Europe Adventure – Prague

Hi again!

WiFi has been spotty at best so posting updates has been a little on the slow side. But that makes this more suspenseful right?!

Sigh. Never mind.

So after Budapest, we took a train up to Prague where first, the train was crazy crowded. Like, hope you don’t have to go to the bathroom unless you’re willing to literally climb over people crowded. And second, the conductor in Vienna forgot to do a full validation on our tickets so we had a bit of confusion\stress on that end.

We made it to Prague anyways and in one piece!

Steve and I stayed at Charles Bridge Hostel which, ironically, is right next to the tourist trap epicenter known as Charles Bridge (it was awesome cause we were right in the middle of everything)

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This was the view out of our window

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The hostel also had a cat named wifi. I grew pretty attached to wifi whole we were staying there.

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Steve and I walked down to grab some beer and traditional Czech food at Olympia and were astounded at how much food and beer we got for less than $30!

We walked forged our way across the Charles Bridge to make get back to the hostel and crash, but we were interrupted by spontaneous fireworks that we had a front row seat to!

Our second day was filled with museums, castles, ice bars, and questionable museums on sex machines (and you thought this was a family trip lol)

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Godmother death was a pretty popular person in older Slovak beliefs

We also saw the clock…

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And we toured some of the gardens before heading up to the monastery for some life-changing beer. BTW, those monks do it right!

Later that night, Steve and I went with Andrew to the observatory to look at their telescope (we saw Saturn!!) And guess who got hurt…..

Side note:there’s a running joke in my family that its not a true vacation until someone visits the emergency room

Steve indoctrinated himself to the family by spraining his ankle -facepalm-

Luckily, it was only Steve so the test of the family was finally able to relax and enjoy the vacation (jk although we were a little relieved). Luckily, it was only a minor sprain and we had some awesome people around to help out!

The next day we took a train back to Vienna where lots of wine was drunk….

See ya later!

Europe Adventure – Budapest

I’m writing this with 2.5 hrs of sleep while on a standing room only train to Prague. Luckily they fixed the AC before a small country boarded so it’s not sweltering like it was earlier.

Anyways we have been having a fantastic time on our vacation thus far! The two days a travel was a lot but we were able to spend a day and a half in Budapest. On a side note, if any companies in Budapest are hiring mechanical engineers, call me! Will move to awesome city!

Right after we found our hostel (Maverick City Lodge for those who are wondering) Steve and I found a cheap outdoor beer garden (0.5L beer for 350 ft/$1.50) and sat and just about fell asleep in the hammocks.
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We met up with the rest of the family at St Stephen’s Basilica. After climbing about 10,000 stairs we were rewarded with stunning views of the city from the top of the tower!

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My mom was driven by a calling to find the cafΓ© with the best known strudels (she has the nickname Tour Guide Barbie for a reason πŸ˜‰) so we wandered/marched over to the Pest side and climbed up a surprise small mountain to find this…
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We did find the strudel place, but after unexpectedly traversing the entire city on foot in 90 degree weather, I really only remember the cold water and lemonade

The next day Steve and I ventured out on our own and decided to be those obnoxious tourists for a day. Best decision ever! We toured the major sights by bus and ferry which kept us cool
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The highlight from all that was putting our feet in the fountain to cool off before climbing a tree and generally acting like 5 year olds πŸ™‚
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We met up with the fam again for dinner at Kaidia and had an OMG AMAZING DINNER. Definitely recommended! I got the duck with spinach gnocci and Steven got the goat cheese chicken (I totally won the who-ordered-the-better-dish-competition BTW)

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We split off after that to join our hostel’s pub crawl with Emma and Stefan and Courtney and Sam. We somehow made it back to bed as the sun was rising at 4am so I’m assuming we had a great time πŸ˜€

I’ll be back soon with an update from Prague!

Ciao!

Adventure Time

Good morning and happy Monday!

