Jaana and Jan @ Charleston, SC

The floor is waterrrr!!!!

Time to celebrate a birthday in the lab, this time with cheesecake, omnomnom.

Friday: Time to check out another place on our list, called Tabulli (http://tabbuli.com). We got there a little late, so we had to eat while in party mode, but the food was really good, for once we ordered something and it didn’t turn out to be burgers! Yum!

The bloody mary Jaana got was a bit more spicy than she was used to, so it took a while to drink that down. Jan was happy with his favorite local beer!

Yum!

The plan this weekend was to go see an old friend in Florida, Valentine, and go snorkling in Devil’s Den in Gainesville. Sadly, since Enterprise requires a deposit of 200$ we did not have enough money on our visa to get our car.  So… Plans canceled, ended up working for a couple of hours.

but we did end up going to Gentry Bar (http://gentrybar.com/), known for its cocktails and comfort food.

Again we were able to order food that was no where near a burger.

As an apéritive Jan got a tasting of Whiskey and Bourbon (coz why not?!).

Jaana went on to test some of the famous cocktails, they were excellent!.  Since this was not a huge burger with fries, impossible for us to finish. We were still a bit hungry and decided to indulge in a dessert.

Jaana went for the bourbon bread pudding.

Jan tried the cookies.

Which appeared to be excellent :p

It started pouring down rain after dinner, so we though it a good idea to stick around and have another couple of drinks.

The place recently opened an upstairs bar, which has live music every weekend and everyday will play host to a new local DJ. Lot’s of fun, even though it was clear we Belgians can handle or alcohol a tad better than most Americans.

Sunday was a rainy day, and we learned that Nala likes to play “Soccer” VOETBAL!!!

And dancing

And taking a nap in our room 🙂

Since Jan stopped working in the lab and has started working on his papers and PhD at home, Jaana found herself having lunch alone… With MAC ‘N CHEEZZZZZE nomnomnom.

NoMo was also helping us have a “healthy” lunch with a lunch time grill out (hotdogs), by the pool.

Many many cuddles with Nala this week, even though she had an accident in our room. 

Luckily the days have gotten longer, so Jaana has been able to enjoy the pool after work, getting a good start on that summer tan.

Even when thunderstorms appear to be rolling in.

Mmmh refreshing

Friday: Time to check out another bar on the list: BIERGARTEN. Which carried some Belgian beers, such as LEFFE or Lef as the Americans call it. 7$, but totally worth it, MAN THAT’S GOOD. Also they don’t carry PALM, but do have the glasses, but no Leffe glasses… meh, better than drinking a Duvel out of a long drink.

Jan didn’t want to spend that kind of money on a beer, but after having a taste of mine he realized, it might’ve been worth it 😀

Look at the foam on that beer, So good!

And we tried their burgers, obviously. After which we realised we are really getting sick of burgers, couldn’t finish it at all. Even though they were very good.

Saturday: Time for the GREAT AMERICAN BAR CRAWL! Which started in Mynt (http://myntsouthcarolina.com), after which we went on to Burns Alley (http://www.burnsalley.com), Republic (http://republicreign.com), and lastly Midtown (http://www.midtownbarcharleston.com). Below you will see some of the pictures we took, click the following link if you want to see more: https://www.facebook.com/pg/greatcrawl/photos/?tab=album&album_id=456131121424519,

as you can see we made plenty of random drinking buddies.

MYNT:

Adam, also called Not-Quinten or American-Quinten, was part of a Bachelor party, he was the only one left standing after the 3rd bar. The Bachelor himself even had to be driven home after the 2nd bar! Not-Quinten however, I mean Adam kept partying with us until the very end!

Steven, who we met in the second bar, but also kept partying untill 4 hours before he had to go to work!

Then we met some Europeans! Martina from Austria, and then a Brit and a Swede who loved yelling “Kankertoerist” when he found out we were Flemish!

BURNS ALLEY

Random dude, who helped us get beer in the super long line at Burns Alley.

Jell-O shots, With Stephen and Steven (which didn’t get confusing at all).

MIDTOWN:

Ally, who turns out, lives in our building! Furthermore, Honorable mentions to Amanda, Tory, Jessica, Morgan, and Greg (who told us not to try and follow his drinking, and then passed out after bar 1).

