travel

Congratulations to Bill & Andrea, who got married this weekend in Meredith, Colorado, at Norrie Colony, where Bill’s family has had a cabin since 1940.The whole area — the Fryingpan River Valley — is just gorgeous. It’s way up in the mountains, about an hour away from Aspen. The GSLIS contingent at the wedding is already making plans to return for a vacation in a couple of years.

Apparently, there’s nothing quite like a country wedding (except maybe a faeries & jedis wedding, but I didn’t know Sparkle J & JeT yet). We sat on hay bales, and the backdrop was miles of mountains and sky. It was a lovely, informal ceremony (take a look at the photo of Andrea and her parents walking down the aisle) for a wonderful pair. I’m so glad I was invited!

At the moment only photos of the ceremony itself are up on Flickr - more to come, though, including some hikes and reception shenanigans.

Congratulations are also due to Darius & Ellen, who marked their first anniversary on Monday. I still can’t believe I missed their wedding . . . actually more than that, I can’t believe I haven’t seen them since before they were engaged (that would be why there is no photo). We hope to remedy that sometime soon, but wrangling the schedules of a grad student, a travlin’ PR guy and an instruction librarian is no small task.

Is it asking too much that there be a reasonably-priced and reasonably-located transportation option between Baltimore and NYC?

I can either take Amtrak for $200 from the easy-to-get-to Baltimore Penn Station, or MegaBus for $40 from the difficult-to-get-to-without-a-car White Marsh Park & Ride. Oh, or I can take Amtrak for $100, but in order to do that I get less than 24 hours with my friends. I have checked Amtrak’s prices to Newark and New Rochelle but they’re the same as going to NYC. EKW suggested trying SEPTA to Trenton, and then NJ Transit into the city, but a train round-trip to Philly at a reasonable hour is $100 (at the moment, at least). So then to add on SEPTA and NJ Transit fares, I’m not sure the savings would be worth the hassle. I have even gone so far as to check one-way car rentals and flights.

I just don’t understand why Amtrak is so expensive. If it weren’t for a couple of other upcoming trips involving flights, hotels and rental cars (split with others, but still), plus the flight home for Christmas which I need to buy soon, I wouldn’t be agonizing about this so much.

This past weekend I went into Philadelphia to celebrate Angela’s birthday with her — the first time I’ve been able to do that since she left for Drexel.  The weekend itself was really fun! On Friday, for Angela’s bithday, we went to Vinny T’s (yes, same chain) with a group that started out as 7 and grew to 16. I’m not sure how happy the waitstaff was about that, but they made it happen. We ordered family-style, so everyone got to try a few different things. Somehow, the tab was still only $20 each (minus Angela), which included tax and tip (and, um, about 8 pitchers of Sangria). We were surprised and several of us kept going over the math, but it was right. I still can’t believe it wasn’t more. Anyway, after that some of us went out to a couple of bars, and for the most part it was a pretty tame night — Angela and several of her friends had been celebrating birthdays most of the week by that point, and knew they were going out again on Saturday night for a double-birthday celebration at McFadden’s (yup). THAT was absolutely insane. (Click through to Flickr, and if I know you in actuality you can see some photos.) The rest of the weekend was taken up by some halfheared tourism in Center City, a quick trip to REI, and a semi-brunch with a GSLIS friend (semi because they wound up eating after us, at another table).

So while the weekend itself was fun, the traveling part was not. Baltimore and Philly aren’t that far apart — just over two hours driving, and about an hour on the train. Given that distance, and the fact that Greyhound is $40 to Amtrack’s $117, I decided to give Greyhound a shot this time. This turned out to be a bad decision. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been back from ASIS&T for several days now (I think it’s Thursday, so apparently a whole week). The conference was really great this year — I found the topic to be more comprehensible (social software), and that went a long way. I have some notes on things to follow up on sometime soon, and names of folks whose research I want to dig up. For me, the highlights were a session on science blogging and sharing scientific data openly (successes and failures) so that folks can benefit from it. Ken Varnum blogged it at RSS4Lib*. Another highlight was hearing Andrew Pace talk briefly about North Carolina State University’s “Endeca catalog.” My best nutshell explanation of this is that they took a type of navigational structure you normally see on shopping websites and applied it to their catalog, so you can narrow your options and refine your search in a way that I think is much more intuitive to folks who are online a lot already. (Here’s Ken on this session, too.) Read the rest of this entry »

Click through for the highlights reel. More photos (and commentary) forthcoming throughout the week.

In an hour or so, I’m leaving for Logan to meet my Mom and catch our flight to London. Hooray!

I know for a fact that a few of you who read this have traveled outside of the country, unlike me. I’d like to solicit your advice regarding my trip to London with Mom in August. Specifically, here’s the sort of info I’d like:

• I want to blend in. I already know: no jeans, fanny packs or white American sneakers. Do you have recommendations regarding travel books or websites that I should look at for more of this kind of info?
• My Mom is booking a lot of tours/excursions while we’re there (like, a thing each day). I am particularly interested in putting together a list of not-for-tourists, hit-and-run type stuff. Parks, shops, districts, streets, historic buildings, libraries (yep), yarn stores (uh-huh), cafes, restaurants, etc. The sorts of things you can do anytime, like after a half-day tour or whatever. Any good books or websites? If you have been there, recommendations for places to eat will be especially welcome.
• I was looking through a travel stuff catalog that the tour company sent with the confirmation package. In London, will I really need to wear one of those waist packs to stash valuables in or will a purse/day pack (not a backpack) suffice? I know I won’t want to leave my passport in the hotel, but I’d prefer to be able to put it in my bag rather than strap it to my midsection. If you do think I should get one of those, what’s your recommendation for brands or features to look out for?
• What’s your strategy for paying for things while you travel? I’m thinking I’ll find out from my credit card companies what their deal is for international use. (I know sometimes they charge hefty conversion fees.) I’m not much of one for carrying lots of cash, and since I am traveling with Mom I won’t have to worry about splitting the bill all the time.
• Anything else you think I should know about London would be great.

If you’ve got a lot to say, you can email me (spinstah at gmail dot com) or chat with me (allykathrn on AIM). Or chat with me in actual life if possible.