“…This past February, my parents came for their annual trip over Chinese New Year, a propitious time to be with family. My growing spirit of adventure called and the warm beaches and clear skies of Vietnam seemed to be the answer. I was eager to spend this time of renewal and reflection with my parents. However, for me to look forward would require my father to revisit his past…something he had never wanted to do….”
“Voulez Vous Coucher Avec Moi?” on loop… that was my 90’s song from Patti LaBelle’s 1974 hit. Why that had to become my earworm to haunt my young adulthood says more about my aspirations than my reality, but it did pique my interest in foreign languages.
Flash forward a million years and I am a mother raising 3 humans in the 2000’s. I clearly went to the coucher 3 times, and it occurs to me that I’d really like my 3 citizens to understand that phrase above. Not exactly that phrase, but to understand French or Mandarin or any foreign language.
Cheap & Cheerful road trip never to be forgotten! We chose our destination, the Redwood National Forest, and mixed accommodations, travel, and food, high with low. Nature emerged the winner - stunning, truly breathtaking. Hide and seek amongst five foot ferns with trees towering above, it felt like the land of the dinosaurs. Our imaginations went wild as will every Star Wars fan who finds themself in the middle of Episode 6, better known as the Tall Trees Redwood Grove. This land was made for you and me...
Who says that travel is wasted on the young? I have never met a family that travelled whose children did not note the difference. Meet the Fitzgeralds... raising global citizens every opportunity they get. You can hear the experiences and empathy earned through their words and everyday actions. #TravelOn
“…This past February, my parents came for their annual trip over Chinese New Year, a propitious time to be with family. My growing spirit of adventure called and the warm beaches and clear skies of Vietnam seemed to be the answer. I was eager to spend this time of renewal and reflection with my parents. However, for me to look forward would require my father to revisit his past…something he had never wanted to do….”
“Voulez Vous Coucher Avec Moi?” on loop… that was my 90’s song from Patti LaBelle’s 1974 hit. Why that had to become my earworm to haunt my young adulthood says more about my aspirations than my reality, but it did pique my interest in foreign languages.
Flash forward a million years and I am a mother raising 3 humans in the 2000’s. I clearly went to the coucher 3 times, and it occurs to me that I’d really like my 3 citizens to understand that phrase above. Not exactly that phrase, but to understand French or Mandarin or any foreign language.
Cheap & Cheerful road trip never to be forgotten! We chose our destination, the Redwood National Forest, and mixed accommodations, travel, and food, high with low. Nature emerged the winner - stunning, truly breathtaking. Hide and seek amongst five foot ferns with trees towering above, it felt like the land of the dinosaurs. Our imaginations went wild as will every Star Wars fan who finds themself in the middle of Episode 6, better known as the Tall Trees Redwood Grove. This land was made for you and me...
Who says that travel is wasted on the young? I have never met a family that travelled whose children did not note the difference. Meet the Fitzgeralds... raising global citizens every opportunity they get. You can hear the experiences and empathy earned through their words and everyday actions. #TravelOn
Written by 11 year old, Calvin Conroy, a city boy on the edge of Griffith Park in Los Angeles, CA. Readers might wonder where his parents were this whole time? Sleeping.
Three years later, she swears that they still talk about this trip "literally daily". In June 2014, Melanie's family took the trip of a lifetime to Cape Town, South Africa. Led by the interests of their 11, 14, and 16 year old kids, they dove with sharks, harvested food with locals, and shared the views only seen by South Africans typically. They found it all in one township: wildlife, adventure, beaches, mountains, culture, history, food, and people... #hablalovestravel
The plan was a six-day adventure with my kids (ages 9 and 11) and my girlfriend with her kids (ages 8 and 10). As soon as we chose Iceland as our destination, my researcher-self took center stage. Blogs and other online travel sites were immensely helpful so when we landed on the beautiful and mystical island, I felt pretty darn prepared.
While my research was fruitful, the focus of this post is to share information I didn’t find that would have been helpful so you, too, can leave with no regrets.
STAY INSIDE AND OUTSIDE THE CITY
SEE AS MUCH OF THE COUNTRY AS POSSIBLE
THE BLUE LAGOON IS AN ABSOLUTE MUST!
Thanks to PAMM, we took away this novel way to get to know other artists on our own, by researching and discovering the music that inspired them. Then, being brave and taking pencil or pen or pastel or paint to paper to see what comes out of us, could we hear the same tunes? What tunes do you think were Picasso’s fave? Or Warhol’s? What would be mine? What would be yours? And what would art would we make?