 

Sunday: Date night, trying out the local steak house: Hall’s Chophouse (https://hallschophouse.com) . Rather expensive, but you get a big steak, nice wine, excellent sides and very good service!

Which we couldn’t finish, so we had dinner for the next day!

The rain that had been predicted the previous day’s finally arrived on Monday. Where it came pouring down like a very expensive rain shower. This caused Charleston to become a wild water ride. Which was fun, but made it impossible for the bus to reach the bus stop at MUSC and so Jaana was stuck, even when trying to reach the next bus stop by foot. Unless she wanted to go swimming.

Luckily Christian had a big car and love driving through puddles so he and Jan came to rescue her and had a lot of fun doing it.

And yes that car on the left is stuck… And it’s a Porsche. Sucks to be you dude.

While there were dry parts, every road that led to downtown was flooded on one part or another.

It took Jaana 1,5 hrs to get home.

Thanks for the kisses Nala!

This week we had to say goodbye to one of our roommates Christian. He kind sneakily decided to leave us on Friday. But this meant we had a good excuse to have a BBQ and drink sangria.

Nala loves the smell (and taste) of BBQ, she doesn’t really beg, she just stares at you and your food.

The good allows for some “good” dance moves 😉

And then came the moment for a last drink with the guys.

And a 203 picture (not including Jacob).

Friday: cheap date night. We went to the Ale house for something other than burgers, yet ended up getting burgers. Yummy! But we’re kind of missing the variety that Belgian restaurants offer.

Next we went to a watering hole called “The Brick” where Jan ordered the strongest beer on the menu (9,1) which was undrinkable, but it was fun bar with live music and very friendly service.

Saturday we did the usual, farmers market, aikiken, work. and then we decided to do something new… We went to church.

This building was a church once. But now it’s a pretty cool restaurant/bar. Only problem is they required our passports to verify our age. Apparently 3 kinds of identification with our names, birthplace, birthdates and pictures was still fishy. In the end he realized we were not under 21 (thanks for the compliment, but come on).

Sunday: lazy day until work was required once again. And then time for expensive day night. Another one at o-ku. Only this time we tried to order sushi, but got no sushi. It was however exquisite! We ordered 5 different chef’s specialties, one after the other they were amazing!Most of the time it was so good we finished our plate before taking a picture.

June has begun, which means the last month of us living in Charleston has started aswel. Which has made us realise we still have a lot of places (restaurants and bars) we want to check out, which we started this weekend.

The week went by as usual… Only difference was that they had predicted rain the entire week. While being used to rain being a daily thing, where predicting sunshine will end up giving you a rainy day. Predicting rain in Charleston, is different. Throughout the entire week, I experienced only 3 drops of rain. And the rest of the week was sunny and hot! This is the kind of rain I can get used to! Yet sadly will have to leave behind soon.

Friday we decided to go out for dinner, visiting the Noisy Oyster for a second time. Food, service and atmosphere were great same as the previous time. The veggies were not as healthy as we would like, but we’re getting used to it.

Afterwards we decided to go to the local Irish Pub, which has live music from time to time, plus who doesn’t love an irish pub, and since it was on the list we thought it was a good excuse to go. Apparently however it is not done to go to this pub and ask for a coke. I was just thirsty, I would’ve asked something alcoholic afterwards! :p

This duo did an excellent job of playing irish fiddle, rock ‘n roll and country songs. Many singalongs, greating everyone who came into the pub seperately. It was alot of fun.

Jan tried the awesomely named Victory’s Golden Monkey. If anything, US craft breweries give great names to their beers. Surprisingly, the Golden Monkey also tasted fantastic, it appeared to be a combination of Duvel and LaChouffe! We are looking where we can buy this and the Lo-Fi Glitter Pony Jaana tried last week, so maybe we can bring some home for our friends to try.

Saturday morning we went to the movies to watch Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 with Christian. Which was awesome! What we didn’t know about the theatre however was that it was a dinner movie theatre. Meaning that each row of seats had a table, and you could order food and drinks during the movie. Just press the buzzer and within minutes, a server came to get your order. The food was movie themed ofcourse, which led to some hilarious names such as ‘The Big Leburger’, the ‘Beauty and the Bisonburger’ or ‘The girl with the bacon tattoo’. Sadly, we had already had lunch and weren’t hungry but we are definitely coming back for dinner. Wonder woman is coming out soon, right? Hopefully, we’ll have the entire theatre for ourselves again then.

