Newport Beach Beer Festival

The Event

For all my beer lovers, check out Newport Beach Beer Festival hosted by Rock Star Beer! Located at Newport Dunes Resort, this event has the perfect Southern California vibe. There is parking on site for $10. I highly suggest taking an Uber because the parking lot gets full fast and especially if you want to drink. Set on the sandy beach of the bay, there were dozens of top Socal breweries pouring samples. Make sure to get VIP tickets so you can enter the event 1 hour early. When you enter, one of the staff will hand you a plastic cup for your sample pours. Don’t lose it! If you have VIP tickets, you can access the VIP section and sample exclusive cocktails and beer.

The Beer

Tickets were all inclusive, so we got unlimited samples from over 150 craft beers!  Lines were long, but they move quickly. Once you get a full cup, swing over to the next line and enjoy your beer till you reach the front. This year was the most beer they have ever served so there was a wide selection of IPAs, were stouts, lagers, ales, etc. My absolute favorite was from Knee Deep Brewing, they had a Nutella Stout and I fell in love with it! We had a VIP ticket, so we were able to enter the exclusive grassy area and try cocktails made with Bai and a yummy Lemon Shandy.

The Food

If you get hungry, they have a variety of food trucks. So if you’re craving tacos, fries, or dessert, it’s all located in the front by the entrance. Lines are long, so while someone is waiting in line to buy food, send someone else in your group to get some cups of beer! We tried the Super Nachos from Samurai Burrito and it was the best $12 we've ever spent. 

The Music

We ended the night with some amazing music from The Black Eyed Tease underneath the large pop-up tent! With cover bands of Black Eyed Peas and No Doubt, of course, everyone will get on their feet and dance! Listening to throwbacks with a drink in hand, everyone was having a great time. In the VIP section, there was a small gazebo with a DJ and room to dance.

I loved the venue because of all the open space, plus we got to see a beautiful Newport Beach sunset. Everyone was happy and having a great time! Events like these are great if you are still new to the beer scene and want to learn more! Some of the breweries were passing out stickers, coasters and pins for free! Overall we had a great time, check out the Rock Star Beer's website for a schedule of  future events! 

CHEERS!

Spa Thyme: Gourmet Food for your Body

Treat yourself with some yummy products created by Spa Thyme. They are a super cute Etsy shop that creates food oriented beauty goods. For those that are craving some coffee or mimosas, this is the perfect opportunity to indulge in some sweet treats. It’s super important to pamper your body so you can feel revitalized and ready to take on the day. Here are two products that I absolutely love.

Gourmet Coffee Lip Scrub

Ingredients: Granulated sugar, extra virgin olive oil, ground coffee, tocopherol (vitamin e) and flavor.

Another reason to wake up in the morning, this coffee lip scrub smells amazing! It’s in a tiny jar, but a little goes a long way. Don’t use too much product, just use enough to cover your lips. Incorporate this into your morning routine so you get polished lips before applying some lipstick or lip gloss. My lips dry out very often, so I try to exfoliate them at least once a day to get rid of the dead skin. The coffee scent and sweetened taste makes this one of my favorite scrubs! After I rinsed off, I was amazed at how soft my lips were.

Mimosa Body Scrub

Ingredients: Organic cane sugar, Organic coconut oil, Apricot kernel oil, Tocopherol (Vitamin E) and essential oils.

Brunch is always a good idea! After traveling to Thailand, my skin definitely needed some scrubbing. I didn’t moisturize (other than sunscreen) and exfoliate during my trip, so I had a lot of dry patches. This Mimosa scrub smells heavenly, a blend of orange and champagne, it’s like a celebration in a jar! The scrub is very gentle and not too abrasive, you don’t need to use a large amount. My focus areas are my knees, shoulders, and elbows, so I spent a little more time there buffing the dry skin out.  After scrubbing my whole body, it was time to rinse off. My skin felt silky, smooth after! The oils in product left my skin moisturized so I didn’t even need to use lotion!

Do yourself a favor and try some new scrubs out. Check out Spa Thyme, gourmet food for your body! They have all kinds of bath goodies, like soaps, scrubs, and soaks for you to indulge in. My skin was glowing, and I felt so renewed! Let me know which one’s you want to try, for me, it’s ALL of them.

X2 Vibe Chiang Mai Decem // Thailand

X2 Vibe Chiang Mai Decem is the perfect hotel for young, trendy travelers looking for a modern, but affordable place to rest and rejuvenate. With three days left in Chaing Mai, we still had so many things to experience. We found this perfect boutique hotel that was close to a lot of places we still haven’t visited. The interior décor gives X2 such a chill vibe, lots of white, green, and blue accents to make you feel relaxed and refreshed. This hotel is perfect for Instagram photos! There are so many cool backdrops, like the vertical garden by the pool, the different wall textures in the rooms, and the plant décor in the open-air café. The staff were so helpful, anything we needed help with, they were happy to assist. They have a small information desk where you can book tours and request a taxi.

THE ROOM

Once we checked in we were offered a refreshing welcome drink; a blue lychee juice in a cute glass bottle. Once we were finished, we took the elevator up to the 7th floor and entered our deluxe room. When we first entered, we saw the huge bed in the middle of the room, I loved that it had some charging outlets built into the headboard. Then looking out from our balcony, I realized we were on the top floor! From our room, you can see some of the city and the vertical garden that lines the pool down below. Next to the balcony door was a small desk where I could work on some photo editing and journaling. The bathroom was clean with gray marble walls; it also had a window that looked into the room. We had a very comfortable stay in our cozy room at X2 Vibe Chiang Mai Decem. The room is so worth the price!

THE POOL

When we had some down time between our Chiang Mai activities, we took some time to relax at the salt-water pool. It was quite small, but we had the pool all to ourselves. There are a few lounge chairs and you can order from that café if you want any poolside drinks. We got to enjoy the blue lychee drink (my favorite) and some fruit skewers. For nature lovers out there, they have a super tall wall filled with plants, giving off an earthy vibe. Take lots of photos here! 

THE FOOD

If you want to eat at the hotel so that you have more time to explore Chiang Mai, visit 4k Café on the ground floor. Here we ate our complimentary breakfast buffet, enjoyed some mango smoothies by the pool, and indulged in a wonderful dinner before heading out to the Night Bazaar. For breakfast, they have a large spread of different types of Asian and western food. On our second night, we enjoyed an intimate dinner including some mango daiquiris, hearty mushroom soups, and steak and salmon entrees!

LOCAL ATTRACTIONS

X2 Vibe Chiang Mai is walking distance from a lot of shopping and food. On our first night, we walked to the MAYA, a multi-floor shopping mall with 2 full floors of food and a lot of different types of shops. If you walk a little further you can visit a small night market that sells trendy clothes. From some of the rooms, you can see Wat Doi Suthep, the golden temple on top of the mountain. From X2 you can take a taxi to the Chiang Mai Zoo and then hop on a red taxi (100 baht) to take you to the temple. If you want to venture into Old City Chiang Mai, it’s also a short taxi ride away as well! We explored the Night Bazaar and did some souvenir shopping. 

We had an amazing and comfy stay at X2 Vibe Chiang Mai Decem. Everything worked out perfectly, and I’m so glad we stumbled across this hotel while doing our research. After a long day of adventuring through the city, it was nice to come back to our base camp with such a cool vibe. Thank you for having us!