Category Archives: Travel

Travel

Martin Guitar Factory

https://youtu.be/i4B4nFfla5E

The C.F. Martin guitar factory is located in Nazareth, Pennsylvania. They offer tours for a modest cost of $5/pp but the tour groups sell out quickly. Advanced online reservations are imperative, especially for popular summer months.

The guided tours are groups of 12 led through the working factory and meet workers. The tour ends in the Picking Room where visitors can try out guitars on the wall and order them at a modest discount.

You can visit the Museum inside the factory without a reservation. The Museum contains guitars and instruments from the breadth of company history, from C.F. Martin’s first guitars to its 1-millionth guitar.

Travel

The Etruscans exhibit: Legion of Honor SF

I visited “The Etruscans” exhibit at the Legion of Honor art museum in San Francisco. This is the most comprehensive U.S. exhibition on Etruscan culture in decades, featuring over 150 rare artifacts like bronze sculptures, gold jewelry, and the longest-surviving Etruscan linen text.

The Legion of Honor is one of San Francisco’s oldest art museums, located atop a hill overlooking the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge, next to the Presidio.

Travel

NYC Muji Store 5th Ave.

Muji is a Japanese retail brand known for minimalist household goods, apparel, and stationery. Unlike traditional home goods stores, Muji also offers a rich selection of stationary and art supplies. Muji is renowned for their high performance pens, mechanical pencils, and premium paper notebooks.

Travel

NYC Gray’s Papaya

On Broadway, near the corner of 72nd avenue is a modern day legend of cheap eats. Founded by a former owner of Papaya King, this clone was founded in 1973. It serves hot dogs and home made tropics flavored drinks. When I lived in NYC it was known for being a cheap lunch. You could get a drink and hot dog combo for $1.99. Today, its now $5.99 but still cheaper than most lunches you can get anywhere in NYC.

Travel

Tommy’s Joynt San Francisco

Near City Hall, Tommy’s Joynt is an easily overlooked San Francisco landmark that doesn’t show up on most people’s radar. Opened in 1947, Tommy’s is the oldest Hofbrau in California.

Hofbrau’s offer beer and German-American comfort food. Large portions at reasonable prices (for San Francisco, that’s anything not insanely overpriced). Tommy’s is famous for its pastrami, turkey, corned and roast beef, made freshly in-house. 

In addition to honest comfort food, Tommy’s offers a wall full of local and imported beers at its bar. In warm summer days, Tommy’s opens its rooftop biergarten. Opened by local singer and radio D.J Tommy Harris, Tommy’s served late-night grub to musicians finishing their gigs at local clubs and stages.

In 2020, rumors spread that Tommy’s was closed for good. Despite reopening after the citywide COVID shutdowns, viral social media posts still circulated that Tommy’s was closing or that the property would be sold to developers. I spoke to one of Tommy’s owners at the bar, and he completely dispelled the rumors.

Geek Out, Travel

Universal Studios Tour Tram Fail

https://youtu.be/QS31P9YIYNY

I’ve gone on the famous Universal Studios Tour since the 1970’s and experienced many of the changes over the decades. But on this tram tour was different and the longest.

Near the start of the tram tour through the Universal backlot, our all-electric tram experienced technical issues. We had a 5 minute delay at the start of the tour while the system rebooted. Later in Old Mexico, our tram electronics again broke down.

Our tram hobbled over to the Old West set and waited there for nearly half an hour for a replacement tram. We walked through the backlot set to our new tram and then continued our tour. To make up for the delay, we got a Quick Pass that we used to go on the Minions’ ride later.

Geek Out, Travel

Jurassic World Ride Hollywood

https://youtu.be/FCzbT-u3OQQ

Jurassic World: The Ride is a high-intensity water-based attraction located at Universal Studios Hollywood. This ride is designed to immerse guests in an adventure from the Jurassic World film franchise. We paid for Early Access to Super Mario World. After the park opened for general admission at 9:00 am, we ventured next door to the Jurassic World ride at about 9:15am and found it almost no waiting line that early.

We jumped into a boat and I filmed the experience. The added large screen LCD action and new improved animatronics ending battle scene with the T-Rex and Indominus Rex were impressive. When I rode the original Jurassic Park ride when it opened in the early 2000’s, I remember feeling a bit underwhelmed and disappointed the the animatronics. But this new and improved ride was worth it.