“I am Dwellable!” Vacation relaxation begins in the planning stages with Dwellable’s new mobile app
Because curiosity is my kryptonite, and because I think their site is super-nifty, I recently downloaded the new free app from Dwellable, a vacation rental company that makes searching for, finding and booking properties across the country a cinch. They’ve updated the app and added another 30,000 rental properties…whew! And while I can be technologically-impaired at times, I have to give it up to this app for being incredibly user-friendly, fast-loading and fun to use. The truth is clear: if (vacation rental) walls could talk, this is what they’d...
Read MoreSleepless to Seattle: Journeying on Amtrak’s Coast Starlight
This is a follow up from my previous article “Why I’m Excited About Train Travel.” Keep reading to see how the journey went! Riding a train is a lot of things. It’s bumpy, it’s claustrophobic, it’s time-consuming, it’s even maddening. But it’s so, so wonderful. What you can see from a train window is something you can’t see from an airplane, a car, a bicycle. Train travel has a nostalgia all it’s own that transports you on a journey beyond the one you’re already on – back in time to when it was the main form of...
Read More30 Before 30…and After: the Travel Edition
…in which I try to assemble 30 travel accomplishments that I have achieved (or will, by my 30th birthday close to end of the year), as well as 30 that I hope to realize in the future. To what end I’m not sure, other than I think it’s good to have goals and also everyone else is doing a list like this, so why not me? Ambition is healthy. So here we go. 30 Before 30 – Things I have done visited 4 continents. I’m 60% there! *fistpump* lunched at Tavern on the Green in New York City (now closed…I’d be more upset but when you charge $4 for a hot...
Read MoreArtSmart Roundtable: The Museum of London
This article is part of the monthly ArtSmart Roundtable, a group of art-history-loving travel bloggers who post a related article the first Monday of each month. January’s topic is the Best Museum You’ve Never Heard of – I think we all had to dig back in our travels for this one, but it was fun to remember and share a worthwhile spot that doesn’t often get the publicity. For more related posts, check out the links at the end, or find us on Facebook here. Anyone who has visited London would probably take one look at this and think, “The Museum of London?...
Read MoreTravel Reflections: 2012 Year in Review
How did this year fly by so quickly? So quickly that it took me ’til July to realize I’d forgotten to wish my own blog its annual “Happy Birthday” back in April? I know we all say it at the end of each year…but wow. Unlike my 2011, this year was certainly a year for travel, as I hope next year will be also. It was a year that saw me take my longest voyage to date, to the other side of the globe where people were warm, the air was fresh & clean, the roads spotless and the scenery breathtaking (and did I mention the wine?) As I’ve told many people...
Read MoreArtSmart Roundtable: Fresco Feelings in Milan
This article is part of the monthly ArtSmart Roundtable, a group of art-history-loving travel bloggers who post a related article the first Monday of each month. December’s topic is favorite art & travel experiences – talk about hard to choose one (you’ll see my internal struggle as you read on). For more related posts, check out the links at the end, or find us on Facebook here! We could argue about “what is art” until the cows come home. I’m pretty sure we actually DID do that my junior year of college in a 400-level art history class, come to...
Read MoreI Studied Abroad – Now What? Why To Consider Travel Blogging
Fact: I never studied abroad. Another fact: it’s one of my biggest regrets. But with a slew of friends working in international education, and after year 2 of spending a day with students returning home from their recent semesters abroad at the annual Lessons From Abroad Conference in Los Angeles, I’ve come to understand (somewhat) the joys and the challenges of such an experience. What I DO know and can speak to, is the world of travel blogging. And be it small successes like mine, or much larger ones like those of my colleagues, I can sit, unblinking, in front of a sea of...
Read MoreHotel Review: Palms Place Hotel & Spa – Las Vegas, NV
The only time I’ll go to Vegas and feel like a high roller is by staying at a rad hotel. Because let’s face it, the slot machines don’t like me, I still don’t understand how to play craps and in typical California fashion I can’t stand casinos for very long because the cigarette smoke gets to me. Call me a sissy if you want, but if there’s one thing I’ll bet on when it comes to Sin City, it’s finding great accommodations. Enter the Palms Place Hotel & Spa, part of the off-strip Palms Hotel and the one tower that was built as residential...
Read MoreHotel Review: Fairmont Olympic Hotel – Seattle, WA*
Seattle: the Emerald City. Gateway to Alaska. The coffee capital of the world. Seatown. Queen City. And the list goes on. A lot of names, and a LOT of rain. But I’d bear a whole vacation of thunderstorms just to stay at the Fairmont Olympic Hotel again. From the moment my feet swung out of the taxicab onto the driveway to my last lingering look at the wood-paneled lobby walls, it was an unrivaled experience that made the term “sleepless in Seattle” (written on many a tourist t-shirt) a flawed notion indeed. Built in 1924, the Italian Renaissance-styled Olympic Hotel sits...
Read MoreBotanical Beauty at Rogers Gardens, Corona del Mar/Newport Beach
2 things about me: one, I have a black thumb. Fern, succulent, it generally doesn’t matter how easy-care it is (or claims to be), I can probably kill it without meaning to. Two, I am (sometimes) easily impressed. So it was no surprise that a day trip down to Orange County to check out Rogers Gardens, which I’d somehow never heard of and now can’t imagine why, both impressed me AND spurred me to do something about that black thumb of mine. And if you think Rogers Gardens is just a florist/nursery, as they self-describe on their website, well, you’d be wrong to...
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