CoCo Ichibanya is a restaurant located in Irvine California that specializes in curry dishes. It is actually a chain restaurant originated from Japan! The restaurant itself is located at the heart of Irvine business district and the restaurant is usually packed with customers lining up at its door. The restaurant itself is easy to find in the plaza that it is in. It is located directly at the corner of the plaza and can be spotted easily when coming out of the parking garage at the back.
CoCo Ichibanya does not take break in the afternoon and operates from lunch time to dinner. We got there around 1:30PM avoiding the busy hour, and we still had to wait for 5 minutes. When we got to the reception, we signed in by ourselves on the tablet to indicate number of people in the party, and whether we have any special request. After about 5 minutes, we were led to the bar table, which is still nice since we could see the chefs in the kitchen making curry.
So the curry at CoCo Ichibanya is more like Japanese style curry. Not Indian style or Thai curry. Thus the curry taste is more sweet rather than spicy. It does have spicy option however. The menu of the restaurant offers many different curry dishes, but we believe that the curry sauce is the same for all of them. The only difference is the meat or the vegetable that come with the dish.
CoCo Ichibanya also allow customers to customize the curry, and of course you can add spiciness to it as well. The maximum level of spiciness is 24! We are not a fan of spicy food. So this time we ordered a port cutlet curry with egg wrapping around rice, and a customized curry dish.
The dishes were served quite quickly and the rice was served in a big bowl plate with lot of curry sauce! The curry taste is quite rich and sweet, which we really like! The egg wrapping rice is very common in Japan, but we find the egg wrap to be a bit thing and we thought the rice is usually flavored with other spice.
Overall, we loved the taste of curry here at CoCo Ichibanya! It is the kind of East Asian curry that we like since its more sweet than spicy.
Trail of 10 Falls is the 7.5 miles trail loop at Silver Falls State Park. This trail is a true gem in Oregon and it is always very crowded during the weekends, even during winter season. Silver Falls State Park is located East of Salem, and it is about 1.5 hours away from Portland. During this Thanksgiving Weekend with 1 day of sun shine, we decided to pay a visit to this beautiful state park.
We left around 9AM in the morning so that we can get there early to make sure there are parking space available. After reaching Salem and head toward East, we were driving through the valley with beautiful green scenery. It was like living in the dream and the sceneries are like the ones that you would see on post card. We actually stopped by the side of the road for several moments just to enjoy it. A note here, if you want to stop on the side of the road, make sure you find a place that is safe since the shoulder of the road is quite narrow.
We got to Silver Falls State Park around 11AM and there was a surprise there for us. The admission fee is waived on Black Friday! This was just awesome! Although the daily use fee is only $5, it still made us very happy! We parked the car at the South entrance of the park and that is where most people go to. Many people brought their cute dogs, but just note that dogs are only allowed on certain trails.
We started the hike from the South Falls, which is the most popular one. Since there was a lot of rain during the winter, the volume of water coming from the Falls is enormous compared to summer season! The trail goes behind the waterfall where we could feel the water splashing against the cliff. The trail was quite wet here and we had to hop around to make sure we did not step into the water.
Afterwards, we started heading towards North Falls, which is about 5 miles away and there are several waterfalls along the trail. The trail was quite easy with limited amount of elevation gain. The trail goes along the river and sometimes crosses the river as well. At this time of the season, although the trail is slipper, most of the dangerous areas have fences along the side to prevent people from falling.
After about 2 hours of hike, we finally got to North Falls. We would say that the North Falls is more beautiful than South Falls! The North Falls was split into 2 unlike the South Falls which was like a giant white curtain. Similar to South Falls, we could also go behind the North Falls. The area behind the North Falls is much wider and dryer, which allows more rooms for people to take photos.
After the North Falls, it was time to turn back and head back to South Falls. The trail loops back along the Rim Trail, which is very easy to hike on with no difficulty at all. heading back was easy due to trail going in a straight line and only 2 miles.
Overall, the Trail of 10 Falls at Silver Falls State Park is simply amazing. This is by farm one of the best trail I have been on and the difficulty is extremely easy. If 7.5 miles is too long for you, there are 2 other smaller loops with just 2 miles and 5 miles. Thus this is a great place for people to hike around with different preference on difficulties.
Class 302 Cafe is a popular restaurant that offers Taiwanese style food. It has many stores within the Orange County. Class 302 actually means grade 3 and second class. The restaurant is known to have use Taiwanese class room styled tables and chairs in the restaurant. People from Asia country would know what we are talking about when they see it.
We have been to this restaurant 4 years ago. This is the first time that we visit this restaurant again after 4 years and things have changed so much. It does not look like it is as popular as before, probably due to the competition from other new restaurants. The food menu does not have as much variety as before either. In addition, the restaurant is now more like order first and then find a seat kind of style, rather than sit down first and the order your meal. We were shocked about how much have changed in 4 years.
So this time we ordered a Taiwanese Sausage Fried Rice, Pig Blood Rice Cake, Boba Milk Tea, and a Slush Ice. The Taiwanese Sausage Fried Rice came with a huge portion with lot of sausage in it. It was fried perfectly. The only thing that we have minor complain on is that amount of onion in there.
