Our Journey is Coming to an End...

I'm getting close to my last blog post, and this very well may be it. We have less than 48 hours left in Korea, and our internet service might expire tomorrow. I am currently writing this in my empty classroom after teaching my last class at CDI. I will admit that there were some tears in my eyes after the last girl was lingering in the classroom to take a photo of me on her cellphone and get a final hug. I told all of my students that I was going back to America this week, and many of them were sad to hear I was leaving. So, many students gave me their snacks as gifts, drew pictures for me, and wrote me letters. I gave all of them my e-mail address, so hopefully we can keep in touch. I was more relaxed with my classes this week, and we had a lot of fun since it was my last week and the last week of the spring term for them.
Not much has happened after our first experience at the hot springs last weekend. On Sunday we went into Seoul in search of a "Doctor Fish Cafe." These places sell coffee, baked goods, and offer complimentary doctor fish service. Those are the little fish that nibble on your feet to eat away the dead skin. They are becoming popular at spas and nail salons back in the states, but the service there is probably more expensive. We went to one cafe near Insadong, which apparently no longer offers the doctor fish service. After eating a vegan dinner at Oh Se Gae Hyang in Insadong, we headed to Hongdae to scope out a second supposed doctor fish location. Guess what? That one had closed down too! It seems as though business establishments come and go really quickly in Korea.
This past week has been really busy for us. We have been packing, we wired our money home at the bank today, and tomorrow we have to terminate our cell phone service. We definitely set aside time for fun though! Last night Danny had Indian food with his coworkers and he also met up with some of them for lunch today. Last night I went to a galbi restaurant with a few of my coworkers. Eating vegan in one of these meat-friendly establishments turns out to be easier than expected. I was able to order delicious dwinjang jiggae with rice and side dishes. I also tried a traditional Korean rice wine called "baekseju," which is similar to a Japanese plum wine. "Soju," which is made from yams and is the the Korean version of vodka, is way too strong on my stomach. Afterwards we went to a bar and played darts and chatted. Tonight Danny and I will hopefully meet up with my coworkers for a final dinner, and then we will head over to Hongdae to see Danny's friends from college. I will probably write one more blog entry to let everyone know that I get home safely! Anyeong!

Relaxing at Icheon SpaPlus

Friday was Buddha's Birthday, a national holiday. Naturally Danny had off from work again, but I had to work 10am-4pm instead of coming in at night. The students complained all day because they had off from their regular school, but they still had to come to CDI. After work I met up with Danny for an early dinner at Petra in Itaewon. We can't get enough of this place, and we might go back later this week too. We can get similar middle eastern food back home, but it's so tasty here and we can order a bunch of different vegan appetizers and side dishes to make a nice meal.

