Archives for March 2020

When I was young, my parents stressed the importance of seeing this world’s natural wonders. More specifically, nature’s wonders throughout the United States. To be more straightforward, I’m referring to the National Parks.

This past summer, my family’s german exchange student, Christopher, and his girlfriend, Caroline, came to visit us, and we took them on a classic road trip through four states and seven National Parks. The journey began in Denver, Colorado, the mile-high city. From here, we drove to Rocky Mountain National Park. From Rocky Mountain National Park, we drove through Wyoming. A beautiful yet extremely flat state. Like possibly the flattest state, even flatter than Ohio. However, Wyoming is beautiful and vast.

Here, we stopped in Thermopolis for a driving break and visited a Hot Springs Park. Here, we soaked in warm natural hot springs that are known to have many health benefits. Warning: the hot springs smelled like rotten eggs at first, but you quickly get over this once you feel the warmth. After relaxing, we hopped back in the car and continued our drive to Cody, Wyoming. Cody is close to one of the main entrances to Yellowstone National Park. While in Cody, you must visit Proud Cut Saloon. This saloon will quite literally take you back into the wild west. Then on to beautiful, wild, and incredible Yellowstone! Old Faithful is a MUST, along with the Grand Prismatic Springs, and of course, the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. When taking a break from hiking, you must try huckleberry ice cream. So yummy! In Yellowstone, you will see so much wildlife. Especially bison…big bison, medium bison, baby bison, all BISON. And if you are feeling extra bison-y, you can grab a bison burger pretty much anywhere and everywhere. I love bison so much, sorry I know I just talked a lot about them. After Yellowstone, we went down to Utah and visited a few more national parks but that is a story for another time. Thank you so much for tuning into my blog this week.

Hello bloggers, in a time of the coronavirus I find myself disappearing away in the world of times before the virus struck this nation. With motivation running low, I am going to take some time and talk about one of my favorite vacations to pass the time. This vacation starts off in Switzerland which is home to the swiss chocolate, Lake Geneva, the Matterhorn, pocket knives, happy people, and so much more. When I say that every city in Switzerland was absolutely beautiful and clean, I really mean every word of it. The swiss take tremendous pride in keeping their nation nice and clean and it is eye-opening compared to some of the cities I have been to around the United States.

One of the stops we had made in Switzerland was at Lake Geneva.  If you are a Queen lover, there is a statue of Freddie Mercury, for he loved this part of Switzerland and often said, “If you want peace of soul, come to Montreux.”The band’s song, the lake’s beauty, inspired a Winter’s Tale. If you also know the basic chords of Smoke On the Water, that song was inspired when the band, Deep Purple, woke up one morning after a late night… and called the fire department because Deep Purple thought the morning fog was actually a boat or building on fire. As a rock and roll fan, I loved this beautiful town by the lake.

Finally, we made our way to Lucerne by traveling through the scenic Grimsel Pass. Lucerne is famous for its medieval architecture and centuries-old wooden pedestrian bridge. This bridge, known as Chapel Bridge, is the oldest covered wooden bridge in all of Europe (dating back to the 14th century) and is a must-see. We walked through Old Town down the cobbled streets and through the tall painted houses. To end your day just right, stop in a restaurant for some classic swiss cheese (and chocolate) fondue. This trip brought me back so much joy from the times overseas. 

 

 

 

My mother and father had gone down to Mexico once before they took me, which happened to be their honeymoon. They had gone to Cancun where my dad drank some unfiltered water and develop a very violent stomach issue which essentially ruined their entire honeymoon. When I went down to Mexico it was originally supposed to be my mother and my father and one of my good friends, Travis, was taking the place of my sister because she was supposed to go down to Guatemala which was a part of her Spanish group trip. However, due to poor conditions and hurricane-like conditions in Atlanta where they would have their layover, they were unable to get the plane off the ground and they were stuck in Pittsburgh. Since there are limited flights to Guatemala, they canceled the trip, but on the bright side, my family had not left yet so Nina could join us in Mexico. From there we went to Puerto Vallarta and stayed at a resort which was an all-inclusive ordeal. This was the first time that I have experienced something like this, and let’s just say I gained a couple of pounds. It was basically the food plan at Penn State but the food was editable.

 

Every night at the resort they would have a special performance which was often themed. My favorite performance was the mariachi band that came in and did a beautiful job. It was also on that night when my friend Travis decided to try some mole, which is a typical Mexican cuisine. However this was a problem because Travis is allergic to peanuts and mole has peanuts in it, which was discovered slightly after he took his first bite. We wanted to avoid using the EpiPen at all costs due to the probability that he would have to go to the hospital shortly after, which meant we had to go to a hospital in Mexico. Thankfully, my mother is a health professional which means she basically has every major medicine needed for emergencies and he took the medicine shortly after the mole and he did not need to use the EpiPen. We had an amazing time on the trip and got to see a ton of sights in Puerto Vallarta.