For dinner we went to a dive bar next to our home called the “Royal American” which is supercozy. And served good chili and burgers. Good to know for next time we’re lazy!

In the evening we were invited to the birthday party of Maddy, one of Jan’s colleagues at MUSC who was turning 28. After a short search in the nortern part of downtown, we finally found the workshop where Maddy’s ‘summer of Love’ themed party was going on – although we didn’t get into the theme by dressing up as we maybe should’ve done.

We were taught a new drinking game by our German friends, Tanja and Janina: “Flipcup”, which is as easy as it sounds. It’s literally a game where you have to flip a cup. That’s all. No sophisticated Pichon or Monopoly rules, just: do a shot, flip your cup and then the next person in your team goes. This friendly game soon escalated into to Europe vs. America brawl, which Europe won time and time again.

Afterwards we went back to “the royal american” as a friend of the Birthday girl was performing there. But as always here, everything closes rather early (around 1.30 am in this case) so not long after, we called it a night.

1. After speaking about it for many months (since before we got there) it was decided, our appartment was getting a dog. From one day to the next, we all fell in love with Nala, the Australian Shepard and some breed left unidentified.

She was left behind by her previous owners, for the life of me I don’t understand why, unless they did not know having a highly energetic puppy would take some work, time and effort.

Nala is very sweet, rarely barks (unless someone is on the lounge area in front of our appartment in the hammocks, because those are hers), and is very smart. It doesn’t take long to teach her something new, and she’s always very excited to meet someone new.

Though highly energetic, the Charleston heat is difficult for everyone to bear, so when it does get to hot for her, she lies down and waits for us to pick her up and carry her along.

Furthermore, we are still following Aikido. This week however we had to say goodbye to 2 of our group, Korey and Marcel. Who were moving away.

Saturday we decided to again try some of the local cuisine… burgers… At the tattooed moose. A cute dive bar in our street. Burgers were good, the duck fried fries were fine, but didn’t seem to us to be anything special. Maybe we are too spoiled or something.

On sunday we went shopping in North Charleston, the Tanger outlet and came home with some nice things. Not necessarily all things we needed. But fabulous all the same 😉

In the evening we went out for date night, having sushi at O-ku. A very fancy sushi place, so we dressed up and starved ourselves all day to fully enjoy the meal.

What we didn’t know is that there was a theme that night: White night. Jaana was dress as a waitress appartently, but who cares! We look both looked pretty 😉

Apparently we had timed our date perfectly, since sundays is wine 1/2 off night! So we decided to splurge a bit and drink a nice european wine.

After dinner the Restaurant turned into a club, which made our life nice and easy. Didn’t need to move to complete this date night.

As you might already suspect the following monday (memorial day) was not a very useful day, thanks to Christian however we were able to get to MUSC to prep for the following day, making it a useful day after all!

Right after leaving Florida, we had already planned another trip to Florida, but this time a little more exotic, visiting Miami and the Keys.

DAY 1: MIAMI South Beach

View of Miami Beach, where we were staying the first night.

Espanola way in South Beach, filled with Italian Restaurants. Very cute, food looked good and authentic.

Ocean Drive, South Beach: filled with restaurants which turn into clubs and girls who need to wear slightly more fabric.

Mango’s

Hand-rolled cigars!

DAY 2: The Keys!

Sunset Grille and Raw Bar: http://www.sunsetgrille7milebridge.com/

With a wonderful view!

The seven mile bridge   

Thank you happy hour with “free” novelty mug

Mahi Mahi and king crab burgers, omnomnom

And wonderful cocktails!

Sombrero Beach      

Key West Sunset “festival”, which takes place every evening!

Sloppy joe’s fries! Not bad, but… rather have andalouse, or stoofvleessaus on top of my fries.

DAY 3: Snorkling and Bahia Honda Bay

Sadly of our snorkling trip we don’t have any pictures since Jaana lost her camera at Bahia Honda Bay, screenshots of the movies Jan made will be uploaded soon though. Sorry Rosina, no buddy picture! But Jan will have the diving pictures uploaded soon!

Lunch at Porky’s: http://porkysbaysidebbq.com/

Jaana went for some roasted tuna fish.