I have been begging Danny to try out one of the traditional Korean hot springs spas, and he finally agreed to go on Saturday. We took the subway and an express bus and about 2 hours later we were in Icheon, a city just south of Seoul. Icheon is famous in Korea for its natural hot springs, pottery, and sticky white rice grown in really fertile soil. We went to the Hotel Miranda's SpaPlus, which is supposed to be more foreigner friendly. It turns out that by foreigner friendly they meant some signs would be in English. Korean spas, or "jimjilbangs," are insanely popular here and entire families will spend the day together at one. There are two kinds of spas though. The urban jimjilbangs in cities like Seoul are open 24/7 and you can spend as much time as you want for only about $10. The hot springs spas outside Seoul are usually connected to a hotel and they are allow entrance from morning to night for about $20. The hot springs spas were more appealing to me because they use natural hot spring water rich in minerals that have tons of health benefits. When we entered SpaPlus, we were given an electronic bracelet to wear that would be used to purchase food and services (so no cash needed on the premises!) We were directed to lockers, where we had to place our shoes. After that we were clueless as to where to go next. We saw two signs: one for the men's locker room and one for the women's locker room. Finally, we realized that we first needed to pick up our mini towel and t-shirt and shorts from the counter in the lobby. I had read up on jimjilbangs before going, so I knew that the spa area was separated by gender. So Danny and I parted and headed for our respective locker rooms. In the women's locker room, I found the locker that corresponded to my bracelet ID # and put my stuff inside. That included ALL of my clothing, because you must strip down to your birthday suit before entering the female-only spa. Next step is to shower down, which I did quickly because I forgot to bring soap. The Koreans take this step seriously and they sit on stools in front of low shower heads and basically scrub each other with soap and abrasive towels. Entire generations of families will come to jimjilbangs together, and the grandmother and her grandchildren will help scrub each other. It might be considered strange by Western standards, but I guess it's good family bonding time. So after showering I was ready to hop in the baths. First I tried one that was about 30 degrees celsius, which was the perfect temperature. They had nice massaging jets all over this tub too. After I hopped in the 40 degree celsius tub, which is the hottest, so I only lasted 2 minutes. I finished my cycle with the cold tub, which actually felt nice after the scalding tub. Then I headed over the the herbal baths, which were all different colors and scents. One was green, so maybe it was green tea. Another was labeled as charcoal, which is really popular in Korea for skin benefits. Next I tried a walking bath, where you walk in a shallow pool with rocks on the bottom to massage your feet. I finished my time in the spa area with a hop in the cold bath, which is supposed to tighten your pores. I met Danny back in the lobby and realized he had been waiting awhile for me while I was enjoying the spa. Donning our SpaPlus cotton t-shirt and shorts, we headed upstairs to the second floor. This floor featured a rest area, where people were just sprawled out all over the floor with wooden neck pillows under their heads. I don't know how Koreans consider a loud area with tons of families and kids relaxing, but I guess living in a city like Seoul is never very quiet either. We realized we were a bit light-headed from sitting in the baths, so we ordered a variation of Korea's famous "patbingsu" dessert. The version we had featured shaved ice topped with sliced fresh fruit and drizzled with a lemony sweet milk. It was really refreshing after the baths, and it kept us cool before entering the saunas. We tried charcoal, amethyst, and jade hot saunas. These were dark and relaxing inside, and the walls were covered with huge natural rocks and minerals. There were mats on the floor, and everyone laid down while watching Korean dramas on the TV in each sauna. Danny and I sat up, because they were pretty crowded. They were hot, but not ridiculously hot, so I didn't get too sweaty or dizzy. After we finished in the cool marble sauna room. We forgot to go into the hottest sauna, which looks like a giant oven and is 99 degrees celsius! The second floor also featured an area with cucumber and charcoal face masks and massaging beds and chairs. These services were all under $5 each, and I wanted to try them, but Danny was being cheap! He was most interested in finding the Doctor Fish, which nibble on your feet and eat away the dead skin. This service was listed on the spa's website as only about $5 for 30 minutes, which is probably a bargain compared to what it would cost at a spa in America. We searched everywhere and found out the Doctor Fish room had closed down. We decided to head outside in our swimsuits to the unisex baths. It was lightly drizzling, but luckily the baths were filled with hot spring water. We tried the bade pool first, which featured all kinds of massaging jets. This was my favorite pool at the spa. Next we went in baths made of wood and stone. After we tried the lime green aroma bath, which smelled really nice. Then we went in the multicolored herbal baths, which were the same as the ones indoors I think. We finished up in the cold pool under a "cave." By this point we were starving and pruney, so we decided to get dressed and head out for dinner. We ate dinner at a restaurant across the street from SpaPlus that offered Icheon's famous "Ssalbap." Ssalbap is steamed sticky white rice served in a hot stone pot. It is the main course of the meal, but what really makes the meal are the dozens of side dishes that are included. We were served our first round of side dishes, and when we finished those the Ssalbap and tons more side dishes were brought out. The Ssalbap is eaten by immediately removing most of the rice from the stone pot and placing it in a small bowl. The rice left in the pot is crusty and browned, so it has a nice toasty flavor. But to eat it, you must pour hot water from a tea pot into the stone pot to loosen the crusty burnt rice. This makes a nice soup that you can eat after your meal. We filled up on the rice and all of the side dishes, and we were given a cool cinnamon and ginger tea at the end of the meal. Most of the dishes were vegan, and they reminded me of the offerings from the buddhist style restaurants in Insadong. The entire meal cost us only $10 a person. We headed home after dinner, and we were surprisingly tired even though we relaxed all day at the spa. Now I'm excited to try the luxurious Spa Castle in Flushing, NY when I get home. It's a multistory spa that's modeled after Korean style jimjilbangs. Unfortunately, it's not as cheap as the real spas in Korea, and it's about $40 a day.

