Let's talk about New York! part 1

More or less like in Steve Karmen's song "I love New York" I have to agree that New York is special. It's the kind of city that even after you saw the world is gonna get your interest and you are gonna feel happy and special to be there. Gazing at all this tall buildings, skyscrapers I fell so lost... I'm in Times Square, one of the busiest areas in New York. I'm searching for an american all day breakfast place. I find it, Junior's, very busy place. We had to wait for a while but food is ok, the waiter is funny, unusual for USA.

After a quick late breakfast we start walking towars The Rockefeller Centre. Here at the top of the rock you can get an amaizing view over New York. It's freezing cold outside but the view is nice and we spend here almost one hour taking photos.

Now we are on the 5th avenue and I can't help checking the shops. It's paradise here for all this US brands: Kate Spade, Coach, Victoria's Secret, Calvin Klein, Michael Kors.... But I heard even better things about the outlets in the USA. Gotta check this out one of this days. 

We wanna check The Grand Central Station and apparently is close by. Inside it looks so familiar. I saw it in so many movies that I almost fell like I've been here before. We have a coffee at Cipriani Dolci and we decide to continue with the shopping. We have lunch on the go at Ray's Pizza, all over NY, best pizza in town. When I reach the hotel I'm so tired that I sleep straight away for 10 hours.

Second day we head over the Brooklyn Bridge. In the sun is quite pleasant today so we take good pictures. As we are quite close to Soho we decide to head there walking. Soho is such a cute place. It's also good for shopping and has so many cute coffee shops and restaurants. We decide to spend an entire day here.

On another cold day I decide to explore Manhattan's West Village where you can also find Carrie's Bradshaw apartment. It looks just like in Sex and the city. This also is a nice area good for eating, shopping and spotting cool people. I saw some really nice outfits around that area.

Taipei, let's get started!

One of the cutest asian cities around the world, similar to Hong Kong and full of japanese influences lays beyond my eyes: Taipei. Skyscarpers, highways, beautiful old streets, sky lanterns is what I see around me. I'm in an Uber heading towards Shilin Night Market for a taste of what means Taipei by night. Live cooking stations full of street food, mostly chinese style and thousands of shops. The market is half covered and half open air. The weather is perfect, around 25 degrees.  Lots of people in the market which indicates this is a popular place. I find lots of cute korean stuff: cute hats and broches, some nice dresses. Prices are good, you can even bargain a little bit. This market seems neverending. I try some local food: french fries with seaweed, honey Lemon Tea and  the famous pineapple cake. Around midnight market is still crowded. Reflexology spas seem very popular around this time.  

                                                                                                                  Second day I head over  Chiufen village, situated on the northeast coast. New Taipei city is called this area. Weather is not that great, cloudy and rainy due to the taifun in Phillipines. Chiufen or Jiufen is an old city in the mountains, used to be under japanese occupation and famous for his gold mine. The old street is narrow and very busy despite the rainy weather. Chinese lampions everywhere, streefood, lots of teahouses. We get some Oolong Tea in one of them. We go up to the last floor. The view would have been perfect if the sky would have had been clear. The landscape of the sea with big rocks inside kind of reminds me of the big ocean drive in Australia. We walk down the streets, heading to a colorful temple we spoted on our way from the car. Beautiful old streets, full of history, ceramic shops and the cutest coffee shop ever. We make a coffee shop and this place has a better view than the teahouse but the sky is covered in clouds now. I can notice that taiwanese people love pets, every shop, restaurant or anything is full of cute dogs and cats. They even walk them in pet strollers. We were supposed to head over Pingxi for a sky lantern experience but the rain is getting heavier So We go back to the city.

Our next stop is Taipei 101. We check the observatory and the visibility is 90% So We go up to 91 floor. This used to be the tallest building in the world before the burj khalifa.   After Taipei 101 I head over Wufenpu market. Similar to Shilin Night Market but between this two I would recomend Shilin. Even So it takes me two hours to check the entire market.

