Somewhere along the way my Type AAA personality became more of a Type 80% A and 20% B?!

I used to constantly feel like I needed to be in control of EVERYTHING, which often made it difficult for me to decide that it’s worth exploring a new place to travel or even a new place to try dinner, if I couldn’t plan the perfect itinerary.

So back in June, when my July work schedule was finalized, I realized I had a nice stretch of 6 days off. After realizing I haven’t taken a REAL vacation since last year when I went to Seattle, it only seemed fitting to jet away for a short getaway. Somehow it seems like so many people around me are going to Austin, Texas for bachelorette parties, and many nurses I know have also moved there permanently—so I figured I’d check out what the hype was about!

If you know me, you know that I’m very much a homebody, and even when I’m on vacation, I can often be a hotel-body, so I wanted to stay somewhere NICE and treat myself for this vacay. Then, the PERFECT opportunity arose, where I got to work with Fairmont Hotel Austin to help them create content for their social media platforms. I have never done a travel collab, and it still feels so surreal that I (ME?!?!) get to travel and create content.

We happened to pick the hottest month of the year to go to Austin, where it was blazing a solid 100 degrees DAILY. I walked in, and before I could even open my eyes, the A.C. already had my heart. This is easily one of my favorite hotels I’ve ever stayed at—I mean just look at the pictures yourself.

I traveled to Austin with my best friend and my mom, and we had a pretty loose itinerary. I was pretty much working everyday leading up to this trip, so all we had was a list in our notes app of the places we probably wanted to visit. The list included a lot of murals and little shops near Downtown Austin, so we figured we would just rent a bike and bike around all of the spots we wanted to visit (instead of spending money ubering).  

Now, while that may sound like a great idea, there was just a COUPLE of problems.

1.     It was blazing 105 degrees outside

2.     Lowkey no matter where we biked, it felt “uphill”

3.     We got a day pass for the bikes, but EVERY 60 minutes, you had to return them to the rental place and Re-check them out to avoid an extra $4/30 min charge.

ANYWAYS, the 3 of us have NEVER sweat so much in our lives, NEVER burned so many calories, and I felt like my entire body was on fire. And the murals were way too far apart so we kind of abandoned ship after seeing just a couple. I wish I had a picture that could ACTUALLY show what we looked like because all of our faces looked like bright red tomatoes.

Fast forward, we give up on the biking, and decide to uber home from Downtown Austin (best decision ever). To treat ourselves, we decided to go to a nice Italian restaurant for dinner, since it was our last evening in Austin. We step into the restaurant, and as the waiter is JUST ABOUT to seat us—the manger comes up to us and says, ‘WAIT WAIT WAIT!’ I turn around and think, there’s no way I know anyone here in Austin

“Were the 3 of you biking earlier today?!”

 We all looked at each other and burst out laughing. Yup, the 3 idiots biking was DEFINITELY us. Literally nobody in the city of Austin was biking in that weather except us. I’ve pretty much lived in California my entire life, where there is SO much diversity, and I never really feel like a minority. But now that I think about it, 3 Asians biking in 105-degree weather in Austin is probably P R E T T Y memorable.

He continued to say, “I saw you guys on my way driving in to work. Your mom looked like she was having a great time—and the two of you looked like you were dying.”

Yup, that sounds just about right.

Needless to say, we didn’t feel guilty about any of the pasta or pizza or thousands of calories we consumed that night because we DESERVED it. Sometimes it’s the dumb things in life that make it all the more memorable.

Austin, you were beautiful, gorgeous and blazing HOT, but I can’t wait to visit again.