Vegging Out in South Korea

So you've probably noticed by now that I like to talk about food. A lot. You should have also noticed that Danny and I have been frequenting vegetarian and vegan restaurants almost every weekend in the past few months. Back in college I probably ate a near-vegan diet when I cooked my own food in my apartment. However, when I first got to Korea, I ate meat because it is pretty much unavoidable in most places here. About 3 months into eating this way, I decided I wanted to try to avoid animal products again. I have read several life-changing book since I've been here that really influenced me to change my diet again. The first, called "The China Study," was recommended to me by 3 guys that I work with. The author is one of the most prominent nutrition scientists in the world, and he's been practicing for nearly 40 years. He talks about the strong link between diet and common diseases. He advocates a whole-foods plant-based diet to prevent disease. This was by far one of the best books I've ever read and I have been constantly talking about it. The second book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma," I finally finished after starting it in college. This book, by famous food writer Michael Pollan, exposes the health and environmental consequences that the American food industry is placing on us. He doesn't advocate any specific diet, and Pollan himself eats meat, fish, dairy...basically anything so long as it's natural and healthy. The most recent book I'm reading is called "Living Vegan for Dummies." It's written by Alexandra Jamieson, a famous nutritionist, vegan gourmet chef, and wife of the guy who starred in the documentary "Supersize Me." Her book makes a vegan lifestyle easy to adapt to and provides recipes that sound so delicious. I'm trying to slowly transition to a vegan diet, which rules out all animal products. So that means no meat, no fish, no cheese, no milk, no butter, no eggs, no ice cream. You're probably wondering "what can she eat?" The beauty of a vegan diet is that most people who follow it probably eat more varied and much healthier than other people. I can eat tons of fruit, veggies, whole-grains, beans, nuts, and more. Oh and those "strange" yet tasty things like tofu, seitan, tempeh, miso, etc. I call it a vegan "diet," but it's not a diet in your typical sense. It's a long-term lifestyle, and it's based on health and environmental concerns. I'm excited to go home now and try some vegan recipes. I'm not sure if eating vegan at home will be easier or more difficult than in Korea. Here it's pretty easy because I only share my apartment kitchen with Danny, and he's trying to eat like me too. So we only buy vegan items when food shopping. However, it's difficult to ask for things veganized when eating out because of the language barrier. So I still get eggs in my dolsot bibimbap and kimbap. I'm thinking of starting another blog when I get home from Korea. Can you guess what the topic of this one will be?

Happy Birthday Buddha! Seoul's Lotus Lantern Festival

We spent both days this weekend in Insadong, which is definitely my favorite neighborhood in Seoul. It's the most traditional tourist area of Seoul and it features many buddhist temple cuisine restaurants and buddhist handicraft shops, so naturally it is home to Seoul's annual Lotus Lantern Festival. It is the largest cultural festival in Seoul each year, and it celebrates the birthday of Buddha. Only about a quarter of Koreans are buddhists, but the festival is a good representation of general Korean cultural, so many non-buddhists (like us!) attend the festival as well. On Saturday, we stopped in Namdaemun Market first to check out the famous "eyewear street," which supposedly offers great glasses with prescriptions for as low as $30 each. We didn't quite find glasses that cheap, but I picked out a cool pair of prescription sunglasses. We walked up towards Insadong through Myeongdong and past Cheonggyecheon stream. The stream has a long history in Seoul, but it was reconstructed in the past decade or so. It runs through most of central Seoul, and it is really beautiful in spring time. After our detour at the stream, we headed over to Insadong, which was a little more crowded than usual because of the festival. We did some more gift shopping there and then had dinner at a Korean vegetarian restaurant "Sosim". We walked around some more shops in the large, winding walkway that is Ssamzie Market. On the second level of the market, we caught a great view of the Lotus Lantern Festival's opening parade going down Insadong's main street. The parade featured giant hand-painted paper lanterns in the shape of animals, people, flowers, etc. Later in the evening we went to see the incredible ceiling of paper lanterns above Jogyesa Temple in Insadong. On the street outside the temple there was a stage with cultural performances as well.

