Friends+Fall+Football=FUN

This past weekend was the Clemson/Miami game. While the game was dissappointing the fun was not lost. Being an extremely dedicated Clemson fan for 25 years now you get used to these sort of things. Thats why since college we have just adopted the "Win or Lose, We Still Booze Philospohy."

This was a very fun weekend because SO many of my favorite people were in town for the game! Sometimes when I think about the fact that most of my friends and I are all living in different places and spread out across the country it makes me sad. But I am so glad we are able to all get together like this AT LEAST 2-3 times a year. This year I was actually very spoiled because with all the plans for my wedding (showers, parties etc.) I got to see my friends a lot more than normal within the past 6 months. I was sad after the wedding wondering when the next time I was going to see everyone would be. It always sucks leaving friends and having no clue the next time you will see them! But shortly after that we all talked about a game to go to and I was so glad it worked out that so many people could come!

The only thing I love even more than seeing all of my friends is seeing all of my friends IN CLEMSON! I love going back to the places that we loved when we were in school there only 3 short years ago (seems like yesterday-tear!) So on Friday we all went to dinner at Blue Heron followed by a trip to 356 (I think that was it for Friday?) Saturday we did our own tailgate and got out there very early (like 9:00 AM) and stayed there allllll day (probably until at least 9:30 PM)...Oh and we saw a football game in between! Then to top off the night we made a stop at Backstreets for some pizza and liquor pitchers. It was a very fun time and we are all already trying to plan our next get-together (New Years hopefully!) Here are some pictures from the weekend.

We created a new Superhero who we will refer to as MOTH SPIDER!

Costa Rica- Pure Vida

I just returned from a trip to Costa Rica last week. I left on 9/26 and got back on 9/30- short and sweet, those are the kind of work trips I like! :) This was my first time in Costa Rica. I flew in to Liberia and drove to the Papagayo Peninsula where the hotel was. From what the locals were saying Costa Rica really only has two seasons: dry and "green" aka. rainy season. Rainy season is from June-November, Dry season from December-May. So we were there for rainy season and boy did it rain! It was always on and off and it was such great weather when it wasn't raining (perfect temps but VERY humid!)

I stayed at the Four Seasons Papagayo. The hotel was probably my favorite part of the whole trip. This was also my first time staying in a Four Seasons. The property was truly amazing and the service was excellent! When I first got to my room I thought wow I must have been upgraded, but no- I was in a totally standard room. They have the nicest 'standard' rooms I've stayed in. All rooms have huge balconies with "ocean views". I say "ocean views" because in Costa Rica they can only have their structures/buildings/hotels so high and they don't do things like cut down trees so you can see the ocean, which I liked. But we still got some beautiful views driving around Papagayo. They have two types of monkeys all over the peninsula: capuchin (the little ones with the white faces) and the howler. I only saw howler monkeys while I was there but I really hope to see the others when I go back! On a side note, supposedly Heidi Montag was there while we were but I am sad to say I did not have any sightings.

We have a group of 250 people coming here in June. So this was a site inspection trip to make some decisions about the activities and events we would do there with the group etc. Those are definitely my favorite trips. Like a little "test" of what you want the groups to experience. While we were there we got a tour of the whole property, went to check out 2 venues we are using, went to view a catamaran and all the motorcoach vehicles we will be using, interview some local staff and my favorite thing we did...go ziplining! I thought I would be way too scared to do it and I was on the first two lines but after the first couple of lines it all feels the same and I was brave enough to actually open my eyes and enjoy it! :)

We got a lot done and had some fun at the same time. I am excited to go back there in June. Here are some of the pictures from the trip:

My room

Our car being stampeded by cows!

On the way to see the Catamaran

Four Seasons Property

Until Next Time...

Honeymoon Heaven

Hello Everyone! Sorry it has been so long since I have posted. As I'm sure you know a lot has happened since then! I will give you a brief recap:

Last time I wrote I told you my bridesmaids were throwing me a kitchen shower at the end of July. They all came into town and we got to spend the whole weekend in Greenville together. It was a lot of fun and was so great to see them! The shower was perfect and I got a lot of great stuff! It was also Brittney's 24th birthday the weekend we were there so after the shower we all went out on Saturday to have some fun! Shower picture:

Then basically all of my free time in the month of August was spent finalizing the final details for the wedding and planning! Matt's mom also threw me a linen shower in Spartanburg the weekend before the wedding which was great and we got a lot of great stuff we really needed! Here is a picture from the linen shower:

Matt and I have been married for a little a month now! We got married on 8/21 so I am officially Ashley Kern now! I am going do a post about the wedding as soon as I have access to and can post my pictures, so hopefully I will have that post up soon!

