{travel memories}

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Those Italy pictures made me think about all my travel memories so today I'll share some more of the places I've been lucky enough to see and experience.

Jay has relatives in Los Angeles so we've gone there three times (I think) together. We've done the usual: Disneyland, Knott's Berry Farm (amusement park), Universal Studios, Magic Mountain (rollercoasters), Hollywood (a let down), Oliviera Street (Mexican stuff), Santa Monica Pier & Boulevard (fun!)... My favorite things about our trips to L.A. are...

1. J.Paul Getty art museum.

I want to advertise this place as not many people realize it's there. I loved the place. Great art, an amazing modern building on a hill overlooking Los Angeles (you can see all the way to the ocean)... Definately worth the visit. You have to book early to go there as they allow only so many people in at a time.
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2. Laguna Beach

I love this little town. Cute shops, awesome beach. Totally "California" to me. This is where I bought my big shell mobile. Good memories. Except Jay burning the top of his head to crisp on the beach. Ouch. That was not good.

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3. Legoland
Yes, I love Disneyland too (especially the teacup ride, my favorite!). But to me Legoland was even more fun. Less crowded, fun cities and all kinds of things built with legos and less commercial than Disneyland. And fun rides too. I want to take Sienna here soon. January/February 2009... How about it Jay? Time to -khm- visit your grandparents again? :)
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4. The Crystal Cathedral
We saw the live nativity program here. It was an awesome experience. I can so handle warm weather and no snow at Christmas time. Loved the Christmas lights on palm trees. :)
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Found this cuuuuuuute picture of Spice as a kitten when I was going through my pictures. He was so little! Y
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And this funny old picture of me. :)

Summer 1985, Marjaniemi beach, Helsinki, Finland.
Yep, I had red (wacky!) hair. I was cool. Honestly. :)

Have I ever had funny hairdos in my life... Oh well, you gotta be able to laugh at yourself.

This was the first summer I went to Italy with my friends.
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Summers 1985 & 1986 were spent working at HK sausage factory with my friends to save money to go to Italy. We usually just packed the sausage (fun memories of all the goofing...) but one day they needed us to go help make tongue (!!) rolls. We had to skin cow tongues that were soaking in hot water. I could not do it. The smell was terrible. Then we sliced the tongues into thin sheets. There was an older lady who had worked at the factory for many decades. She ate the raw tongue sheets while we were making all this stuff!! Gross! I had a hard time putting my hand in this stuff first but once I did I actually had so much fun making the tongue rolls.

Needless to say - I don't eat sausage anymore. Not because I saw how they make it. Something to do with working in that smell. This seriously was a fun job as my friends & other young people worked there and we were always goofing off.

ps. The last layer of these rolls were sheets of fat! Yum-my-o! :P
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On the ferry to Stockholm, on my way to Italy, summer 1986. We did the "Interrail" thing this time. Straight to Italy though. Not touring all over. In 1985 we flew straight to Rimini.
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Two of my friends had Italian boyfriends but I never did. Lots of little crushes, of course. :) While in Rimini, we met some really nice boys from Rome (we totally were just friends with them) who invited us to Rome for three days to tour the city. Here we were on our way to the Spanish Stairs when one of the cars broke down. Italians drive insanely by the way. They don't stop at intersections to see if someone's coming. They just hunk the horn. "Here I come" so to speak. It was wild.

Man I was skinny and I actually had a tan!!! Crazy hair again though. But that was the 80's.
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We made it to the Spanish stairs. Notice the trees and plants growing on top of the building. We saw a lot of that in Italy. Sorry about the poor quality of the pictures. I was too lazy to scan them (hook up all the right cables to the scanner... forget it!) so I just snapped pictures of the pictures. Man, this totally looks like we were boyfriends/girlfriends but honestly we weren't!
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This was taken summer 1989. I was getting ready to go to Ireland. I wasn't sure if my friends wanted their picture on the internet so I did the censor thing. Forgot in the Spanish stairs picture. :)
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Me in Norway. I'm trying to remember what year it was. Summer 1988 or something like that. The fjords, mountains and glaciers were beautiful. Norway is a beautiful country. Too bad about the weather. They say Norwegian drivers are the best. I'm not surprised. You'd have to be to drive on those narrow icy fjord roads.
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Vigelund Park in Oslo, Norway. Artist Gustav Vigelund's many, many, many naked people statues. That's about all I'll say about that. :)
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Summer 1989. Before going to Ireland on my mission I went to Stockholm, Sweden. I bought my nice leather jacket from Gamla Stad (the old city). Love Gamla Stad! The narrow walkways, the cool little shops, the restaurants, all the artsy craftsy stuff... Loved this outfit back then. I was totally into long skirts. All my nice skirts got ruined while biking in rain in Ireland. But that's another story.
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Muutkin bloggaajat: blogatkaapa matkoista kuvien kera. Kiva paasta matkustelemaan muiden kautta.

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