Usually Mondays are not the greatest, actually they are the wooooorst, but today is super special because STEVE AND I LEAVE ON A 2 WEEK VACAY FOR EUROPE TODAY!!!!!!

My life for the foreseeable future is packed into this color-coordinated carry-on (an actual cute purse is already packed because priorities y’all)

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Anywho, here are the deets of where we will be. If anyone has any suggestions for must-do activities, places to eat, etc, then comment and let us know!

  • June 1-2: Travels
  • June 3-5: Budapest, Hungary
  • June Β 5-7: Prague, Czech Republic
  • June 7-9: Vienna, Austria
  • June 9-12: Berlin, Germany
  • June 12-14: Barcelona, Spain
  • June 14-15: London, UK
  • June 15: Travels

We’ll try to check in with the blog when we can but you can also follow me (@amandaguin54) or Steve (@thievensteven) on Instagram for an overload of pictures of our travels, sorry not sorry.

When You Miss A Goal

Today is the day!

At approximately 8:20am the 25-29 women’s age group began the swim in Jordan Lake for Ironman Raleigh 70.3.

And I wasn’t there.

And it sucks.

It sucks because I set a goal for myself and didn’t reach it. It sucks because I spent months training for it. It sucks because I spent what little extra money I have on it. It sucks because I won’t get that awesome race high/bling/post race euphoria.

But it’s ok.

It’s ok because I chose grad school over this one race. It’s ok because I can enjoy my vacation without feeling exhausted. It’s ok because I’m not going to injure myself by racing hard.

But most importantly it’s ok because this was just one race. There are so many more races I can do that will fit my schedule better right now. So, for the time being, I am putting my long distance triathlon dreams on hold. I can’t spend 8 hrs on a bike every Saturday because I have to spend those 8 hrs rebuilding a 3D printer. I can however, work on a new 5k PR, training for the USA Nationals Half Marathon in November, and improving my olympic distance triathlon PR.

 

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Not to mention I got a brag-worthy shirt and awesome backpack out of it too.

Return From The Void

Hello faithful blog readers!

We are just now getting a minor amount of sanity back after the site visit void. For the last couple of weeks, Steve and I have been working someΒ insane hours to get things ready for the ASSIST 3rd year review from NSF. While we get reviewed every year, the 3rd and 6th years are key review years where NSF determines if they will continue our funding. AKA everything breaks and shit hits the ceiling over the span of 12 hrs

Needless to say, the blog has been a little neglected. So has most every other aspect of our lives (sorry Indy). So, even though the site visit shenanigans finished up on Thursday, we have spent the last two days sleeping, spending time with Indy, and doing normal shit like grocery shopping, cleaning, laundry, etc.

As goes with the whole working 15 hrs days for 2 straight weeks thing, my Ironman Raleigh 70.3 training has been GREAT! Wait….that was meant to say nonexistent. I went for a 2 mile run yesterday and thought I was going to die for most of it. Partly from lack of sleep and partly from lack of working out for 2.5 weeks. This means I’m not sure if I’m actually going to do the race. I don’t feel prepared and I’m still recovering from lack of sleep and extremely high levels of stress. I’ve decided to take it one day at a time and see how I feel morning of.

On a happy note, all the work and struggles and sleepless nights and broken equipment and last minute panic was worth it because the ASSIST Center passed our 3rd year review with UNANIMOUS AND UNCONDITIONAL TERMS! Basically we were perfect and have raised the bar for what NSF expects of their engineering research centers. We were all so excited that we went to the only place that serves alcoholic beverages on campus, the golf course!

Please ignore the look of crazed exhaustion/delirium that’s on our faces. We are actually super happy.
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In other exciting news, Indy has learned how to jumpΒ faceplant off a dock! It only took us actually throwing her into the lake about 5 times before she got the hang of it πŸ™‚

 

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Maybe one day she’ll get the hang of it. Until then we will continue to post embarrassing pictures of her faceplanting into the water and she will continue to silently resent us πŸ™‚

Have a great Memorial Day!