Blog Travel

Admittedly one day in Athens isn’t enough to really get to know the city, but oftentimes travelers to Greece spend very little time in Athens before heading out of the city to explore other parts of the mainland or one of the hundreds of islands.  So if you do only have 24 hours in Athens, it is best to have a game plan before heading out so you can see as much as possible in a short time. It was no different for us when we traveled to Greece.  We had a few hours in Athens the day we arrived before leaving the next day for our off-road trip through central Greece .  We returned to Athens for one night and half a day, when we took our Athens food tour , before leaving again to explore Crete, and then at the end of our trip we had one full day to devote entirely to Athens.  While much of our time in Athens was scattered, our well-planned one day in Athens provided the perfect, albeit brief, overview of the city covering many of the more popular Athens tourist attractio...

We were recently invited by Club Carlson to stay at one of their hotels, so we chose to enjoy a weekend getaway to Santa Maria in Central California and stay at the Radisson Santa Maria.  When I was researching which property we would visit, I was impressed to find the Radisson Santa Maria was listed number one of 20 hotels in the city on TripAdvisor .  I was also intrigued that some of the prime rooms have runway views.  Runway Views The view from our room complete with runway and cows. Granted an airport hotel isn’t usually one that is sought after unless you have an early flight.  Airport hotels are usually more for convenience and far away from where you want to be on vacation.  However, the Radisson Santa Maria is different.  Seeing the blue lights lit up on the runway at night is a perk, not a detraction.  Plus, Santa Maria is a small town so nowhere in town is far away. The Santa Maria Airport is not a bustling airport with commercial flights fl...

When we told people we were traveling to Sweden in March we were asked, “Isn’t it still cold there?”  The answer was yes, it was cold.  In fact, it was very cold where we were planning on going, because we were heading above the Arctic Circle to Swedish Lapland.  There was a reason we were going to spend four nights in below freezing temperatures—the Northern Lights.  Come hell or high-water, I was going to see and photograph the famous Northern Lights . . . if I was lucky. Our Northern Lights Story I was under no misapprehension that a Northern Lights sighting was guaranteed.  I had been researching seeing and photographing the Northern Lights, including the recitations of fellow travel blogger Jennifer Dombrowski, Luxe Adventure Traveler , about her chase of the Northern Lights, especially her 5 Things No One Ever Tells You About the Northern Lights .  I had found in my research that Swedish Lapland above the Arctic Circle was one of the best places in th...