces so parking across the street seemed like a good call.  We could have easily been sitting in traffic for an hour to get into the place.  Once we got past the parking lot the line of people waiting in line was pretty bad too.  The line stretched about a football field’s length out from the building where you buy tickets.  Inside the building it snaked around and we quickly realized that we would likely be standing there for quite some time.  We did notice that the line for pre-bought tickets was pretty much non-existent so we got on our phones, went to their website and gladly paid the additional $2 per ticket processing fee essentially to skip the line.  We had our email confirmation; stepped out of the long line,  proceeded to the pre-bought ticket window and we were in the ice castle in no time at all.

The construction of the castle involves sprinkler systems that spray water onto metal racks to produce thousands of icicles. The icicles are then harvested and stuck to the ground around sprinkler heads, where they are drenched in water and grow in all kinds of shapes depending on the temperature and wind.  Over time the icicles continue to grow and depending on the placement of the sprinklers, tunnels and passageways develop, making for an elaborately built castle.  When they add lighting inside of the ice it makes it look really cool in the dark.