Take Me Back: Florence, Italy

You arrive in a new city and your heart starts to beat differently. An overwhelming sense of calm washes over you and you just know you were meant to be in this place. You see things you've never seen before, but they look so familiar. Has this ever happened to you before? Every so often this happens in certain moments, but to have deja vu for an entire place?

In Italy this happened to me. I felt so home - like I could stay there forever and be perfectly content. Everything about Italy seemed familiar - the laid-back life, the smells, the dolce vita. Even communicating with people in broken Italian seemed effortless. I haven't been back, so I'm not sure if it was a "perfect moment in a perfect time with the perfect people" thing or if it was something more. Living in Tuscany for 6 weeks was an absolute dream and it just felt...right. I still honestly believe that the only reason I came home was because I missed the people and not the US. Here we are, 7 years later, and I miss Italy more than ever.

Florence was the closest big city to our Tuscan town of Castiglion Fiorentino. We had the chance to visit here a lot during our 6 week study abroad as it was only an hour train ride away. If I had to pick my favorite place in all of Italy, I would have to go with Florence. If you are planning a trip here, here are a few of my "Must Do's":

San Lorenzo Market - In between the train station (Santa Maria Novella) and the famous Duomo of Florence, this sprawling market is a must. Pick up your leather goods, souvenir t-shirts, any type of scarf imaginable, or a slew of silk ties for a couple of euro a piece. It's more than okay to haggle here...I was able to get my leather purse for less than 1/2 price! Spend a few hours wandering around the stalls.

The Accademia - Go here to see the famous statue, the David, by Michelango. It is super impressive just how tall this statue is. There are also other works here by Michaelango and important pieces by Botticelli and Giotto.

Climb the Duomo - It's 463 steps to the top, but you couldn't ask for a better view of Florence and the Arno valley. You also get an up close and personal look at the paintings inside of the dome itself.

Piazzale Michaengelo - I would make the hike up here for a drink at the end of your day. The sunset views are great from here, but the restaurants are a little expensive. It might be best to grab a glass of bubbly and a few antipasti to enjoy instead of a full meal.

Day Trip (or more) to Tuscany - Like I said, Florence was only 1 hour by train. Cortona was one stop past Castiglion Fiorentino and Arrezo was one stop before. Both of these are good places to experience a perfect day under the Tuscan sun. If you can, go to an agriturismo and sample cheese, olive oil and wine and take a peek in a some of the old churches.

There are many more things to do in Florence. You can walk along the Ponte Vecchio and look at jewelry, explore the Medici Chapels, visit the Uffizi Gallery and Bargello Museums and eat lots of pasta and gelato (of course). There is a "Firenze Pass" that works at many museums and for public transportation which would definitely be the way to go! I would love to make a trip back here in the next few years so I can show Jason - we'll see if that works out!

Note: We're going to keep doing this "Take Me Back" series so we can remember some of our favorite places we're traveled before Southwest Airlines came in the picture. Expect some posts about Hawaii and maybe a few more from Italy!

 

Oklahoma City, OK

Since college, we've done an annual girl's trip to help everyone keep in touch within our group since we live all across the US (and now Canada!). We've made trips to Dallas, Minneapolis and this year, we went to Oklahoma City. Last year, 2 of us moved up to OKC, so we figured this would be a good chance to see where they lived! I went up last year to visit, but it was nice to make the trip back up again this year.

Our trip last year, we went to the OKC Bombing Memorial. It was a really beautiful tribute to all of the people who lost their lives here. It was boiling hot last time we went, so it was a brief trip, but it was still nice to see. The OKC Marathon starts and ends at this memorial and this year it was held a week after the Boston Marathon. They invited all of those who weren't able to finish in Boston to come finish in OKC. The Boston runners were able to run with the support of a city that really understands overcoming tragedies. Kind of cool I thought.

 

 

 

 

This trip, I was able to meet up with the girls after they visited the memorial. The boys grilled and we had a lovely meal cooked for us by Rebekah and Brittany. The next day, we ate a yummy brunch and then went to hang out in Bricktown. We took the water taxi that showed us around the area.

 

 

 

 



 

After this, we explored downtown a little and then headed to the Paseo district. We looked around some art galleries here and grabbed a bite to eat. That night, we went to an awesome jazz show at the University of Central Oklahoma's jazz lab. We ended our trip the next day with brunch at Whiskey Cake and a trip to Pops along Route 66. This place is so cute - they have thousands of different kinds of soda in hundreds of flavors. They have the usuals like root beer and cream soda, but also the weirdos like bacon and apple crumble.

 

 

 

 

 

It was a great weekend filled with great friends, bad pop music and many laughs. For our girls' trip next year, we're hoping to go visit Emily in Toronto! Thanks again ladies for a great weekend.

 

I will be going to Orlando, FL in a month for a work conference...the longest non-traveling break we've had all year! I'm planning on going a little before the conference starts and visiting the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Disney - I can't wait!

Vancouver, British Columbia

Seattle was one of my favorite trips that we took last year, so I had high hopes for Vancouver as well. We had originally planned to use Jason’s gold passes, but ended up not needing to. This is great news as we can now use those to go to Mexico or the Caribbean with a confirmed seat!

The trip really started Friday morning when we drove from Seattle into Vancouver. This was only around a 3 hour drive (with border crossing) even with a bridge collapse causing a detour to our route. We got in around lunch time and immediately went hiking after a quick bite to eat. We had been told that Lynn Canyon has great hiking and a really cool suspension bridge. We choose a 3 hour hike that was really nice. The weather was beautiful and it was so nice to just be outdoors all day.

