Here you will find an archived weblog of my food, travel, and creative pursuits which I kept from 2010-2016. Please note both that the travel information contained here may outdated and that these logs were created on a prior version of this website and may not yet be optimized for the current version. If you’re looking for specific content, use the search field below! <3
Before heading to Cadaqués, my husband and I had two things not going very well for us; my still-healing-from-an-injury-ankle was swollen and our camera had died. While we couldn’t do much about my ankle, other than skip our planned Pyrenees hikes, we figured we could purchase another camera to get us through the rest of the trip and head to the coast a day earlier than planned.
Read MoreJust a short day trip from Anchorage, the city of Whittier has only one access point by land - through a two and half mile tunnel. It's the second longest highway tunnel in North America, only one lane wide, and is mixed use - for both road vehicles and rail.
Read MoreWhat I Was Reading & Watching
A family of three journeys from California to Argentina in a van. Awesome.
Feeling inspired by Ingunn's honest tale of climbing Mt. Adams.
YES to everything in this post on thirty-something travelers. And yet another reason why Brenna is one of my absolute favorite travel bloggers/writers.
Exploring Cornwall has been high on my travel to-do list for some time now - and what better way than with a road trip!
What's on my desktop right now? This rebeltastic wallpaper from Striped Cat Studio.
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In general, I've been very hands off with the garden this year. Lots of unexpected things have come up and I just haven't had the time to be as attentive as I'd like. I am, after all, a rather lazy gardener with purposefully low expectations. That being said, at the beginning of the month there was only one tomato each on the Brandywine and Amish Paste plants. So, I decided it was time to give pruning a try. The idea behind pruning is that you get more good nutrients going towards producing fruit by cutting off some of the excess foliage which is taking away that energy and fuel. I ended up removing most of the lower branches as well as most all without flowers all around the plant.
The result?
Jennifer is a writer and travel enthusiast based in the Sacramento area of Northern California. She has recently given in to the insatiable urge to wander and shares her photos and experiences over on her blog, People + Places + Things. Jennifer has also authored several travel guide apps and creates content for online and print publications.
Stay somewhere comfortable
Deciding where and how you’ll catch some zzzzz’s while you’re visiting a national park is very important and one of the first things we tackle when planning a trip. Do you want to camp and sleep under the stars? What about a nice hotel inside the park? Or perhaps a small rustic cabin in the woods nearby?
Whatever offers you and yours the most comfort and an opportunity for some down time is often the best choice. You’ll be happy to have a place to rest and recover after long days full of hiking, exploring and sightseeing.
It's starting to seem like just about every trip I take to Boston is filled with some kind of food related mishap or at least a mildly chaotic episode. On my first trip after going gluten free back in 2011, I got glutened and spent 2 1/2 days feeling incredibly sick. This time around finding gluten free options seemed much easier, however each time I ordered my gluten free dish without any dairy - that last request always seemed to slip the staff's mind. That being said - both restaurants I'll mention in this short post recovered very well from the stumble and got me a new hot dish immediately.
The Alpine Lakes Wilderness is the kind of place my dreams are made of. No joke, even my day dreams are filled with craggy mountain wonderlands with crystal clear lakes, pine trees, and trails. Not surprisingly, a visit to the Alpine Lakes Wilderness in Washington's Cascades has been high on my list since we moved here.
Read MoreDuring our drive down the West Coast of the South Island of New Zealand, we stopped to take a short hike out to Fox Glacier. Perhaps one of the most fascinating things about this glacier is that ends in a lush green rainforest which makes the beautiful blues in the ice stand out even more.
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Let me answer the first question that's on your mind. Am I in San Diego for Comic Con?
No. I'm home in Seattle - still dreaming big dreams after WDS. However, I certainly wouldn't mind a trip to San Diego for a combination of Comic Con and some surfing in Encinitas.
Even though I'm not in Sandy Eggo this week, thousands of other awesome people are descending upon a city which I used to call home and which happens to have a fantastic gluten free eating scene. After all the thanks and positive comments I received about the Gluten Free In Portland: For WDS post and a great twitter friend of mine asking if I had a similar guide for San Diego - it seemed just right that I get this post together.
One last thing before I get into my picks for the best places to eat around the city. When I attended WDS a few weeks ago in Portland, I found a custom twitter hashtag to be very useful for sharing great finds with my gluten free compatriots. So if you find a great gluten free establishment during your week in San Diego - share it on twitter with #SDCCGF!
I was introduced to muesli during my very first trip to New Zealand back in 2005 at a small hotel on the shores of Lake Taupo. It was just before the beginning of winter, so the hotel (and the town) was seemingly deserted aside from myself and my travel partner. The breakfast buffet was so eye opening and delicious, it completely changed my morning habits. With a spread of fresh fruits, European style yogurts, jams, and this funny looking oat based cereal called muesli - that little hotel had made me my favorite breakfast that I'd never had.
There's something about museli that just feels filling and hearty to me. While I could enjoy it with yogurt, my favorite way is to soak it in my homemade Almond Milk for about 5 minutes and add a teaspoon of Rhubarb & Meyer Lemon Jam. A jar full of muesli is also one of my favorite recipes to take on the road with me. At this point it's pretty easy to find at least a carton of non-dairy milk wherever I travel, but finding gluten free muesli that doesn't have raisins or cranberries seems to be near impossible. The other advantage of making it at home is that I got to stock it full of my favorite dried fruit and nuts - most often I go with this combination of apricots and hazelnuts.
