Category: Popular
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Elephant Love
I didn’t expect to have such an emotional response to seeing the elephants at Maetang Elephant Park in Chiang Mai, Thailand. I couldn’t stop my eyes from filling with tears as they gently took the bananas and sugar cane from my hand. Or my heart from swelling as I carefully washed their skin in the river. They were…
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Show Me the Money: Part 2
We ended our 3 months in Western Europe over our total budget by $1,298.97. The most expensive week was Week 16 when we rented a car and drove around Ireland (and splurged on a fancy hotel for our anniversary), followed by the week we returned to Virginia in Week 24 because plane tickets during the holiday…
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FAQs – Western Europe edition
What was your favorite place to visit? We have a list for Western Europe, and that list is broken into several categories. (You can see the full list at the bottom of the post if you’re so inclined). What was your Favorite Meal and/or Food? What was the most valuable thing you learned? (Full list…
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Siena waits…for you
Do you remember that color in your box of crayons called “Burnt Siena”? Maybe not, but that color comes from the color of the buildings made from the clay taken from the surrounding hills. Siena, a walled hill-town city in Tuscany, has all of the medieval magnificence of Florence on a smaller scale. What it…
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Normandy
If you are looking for a region that is American-friendly, has lots of history, is easy to navigate and has great food ~ Normandy is the place. From the D-Day beaches to thousand year old cathedrals, to pastoral landscapes dotted with cows and sheep, we enjoyed Normandy quite a bit. We also liked Normandy because…
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Paris
I was prepared not to like you Paris. I had heard stories of the French being aloof and arrogant with tourists when they couldn’t speak the language so I started my daily DuoLingo lessons back in July hoping that I could maybe order from a menu by October. I had read multiple warnings of…
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There shall be rest….and Whisky
Sometimes you need a vacation from your vacation. Water, the desire for a rural landscape after all of the cities we’ve been in and a chance to cook for ourselves several days in a row led us to rent an Airbnb in Invergordon Scotland. We got off the boat from Amsterdam at Newcastle on Tyne,…
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Angels on our shoulders….
“Where’s your gray bag?” I felt a panic start at the top of my head that settled into my gut as I realized in an instant that I had left my bag with my PASSPORT, our iPad, 2 debit cards and my Amex on the tram. I had left that bag behind when exiting the…
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Show Me the Money: Part 1
Food was undoubtedly our biggest expense. Dining out is clearly much more expensive than cooking for yourself. However, when you’re at a campsite or AirBnb, you can’t fall back on a well-stocked supply of pantry staples so you have to work with what you have available. This meant a lot of the meals that I…
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Virginia is for loved ones
After we drove 10,997 miles in the United States and Canada over the last 10 weeks, Marla and I were more than ready to park ourselves in a single location for 7 days. My Mom and Dad generously opened their home to us this for meals, laundry, storage, family gatherings, conversations, and problem-solving. I…