Jan wanted a little bit of grilled meat and some onion rings… Getting used to these portions appears impossible.

Bahia Honda Bay, where we stayed most of the day in order to see the beautiful sunset.

     

DAY 4: Back in Miami

Jan has all the pictures for this part.

We were staying in little Havana, so decided to enjoy the local cuisine at Versailles (yes, Versailles is Cuban) where we had some yummy croquetas and empanadas.

Next we went to Bayside Marketplace, where we enjoyed the ambiance and heat! Damn it was hot!

Lastly we went back to Miami Beach to walk on the beach and check out the “park” between the beach and Ocean drive, where there is plenty to see. From Beach/foot volleyball, to skaters, and people working out.

Then back home to Charleston, S.C. but first travelling through a thunderstorm in a plane, lots and lots of fun! Sadly very difficult to film.

That’s right! You read it! We went to Universal Studio’s and spent most of the day exploring Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley and Gringotts! To put it mildly: ‘t was AWESOME! Below you will find some of the images taken with Jaana’s camera. Not to worry, Jan has many many more video’s taken with his GoPro! But this first has to be edited into a nice movie.

Day 0: Trip to Orlando

Apparently it is perfectly normal for you to rent a Car, after the car rental place has already closed, since this has happened to us twice now. But we have learned to check the closing times now, we think.

So you have guessed it, we were just in time to pick up our car, even though the website found it no problem at all for us to pick up a car after it has closed. Luckily, Jan is in good shape and ran to the Car Rental place and got there just in time. Most exciting part of the trip is over? Maybe.

Waze had told us, it was about 6 hrs drive, so we decided to go for 2 drivers since 6 hrs is a long trip for 1. Jan however, manly as he is did the whole trip on his own, with the occasional stop. We had Wendy’s for dinner, and I don’t know… We’re not a fan, maybe we’ve just been spoiled with all the gourmet burgers present in Charleston.

At 1 a.m we ran into so traffic, which is great when you’ve already been driving for about 6 hrs. And well, dearest Americans, it does not really make a difference if you switch lanes constantly, it only makes everything a whole lot more stressful and dangerous, please STAHP!

Day 1: Adventure  Island

The park is open, we are through the entrance… First things first, RUN TO THE HARRY POTTER PART!

Hogwarts Castle!

Through the entrance hall, with real talking protraits!

DSCN0006

The entrance to Dumbledore’s office.

The pensive

Dumbledor’s office, with Prof. Dumbledore! 

The DADA classroom!

The sorting hat, guiding you to your carts for the Forbidden Journey!

The line to the Forbidden journey (which goes through the castle, but if you know what to ask for you might be able to enjoy your trip even more! Ask for the tour at any of the Harry Potter attractions trust us!)

After having explored the castle about 3 times we finally took the time to look at Hogsmeade and all it had to offer. It was truly magical from the moment you stepped in. It is really worth visiting.

With a little bit of pain, we go and explore the rest of the park. The pain dissapears rather quickly however since the rest is equally as amazing. Every attraction you do (if you don’t have a lot of problems with motion sickness (which Jaana does)) is great (even with the motion sickness)!

Though sometimes quite confusing… Are the Jurassic park dino’s the dragons that escaped from the Harry Potter Dimension or the other way around?

The Jurrasic Park water attraction is quite tame in the beginning but turns out to be very impressive at the end, great to escape from the 3D rides for a bit. At the end a T-Rex litterally comes up to eat you!

Though neither of us has seen the new King Kong movie, the set of this ride looked so real (impossible to capture on film) that we decided to hide from the rain in this attraction, which was excellent! Kind of made us want to watch the movie.

Next was Toon land! Which is so colorful and worth standing out in the rain for!

Marvel Land: The attraction Jan has been waiting for all day: SPIDERMAN!

And then typical that we as Belgians experience this: RAIN!

Ending the day with a well deserved Butterbeer (sadly not a fan though)

Day 2: Universal Studio’s

Same drill as yesterday, only this time with sunshine!

Hastily walking towards the Harry Potter part of this Park. Where suddenly you find yourself in London and you see the Knight bus, you know you’re on the right track. The entrance to diagon alley however is only noticable by the vast amount of foot traffic going in and out of a small alley.

