Adventure of the month

I'm not even going to lie. I got way behind on this blog and was considering abandoning it altogether. A night out talking travel with a friend's sister reignited my creative juices and got me to jump back in. Since then I have been using the magic of time travel (aka the blogger "schedule" function) to go back and fill in the many blanks. I am happy to report that once these posts on the land of H&M and Ikea are done, I will be fully caught up. That's the good news. The bad news is that it has been almost a year since I paid a three day visit to my 95th country so the details are not as clear as they could be.  There is also the issue of what happens when you give a FOMO sufferer an all access museum pass.  I was pretty much non-stop for 72 hours.  I was checking off parks and museums like it was a competition and Alexander Skarsgard was the prize.

The good:  I had a day to kick around in Trondheim, Norway and a self-guided walking tour I had printed from the Fodor's website to steer me in the right direction.  I was off to a good start, seeing as we were staying right in the heart of downtown and the sun was making a valiant effort to come out and greet us. The bad:  One day was not enough.  To compound matters, this one and only day started rather late due to a delayed arrival and was cut short by a very early departure.  Also, that sun could have tried a little harder.  Norway in mid-June is not exactly balmy. The trying to find a silver lining in our shortened stay:  Had I stayed any longer, I would have had to look into selling an organ to cover costs and I fear that the blue book value on my original parts is not as high as I would hope.  Norway is the second most expensive country in the world to live in (after Switzerland).  Just getting through the day requires lot o...

Iceland and Natural Beauty. The two go hand in hand like Bey and Jay. Like Brad and Angie. Like Bert and Ernie. From the moment you step off the plane in Keflavik, you are struck by how dramatically gorgeous the surrounding landscape can be. If it happens to be June and you are not bundled into 17 wooly layers and are not tearing up against the harsh winds every time you step outside, you enjoy it all the more. My most recent visit was during the "summer". I use quotes around the word "summer" because the Icelandic average "summer" temperature is in the mid-fifties. This is remarkably similar to Miami's "winter". Mind you, this is way better than their usual climate, which is somewhere in the range of apocalyptic freeze and "Why can't I feel my toes?"  But what Mother Nature takes away in beach days, she more than makes up for in other ways.

Knock, knock Who's there? Four days off in Martinique Four days off in Martinique who? Four days off in Martinique at the very same time that my good friend's husband, a born and bred Martinican?/ Martinese?/ Martini?/ On the rocks?/ Shaken not stirred? (Note: ask Sebastien what exactly his people are called) is there to celebrate his mother's 60th birthday. That's not a joke.  That's just you bragging about an incredible stroke of luck. And if you would just spend 2 seconds googling, you would know that Martiniquais is the preferred answer. What's that, fictional construct that I created in my head?  I can't hear you over this jamming soca music.  And hey, since you are over there, could you pass me the sunscreen?

Back in the days when I was a bored law student, longing to get out of my small college town, I got wind of the possibility of a summer study-abroad program. I would pay for the credit hours and flight and the University would take care of my room and board. There were three options. Belize, London or Yugoslavia. Belize held the promise of beaches, which I had in ample supply back home. The London program, at Oxford I believe, was rumored to require actual studying.  Nope. I knew next to nothing about Yugoslavia. Couldn’t have pointed it out on a map if I’d been asked but this program was led by a favored professor, a notorious good time guy who liked to throw extravagant parties at his home. (extravagant, at that time meant that he used actual glassware and provided beers from actual bottles and not whatever keg was on sale at Mike’s Beer Barn). Additionally, word had trickled down to us about how cheap everything was, words that sing loving harmonies to broke college stude...

Regular readers (hi Sans, Roly and Yale)may have noticed that this blog has been silent for the last few months. Others, (hi, people who have stumbled upon this page whilst googling the importance of size and are now sorely disappointed) will see that thanks to the magic of back-dating everything is business as usual. To both groups, I apologize. Anyhoo, last time I checked in, I was in Munich for five days, drinking beer in quantities that led me to believe that buying a dirndl was a good idea. Fortunately, I did not have the space in my bag for the five underskirts and push-up bra the outfit requires, so a change of scenery was in order. As luck (and basic geography) would have it, there was also a country I had not been to a mere 2.5 hour drive away. Thus it was decided, we were going to Liechtenstein. Situated in the Alps,  somewhere between Austria and Switzerland, the world's sixth smallest country (it's only 62 square miles) promised, if nothing else, a really ...

Fifteen years ago, I had the good fortune of going to one of Europe's booziest cities at the peak of its drinky drunkenness.  More specifically, that would be Munich on the opening day of Oktoberfest.  From the moment the first keg was ceremoniously tapped (noon-ish?) until the wee hours of that evening, my friend Michelle and I swung heavy tankards to and fro, all whilst becoming increasingly proficient in the art of German drinking songs.  As we stumbled from tent to tent, I remember trying to find something non-meatlike that I could eat.  The sole menu item available to me was the giant pretzel. I must have had at least a half dozen in a misguided attempt to somehow soak up all the alcohol that was coursing through my system. That day was as messy as it was fun.  Falling asleep on the train and ending up in the wrong part of the country the next day...not so much.  But we survived it and had a story to tell...but not a single non-ale related photo to...