You might think the experience would lose a little of its luster the second time around, at least at the margins, but waking up in perhaps the most famous city in the world for a second consecutive day was no less thrilling. The only bugaboo this time is that we didn’t have a full day in London ahead of us. It would be but a mere few hours before we needed to return to London Stansted Airport and head back to Ireland for the very final leg of our whirlwind European adventure, meaning there was no time to spare.
Waking up in London had been an item on my travel bucket list for years — years! — and finally the day had arrived. When my alarm went off at about 8:30 a.m. Thursday, I opened my eyes and found myself in a flat — a flat! — on Longmoore Street in Westminster, with one of the most iconic cities in the world waiting just outside the door.
It wasn’t quite the crack of dawn, but Day 4 in Ireland certainly got off to an earlier start than any of its predecessors. Why, you ask? Well, because a mid-afternoon flight from Dublin to London was definitely going to sneak up on us faster than we would have liked — which meant we had but a few wee hours to see or do anything else in Galway before we had to hit the road, Jack, and not come back no more (no more, no more, no more…).
Apparently not ready to leave the cozy confines of Gem’s place in any kind of a hurry, Day 3 in Ireland got off to a slow start. Once we got going, however, we began the day by heading over to the same place the previous evening had concluded: the quaint and colorful city of Cobh.
As far as the day itself was concerned, we hadn’t looked up a ton of things to do or really put any kind of concrete plan in place, but one thing that was absolutely, without-a-doubt, no-ifs-ands-or-buts-about-it on the list was a visit to Blarney Castle. There, we’d have the opportunity to climb up to the parapet or rampart or battlement or whatever you want to call it and kiss the fabled Blarney Stone, which is said to bring good luck and eloquence (“the gift of gab”, so they say) to anyone who lays a wet one on it.
It was only recently, as in within the last couple years, that I learned just how Irish I am. That sounds odd perhaps, but I’ve lived most of my life believing I was mostly Polish. That may still be true, but according to data from MyHeritage, my maternal grandmother was 94.1% Irish, Scottish, and Welsh, which no doubt means some of that Irish blood runs through me, as well. Armed with this information, I set out for my newly-realized ancestral homeland in late March 2024, looking to connect with my Irish heritage and maybe drink a Guinness or two.
Look, folks, if you clicked on this, it’s possible you’re thinking about making a trip across the pond, and that’s super. It’s also within the realm of possibility that you’re simply curious to see which cities and airports would land on a list such as this and have no plans whatsoever to do anything with this information other than file it away for a rainy day, and that’s cool, too. With deference to the likes of World of Wanderlust, Travel + Leisure, and Travel Off Path, among others, here are the five cheapest European airports to fly into from the good ole U.S. of A.
Whether you’ve crisscrossed the globe five times over or simply scrolled through Instagram on a lazy afternoon, you’ve undoubtedly learned by now that some destinations are just more photogenic than others. That’s not to say that “ugly” cities and towns aren’t worth visiting; places that impress with personality alone are certainly bucket list-worthy. It’s more about this plain statement of fact: not all destinations are equal in the eyes of the camera’s lens.
Since the invention of the flying machine, getting to far-off destinations has become easier than ever — and yet, there are still significant barriers you may come up against when attempting to travel to certain parts of the world.
Continuing its yearly tradition of offering travel writing scholarships to fledgling writers, World Nomads, an international travel insurance and safety services provider, is looking to send three aspiring travel writers to Portugal this summer.
All it took was two weeks. Two weeks back in Michigan, fresh off a seven-week backpacking trip across Europe, and there it was again: the travel bug nipping at my heels. And even though the Great Lakes State makes a compelling case, it was powerless to keep me grounded. I needed a new adventure and moving to Seville, Spain, for three months would be just the thing.
As long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to visit Greece. When I finally got the chance to go earlier this year, it was more than a dream come true. From the extraordinary culture to the wonderful people I met, from the gorgeous views to the amazing food that I had a chance to cook myself, it was as if I’d stepped onto the set of every Greek movie I’d ever seen.
Day 4 was set to be the relaxing day, the day we weren’t running around like chickens with our heads cut off, intent on seeing every last nook and cranny we could find. And it was that, which is why no one was too concerned when we got off to another slow start in the morning.
There’s nothing quite like waiting until the last minute to plan something out. And it doesn’t get much more last minute than when you’re sitting at the kitchen table in your Airbnb after a long night of shenanigans in the northernmost capital city in the world searching up places to be and things to see on the Google Machine less than an hour before you’re planning to hit the road.
I don’t think it was our intention initially, but Day 2 in Iceland wound up being the longest day of the trip by far. The plan was to explore the country’s southern coast, traveling at least as far as Vík, a seafront village which exists in the shadow of a glacier called Mýrdalsjökull. The village is approximately two and a half hours east of Reykjavík, about the midway point between the capital city and Vatnajökull National Park.
I’m not sure if Iceland was as popular as it is today when I first set my sights on it a few years ago — they actually deal with a little bit of over-tourism these days — but it was a place I wanted to visit regardless if other people were going there or not. And so, finally, here I am, on the frosty frontiers of this large island nation that sits just a few degrees south of the Arctic Circle.
“When we first got to the college, the afternoon that we got there the sun was setting and our rooftop overlooks the entire city of Rome. I remember we got up there and I looked over at St. Peter’s Basilica, which is literally right next door. I was blown away: ‘This is going to be our home? We’re going to live here?’ And somebody said, ‘This is your backyard for four years.’”
London had been a trip, as had Galway and Cork and Cobh before it. But we were back in Dublin, where we began (and then ended and began again), and it was finally time to give the Irish capital a proper spin. Thus, on a wickedly windy Saturday morning, we stepped out of the Ashling Hotel and onto Benburb Street, ready to take on the city.