First thing you notice is the giant dragon on top of the Wizard Bank Gringotts! Which breathes fire when she feels like it.

 

After the inital shock and awe has worn off you notice the other parts, the little things. The statues, the shops, it’s fantastic. Again you know this part of the park is going to be hard to leave behind.

Weasley’s Wizard Weazes

Number 12 Grimauld place!

Hagrid’s/Serius’ Motorcycle

Time for the other parts of the park… Fine if we have to!

Simpsons Land! With a ride which apparently totally awesome (only Jaana had to miss most of to refrain from becoming nauseated, hooraay motion sickness)

The Kwik-E-mart sold donuts so large, lard lad would almost have difficulty carrying it. Very tempting to buy it, but the adults and healthnuts inside us said NO!

Picture of the surrounding parts of the park, very Hollywood!

Jaws just wanted to be loved!

TRANSFORMERS! Another great 3D motion simulator ride!

The minions parade!

Ending this day and the trip with a clothes shopping trip at Madam Malkin’s in Diagon Alley. Where they have a mirror which judges your outfit, which Jaana loved.

And a walk past the Hard Rock Café. 8pm and still 6hrs of driving ahead of us, tomorrow is going to hurt, wish us the best of luck!

It was a very sunny and hot week, which made walking around very fun. Getting some excercise and loading up on the Vitamin D.

Snacks are necessary when working in the cold labs. Snack 1: CUPCAKES!

Snack 2: Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. Yummy! Thank you foodtrucks!

We found something wonderfully Belgian in the store… Too bad Belgian waffles are made in Paris apparently :p

Thursday evening: After aikido practice we decided to have a fun night in with the roommates, pretending to know magic tricks and coming up with weird card games.

Friday: Cinco de Mayo! First a very American dinner at Five Guys, with slightly spiked soda for the road 😉

Next a bar on King Street called JohnKing Grill & Bar. A live band playing, cheap margerita’s, life is good. For the video of the band follow this link:  https://www.facebook.com/Awesomesaucest/videos/vb.613564199/10154809636669200/?type=2&theater&notif_t=video_processed&notif_id=1495812887249430. This kid was insanely good, only 17 years old and only started playing in 2013. We also met some random people who were in the middle of a Bachelor party, sadly they had to move on the next location: a strip club :p

Saturday: As we have mentioned earlier we have started Aikido classes with Sensei Willian. It’s alot of fun, very confusing from time to time, but fun. On saturdays they also have Aikiken classes at Marion square, which we thought we should check it out. Arm muscles were aching.

Later that day it was time for a BBQ with the Aikido group! Yum!

Sunday: walking to work to prep for monday and save some time, on the way home it was time for a pizza a very italian pizza! We tried out the restaurant: Monza! While difficult to eat, it was very yummy

After Aikido on Thursday we decided to go into town to find something to eat, since we were to tired, lazy and slighty beaten up to cook ourselves. Jan had found The Griffon online, and we thought it would be the perfect opportunity to check it out: http://www.griffoncharleston.com/

First thing you notice are the thousands upon thousands of 1 dollar bills that wallpaper the place. Each with their own little messages on it, some with nice “we were here messages” others with silly insults and such. We are definitely planning on adding our own dollar here.

While the dinner was relatively yummy, it was kind of greesy (not surprising in the states) but we were not able to finish our dinner. Which in hindsight, is not such a bad thing. Keep those Belgian figures!

After dinner we slowly walked to back home through the cute little streets of downtown Charleston.

Saturday: Time for a roadtrip! In order to get to know the surroundings a bit more, we decided to take a trip to Hilton Head Island. A town, full of resorts and the only reason to go there is the beaches.

As dinner we had burgers (surprise!) in one of the resorts. Pretty good burgers, top 4. With sweat potato fries, a nice alternative to the “French” fries.

To end the day we decided to watch the sun go down at the Alder Lane Beach. Sadly the sun went down behind the trees instead of behind the ocean, but it was pretty nonetheless.

Sunday: I had to go seed my cells, in order to gain a day of work (Yes, yes we also work here!). Since it was superhot, we decided we earned a very nice ice cream sandwich with pie filling. Nomnomnom.

 We decided that we had not investigated the campus life of the College of Charleston and went for a short walk while waiting for the bus home. Pretty.

The rest of the day was spent chillaxing, drawing, reading, tanning…