This Tuesday, I’m enjoying a cup of herbal tea with 2 pieces of homemade biscotti. I put the biscotti on a plate rather than sitting down with the whole bag so that I wouldn’t eat 8 pieces with my tea like I did last night. You may remember that I don’t cook much, so while this pistachio and cranberry biscotti (also known as heaven) is homemade, it was not made in my home. It was a belated birthday present from my friend Katie, whom I’ve mentioned before on the blog (here, here, and here). Personally, I can think of no better accompaniment to biscotti than tea; it makes the hard…
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Why Prague is a Best Bet for Your First Solo Trip to Europe
If I’m being honest with myself, Prague is a very popular tourist destination, but its Eastern European location and fairytale architecture make me feel like I’ve discovered something unique and secret. And while Prague is a unique city, it’s not a secret. Prague hosts 4.1 million international tourists a year and, in 2011, Prague was the sixth most visited city in Europe. I don’t have statistics on how many backpackers visit Prague each year, but I can give you a rough estimate: a whole lot. While some backpackers are looking for “off the beaten path” destinations, the fact that there are so many visitors to Prague year around is a…
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Hiking in Haleakala National Park
In which I hike 7 miles in 6 hours with 1 water bottle. Not one of my smarter decisions. You know how I recently updated my header tagline to read “travel, tea, misadventures”? This is a misadventure. Back in early March, I found myself with a weekend off from farm work and nothing to do. Another woman working at Hana Farms, let’s call her Alaska (because prior to arriving on Maui, she was living in Alaska), also had the weekend off and suggested we use our free time to go camping and hiking in Haleakala National Park. We had heard from the other farmies that the cool thing to do…
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25 things to do before I turn 25
Today is my 23rd birthday (don’t worry, I wrote this post ahead of time, and I’m off doing something fun with my day) and this seemed like as good a time as any to announce my latest project, which is: 25 things to do before I turn 25 (I know, I’m a baby, and you can’t believe you’ve been taking my travel advice.) I’m a list-maker by nature, and I always enjoy reading other people’s lists of things to do before [insert upcoming birthday here] so I decided to make my own. I’m not a big fan of “bucket lists” because, as I’ve mentioned before, I think people should take…
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Weekly Travel Linkspiration
Maybe I should stop trying to fit words into other words…. While I ponder my syntactical choices, you should check out these awesome links from around the travel blogosphere: Spain, How do I say goodbye? from The Big Travel Theory: Jessica waxes poetic on what sounds like an amazing 6 weeks living in Vilanova i la Geltrú, a small town outside of Barcelona, which I have had the privilege of visiting. Why I Decided to Travel Solo for a While from Keep Calm and Travel: Sometimes travel bloggers gloss over how big a decision it is to travel solo and jump straight to advising their readers to do it, but Klelia…
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Green Mountain Film Festival 48-Hour Film Slam
I spent this past weekend in Montpelier, Vermont, for the Green Mountain Film Festival‘s 48-Hour Film Slam. In fact, E and I came home from Hawai’i in part to participate in this event. Why was the 48-Hour Film Slam so important to us? And what the heck is a 48-Hour Film Slam, anyway? Good questions! A 48-Hour Film Slam is an event where teams of filmmakers come together to write, film, edit, and premiere a short movie (in this case, 7 minutes or less) over the course of a weekend. This film slam was important to us because it’s the third in which I’ve participated, and the fourth in which…
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Prague: First Impressions
I took an overnight train from Krakow to Prague. My advice for that train? Don’t pay more than the standard fare, even if you want a smaller compartment, because you won’t get it. All the compartments are the same size — they can hold six people, three bunks on each side — just hope that some of the beds aren’t occupied. When you arrive, you’ll need to convert the benches into beds yourself and put on sheets. The conductor on my train didn’t speak English, so when faced with compartment mix-ups he was unable to say more than “no” to his passengers. He was in an awful mood when we…
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Tea Tuesday: Home From Hawai’i
You may have noticed on the sidebar that my current location has changed. This time last week, E and I said our goodbyes to Maui, and returned to New England. It was an interesting first week back: Monday night we slept on a beach in Hawai’i, Tuesday night we slept on a bench in the San Diego airport, and Wednesday night, after more than 24 hours of traveling, we slept in a bed at E’s parents’ house in New Hampshire. It was our first time sleeping in a real bed in two months! After just one day of recovering from our jet lag, we were off again! Luckily, we were…
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Weekly Travel Inspiration: Wild by Cheryl Strayed
I know everyone and their brother read Wild when it came out last year, hit #1 on the New York Times Bestseller List, and became an Oprah’s Book Cub Pick, but I only just finished it, and found it to be a great inspiration. The book’s subtitle is “From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail,” and it recounts the author’s experiences hiking over 1,000 miles through California and Oregon, alone, at the age of 26. As such, it could be considered a travel memoir, but Strayed elegantly weaves this tale with the events which led to her taking this trip — the sudden death of her mother, and…
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Travel is a bit like acting
Throughout high school and college, I did theater. I loved being on stage with an audience watching, but unlike many of my friends, I didn’t want to pursue acting as a career. For me, acting has always been a fun hobby. I think one reason I like traveling is because it’s a little bit like acting. When I travel, I assume a travel persona, and this persona is different depending on where I am and how I’m traveling. I noticed this most obviously while living in Hana, Hawai’i for the last two months. Hana is located on the Eastern end of Maui, and is only accessible by plane or driving…
