Back to Asia: Discovering Taiwan
The last time we were in Southeast Asia was in 2019, which now seems like a lifetime ago. Our first trip to that region was Thailand in 2013, followed by India in 2014, Japan in 2016, China in 2017, Cambodia in 2018, and finally Vietnam in 2019. On our first […]
France Flashback: Châteaux of the Loire Valley
If you’ve ever skimmed our blog, you already know our usual pattern: go to a country, spend two weeks there, enjoy the hell out of it, swear we’ll return, and then never set foot there again. It happens every single time, no matter how earnestly we insist that this time […]
A Year in the Windy City: Unique Things to Do in Chicago
With 2026 underway, we’re excited for all our upcoming trips this year. But globetrotting aside, our own city of Chicago offers enough adventures to fill a whole calendar. We love being tourists in our own backyard, exploring it even after decades of living there. And because we are always obsessed […]
The U.S. Virgin Islands: Unlikely, but Possible
After getting back from the U.S. Virgin Islands, we calculated our total expenses for two people for six days, one week before high season, and it came out to $1,875 for everything, including flights, accommodations, a rental car, food, and all entrance fees. Nowadays, whenever you don’t know how to […]
The U.S. Virgin Islands: America, But Not Quite the America You Know
“So, did we travel internationally or not?” We asked ourselves this question recently after returning from the U.S. Virgin Islands. Before the trip, we felt we weren’t traveling outside of the United States. The USVI is not a country. It’s a territory and part of the United States. The “U.S.” […]
The Magic Dancing Dolls or The Scam That Took 15 Years to Solve
In 1999, a few girlfriends and I decided to take our very first international post-college trip to Europe. We had no idea how to go on our own, so we booked a bus tour that would take us across seven countries in a span of two weeks. The tour company […]
A Lesson On How Not To Get Scammed From People Who Got Scammed
From the moment we strap on our backpacks, tell the cats we love them and to behave themselves, and head out to the airport, an invisible target appears on our backs. We are now tourists and therefore the target of every tourist scam in the world. We are strangers in […]
Tour de World
When we travel, we generally rely on all modes of transportation available to us. Through the years, we flew on domestic Brazilian and Peruvian airlines, took overnight trains in India and Egypt, rode subways in Mexico City and Barcelona, and bounced in packed minivans in Jamaica and Guatemala. We also […]
NAKED BATH JAPANESE GIRLS
It’s always interesting for me to see which of our posts get more traction and which barely get a trickle of visitors. I often find it to be completely unpredictable when some of my own favorite posts fly under the radar (example 1, 2, 3) while uninspired 20-minute write-ups are getting […]
There Is Always Room for More: Exploring Japanese Cuisine. Part II
My last post was all noodles – soba, udon, ramen, but there is so much more to Japanese culinary traditions. To expand our food horizons, we visited Dotombori Street in Osaka. The name “Dotombori” refers both to the Dotombori Canal and to Dotombori Street, which runs parallel to the canal’s […]
Welcome to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the Coffee Capital of the United States
For many people, Milwaukee is and has always been the U.S. beer capital. The stereotype is understandable given the city’s history, but a little bit outdated. Milwaukee’s breweries thrived in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and for a time, the city was home to the four largest breweries in […]