On Sunday we headed out to Seoul in the afternoon for the second day of the festival. This time, the neighborhood was crowded with Koreans, foreigners (including lots of ex-pat English teachers like us!), and buddhist tourists from all over the world. The street in front of Jogyesa Temple was a sea of tents offering tastes of food from around the world and chances to take part in buddhist handicrafts. The tents kept us busy for a few hours and by the end of the festival we had a big bag of handmade gifts and other things to take home. We learned to make origami-style paper lotus lanterns, made our own natural soap, made a traditional buddhist ink drawing, and made a lotus candle. We also sampled various soy-based foods, lotus nut cookies, and a delicious Nepalese dish of curried vegetables and fried rice flour rings. We stopped for dinner at a vegan Korean restaurant in Insadong called "Oh Sae Gye Hyang." We had sweet and spicy chili mushroom rolls and really tasty dwinjang jiggae with radish leaves (a stew made with fermented soybean paste). After dinner we made our way over to Jogno street to see the parade, which is the festival's main attraction. The parade featured many of the same performers and paper lanterns as the night before, but it had even more new things to see. It lasted over two hours! At the end of the parade, we went to Cheonggyecheon to see the stream at night before heading home.

Dancing the Night Away at the Seoul World DJ Festival & Strolling Through Seoul Forest

We finally finished administering the Level-Up exams to our students on Friday. Now they have to wait a week or so to find out if they moved up to the next level for the summer term. Wednesday was Children's Day, a national holiday celebrating - you guessed it - children! Danny was lucky enough to have off from work, so he went out for galbi and some drinks with his coworkers Tuesday night. On Tuesday night I went to a pork galbi place with some of my coworkers, but since I'm not eating meat, I ate two delicious bowlfuls of dwinjang jiggae (a spicy soup made with fermented soybean paste, tofu, and veggies). I wasn't lucky enough to have off from work on Children's Day, but my school decided to move our usual afternoon class to 10am-1pm. So I went into work for only 3 hours, and had the rest of the gorgeous sunny day to myself. Danny and I went to see an FC Seoul game at World Cup Stadium with his coworker. On Children's Day, every kid has off from school (except my poor students who came in 10am-1pm to take the Level-Up test!). Parents usually take their kids somewhere special for the holiday, so World Cup Stadium was packed. Well FC Seoul definitely pleased its thousands of young fans with a win of 3-0. After the game, Danny and I went to Petra, our favorite middle eastern restaurant in Itaewon. We wrapped up the night with some gift shopping in Insadong and sticky delicious Turkish ice cream (if someone knows where to buy this in America please let me know!).

On Saturday, we headed to Han River Park's Nanji area near World Cup Stadium for the Seoul World DJ Festival. I think this was the 4th year of the annual event, but it keeps getting bigger and bigger each year. This year the festival was a marathon of music from 2pm Saturday to 6am Sunday. Danny and I walked through the Mapo-gu Agrictultural & Marine Products Market on our way to the festival site. We then followed the festival music through Hanuel ("peace") Park to Han River Park. We met up with Danny's college buddy Lee, and got into the festival around 4pm. Luckily we didn't bring lots of food, because they confiscated everyone's food and drinks before entering. Fortunately, the food and drinks inside the festival grounds were way cheaper than they would be at a public event in America. The festival was set up with 4 different stage areas and various food, drink, promotional, and arts & crafts tents surrounding each stage area. The four stages were basically divided by genre: hip-hop, pop/rock, techno, and reggae. There were other performances going on simultaneously near the tents, such as drumming, Brazilian music & dancing, juggling, Samurai swordsmen, fire dancers, and belly dancers. My favorite area was the "Innertrip" stage area that features the reggae stage and most of these alternative performances. We also met up with Danny's other college friends Cormick and Christian throughout the night, and we danced from stage to stage until we were exhausted. After being at the event for nearly 8 hours and freezing from the riverside breeze, we took a taxi home.

On Sunday, the gorgeous sunshine woke us up early again and beckoned for us to come outside and enjoy the weather. We took the subway an hour away across the city to Seoul Forest. It is not really a forest, but just a huge park with various areas for recreation and relaxation. There were so many scenic picnic areas, fountains, sculptures, playgrounds, athletic courts, gardens, and eco-parks. We first had a mini "picnic" of oranges, granola bars, and cherry tomatoes along a pretty lake. Then we walked around the park for about 3 hours. After we headed to Itaewon for dinner in hopes of trying a Bulgarian restaurant that's supposed to be really authentic, fresh, and delicious! Unfortunately, the restaurant is super popular, and we couldn't get a table. So we ate at a Moroccan restaurant called Marrakech Nights. We had a buffet of salad, hummus, pita bread, cous cous, rice, and various tagines. It was delicious, but I'm still determined to go back and try the Bulgarian place. It claims to be the only Bulgarian restaurant on the entire Asian continent, and it's one ethnic cuisine I haven't tried yet!

