Tag: Personal

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 9: Hoi An Sunday September 29, 2019

If I didn’t mention it, our hotel in Cambodia was one of only two we stayed at which didn’t have a breakfast buffet, though I just ate up that congee. Well this hotel had a pretty large buffet and it was once again quite good. One of the things we appreciated about the hotel breakfast …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 8: Riley Goes Back to Vietnam from Cambodia Saturday September 28, 2019

I might have slept even worse this night as I woke up at 2 or 3, I think, and never went back to sleep. Fortunately once again I was able to eat congee for breakfast, which seems like basically the best thing to eat when you don’t sleep and you have a cold.

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Cambodia Day 2 (Vietnam Trip Day 7): Angkor Wat Friday September 27, 2019

I slept horribly. I think I was up at 2 or 3 but I didn’t check. My cold was in full force by this point and I think I even worried I had a fever at some point. I didn’t manage to get back to sleep and I felt better once Jenn woke up, but …

Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 5: Mekong Delta Wednesday September 25, 2019

Our alarm went off at 5:45AM to go on a tour, but I was up at 4 or something, due to jet lag. After breakfast, we got in a van at 6:55 to head to the Mekong Delta. We booked a tour with the same guy who did the food tour because we were so …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 4: Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City Tuesday September 24, 2019

It all blends together at this point, but I know I didn’t sleep well during the night. This might have been the night I was up in the middle of the night for an hour or two but managed to get back to sleep. But the jet lag hit me hard over the next week …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley goes to Vietnam Day 3: Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City Monday September 23, 2019

We woke up early but not as early as we would on subsequent days. We went down to breakfast and found an elaborate breakfast buffet, which would become a theme of our trip, as only one hotel we stayed at wouldn’t have one. I had noodles as well because, in my jet lagged state, I …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 2: Ho Chi Minh City/Saigon Sunday September 22, 2019

We landed in Hong Kong very early in the morning, just in time for sunrise. The Hong Kong airport is gigantic and also quite nice. Not a ton of stuff was open because it was so early, but at least we could walk around. And it’s all glass so the views on one side are …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Vietnam Day 1: Saturday September 21, 2019

We left on the last flight from the airport (or at least the terminal) for Friday, leaving at 1:45AM. I didn’t know flights were allowed to leave that late and on the way to my airport my mom and I had a conversation about how we thought there was a bylaw preventing flights from leaving …

2018, 2019, Basketball, Personal, Sports

Your NBA Champion 2018-19 Toronto Raptors

I attended a Raptors game at Sky Dome. But I’m not one of those fans who can say that I have been a fan of the Raptors the entire time. The seats we had at the Dome were bad enough my only memory is not being able to see the ball well and not understanding …

2019, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Killington, Vermont – March 21-25, 2019

I have been to Vermont many times. I have skied at Jay Peak something like six times. I have skied at Bolton Valley and Stowe and, once before this year, Killington. But I hadn’t been to Vermont since I was in University, so long ago now it makes me feel old. So it was nice …

2018, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Mexico City Day 5 October 29, 2018

We packed a bit the night before, but finished packing this morning. I was up early so I was ready to go pretty early. So I finished Sophie’s Choice. I also tried to read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, which my dad lent me ages ago, but I just couldn’t do it. Anyone who …

2018, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Mexico City Day 2 Friday October 26, 2018

This morning we woke up and headed down to the bakery a few doors down. (There was one right below us too, but they were undergoing renovations into a more conventional restaurant while we were staying there.) We both ordered Pan de Muerto in honour of the upcoming Day of the Dead and because we …

2018, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Mexico City Day 1: Thursday October 25, 2018

We got up at 5AM because of an early flight. We did our usual thing, and took the TTC to Dundas West, and took the UP train to Pearson. If you don’t take this train yet, it’s the best way to get to the airport if you live in downtown. It’s so much faster than …

2018, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Memphis, Tennessee May 31 – June 3, 2018

So I went to Memphis over the weekend. We chose Memphis for an odd reason: it was our fallback after we decided we didn’t want to go to Nashville, as flights to Nashville for this particular weekend were too expensive, and we both read an article that soured us on that city. So we looked …

2018, Personal, Sports, Travel

Riley Goes to Panorama Mountain Resort, February 3-February 9, 2018

For the past week, I was in the Kootenays, skiing at Panorama Mountain Resort, a place I have wanted to ski at for a very, very long time. (That is true of many ski resorts in North America, however.) I cannot say enough positive things about the resort and I would strongly encourage you to …

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Goes to Amsterdam Friday October 13, 2017

This morning we went to another bakery, more expensive and not as good as the bakery of the previous morning. My tea was insanely hot so we had to wait a while, and I actually had to dilute it was some of our bottled water.

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Amsterdam Thursday October 12, 2017

This morning we wandered around looking for dessert places in the Red Light district until we found a dessert place that had the odd breakfast pastry. We had croissants and a Danish.

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Amsterdam Wednesday October 11, 2017

Though staying at a “bed and breakfast,” breakfast was not included (this city is pricey) so we went out to find breakfast, a little groggily as our neighbours came back at 3AM (they couldn’t open their door…).

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Amsterdam Tuesday October 10, 2017

Our return to Podgorica and our train trip to Belgrade were the worst days of our trip and, though we enjoyed Belgrade despite everything being closed, we were still kind of beaten down when we got up on Tuesday morning. So, given that we had an afternoon flight, and our rather swanky hotel tolerated fairly …

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Podgorica Saturday October 7, 2017

We finished off our watermelon first thing, and then got in the car and I drove as quickly as I could through the narrow street to get down to the downtown. There we picked up breakfast for the road. It was raining rather hard, the first time it had rained hard on the trip when …

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Ulcinj Friday October 6, 2017

After we woke up and admired our view once again, we realized that the only map we had was in Montenegrin and not very good. It was one of those highly stylized maps sponsored by a local business. The maps we had used in Zagreb, Dubrovnik and Kotor had all been exceptional, given their detail …

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Ulcinj, Montenegro Thursday October 5, 2017

We had breakfast at the hotel again, as it was included, but it was in a different room, which was interesting. We never really found out why. The good news is that it was on the first floor, where we a much better view than from the basement, with no windows.

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Zabljak Wednesday October 4, 2017

We ate breakfast in our hotel, as it was included. It was a big buffet that was pretty good, though apparently the coffee from the machine was shit. But the weather was absolutely miserable when we woke up, raining pretty heavily. So we hung out in the room for a while.

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Montenegro Tuesday October 3, 2017

We woke to the bells of the old church next to us, and the sound of children going to school. The only bad thing about our place was its proximity to the church, but there’s not much to be done about that when you want to stay within the old city and then old city …

2017, Daily Log, Personal, Travel

Riley Goes to Kotor Monday October 2, 2017

The night before, I saw what appeared to be an excellent deal for breakfast. So we went to a hotel for a cheap buffet and that turned out to be a mistake. (Well, we were maybe too late.) The hot food was cold. Everything was not really as good as we had at other hotel …