My wife and I tried a new vegan food place called the veggie grill. The food was great but the service was poor. I think in the future we will stick to native foods which has both great food and good service.

The hotel we stayed at was comfortable which I purchased online for a steal. I clicked on Mr. Rebates for 2% cash-back to start my purchase. From that website I went to Price line and did my usual bidding pattern. I don’t like to buy below 3 star hotels. The website always tries to doubt the amount you are bidding with a quick note stating that my bid has a low chance of getting accepted since average prices for that area go for $140 a night for a 3 star hotel. It states that every single time and then asks you if you would like to increase your bid before you submit it. Simply just hit skip this page when you see it. I bid $38 the last few days and was declined which is always expected. Then they finally accepted my offer as expected. I do not like to pay more than that for a hotel room stay.

The bigger the savings, the better I feel about my purchase.  I like to maximize the value of each and every dollar I spend.  Saving $102 can be spent on 2 more nights at that same hotel with room service!  It had free wifi and free parking which is great and the room was clean and modern.  It came with 2 queen beds instead of the 1 king size bed that they usually give me.  One bad thing is this hotel did ding me with the infamous “resort” garbage fee.  I hate when they do that.  Overall service was good but not excellent.

I feel like my wife and I got a lot of things accomplished.  I was tired after driving for 5 hours straight and went to sleep for a solid 10 hours when I got back.  Nothing beats sleeping in your own bed.  Thanks for stopping by and have an excellent weekend. Cheers!

I wound up bidding twice on priceline.com for a 4 star hotel for $40 a night. I wound up staying at Southpoint Hotel which is about 10 minutes from the strip. I checked on their site to see what the lowest prices for the same days and it they were $76 a night.

The hotel is easy to find off the freeway. After checking in we checked out the room. It exceeded our expectations. They gave us a funbook and we used some of the coupons. We used the 2 for 1 breakfast buffet coupon. The food choice was good and tasted great. I loaded up 2 plates of breakfast foods and was lucky not to get a stomach ache. That is the problem with all you can eat buffets, you wind up eating more than you want or should.

The other coupon I used was the free $25 slot play. You have to spend it all completely once–before you can cash in for real money.  I was up to $40  before cashing out at and netted $15 free money. I am not a gambler but I do like to get free money when I can get it.

They also had a bowling alley and a 12 screen theater inside. I checked both of them out and thought their bowling alley was very modern and their theater had first run movies and no different than any major chain.

Anyways, I would recommend staying at Southpoint Hotel.  Overall, very impressive for convenience and the many activities you can take advantage of.

Now, my wife has been putting this new travel and food show to fill up our empty DVR and every time I watch it, I just get hungry.  The show is called Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations. In the last week, I have watch at least about 20 previously aired shows where he visits all these other countries and gets fed by all these amazing chefs making special culinary delights for him.

For all the food Anthony eats, I am surprised he is not a much bigger guy.  This guy seems to be eating all the time, but then again that could just be the edit.  It seems like everything he gets to eat is delicious.  No matter which country, he samples dishes with unique ingredients.  I think the weirdest thing I saw him eat was camel in Egypt or Saudi Arabia.  Definitely something I would not desire to eat, but after watching him do it and seeing the way the native people prepared it, I could see myself trying it if the opportunity presented itself.

Now the show isn’t like fear factor where he eats stuff to try and gross you out.  He actually gets to eat the best stuff, but is always willing to try new foods native to that country.  He definitely eats a lot of stuff that I want to eat, and usually crave for after I finish watching the show.  I think his show can basically make it hard for someone to diet.

I know this guy is a chef himself and seems to really enjoy food for what it is.  What I like about him is his sincere gratitude for the foods he eats and the people he meets.  Anthony also has this New York wise guy attitude and a sarcastic sense of humor that adds a lot of flavor to his show and makes it enjoyable to watch.  It is an hour long show about food but also blends in plenty of culture.  It usually goes fast because it covers so much and because I fast forward through the commercials.   I am very surprised I haven’t seen this show before now.

I think the first time was awesome when my wife and I took the Amtrak train up there. It took a day and a half and the coast was beautiful. It’s suppose to rain a lot in Seattle but both times we went there, it didn’t really rain.  We took a bus tour to familiarize ourselves with the city and that made us want to explore it more.

The second time we visited, we flew up there and stayed at the Hotel Max which has the most comfortable pillows and bed.  If you read the reviews at the different travel sites, you will hear the same comments about this.  My wife and I did not rent a car this trip and walked everywhere. Needless to say, that is what makes staying in downtown adventurous.

What can I say, I love visiting Seattle and I have fond memories of my visits.

