Ever since I was a small girl, I had always traveled. Of course as a child it was not by choice but by destiny. I just so happened to have two young parents who loved to see the world and had eloped during the tender age of 23 and 25 to Europe to get married…
There are few places in the world that stir up such longings and true joy of Mother Nature than Patagonia…. We arrived at the insanely beautiful Torres del Paine National Park around 5:30 PM, completely blown away by its unforgettable beauty. After taking a few photos near the entrance of the park, we climbed back…
Day 3 hiking the Inca trail was the longest and more tiring day of all. From our campsite at Pacamayo we hiked an hour up to the fantastic ruins of Runkuracay, a lovely sample of what was to come. After stopping briefly to take some photos and a rest, we climbed up another forty-five minutes to…
I’d always wanted to go to Iceland. As a travel wonderer at heart, Iceland was one of those mystical places that highly appealed to me. It seemed to have it all: Incredible nature, explosive landscape (consisting of some of the largest glaciers in the world and several active volcanoes), a small, easily accessible country, loads…
It has been eighteen years since I lived in Paris. Eighteen entire years. For me, Paris was a turning point in my life. I was young, free, educated and ready to explore the world. In 1993, shortly after the new year my mom and I boarded a plane from Minneapolis to Paris where I would…
It’s been a long, exhausting, unrelenting week. Our harsh, brutal winter has continued to hang around, bringing bouts of cold wind, rain, and even a few miscellaneous snowflakes. The barren trees have yet to bloom. Yet there are signs of life’s rebirth and rejuvenation. The birds are back. I hear them singing their beautiful, glorious,…
About two weeks before my departure to Morocco I received the long-awaited email answering the great unknown: My volunteer placement for my program in Rabat. Before signing on with Cross-Cultural Solutions (CCS), I knew the deal. Volunteers would not find out what their placement was until two weeks before the trip. It is standard protocol…
After my experience in the Rabat medina, I was utterly exhausted yet for some reason, I kept on going like the Energizer Bunny. I couldn’t stop. I was mesmerized by what I’d seen and the Casbah was only a short walk away. The sun was beginning to set and cast a beautiful rainbow of pinks,…
The flight to Rabat was uneventful except for all the crying babies who kept me awake. I was really looking forward to sleeping the entire way yet it wasn’t in the cards. As we made our approach, I looked out the window longingly at the beautiful countryside and array of colors. There were greens, earth…
The flight to Paris was uneventful. I was jam packed like a sardine in a tin can yet somehow I was able to relax and manage to get a couple hours of sleep (thanks to my over the counter sleeping pill). Thus the flight passed by quickly and before I knew it we were making…
After leaving El Chalten, we boarded the sole bus headed back down Ruta 40 to El Calafate. This time, I wasn’t shocked by the barrenness of the land, the no man’s land of guachos, guancos, condors and pumas. I was just plain old tired. Tired from all the hiking, and tired of all the travel. …
The small alarm clock beeped incessantly for at least a minute until I turned it off, groggy and cold. It was already past seven o’clock and I was surprised that I slept “in” so long. To my dismay, there was no beam of light shining through the thick woolen curtains. Just darkness. There were no…