Now for the honeymoon! We had such an amazing time there and we did not want to leave! After much research we decided on St. Lucia. We decided to split up our time between 2 hotels, 4 nights in one then 4 in the other. We did this for a couple of reasons: One hotel, Jade Mountain, was a very remote, private getaway experience (no internet, AC, TV, phone etc.) The other, Calabash Cove, was a totally different scene near all the nightlife and a more "fun" atmosphere (AC, TV, WIFI included :). And lastly because one of the places we went we would never have been able to afford if I did not get a great industry rate through my job. However, even with the amazing rate, staying over 4 nights would have been out of our budget! Both hotels were amazing in different ways and we hated to leave them both!

I like to travel a lot (for work and play) and I like to post about about my trips. I want this blog to be a little bit of a travel blog where I can write "reviews" and details about destinations, venues and hotels I visit. So I will break down the two places we went to on here. I have uploaded pictures from both hotels on facebook. After I posted pictures I got a lot of questions about where we stayed etc. I know there might be a lot of people searching for places to go on their honeymoon or vacations and maybe this will help them if they are thinking about the Caribbean or St Lucia. If you are anything like me, I love to stalk pictures and hear all about other peoples trips, vacations, honeymoons etc.

JADE MOUNTAIN-When we arrived in St Lucia the first 4 nights of our stay were spent at Jade Mountain. Jade Mountain is in Soufrieie, St Lucia. It is located on a cliff/mountain so you get some amazing views there. It is designed to be an extremely remote, private and romantic experience with a lot of pampering. Every room has a view of the Pitons (St Lucias 2 mountains). The entire property consists of 29 "sanctuaries". 25 of those 29 rooms have your own pool. These are much different than a "plunge pool" as all of the pools are pretty big and the higher the room category you reserve at Jade the bigger the pool. Every room has a jacuzzi tub and shower which also have a great view of the Pitons. Really from anywhere you are in the room there in an amazing view in front of you- it is truly breath taking! Jade Mountain has an all inclusive package you can chose to purchase if you stay there and if you go there it is definitely the best bet. The only thing not included in the package is champagne and high end wines. All food on their menus, room service, premium liquors and house wines etc are all in the all inclusive package. It also gives you access to Jade Club (Jade Mountains main restaurant), The Beach restaurant, all the restaurants at their sister property, Anse Chasnet (right beside Jade) and beach service. Anse Chasnet and Jade Mountain share their own beach which is amazing! The beach has a great water sports shop where you can book tons of excursions or get free snorkel/kayak rentals. There is really good snorkeling right off the beach there. Jade Mountain is in a very remote location and it would probably take you about 15 plus minutes to get anywhere else by car. Also if you get car sick easily it is not a great ride to the resort. So if you want to leave the property a water taxi is the best way to go. But there really is NO reason to leave the property. The food at the resort is far better than you would be able to get at a local restaurant and they provide every excursion or activity you can think of on site. Every room at Jade Mountain has its own bridge for ultimate privacy so you have no 'neighbors' and every room is at least a bridge away. Jade Mountain also has Major Domos. Each room you are assigned one Domo and one asst. Domo. They give you a firefly walkie talkie thing that you use to get in touch with your domos at any time anywhere on property for literally whatever you want (room service, can you buy me some sunscreen, I left my book in the room can you bring it to the beach for me etc.) It definitely took some getting used to but they make you pretty lazy there. I should also mention that this resort has no AC and every room has only 3 walls. Our infinity pool flows out into the open air. I was worried about this before coming there but it was really never an issue. Every night we would make dinner reservations and while we were gone housekeeping would come and spray our entire room for bugs as well as light coil candles around the room to keep bugs away. We also obviously had a mosquito net around our bed. Bugs or Mosquitos were never a problem for us at all. Birds on the other hand were a different story. If you are a light sleeper this may not be the place for you. The sun is in the room and the birds start chirping very early. Fortunately, I can sleep through just about anything so this never stopped me from sleeping in. Also, the resort is pretty much dead by 10:00 or 11:00 so you always go to bed early anyways. As for no AC, there are ceiling fans all over our room and above the bed for the heat. They kept the pool pretty cold so if we were ever hot the pool was a great relief. I am very cold natured so the heat never really bothered me. The room got a great breeze because we were so high up and if I ever got hot I would go for a swim or stick my feet in the pool. Matt did say he would get a little hot sleeping at night though. As I mentioned before there was no TV or Internet. I thought this would be a much bigger deal than it was and I barely noticed! Jade Mountain was incredibly amazing, relaxing and pampering. We will probably never get to stay in a place this nice again (until we go back of course!) We had some cool activities included in our package so here's a breakdown of our days there and some pictures!