That night, we went to go grab some of Vancouver’s famously good sushi at a place called Aki. It was so incredibly fresh and honestly pretty cheap. Overall, Vancouver is super expensive, but we lucked out with this place!

The next morning, we went to Honey’s Doughnuts to grab some grub before we went hiking AGAIN! I got a delicious maple and Jason got a honey “doughnut” that were more like really dense cake. With some coffee to warm us up, we set off to hike the Baden Powell trail in Deep Cove. This was definitely a more rigorous hike, but once we got up to the top, we had some crazy views of the water.

That afternoon, we rented bikes to explore Stanley Park. This park is roughly the same size as Central Park, but that’s really the only comparison. It’s set on the seawall and you can bike around the entire thing in a few hours. It really has everything you could ever want – beaches, stunning views, forests, gardens, an aquarium and more. I have never been to a place like this before. It was pretty spectacular.

 

From the park, we caught an “Aquabus” to Granville Island (we could bring our bikes along too) and explored the tiny island. There is a daily farmer’s market, shops of every kind (my favorite was a hat shop) and even a water park! We stopped in at Granville Island Brewery for a tasting before we finished our walk around the island. Overall, it was perfect, but exhausting, second day.

Our last day in Vancouver, we drove the Sea to Sky Highway up to Whistler. This was the most beautiful drive I’ve ever been on (Jason’s is still Road to Hana on Maui). We had a view of the Howe Sound almost the entire way. It was only about an hour and ½ drive from downtown and once we made it there, we…went hiking of course! We hiked about 6km along the Cheakamus River which eventually turned into the lake. It was a very fun hike – probably our favorite!

We made a quick stop around downtown Whistler before heading back towards Seattle to catch an early am flight the next day. Vancouver was amazing and the most beautiful city we’ve been to. Everything was so green, everyone was outside and active and Canadians are just so darn friendly. I love the Pacific Northwest and definitely want to make many trips back there. I would love to see the San Juan Islands and spend a few days hiking around Mount Rainier. I am also looking forward to attending a wedding in Portland later this year. Out of all the places we’ve been, Seattle feels the most like home and I could definitely see us living here somewhere down the road.

Well, this was our last “together” trip for quite a while. Jason has a trip for work to do a station audit (somewhere REALLY awesome – I’m jealous!) and I have a conference, girls’ trip and a few weddings to attend. Jason is over travel, but I’m still in that travel routine. I’m glad I have a few things lined up within the next few months. When we’re just here in Dallas, sometimes I get bored not having trips to plan and cities to explore. Not the worst problem in the world, I know. Next up - Girls' Weekend in OKC in a few weeks!

Siem Reap, Cambodia {Part 2}

As I mentioned, we decided to hire a tuk tuk driver (for $12/day!) for our 2nd day of exploration. This was the best decision EVER! Our first stop was Bayon, a Buddhist temple built in the late 12th century complete with 37 towers. Almost every tower has four carved faces each pointing in a cardinal direction. From afar, the temple looks completely uniform but up close, you can see how each stone was fit together like jigsaw puzzle pieces. The large stone faces have become some of the most famous images connected to Khmer art and architecture. Inside was like a giant maze with passage ways, shrines and open window sills all looking like they were about to crumble.

 

Bayon was part of Angkor Thom, which was a complex that included many other temples and terraces. Below, there are pictures of the Terrace of the Lepers and Terrace of the Elephants. It was fun walking around, but we didn't last long here as most wasn't shaded. Did I mention that it was HOT?! When we got back to the hotel later this day, it was 107 - I can only guess that it was hotter while we were out exploring.

We really enjoyed Preah Khan temple as well. This was probably the temple that we saw that was the most "in ruins". There is a debate going on about how much to restore this temple and how much to leave it in the state that it was found in. I personally loved the feel of this one since it was really in the jungle with overgrowth and trees poking out. You could hear the birds chirping and there were hardly any people to be seen. I felt very much like Indiana Jones discovering this hidden ruin. For the most part, you can really jump and climb over everything. Hard to believe that all of these areas had to be swept for landmines only 30 years ago. For that reason, when an area says "danger" or "landmines may be present", you need to respect that.

Our absolute favorite temple was the last we visited - the Buddhist temple of Ta Prohm. I loved this temple because it was in complete shambles and tinted a faint red and green color from its jungle surroundings. The grounds and temple itself were completely overgrown with humongous roots and trees. This is also the temple that was featured in Lara Croft, Tomb Raider for any of you movie buffs out there.

 

We ended our day at the pool with $5 pitchers of Redbull/vodkas and massages. The next morning, we got in some pool time before we had to catch a plane to Bangkok. The trip back to the US home involved us frantically buying Australian visas at the Bangkok airport (only needed for people who don't have a "guaranteed seat" out = us), but seats looked good! We jumped on a flight from Bangkok to Sydney (on Emirates) and Sydney to LAX (on Qantas) and then LAX home (on Southwest). 30+ hours of traveling later and we were home!

We really loved this trip and we especially loved how cheap everything was. There are so many places I would like to go in the world, but I can definitely see going back here some day. I would recommend every single place we visited and would be happy to email anyone more details in case anyone is thinking about a trip. My biggest piece of advice? PACK LIGHT! I am fairly high maintenance and I managed to fit 16 days worth of clothes in this carryon pack. Be impressed - be VERY impressed.

 

Thanks again Southwest Airlines. This trip had been planned in my mind for at least 6-7 years and was truly epic. Standby travel is always stressful (I expect no sympathy here), but it is always worth it. I'd like to think that we're kind of old pros at this thing now!

Up next for us? We just can't stop - we're heading to Vancouver, Canada tomorrow. We've never been to Canada before, so it should be great! I hope everyone has a great Memorial Day weekend!