Our 1-day Western Kyoto Itinerary features a range of temples, gardens, and other stops in Arashiyama and Sagano, along with one of the best places to see monkeys in Japan (because we’ve got our priorities straight). In this touring plan, we’ll provide strategy for efficiently seeing everything from UNESCO World Heritage Sites to under-the-radar gems, […]
France is an incredible place. After numerous trips spanning from Normandy to the Loire Valley, and a variety of places in between, it has become one of our favorite countries in the world. In this post, we’ll detail some of our favorite experiences in France thus far. It’s not so much a top 10 things […]
Due to its sprawling nature, one of the challenges about a list of the top things to do in Los Angeles is defining L.A. This might sound odd, as the definition of city is pretty straightforward. It’s not exactly an amorphous thing. However, since Los Angeles is spread out, with many of its key draws beyond the […]
If you’re traveling to Japan and plan to tour Kyoto for 2 days, this provides our itinerary for efficiently experiencing temples, shrines, and the most popular attractions in Kyoto to save time. In so doing, our 2-day Kyoto itinerary also offers a few suggestions for off-the-beaten-path ways to “stop and smell the roses” (or cherry […]
With the Winter Olympics in PyeongChang sparking new interest in South Korea, I thought it’d be a perfect time to finally share our experience visiting nearby Seoul with a quick trip report and 50+ photos from our travels. A lot of new travelers are going to fall in love with South Korea from afar…so why not add […]
If you’ve perused the National Parks category of the blog, you might know that I’m a huge NPS enthusiast. In this post, I wanted to share my favorite parks from Maine to Hawaii, and everywhere in between. For a number of years growing up, we took two vacations every year: Florida in the late winter […]
Konnichiwa from Japan! During our trip, we made stops at Mount Fuji, Nagoya, Hiroshima, and Osaka before arriving in Kyoto. We’ve already posted photo-heavy installments of this trip report from Tokyo through Nagoya, and will have the other parts of the report soon. (Last updated January 24, 2018.) This post basically just functions as a […]
As Japan’s “cultural capital,” Kyoto has no shortage of things to do and places to see. Its temples and shrines alone number over 1,600, with a dozen of those being UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Its allure goes far beyond the spiritual, with Kyoto offering so much that you could spend months here without experiencing all […]
We’re back from Japan and gearing up for a big year. In this post, I want to run through a variety of topics looking back at last year and forward to this year, covering where the blog is going next. Mostly, I want to “think aloud” a bit, tossing around some ideas, explaining my rationale, […]
Planning a winter trip to a place with cold weather? Wondering what to pack to stay warm for your hike or photography expedition? This post has you covered! Growing up in the snow belt of Michigan where the “Lake Effect Snow Machine,” as our local weatherman typically called it and attending college just south of […]