Out and About...Enjoying the Wonderful Weekend Weather!

Last weekend we has just gotten back from Everland Saturday night, and we were exhausted. Sunday is usually our day for staying in and relaxing, but the weather was just too nice to be inside. We went to nearby Ilsan for the Goyang International Flower Show. Ilsan Lake Park has a permanent exhibit center on premises that is just for the annual flower show. Goyang city, where we live, is internationally recognized for its flower production, especially its roses. Like most other events we've been in Korea, the Goyang show had impressive displays of flowers in every shape and color. The indoor portion featured local and international merchants advertising different flower products and flower art. My favorite was the "pressed flower art" competition exhibition. When I first approached the area, I thought I was looking at beautiful paintings on display. But, looking more closely, I realized that the "paint" was really made of delicately arranged pressed flowers, plants, fruit, and vegetables. The artists used pressed flowers to decorate everything from furniture to jewelry and clothing. After images of flowers were burned into our eyes, we went to our new favorite vegetarian buffet in northern Ilsan.

We were constantly on the move this past weekend as well. Saturday we went to Gyeonghuigung, which is the 5th of the largest palaces in Seoul that we've been to. Every Wednesday and Saturday there is a free Taekwondo exhibition on the palace grounds. The exhibition featured the internationally recognized "Korea Tigers," a large group of mostly university students (including 3 girls!) The show was arranged so that it told a story and presented Korean culture. Taekwondo is really graceful and it's almost like a dance, so it fit perfectly with the music. After the show we explored the palace grounds a bit, but Gyeonghuigung is the smallest of the 5 palaces, so it didn't take us long. We walked over towards Gwanghwamun Square after in hopes of spotting Cheongwadae, which is known as the "blue house" and is the president's residence. On our way, we came across a street stand selling "hotteok", which is a type of pancake made with a filling of hot gooey honey, cinnamon, and black sesame seeds. We've never tasted it before even though it's one of the most famous street foods in Seoul. Ours had green tea in the pancake batter, and it was amazing! With our bellies satified, we walked over to Gwanghwamun. While admiring the new flowerbed there, we were stopped by some English speaking Koreans that were about our age. They asked us to take a picture with them, and afterwards they were nice enough to take down our email address to send us the photos. From Gwanghwamun, we spotted the famous blue roof of Cheongwadae, so we walked in the direction of Gyeongbokgung. On the palace grounds, we were directed to a road that would lead us to Cheongwadae. When we got to the Cheongwadae "photo zone," we learned that we couldn't actually go on the grounds, but we could only take photos from a distance. There are special tours of the blue house available, but you have to register nearly 6 months in advance! Next, we walked over to Samcheongdong, which is a cute neighborhood full of cafes, restaurants, galleries, and artsy shops. It seems to be the more fashionable and less touristy version of Insadong. We did some gift shopping in cute stores selling handmade items, and then came across a gorgeous park on the north end of the neighborhood. We finally made our way back south to Insadong for some more shopping and dinner at our favorite vegetarian buffet.

On Sunday, we took the subway all the way across the city to eastern Seoul for Chungdahm's Spring Picnic in Tteoksam Resort Park. English teachers from dozens of Chungdahm branches in the Seoul metro area were at the picnic. The picnic naturally featured some American style picnic food, like burgers, hotdogs, Taco Bell, fruit and veggie salads, and cookies. There were also recreational activities like ultimate frisbee, dodgeball, balloon toss, kite flying, and rock climbing. Danny and I had the highest score in balloon toss, but that was probably because we used a really tiny balloon that didn't break as easily. I wanted to try the rock climbing wall, but there was a long line. We wandered to the other side of the riverside park, where there were those swan peddle boats for rent. We peddled around the designated area in the Han River, and caught some views of Olympic Stadium and Namsan. After the picnic we headed over to nearby Children's Grand Park. This park was just down the block from the CDI training center that we were trained at in August. We had no idea back then that there was such a huge beautiful park nearby. Children's Grand Park was originally designed to celebrate children, and it includes an amusement park, zoo, playgrounds, botanical garden, ecological park, theaters, and more. Just like its name suggests, it was packed with children and it was definitely grand. It was probably the most beautiful park I've ever been in. We tried out the barefoot park, which is supposed to massage and strengthen your foot muscles (just what I need!). We also walked quickly through the zoo, botanical garden, and ecological park. As the sun set, we made our way over to Achasan vegetarian buffet for dinner. This buffet had a lot of dishes to choose from, but they featured too many mock meats and white bread. I prefer the more vegetable and whole grain based veggie buffets. But, Achasan's mock meats were tasty and could easily pass for real meat!