We checked out of our first hotel and made our way to our last hotel. This is the one we paid for at Priceline.com and used betterbidding.com to do our research and purchased our room at an unbelievable price. We have tried using Priceline before but were never successful at getting a winning bid. We always wound up using Hotwire.com which is also another great site to get low prices. Anyways, the hotel we stayed at was a 4 star hotel near SFO called the Grand Hyatt. It has plenty of positive reviews.

We took the BART back down to the SFO and then took a courtesy shuttle to the hotel. When we checked in the check in person was very personable and extremely friendly. She answered all my questions. I wanted to upgrade our room to a jacuzzi suite but she said those weren’t available. However, she did upgrade me to a bay view room for free. Our experience from beginning to end at this hotel was pleasurable.

When we went into the room, it was awesome. The room was big, the layout great, and everything it in it was modern. The bed was comfortable, there was an indoor fridge, and the view of the bay was nice. The airport is right next to the bay so you could see airplanes taking off in the distance. Inside the hotel, there is an atrium with a deli, restaurant, sports bar, and a fitness center.

We only stayed here for a night but did order room service for breakfast. The prices were actually reasonable and the food was great. It would have been perfect if we stayed at this hotel from the beginning. The only thing is I wouldn’t have been able to book these rooms for free through my credit card rewards program.

After breakfast we got ready for the airport. We used the TV video checkout, then the courtesy shuttle took us back to the airport. The shuttle was early and the plane was late. The flight was still enjoyable with all its amenities and it seemed like the flight was actually shorter on the way back.

Overall, this was a great vacation and hope to do it again soon. We were very lucky to get to do all the things we did, take in the city, meet many nice people, and get some freebies for this trip.

When I got up that day, my legs hurt. My left knee was aching a bit so we were going to minimize our walking. We caught a matinee in a local downtown area and watched that epic movie Australia.

Australia was a great movie directed by Baz Luhrmann that starred Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman, and Bryan Brown. We love watching movies so this was a treat.  The theater was old and their were only 3 patrons in the entire place.  It felt like a private screening. :lol:  I highly recommend this movie. It delivers what it promises and definitely entertains you.

After the movie which is almost 3 hours long, we had some sushi at a local restaurant Asa Sushi? that also received good reviews.  The sushi was fresh but the salmon teryiaki was a little overcooked. Definitely on the pricey side.  The other restaurant we considered going to was Naked Fish Sushi. That place has a funny name but good reviews, too.

Overall, another excellent day.  I would definitely consider living in San Fricisco because the place is great and the people were very friendly.  I also to like the way the housing looks too.

The first activity we did was walk down to the marina towards Fisherman’s Wharf. Yes, it is a tourist trap and we were ready to do touristy things. I booked a Double Decker bus tour to take in the city. I bought a multiple tour package to save some money. The first tour we took was a Golden Gate Bridge tour. It was an extremely clear day. We rode on the top deck. It was extremely cold and by the time we got to the bridge, it was like Arctic cold. I had a jacket on and used the blankets they provided but was still feeling cold.

The Golden Gate bridge is amazing. The views were spectacular both on the bus as we crossed and at the look out point at the other side of the bridge. I highly recommend taking a tour of it if you are ever in the city. Our tour guide quite frankly sucked. He seemed very bitter and talked about his former failed real estate agent career in Frisco and seemed very upset with rich people. He also made many inappropriate remarks about all types of people. He had a very thick accent as well so understanding him was difficult. I basically tried to ignore him because the tour itself was great.

After the first tour, we walked around the wharf and had some excellent clam chowder in the famous bread bowl and delicious crab sandwiches at Alioto’s Restaurant. The people out there were very aggressive as we walked by their restaurants to try to get us to go into their establishments.  I have to say if you eat down at the pier this place is great and not too pricey.

We went on our second tour which was a night tour that started at 6pm.  It was already dark and probably about 50 degrees.  It was still very clear and the fog didn’t roll in.  On this tour, the guide was a preppy hippie that went by the name of G or Gia and her sidekick busdriver named Jon T.  They were both a fun bunch and actually added to the experience.  The tour itself was great again.  We got to see all the lights as well as the entire city lit up.  Since it is Christmas time, there were lots of trees decorated and holiday lights everywhere you looked.  This trip was even better than our first tour and I am sure it is good even during the non holiday seasons.

We also passed by the Starbucks near the pier and while we were taking a load off our feet watching  people pass by, we saw a man with a rat perched on top of a cat that was perched on top of a dog.  I have actually seen this before when I use to do much more stumbling at stumbleupon.com.  To see it live was quirky.  The animals did look tired as well as the homeless guy parading them around.

The walking tired us out and we had to take the bus back to the hotel.  When we got back, we were spent.