Thursday, September 3rd
The first leg of the trip is 5-hour flight from Portland to Dulles followed by a 7.5-hour flight to Brussels, Belgium. We'll arrive tomorrow (Friday) at 7:30am. For future reference, Belgium and Germany are on Central European Summer Time, or CEST, which is 6 hours ahead of Eastern Time Zone, and 9 hours ahead of Pacific Time Zone. Since it will only be 10:30pm on my body's clock, I may have to start the trip off with a breakfast beer.
I have taken all necessary actions to ensure that we have WiFi/internet access while we're gallivanting across Belgium and Germany, but realized that blogging in any substantial way is impossible for two reasons: 1) we are only bringing along an iPod touch for reliable internet access, which is not exactly ideal for typing; and 2) I am pretty sure I'd much rather spend my time sipping a Dunkelweizen or nibbling on mussels and fries than fussing with Blogger and html code. So, I've managed to put together a few canned blog posts to help you follow along in our follies.** This was a particularly helpful task in planning my own itinerary. It forced me to learn about our destinations and have a pretty good idea of where we'd be on any particular day of the week.
As a side note, the travel blogging and general planning wouldn't have been possible had I been working, so a quick moment for our organizational sponsors: Oregon's 12% unemployment rate, please take a bow.
The things you can expect to find in my upcoming posts are general time lines and destinations, any important facts/history that I deem interesting, and rudimentary maps (expertly edited in Paintbrush) to show our general travel path and location. Also, the posts will be filled with images pilfered from the internet, because I don't think I'll be able to upload any of my own in a reasonable amount of time.
Initial trip highlight predictions: Delicious sausage and cabbage, hopefully bicycling, castles, general medieval wonders, splendid natural scenes, and of course beer coupled with mild intoxication -- on life, of course. ** I will try to comment real-time as often as possible, but you can reliably know where we are by individual entries. I won't post until we get there (this is mostly for the Moms so they can sleep at night knowing we're on track and safe).
Last night I cooked our last meal at home before the big trip. While talking to my Mom on the phone yesterday, I was going through the fridge for perishables and scratching my head over what to do for dinner. I had about eight or ten tomatoes that were intended for tapas this weekend, but never quite made it. Naturally, fresh pasta sauce came to mind, but we made an insanely giant batch of Asian peanut noodles for dinner the other night (and still have leftovers), so I was not feeling like spaghetti.
While rummaging through the refrigerator, I found a lonely chipotle chili in adobo sauce stored away in the back and remembered that I had some dried chilis left over from my Oaxan feast. Voila! Dinner is born. Jesse ran out to the store to pick up some chicken and we were all set for an insanely tasty meal of chicken cooked in a tomato/chili concoction over brown rice with onions, garlic, oregano, and fresh cilantro. It looks like a humble meal, but it was really tasty. So tasty in fact, I'm having it for breakfast (with an egg on it of course):
Erin's Empty-The-Fridge Sauce
8-10 fresh tomatoes (blanched and peeled)
1 28 oz. can plum tomatoes (use 2 cans if fresh tomatoes aren't available)
5 dried Guajillo Chilis, stemmed and seeded
1-2 Chipotle chilis in adobo sauce (plus 1-2 tsp. adobo)
1 onion, diced
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 T. chili powder (or more to taste)
2 tsp. dried oregano
2 tsp. cumin (or more to taste)
1 tsp. salt (or more to taste)
4-5 chicken thighs
olive oil
Skin and de-bone thighs (or purchase them that way) and sprinkle with salt, a little garlic powder, onion powder, and cayenne. This is the time when I break out my reserves of Tony Chachere's Cajun Seasoning -- it has the perfect amount of salt, spices, and heat. Let the chicken sit at room temperature while you prepare the other ingredients.