The Beautiful Hotel!

Day 1: Arrive at Jade Mountain to this beautiful view in our amazing room! We promptly ordered room service for lunch and drinks, swam in our pool, walked around the property and had dinner at the Jade Club.

The beautiful view from our bed we woke up to every morning!

Day 2: Sleep in, room service breakfast, relax by the beach all day drinking frozen drinks (me!) and piton beers (Matt!) followed by delicious burgers on the beach for lunch. After that we did a site tour of Jade Mountain as well as their sister property, Anse Chasnet. Dinner at Jade Club again!
The Beach at Jade Mountain!

Day 3: Breakfast, Beach, sailing excursion around the north half of the island followed by snorkeling at Marigot Bay. Came back just in time for a couples massage in our room. Branched out to Anse Chasnet for dinner (not nearly as good as Jade Club), went swimming in our pool, decided at about midnight we wanted room service because we were missing the food.

Beach, sailing and midnight snack!

Day 4: Breakfast, morning snorkel at the base of the Pitons, beach, lunch, went kayaking to another nearby beach, back to our beach, dinner at Jade Club (we were not about to branch out again on our last night!)



Day 5: Breakfast, swimming in our pool, lunch, drive to Calabash Cove, check in there, relax, dinner.

Last picture in our room (above) then stopping at an overlook on the way to Calabash (below).

CALABASH COVE-We spend out last 4 nights here. Calabash Cove is located in Gros Islet. Which is right between Castries and Rodney Bay. You can get to either town in less than 10 minutes. Calabash Cove has a great view of Castries across the beach. At night you can see all the lights of the town and it is so beautiful! Calabash Cove is also a small "boutique hotel". They have regular rooms, swim up suites that go right out to the main pool, and 9 cottages each with their own plunge pool, deck, hammock and porch with amazing ocean views. We were in cottage 4 but if you ever go, request cottage 5 -definitely the best. There was also a table and chairs on our porch which was great because we got to have breakfast out there every morning and dinner one night. The resort also gives you the option to buy an all inclusive package if you wish and again its definitely the only way to go. This package includes everything (wine and champagne please!) The resort has one main restaurant which is supposed to be the only 5 star restaurant on the island. But to be honest, if I had to pick, I would say I liked the food at Jade Mountain better (however, I think Matt might disagree). The restaurant has breakfast, lunch and dinner there. There is also a swim up bar at the pool where everyone hangs out. The bartenders are awesome and made the BEST drinks. They were always creating new drinks and giving little samples to everyone. If you ever go order the club special cocktail (amazing!!!!) You can order lunch at the swim up bar which is what we did everyday. The pool, restaurant and room service menu were all different although they all came out of the same kitchen which is odd but good for variety. The beach here is awesome and for some reason no one staying at the hotel goes out there! Matt and I talked about how weird that was. They all hung out at the pool. So every morning we would start off there and spend at least of couple of hours there and have the beach all to ourselves. We would pull our chairs right into the water-paradise! Locals would come up to the beach via jet ski or boat selling jet ski rides or fruits etc. I felt bad saying no to them considering they came all the way over and we were the only ones out there haha. One negative at this hotel was all the front desk staff left at 11:00 pm and you didn't see them until 7:00 am which was a problem when we were trying to set a wake up call the morning we had to leave. This resort had great views and a really young/fun vibe. Here are some pictures of the resort and what we did during the rest of our time here.
Top: Pool, swim up suites and main restaurant. Middle: the view of Castries from the Cottage porch at night, Below: view from our porch.