The weather is not getting any better but I still decide to visit  the Elephant Mountain. This is a hiking trail with lots of view points over Taipei 101. The hike takes about 30 minutes and includes lots of stairs. The view is amazing. 

Amazing Bali

I think Bali has always been on my wishlist so I was quite happy when I finally landed on this exotic island. Can't remember a lot of details about Denpasar Airport. We stayed in a nice resort in Nusa Dua, with an amazing beach and pool.

I was expecting Bali to be a budist island, but I discovered that has more hindu rather than budists. The traffic on this island is quite hectic. Lots of cars and scuters, narrow roads and traffic jams. One of the biggest attractions on the island is Kuta, a fun place full of bars, crowded at night time.
My first day in Bali I went to visit a traditional house. I don't remember much about this except that they have a baldachin bed outside and I think it's pretty cool to sleep there although there are a lot of insects. Our next stop was a rice field where you can enjoy a bike ride. Then we went to visit a bali luwak coffee shop. I wasn't very familiar at that time with this but I would't repeat the experience now as I know they were exploating the civet cats. If kopi luwak coffee (part digested coffee beans) is produced in nature by free civet cats, I don't support the fact that some people are cageing the civet cats and feed them with coffee beans and laxatives. They were serving there different types of coffee.

Another stop we had was the Kintamani volcano. This place is very popular for trekking. I was surprised that this area was very populated with street sellers and a lot of them they were selling puppies. After we took some photos we decided to go to Ubud for lunch. We found a really cute restaurant in the city centre with amazing food. The entire experience was quite good as we were sitting on the floor. Our next stop was The Monkey Forest. You have to be really careful with your bags here as monkeys likes to steel. The funny fact is that they trade everything they get from you for food. We finished our day with a nice balinese massage in Nusa Dua.
Second day we headed towards Ulun Danu Bratan, a temple situated at the edge of Lake Bratan. The landscape around this area is amazing.

Pura Tanah Lot is another temple we visited that day. This temple is situated on a rock next to the ocean. It's a great place to take amazing photos. You can get inside the temple to get a blessing from the monks. There is also a cave where is supposed to live a giant snake who is protecting the temple. Also next to the temple you can find an open market where they sell everything from clothes, souvenirs, handcraft, paintings, fresh fruits.

It's all about the beach: Part 3 Los Angeles

Been already for a couple of days in California and decided to go to check the famous Newport Beach. This city is part of the Orange County. It takes about 40 minutes drive to reach there from LA. It's full of beautiful houses and some of the houses have sea view. If u go Out of your villa, you are literally on the beach. The beach is pretty clean and large, But very basic. People are either bringing their own sunbeds or they are Using towels. I didn't see Any point where u can rent sunbeds. A lot of people on the corniche, jogging, Walking dogs. We fall in love with a house. It was full of details. Every single thing it looked like it was neant to be in the perfect spot. The owner is a jeweller and the house is full of artistic details. Later on we found a brazilian juice bar where we had a delicious acai smoothie. There are also a couple of restaurants around that area.

In september I decided to go to Malibu. There is a lot of traffic in that area but the landscape is great. There are plenty of things to explore all over that place. I would have love it to stop and take pictures with every single thing but I wasn't having so much time available. I wanted to reach Paradise Cove Beach Cafe Malibu. It has a lot of nice feedbacks about the food and the place itself. It's located towards the end of Malibu. It's a beautiful place. It's a piece of isolated beach featuring a nice restaurant with private beach and parking. They have sunbeds with seaview. In September the weather is starting to get a little bit colder but in the sun is pretty warm. The water was pretty cold but it's the perfect weather for taking a walk on the beach and take plenty of photos. The restaurant has a pretty good menu, featuring a lot of seafood but all the portions are quite big, they go better for sharing. You can sit inside or outside where they have a beautiful terrace, straight on the sand. It's a beautiful place. I did enjoy it and for sure I'll come back there.