The Pig Blood Rice Cake might sound scary, but it is very common in Taiwan. It is usually dipped with peanut powder to add sweetness to it. We definitely recommend people to give it a try. It is really tasty and not as scary as it sounds and looks.
The Boba Milk Tea is the one that we were shocked with. When we placed the order, we were given an empty cup. Apparently the drinks are self serve. We went to the drink bar, there were different types of bobas and puddings for people to place in their cup and then you choose which drink you want to fill your cup with. It was quite an experience.
The Slush Ice is not as good as before. We felt that this is more like ice cream, rather than crushed ice. We prefer to have crushed ice since that's more like Taiwanese styled dessert.
Overall, we felt that Class 302 Cafe is no longer as good as it used to be. We wished that it could have maintained its quality as before, but the owner must has his/her own reason to change the way how the restaurant operates.
Griffith Observatory is one of the four observatories in California. It is located North of Los Angeles. There is no entrance fee to enter the observatory, but there are parking fees with an hourly rate of $3. Since we were having a vacation at Southern California, we decided to pay a visit to Griffith Observatory.
The observatory was not hard to find. We simply just drove up the road all the way to the top of the mountain. When we got there around 3pm, there was already a lot of car in the parking lot and many car were parked on the side of the road. Note that you still have to pay for parking fee even if you park your vehicle on the side of the road. Luckily, we were able to find a spot in the parking lot right away.
We went into the observatory and looked at the photos of the galaxies and the telescope used to observe the stars. On the outside patio, we could see the entire metropolitan city of Los Angeles. We could still see the smog among the city due to the forest fire that happened a week ago. On the North side of the observatory, we could see the Hollywood sign on the mountain.
There was a stair way on the side for people to access the observatory telescope at the top of the observatory. The telescope is open to public from 7PM to 10PM when the sky is dark. We did not get to try it since it was still in the afternoon and the sun was still bright. But it would have been an awesome experience to check out the telescope.
The observatory also had shows for people to watch, with additional cost. We did not bother to check it out since we just wanted to enjoy the view from the top of the mountain. This is one of the best place to see the sunset over Los Angeles. Furthermore, it is also the best place to see the night scape of Los Angeles.
Overall, we don't think it is a must visit place when visiting Los Angeles, but it is an interesting spot. It would be a romantic spot to spend the evening here to see the night view over the city. We didn't get to stay till the sun goes down, but we would definitely do it next time.
Hollywood is known for its entertainment film publication in the world! It also has this famous HOLLYWOOD sign at the top of the mountain as its landmark. Hollywood is located North of Los Angeles and it is just about 20 minutes of drive, if there is no traffic.
We drove to Hollywood from Irvine and took us about 1.5 hours to get there. The traffic is just crazy in Los Angeles region. When we got there, we wanted to park the car at Highland mall, which only cost $2 parking fee. However, we took the wrong turn and went to a valet parking place, which cost $15.
From Highland mall, we could see the Hollywood sign from afar, and most people take photos of it from here. Originally we thought we could do shopping at Hollywood, but we found out that there weren't many fashion shops there. It was mostly restaurants and pubs. It was very much like a tourist place and there were many scammers on the street. For those scammers, we just try not to talk to them.
The Chinese Theatre is probably the most famous building in Hollywood. Many films were shot here as well, such as Iron Man 3. There were just so many people and we did not bother to enter to take a look.
As we walk on the street, there were stars on the ground and each corresponds to a celebrity. Some stars do not have celebrity's name on it and it is probably for new celebrity to fill their name there. We were trying to see if we could find Donald Trump's star, but we did not find it.
The souvenir shops were interesting and filled with Oscar's golden statues. It was quite interesting. The Oscar golden statue aware sold in the shop shows that it is for "best mom", or "best dad" award. It would be a great gift to bring back to people who are very interested in this kind of stuff.
Overall, it was an experience to visit Hollywood, but not as interesting as we have thought. There were not much stuff for us to do there other than just walking around and look around to see things. However, if you have never been there, it is worth a day trip to check it out.
Top Gun Seafood Restaurant is a Chinese Dim Sum restaurant located in Bellevue Washington. It is a very popular restaurant and there is usually a long line of people waiting at the entrance. We drove from Portland to Top Gun Seafood Restaurant on a Saturday and took us about 3 hours to get there. When we got there, the parking lot was already full. What we meant by full is that although there is still a lot of empty parking spaces in the plaza, most of them have been marked to be reserved for other businesses in the plaza. Thus we had to park our car across the street to avoid the car being tolled.
We walked into the restaurant and took the number to wait in line. We estimated that we had to wait for at least 30 minutes to an hour. Luckily, the restaurant has 2 separate seating areas and the second seating area was still closed. After we waited for about 10 minutes, the restaurant opened the second seating area for everyone who were waiting in line, including us!
After we sat down, we ordered Jasmin Tea. The tea came with a nice looking tea pot, but it could not hold much tea in there. We waited for about 5 minutes before the cart started to come by and we started to order the food. We ordered the usual Pearl Chicken, Shrimp Dumpling, Pastries, and Egg Tart.
