There is so much to see in the Azores. Depending on how much time you have, you’ll have some choices to make about what to see and what to skip. To make the most of your trip, don’t miss these 10 things when visiting Sao Miguel: 1. Beautiful viewpoints and vistas Sao Miguel is dotted by incredible viewpoints and vistas. As we road tripped around the island, we pulled over often to take in the scenery. As you’re traveling around,…
Welcome Home! After returning to the good old USA at the end of April, we had a few weeks at home to see family and friends. Some of the highlights: We were warmly welcomed at the airport in DC by my mom and at home by my dad. John’s mom and family friend Pat drove down from NJ to see us later that afternoon! Our friends organized an awesome welcome home party on our first weekend back, with surprise visits…
We loved Hoi An. Here were our top favorite activities: Food Food Tour By far our favorite part of Hoi An was the food. We did a food tour on our first day which was excellent. We were led by Pearl, a local who has a passion for food and was genuinely excited to show us all of the foods of Hoi An and the proper ways to eat them. We tried a total of 10 different items over the course of…
Our first stop in Vietnam was Hanoi, the capital city located in the northern part of the country. We had one night here before heading north to Bac Ha for trekking, and then we returned for 3 more nights post-trek. Our friend Jen, who I grew up with, joined us for two weeks beginning with our second stop in Hanoi. Hanoi is the craziest place we have been, earning this distinction mostly because of it’s insane traffic. Stop lights and traffic lights are…
After a quick stop in Bangkok, we arrived in beautiful Chang Mai. We had three nights to explore this incredible city and had some of the best experiences (and food) from our time in Thailand here! Some of our favorites were: Cooking Class We took a cooking class with Asia Scenic Cooking School. We arrived in the morning and met our teacher, Marin, and our 6 other classmates from Denmark, South Korea, New Zealand, and Germany. As a group, we…
We had four fantastic days in Taipei, Taiwan’s capital city. We saw some of the city’s historical temples and shrines, visited the newer downtown area (home to Taipei 101, the world’s 5th tallest building), and sampled lots of local food at several of the city’s night markets. We also did a day trip to Yehliu Geopark. Taipei Temples We started our day with an attempted trip to Confucius Temple but quickly learned a lesson about checking which days of the week…
Kenting was recommended to us by my cousin Carolyn who lived in Taiwan for a year. We were originally thinking of staying in Taipei for a week and doing some day trips from there, but are so glad we instead opted to spend some time in this fantastic beach town! We arrived in Kenting around 6pm on a Wednesday to a bustling night market lining the main street where we stayed. After dropping our bags in our room, we went…
Busan We arrived in Korea at the very southern end of the Korean peninsula in the city of Busan after a 3 hour ferry from Fukuoka, Japan. The ferry ride was mostly smooth and uneventful despite some 3 to 4 foot swells in the Sea of Japan. For those of you that like facts, Busan is the second largest city in Korea and the 5th busiest port in the world. My traveling philosophy is that the bare minimum language you…
Kyoto is a charming city with a great public transportation system and we had a great time exploring in the 3 days we were there. What stood out to us the most were the amazing temples and the delicious food. Here are some of our favorites: Our Favorite Kyoto Temples Kiyomizu-dera Temple was a short walk from our Airbnb and offered some of the best views of the city. The fall foliage was especially vibrant here which made for an extra special…