Hydrate guajillo chilis in about 2 cups of boiling water (this takes about 10-15 minutes). While chilis are hydrating, saute onions in a medium dutch oven or sauce pan with olive oil until softened and starting to brown. Add fresh and canned tomatoes with all sauce and juices to pan. Roughly break up tomatoes in pan. Add guajillos and their liquid, chipotle, adobo, garlic, chili powder, oregano, cumin, and salt to tomato mixture and stir. At this point, I used an immersion blender to blend the sauce into a nice smooth consistency. You could also do this in the blender. Let sauce cook at a medium to medium-high heat uncovered for about 20-30 minutes. If it splashes too much, set a lid ajar on the You want it to start to really cook down and thicken. Adjust seasonings to taste.
While the sauce is cooking, heat olive oil over medium to medium-high heat in a saute pan (preferably not non-stick). Brown chicken on both sides (about 3-5 minutes per side), in two batches if necessary. When chicken is browned, place in sauce and cover with lid and return saute pan to stove top. De-glaze the saute pan with a few tablespoons of white wine, dry vermouth, chicken stock or water (I guess beer would work here too). Add liquid to chicken and sauce. Cook for another 30-40 minutes until chicken is fully cooked and tender.
Serve over your choice of rice and enjoy! This would also make really good filling for tacos, burritos, or enchiladas.
Now, I'm off to finish packing, run a last few errands, and finish up those blog posts for the trip!!
We officially have only 5 more days (including today) to get things accomplished for our trip. J did an insane amount of laundry yesterday and we started setting aside things that we potentially want to take with us. Our goal is to pack only two small bags (weekender-size) with everything that we'll need. Since we'll be lugging them around on trains and up small flights of stairs for most of our hotels, I want the luggage to be as manageable as possible. So, that means probably 2 pair of pants, 3-4 shirts, a jacket, light rain jacket, and toiletries.
Thursday night, we ran a few errands in the neighborhood. J got a couple of 50/50 t-shirts at American Apparel for their quick-dry and non-wrinkle properties. I won't even go into my feelings on the store and their products (I was totally not into being there, but they do make t-shirts that fit J really well). Then, we stopped by Powells to pick up a couple of used paperbacks. We want to bring books that we don't mind leaving behind when we're finished. Luckily, Powells has an awesome Mystery section and we got an entire series of George Pelecanos novels that revolve around Detective Derek Strange. We have listened to a few of Pelecanos's more recent novels on audiobook and really enjoyed his writing -- especially since most of his novels are set in D.C. I love Powells because they have every book you could ever want and we got all three used books for about $5 a piece -- some were only $2.50. That's like buying a magazine!
Also exciting news? My Mom sent a special care package from Louisiana (she and my sister drove out to pick up my grandmother for a visit to Florida). I was thrilled when J opened the box and found a package of Cajun Beef Jerky from Bourgeois Meat Market in Thibodeaux. This isn't your average beef jerky with ground, processed mystery meat full of chemicals (and god knows what else). It's delicious strips of beef that's house smoked and cured. It's up near the top of most amazing foods I've tasted. J and I first had it when we went to visit my grandparents in 2008 (the same day that we picked up three varieties of Boudin and had a feast for lunch). Since it's so fresh, it only lasts for 2 weeks after being opened, so J and I have just been staring at the package and trying our best not to rip into it before we leave. I'd probably take it with us for snacks on the road, but I'm afraid it'll get taken away at customs. I think I'll just leave it at home for a tasty treat when we return.
The other night I decided to put together a spreadsheet to track our travel budget, since I have been doing a lot of hotel, train, and airline reservations this week. Don't worry, we're right on track. Actually, we probably won't end up using all the money we have set aside. When filling out the "airline/train fare" column, I realized that I hadn't looked into how much it would cost to check our bags. Given the airlines' propensity for nickel and diming customers, and the fact that we're taking an international flight, I just assumed they would up the ante and we would have to cough up the equivalent of a domestic airline ticket for our two small bags.