The pastry dessert was a bit too sweet. The bottom of the pastry was all covered in brown sugar glaze. The egg tart was a bit too small, and not enough taste to it. Pearl Chicken is the only dish that we actually liked because there wasn't any small shrimp in it. The chicken feet wasn't bad either.
Overall, Top Gun Seafood Restaurant is rated with 4.5 stars on Google, which we think the rating is way too high. We would only give Top Gun Seafood Restaurant a rating of 3 stars due to the taste of food, the service attitude, and the cleanness of the place. In addition, parking was just so difficult. If you plan to go there, make sure you go there early!
Wallowa Lake is located at North Eastern corner of Oregon state and it is known to be little Switzerland in Oregon. It is located right by the town of Joseph and it is about 6 hours of drive time from Portland. Wallowa Lake is also one of the seven wonders in Oregon and its surrounding mountains provide a lot of amazing hiking trails for people who love to hike.
We decided to go for a 4 day vacation at Wallowa Lake during the Labour Day weekend. We left Portland very early at 7AM in the morning and headed East of I84 towards Wallowa Lake. The drive on I84 was smooth along the Columbia Gorge. The scenario was just amazing. Once we arrived at La Grande, we took a rest and had lunch there. We have never been to the Eastern part of Oregon before, thus every thing seem to be very new to us!
We arrived at Wallowa Lake around 2PM in the afternoon and this time we are staying at Wallowa Lake Lodge located at the South side of the lake. Wallowa Lake Lodge is right by the lake and very convenient. The lodge did not offer any air conditioning, but it was not needed. The electric fan was good enough. There was also a lot of deers roaming around the lodge and we have never seen such a big horde of deers before.
On the first day, we just walked around the lake and had a good rest. At night, we went out for star gazing. Wallowa Lake was a perfect place for star gazing due to extremely low light pollution.
On the second day, we woke up extremely early to do a hike at Ice Lake. The hike to Ice Lake was extremely long but well worth it! The lake was beautiful and the trail to the lake was just simply amazing! After we came back from hiking, we had a wonderful dinner at the restaurant at Wallowa Lake Lodge.
On the third day, we went for brunch at Old Town Cafe. The food was amazing there! Afterwards, we went to buy few drinks at Arrowhead Chocolate Coffee & Tea. The chocolate smell amazing there. Later in the afternoon, we decided to head to Hell's Canyon and it was the deepest canyon in US! It was definitely worth a visit!
On the fourth day, we did another hike to Deadman's Falls in the morning along Hurricane Creek. We loved the hiking trail that went through the meadow! In the afternoon, we took Wallowa Tram to the top of Mount Howard. Mount Howard was one of the tallest peak and we were able to see Wallowa Lake from the top!
When we head back home on Friday, we found out that there was wild fire along Columbia Gorge. We could see ashes falling down from the sky onto the car and I84 was closed. We had to drive on Highway 14 on Washington state side instead. It was extremely smoky and visibility was very low.
Nevertheless, Wallowa Lake was an amazing place to visit. We would definitely go there again and explore the area again!
Mount Howard is located in North Easter Oregon and it is the tallest mountain of the Wallowa region. It is known for its breathtaking view from its summit. Due to its popularity, a tram was built to take visitors all the way to the peak at more than 10000ft. There is also a restaurant at the summit of the mountain Called Summit Grill. People in Wallowa often ride the tram to the top to grab a drink while enjoying the view from the summit. In addition, due to Mount Howards height and location, the summit of Mount Howard also provides the perfect place for launching paragliding. Paragliding is a very well known recreational activity here.
The tram station was not far from Wallowa Lake Resort lodge. It only took us about 1 minute to walk to there. When we got there, there was not many people heading to the summit due to the low visibility of the day. The kid who set up the fire in Columbia Gorge is to blame for all these smog. We got to the ticket booth and the round trip ticket is $30 per adult. Seniors and kids under the age of 12 can get cheaper tickets.
The tram seems quite aged but well maintained. The tram was not very big and can only sit 4 people. After we got into the tram, we had to wait for a couple minutes before the tram actually starts moving. While taking the tram, we had the perfect view over Wallowa Lake from the top. It was just amazing. Looking down at the mountain, we could also see trails used by ATVs to deliver goods to the top of the mountain.
After around 7 minutes, we got to the top of the summit. The first thing we did is to grab lunch at Summit Grill restaurant. It was not a very big restaurant and just offered the usually burger, fries, and salad. We did see many locals enjoying their lunch here.
Once we finished our lunch, we went for some hike at the summit. There were few very short trails at the summit. Every trails at the summit lead to a view point towards different directions. However, due to low visibility, we could not see very far. The total of all the trails at the summit sums up to be about 2 miles, but when we were hiking on the trail, it felt less than 2 miles and we finished all the trails rather quickly.
We also went to see the paragliding launch area at the summit. There was no one there when we went. We could feel strong wind blowing towards us.
In general, Mount Howard summit is a must visit place since it is the hallmark of the region. The summit of Mount Howard offers incredible views during clear weather and having a drink at the Summit Grill is just one of the best thing to enjoy.