Day 6: Room service for breakfast, beach, lunch, pool, pool bar, dinner, went with a group from the hotel to the Friday Night Jump Up in Rodney Bay, St Lucia for a street party
Shots at Rollover Bar in Rodney Bay and Matt and I at the Street Party.

Day 7: Breakfast, beach, lunch, pool bar, shopping trip to Castries, room service for dinner/drinks and swimming in our pool.



Day 8: Breakfast, beach, lunch, pool bar, hanging out in our pool and dinner.

Day 9: airport, find out flight is canceled, back to hotel, breakfast, sleep some more. Drive to airport on other side of the island before heading back to Charlotte!

Both hotels were amazing. Jade Mountain was obviously my favorite of the two but Calabash Cove was awesome too! The weather in St Lucia was great and the water there is so calm, its like a lake. The one day we had "bad weather" it was just windy and there was a yellow flag on the beach but the waves were about what you could expect at any beach in Charleston-haha. I guess compared to every other day there the water was 'rough'. St Lucia was beautiful and romantic. I liked it better than everywhere else I have been in the Caribbean (Bahamas, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Grand Cayman etc.) We had such an awesome time and I cannot wait to go back one day!

Stay Classy San Diego...

I just returned from an 8 day program in San Diego. I was there from 7/16-7/24. We had a group of 43 adults and 5 teenagers come to San Diego. We stayed at The Grand Del Mar in San Diego which I have to say I am slightly obsessed with. The hotel is AWESOME, by far my favorite I have stayed at for any work program or in general for that matter. The group was there for 5 days which were all jam packed with events and activities. Below is a picture of the hotel. Here are some of the things we did...
The group arrived on Monday, 7/19 and had a Welcome Reception at The Addison. The Addison is an amazing restaurant at the hotel. Addison is Southern Californias only 5 star 5 diamond restaurant and I believe there are only 2 in the whole state of California. The group had a 4 course dinner with wine pairings and a tour of the wine cellar. Here is a picture of the view from the Restaurant. Tuesday, 7/20 the group either played at Torrey Pines South Course, took a tour of Balboa Park and Old town or relaxed in the Spa. Tuesday night we took the whole group to Joan Emberys Ranch for a special night. If you dont know who Joan Embrey is she is the Jack Hanna of the 1970's and was a regular guest on The Tonight Show with Jonny Carson. She is extremely dedicated to Wildlife Preservation and has a ranch in San Diego with lots of unique animals. We had our group come out to her house where she did a special animal presentation for them. They got to tour her property, take pictures with the animals and had a sit down dinner with her and her husband in her barn. It was so cool and a very unique experience. Here are two videos of her showing some of her animals.

Wednesday, 7/21 was opening day at The Del Mar Race Track. Our group got to experience it VIP style with a private celebrity suite in the infamous Turf Club. Here I am overlooking the Winners Circle. Thursday, 7/24 The group either Played Golf at The Grand Del Mar Golf Course, went to the Spa or the San Diego Wild Animal Park. I got to go to the Animal Park where we went on a safari. It was really fun and we got to pet and feed giraffes and rhinos. Thursday night we had a private concert at the hotel. Our client was a big fan of Nikki Yanofsky, a 16 year old jazz singer who is amazing and will probably make it big sometime soon. Check out her website below as well as a video of her Scat Singing. After the concert we went on a dinner cruise on the The America Cup sailing around the San Diego Harbor.

Me Feeding the Rhino

The Giraffes at Wild Animal Park

http://www.nikkionline.ca/
Friday, 7/25 was a day at leisure and a final night dinner at the beautiful Elizabeth Capella Chapel in the hotel (below).


Overall it was an awesome trip with a great group. The weather was good although it was a little cold for me at night. In some free time I got to shop and check out the beach at Del Mar and explore La Jolla a little too. Both were awesome areas that I would love to go back to and visit again. I am very glad to be home though because now it is time for me to plan my most important event...OUR WEDDING! We are less than a month away and I am so excited! There is a lot to do as it gets closer and closer and a lot of fun stuff going on. This weekend I am going back to Greenville for a Kitchen Shower my bridesmaids are throwing and I am so excited to see everyone! I will blog more about that next week. Until Next Time....