Our recent trip to Oahu was a trip of firsts. We hiked in places I never dreamed of seeing, swam off the shore of Waikiki after jumping off a forty-seven foot yacht, ate the tastiest organic food at the local farmers market, viewed the largest waves we have ever seen and found the best place to shop on the North Shore.
Typically, I travel with Craig or by myself. What would it be like traveling with a group of friends? Would I get enough time alone? What do I do about the travel blogging part of the trip? Will they be annoyed by my taking photos of our food and drinks? They were not annoyed in the slightest, they even helped out!
One of my biggest dilemmas of travel blogging is finding a balance between being in the moment of a travel adventure and making sure I capture just the right details. I do take notes, but just pausing and writing down some of my immediate reactions and emotions is paramount to authenticity. I wrote the bulk of this post while on vacation, everyone else was relaxing or talking or playing games in between activities.
Although you may have read about some of these experiences here individually, seeing them gathered together in one large travel menu is a fun exercise. I have had the opportunity to reflect upon additional details and nuances of each experience or meal, plus you can compare and contrast!
Culinary travel is BIG and also a perfect way to get closer, to mingle with the locals and even learn something! I believe that this type of foodie discovery is here to stay and will only get more focused for future opportunities.
Is Muay Thai also known as Thai boxing on your adventure list? The martial art form of Muay Thai is HUGE in Thailand. It’s very popular in the U.S. as well. Part of the comprehensive travel experience created by our hosts at the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) was to visit Krudam Gym for a morning lesson of Muay Thai.
So I decided to do a quick year in review, not to boast about how many places I have been, but to unpack, pause and appreciate what can be accomplished through thoughtful planning, careful research, great relationships, accumulated miles and points and the best dog sitter in the world!
I started the year with knee surgery on Jan 6th, so the pace of the travel was slow in the beginning, but it quickly picked up in early March. I may not have been fully recovered but we had adventures to take, people to see and places to go. There was no sitting around.
We don’t have any Toys R Us shopping to do any longer or a list for Santa. Most of our shopping was done online, how about you? What we do have is lots of quality time with our grown children and our extended family. I think that is what Christmas is really about. We spend more time planning the menus and the handcrafted cocktails, making playlists and taking selfies and Boomerangs. What’s a Boomerang? It is an app where it takes a four second video and repeats it over and over. It’s creative and clever and everyone seems to be doing it. You can see more over on my Instagram=> Here!
Dinner at Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Pleasantville, NY
We traveled by train thirty miles outside New York City to enjoy the holiday season and to meet up with my good friend and fellow travel writer Irene Levine of Getting on Travel and her husband Jerry. Irene and Jerry live locally and have visited Blue Hill at Stone Barns on several occasions. The restaurant mood was calming and a lovely stone fireplace lit the path to our seats for a magical four hour meal.
To find the best restaurant in Cozumel on my first trip there was quite amazing! However I did not discover this jewel on my own, I was actually a guest of my friend and fellow travel writer, Tam Minton of Travels with Tam.
Tam invited three of her best travel writing friends, Sara of Travels with Sara, Melody of Wherever I May Roam and Me to her beloved island of Cozumel. She and her husband own a lovely vacation home and have enjoyed the delicious restaurants and superb scuba diving on this quiet island for the past 19 years. Tam was an excellent tour guide, gracious hostess and she knew where to eat great food. We had a ridiculously fun time full of a few wacky (and fabulous) adventures. Although we had not all travelled together before, we had so much in common that it was extra satisfying!
Greetings!
We make every attempt to continue a Christmas tradition of traveling to New York in December to soak up the sights and lights of this beautiful city during the holidays. I just wanted to check in to say hello and let you know you can follow along over on our Instagram ===> Here! And on our Facebook Page ==> Here!
I am very excited to announce that we have just finished a new video for Adventures of Empty Nesters. We wanted to convey to our audience just what we are all about! We partnered with Clint Simone (our very talented nephew) as he filmed, directed and produced this pretty snappy video.
Clint’s vision was to show what it is really like in the “Empty Nest” and how embracing Life 2.0 is the best way to find adventure at this time in our lives. Our kids are grown and flown from the nest and now it’s our turn. It is time to determine what we want to do next and how we will go about it.
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