This Wednesday is Children's Day, which is a national holiday. Children usually have off from school, so Danny also has off from work. I still have to work, but my school is having a 10am-1pm class instead of 4pm-7pm. So I am able to go to an FC Seoul soccer game with Danny! Then on the Saturday coming up, we are going to try to go to the Seoul World DJ Festival. It is an annual 12-hour show outdoors along the Han River that features international DJ's and dancing all day and night long. So I'll keep you updated!

Spring is finally here!!

Sorry to keep you all waiting....it's been nearly 6 weeks since I last blogged! Danny and I have been super busy with school and other things. So we have some good news for all of you back in the states....we are coming home early! In late March I started looking into nutrition programs online to be sure I was on the right track. Originally I had planned to start working towards a registered dietitian (R.D.) certification at Queens College in the spring of 2011. But, I recently found out that Hunter College in NYC just launched a new program that combines a masters in nutrition AND an R.D. certification. This is a great opportunity, because very few schools offer these two things together. So, I won't be ready to enroll at Hunter until the fall of 2011. But, I need to come home ASAP to start taking pre-requisite science courses for the nutrition program. I spoke to my director, and she was obviously sad to hear I was leaving, but she understood. I will hopefully be home in the beginning of June (just in time to take General Chemistry I at Nassau Community College). I am already signed up for two science courses in the fall, and I have to take two or three more in spring. In case you're wondering, Danny will be coming home as well! We are a exciting to come home and see all of our friends and family, but we will miss Korea and our students though.

I'm trying to remember what we've been up to the past few weeks...Danny and I were sick for awhile (allergy season + stomach virus), and we had tons of work to do at our schools. So if you look at all of the pictures I've posted on Picasa, you can get an idea of what we've seen so far. Three weeks ago it finally started getting nice outside, so we walked around Ilsan Lake Park. We walked another 2km or so around the Ilsan area and finally found a vegan buffet restaurant that I've been looking for. It was probably one of the freshest and most delicious buffets we've been to so far here, and we are actually going back for dinner tomorrow. Last Saturday we went to Yeouido, which is an island in the middle of the Han River in Seoul. The annual cherry blossom festival was held there, and despite the late spring in Korea this year, the cherry blossoms were in full bloom. Last Sunday we went to the Korean War Memorial Museum. It was a huge museum, with displays on all the wars that Korea has fought in, and the grounds were beautiful too. Today we went to Everland, which is the largest amusement park in South Korea. It's owned by Samsung, but it's got nothing on Disney World. It was a lot smaller than Disney, but it was still really entertaining. It was a beautiful day, so nearly everyone in the Seoul metro area seemed to be at the park. Since it was so crowded we only went on two roller coasters and a water rapids ride. The wooden roller coaster was actually really fun and scary. The other rides were mostly kiddy rides, and the other adult rides had ridiculous wait times. So we spent most of the time exploring the park, which was really scenic because it's built into a mountainside and the cherry blossoms were blooming. Our favorite things were probably the giant tulip garden and the huge zoo area. I actually had my best amusement park meal ever there too. Literally every other snack stand or restaurant on the premises served only meat dishes, so we found a fancy buffet that had fresh food with lots of veggies. Plus there were no crowds in the buffet restaurant! The only thing that was disappointing about the day was the transportation. It took us nearly 3 hours to get the park, because the wait for the public intercity express bus was so long. On the plus side, everything was so cheap! For the entrance fee, transportation, and food combined we probably spent less than we would on just the entrance fee alone to an American amusement park.

I promise I will try to keep you all updated over the next few weeks, because we are scrambling to see as much as we can before we leave! We actually planned out a schedule for each weekend.