As the days rolled along, there was way more to why this vacation was feeling like a vacation….
When was the last time your bathing suit was your uniform?
Or you felt a breeze across your belly and your back every single afternoon?
Or didn’t bathe for days because the ocean washed you?
Or didn’t brush your hair because the wind did?
Or felt the earth beneath your bare feet, between your toes instead of socks and shoes?
Mindfulness. Music. Language Learning.
How they are connected. Why they are connected. And how to learn a new language the easiest way possible. Here are 7 tips on how to use mindfulness techniques when learning or teaching foreign language through music.
...Because we are using our conscious awareness every time we pause to think of a new word or a correct verb conjugation, we find ourselves in the present moment. We also embody a tender vulnerability when we find ourselves in the position of a beginner. As Zen master Shunryu Suzuki says, “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.” If we can stay with that vulnerability and have the courage to make mistakes and keep on trying, we have huge opportunity for growth...
I ate a big but ant (salty!).
I nearly drowned myself in a mud volcano.
I dipped my cheese in hot chocolate and loved the savory-sweet juxtaposition.
I felt the graciousness of so many Colombians that it makes me take pause.
There are not a lot of tourists in Bogotá, and I suppose that is due to the prevailing reputation of narco-guerrilla violence leftover. But I tell you, it couldn’t be a nicer surprise. Arriving to Bogotá, we were greeted by the vast and sprawling city surrounded like a jeweled necklace of lush green voluptuous mountains. My girlfriend told me “me llenan”, they fill her, and I get it. They would be overwhelming if they weren’t so nurturing. The only thing that rivals these Andes are the constituents it protects.
One of the fears we have as travelers is going somewhere or doing something that is clearly cheesy. For example, in South Dakota lives a billboard-driven place called Wall Drug, a sort of roadside mall surrounded by fiberglass animals like a fake-looking, brilliant green 80-foot dinosaur, invariably surrounded by a family posing with a selfie stick thrust in the air. Cheesy is an underestimate – let’s just say locals do not take these pictures.
So it was with mild trepidation that I had stumbled into a classic tourist trap when I booked the Don Juan Coffee and Chocolate Tour in Monteverde, Costa Rica, located in the mountains three hours northwest of the capital, San Jose.
I could not have made a better choice.
The best part about traveling in an unfamiliar place is finding exactly what you didn't expect.
Take, for example, the French bakery on the side of the narrow two-late road just over the ditch about a mile from downtown Tamarindo. From the outside, La Panaderia de Paris sits inside a tired building complex, including a motel notable for its beach proximity and not so much for its elegance. Entering a dark hallway, an old man, curiously from China, sat slumped in a wooden chair just outside the bakery’s door. I nodded hello, unsure if his silent stare was an ominous warning or a curious gaze that I had stumbled into the place.
And then I walked in.
Racks of pan de raisins, croissants, chocolate éclairs; baguettes baking in vintage ovens, the air pungent with yeast and flour and roasting coffee bean ground for espresso ...
“Magic,” my daughter whispered, gazing wistfully at the moonlit sea. “I knew fairy dust was real!”
Her older sister shoved her bare feet deeper into the day’s sand castle, readying to provide the scientific explanation for the sparkling water. With a gentle but quick hand on her shoulder, she caught my look. Don’t interrupt this moment of wonder, my eyes implored. Let her be.
And so that is why the three of us, dressed in breezy linen blouses and sarongs on a warm evening, leaned back on damp towels on the inner curve of a long, palm-tree lined beach in Tamarindo, Costa Rica: to catch the next sighting of fairies scattering twinkling dust across the ocean waves, gently lapping at the shore.
I’ve always been nomadic. As a young adult, the idea of staying in one place for more than a few months, let alone a few years, was a foreign concept. The same can be said for my husband. Both individually and as a couple pre-kids, we’ve travelled to Southeast Asia, Australia, South America, and Europe. We hadn’t been abroad (except to Canada and Mexico) with our two children ever, and they were 8 and 10 years old! The time had finally arrived for our overseas adventure.
...a challenge when traveling in your own backyard is that the experience loses some of the normal excitement found in exploring a new place...
Travel doesn’t have to mean an overnight trip, or a week away. A trip can happen in your neighborhood for a few hours – just enough to take a break, rejuvenate the soul, and experience a little more of the world around you.
