After giving ourselves time to settle in on Thursday, Friday came in like a lion, and not necessarily the cute and cuddly kind. While you process that visual, allow me to paint another one: the two of us, my traveling companion and me, walking through the streets of Paris before the sun had even risen, racing across town to meet our tour bus.
Read MoreIt was a random Sunday in July when my traveling companion and I decided to write down a number of countries we might want to visit in the next year or so on little scraps of paper. We proceeded to toss said scraps of paper, maybe a couple dozen, into a Red Wings beanie. We then shook them all up and fished out three just to see what we’d get. We told ourselves beforehand that none of this was binding, but then gave each other simultaneous side-eye glances after saying so, as if to indicate that maybe we kinda wanted it to be, that perhaps maybe it was.
Read MoreWriting and travel are two of my greatest passions in life, so you’d think combining them would send me into a state of euphoric delirium. The truth is that being a travel blogger means I am constantly thinking of ways to make content out of my travels, which can be draining at times. When you’re in a new place experiencing new things, it’s generally best to simply be in the moment and enjoy it, but there is always a little voice in the back of my mind reminding me that these posts don’t write themselves.
Read MoreLet’s face facts: museums can be boring. Of the tens of thousands of museums the world over, they’re not all gonna be winners, okay? Somebody has to come in last; that’s just the reality. But we’re not here to talk about boring museums. No, no, no. We are here to talk about some of the most interesting museums I’ve stumbled upon in my travels over the years, the ones that burrowed their way into my brain and remained there long after I’d visited — and that I’d happily pay a return trip to.
Read MoreWhile I do not in any way, shape, or form agree with the Confederate cause (because, you know, let’s just make that crystal clear), this was still a chance to see history in person, and I would be loathe to turn such an opportunity down. So, with a few hours to kill, I headed over to Beauvoir, where Davis lived from 1876 until his death in December 1889, to get a glimpse of the way in which the South commemorates the man whom many would consider one of America's greatest villains.
Read MoreThere they went, walking down the street in a straight line, looking like a high school football team warming up before practice with some high knees. There was Andrew, James, Michael, Patrick, Lucy, Bernadette, and, oh my goodness, don’t look now, but it’s Francis of Assisi himself. That’s right: it was Thursday in New Orleans and the saints were marching in. Or was I just hallucinating?
Read MoreOf all the iconic cities in the good ole U.S. of A. — New York, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Nashville (to name a few) — New Orleans was one that I had yet to check off my list. That was rectified in the spring of 2025 when I ventured once more to the Deep South with my parents and two of my siblings for a little family vacay in the Big Easy.
Read MoreStop me right now if you’ve heard this before, but, hand to god(s), we had another major, major year here on the blog, shattering records all over the place. I mean, are you ready for these percentages? I don’t know if you are. I think you’re gonna have to convince me. “Uhh, how the heck am I gonna do that?” you ask, staring blankly at your phone/tablet/laptop screen as you read these words. Well, it’s simple, Fred: …
Read MoreNestled up in the Hudson Valley, only an hour or so from the hubbub of New York City, is where you’ll find the small village that author Washington Irving once described as “one of the quietest places in the whole world”, where “the occasional whistle of a quail or tapping of a woodpecker is almost the only sound that ever breaks in upon the uniform tranquillity”. Sleepy Hollow, forever immortalized in Irving’s writing, is still a quaint little place to visit these days; whether or not Ichabod Crane would recognize it in its current state is another question.
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