I nearly went into shock when I found out the cost: Zero. What? As of this week, United Airlines does not charge you for checking up to two bags for international flights. That's the best news I've heard all day. It certainly has made me more upbeat during my somewhat arduous search for a place to stay in Regensburg. There must be some kind of crazy convention going on there on the Saturday night that we're stopping in, because every single room (hotels, guest houses, and hostels included) under €90 is booked. I'm now searching for apartments and flats that might have some space. It's my last ditch effort and then we'll have to go on to Plan B -- I have yet to figure that part out.
How on earth is it already August 24th? I'm seriously going to have to put my foot down and insist this month stop moving so quickly. That means that we're only 9 days away from stepping on that plane to Brussels! I'm so excited that I don't even know how I'm going to sleep at night as the week nears its end. Jesse has an intense work schedule the day before we leave (Wednesday, Sept. 2nd), so we've set a strict deadline for packing. Everything must be ready and in the suitcase by Sunday, Aug. 30th -- as in six days, oh crap!
As if we didn't have enough to do, a couple of months ago we signed on to take a rafting trip down the Deschutes river with a few of our kickball friends. I have to admit, I was a little leery of camping and rafting all weekend, however, I had to remind myself of how much fun I had tubing down the Shenandoah with our friends in D.C. I'm glad I got over my initial reservations, because I had a blast. We drove down on Friday night to a campground in Mt. Hood National Forrest, pitched our (borrowed) tent and unrolled our new self-inflating camping mats. When my parents were visiting they gave us an early anniversary gift, which in turn funded two wonderful nights of sleeping outdoors. The last time we went camping, we bought cheap foam mats from Target and after the first night of restless sleep (and aching hips) I was ready to go home. While the mats only inflate to about a 1/2 inch in height, they are pretty darn awesome. I slept like a log.
Saturday morning we got up, had a little breakfast, and shivered into our bathing suits (it was barely 60 degrees at the campsite). The drop-off point was about a 30 minute drive and not long after breaking through the canopy of the forest, the landscape turned into burnt hillsides dotted with a few trees and houses. It reminded us a lot more of California than the lush Oregon that we've gotten used to in Portland. Thankfully, the sun was out and the sky was crystal clear -- we wouldn't freeze to death on the river.
As for the river, it was absolutely beautiful. I didn't bring my camera, because I didn't want it to get wet, so these two images are borrowed from Google Maps. The Deschutes is a lovely blue-green color and rolls along (in the section where we were rafting) with a few small rapids. We got on the river about 1pm and floated along with oars in hand to direct the raft to the best rapid spots. Of course, with Jesse on the boat, he ensured that we got the best turbulence possible by bouncing the raft over rocky spots. Luckily, we never turned over. We reached our end destination around 4pm and had already decided that it was so much fun that we definitely need to do it again. The sun was extremely hot, but I'm pretty sure none of us got a sunburn (thanks to the liberal application of sunblock). We all had plans for a rockin' party back at the campground, but reality hit when we were starving and dead tired by 6pm. In an attempt to rally, a fire was built and we played games, but there was no rescuing the evening.
Next time? Party first, then raft. And yes, there will be a next time.
I have taken all necessary actions to ensure that we have WiFi/internet access while we're gallivanting across Belgium and Germany, but realized that blogging in any substantial way is impossible for two reasons: 1) we are only bringing along an iPod touch for reliable internet access, which is not exactly ideal for typing; and 2) I am pretty sure I'd much rather spend my time sipping a Dunkelweizen or nibbling on mussels and fries than fussing with Blogger and html code. So, I've managed to put together a few canned blog posts to help you follow along in our follies.** This was a particularly helpful task in planning my own itinerary. It forced me to learn about our destinations and have a pretty good idea of where we'd be on any particular day of the week.
The things you can expect to find in my upcoming posts are general time lines and destinations, any important facts/history that I deem interesting, and rudimentary maps (expertly edited in Paintbrush) to show our general travel path and location. Also, the posts will be filled with images pilfered from the internet, because I don't think I'll be able to upload any of my own in a reasonable amount of time.
