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Charleston Plantations Guide: 6 Plantations near Charleston South Carolina

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Charleston’s plantations are a window into the area’s past. Here you will find tales of wealth and prosperity, of love and war, and of suffering and survival. Before the Civil War, there were hundreds of plantations located outside Charleston, growing indigo, cotton, rice, and other cash crops. Charleston became wealthy from these plantations, but these riches were of course made on the backs of the slaves who were forced to work the fields. Many of the plantations near Charleston were either destroyed during the Civil War or ceased operations soon after as many become unprofitable without the use of slave labor. Today, several plantations and plantations homes, ranging from farmhouses to mansions, have been restored and preserved as museums and tourist attractions. Each of the Charleston plantations offer different experiences. Whether you’re looking for an escape from city life, a walk in a beautiful garden, a glimpse of history, to… Read the rest

A Guide to Harry Potter Filming Locations in Scotland

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Scotland is a magical destination for several reasons, one being that you can find many Harry Potter filming locations in Scotland. As any fan of the Harry Potter films will know, Hogwarts is located in Scotland and thus it is not surprising that a number of exterior scenes for the movies were shot in Scotland. Some of most iconic are the Hogwarts Express train scenes and the location of Hagrid’s hut. Lots of scenes involving lakes were also filmed in Scotland with several Scottish lochs appearing across the eight movies. The dramatic Scottish scenery often provides a great backdrop for Hogwarts and the time the students spend at and around the school. It is often used in the Harry Potter films when it needs beautiful landscapes or a more wild and eerie location. We provide a guide to all the top Harry Potter filming locations in Scotland, including the Hogwarts… Read the rest

Complete Guide to Visiting the Eiffel Tower in Paris

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The Eiffel Tower is one of the most iconic landmarks, not just in Paris, but in the world. The iron tower is both an amazing feat of engineering and an inspiring symbol of the City of Lights. It’s a must see for all visitors to Paris. The problem is, everyone else wants to visit the Eiffel Tower too! The Eiffel Tower is the most visited paid monument in the world and receives an average of 25,000 visitors a day! New security screenings can slow down the visiting process even more. If you value your time, you’ll want to do a bit of pre-planning before visiting the Eiffel Tower. We’ve visited the Eiffel Tower several times and our post has all the information you need to plan your visit to the Eiffel Tower, including how to get there, how to buy tickets, where to get the best views, how to book… Read the rest

Guide to Visiting The Alamo in San Antonio Texas

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We’ve put together a guide to visiting The Alamo in San Antonio as well as the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park. No visit to San Antonio Texas is complete without visiting The Alamo! We’ll give you a brief history of The Alamo and the Battle of the Alamo so you can better understand and appreciate this popular attraction. Then we’ll tell you everything you need to know in order to visit The Alamo in San Antonio, including how to get here, fees, tips for parking, what to see, and nearby attractions in San Antonio. We also give you an overview of the Spanish colonial missions in Texas and why these were constructed. In addition to The Alamo, there are four other Spanish missions that you can visit in San Antonio and these form the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park. We share information on each of these mission and tips on… Read the rest

Guide to the Best Places to Celebrate Burns Night in Scotland

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Wondering where to celebrate Burns Night in 2019? We’ve put together a guide to the top places to join a Burns Supper or other type of Burns Night event to celebrate Robert Burns and his poetry. Whether you are a lifelong Burnsian or new to Scotland’s favorite bard, there are hundreds of ways to celebrate Burns Night in Scotland. We list 2019 Burns Night events in Ayrshire, Dumfries, Edinburgh, and Glasgow and information on when, where, and how to join these events. Whether you are looking for a formal Burns Supper, The Big Burns Supper festival, a poetry reading, a casual Burns brunch, or a family-friendly ceilidh, we have you covered. We also discuss each area’s connection with Robert Burns and Burns related attractions that you may want to visit. We also provide a brief history of Robert Burns and what happens at Burns Suppers for those who are celebrating Burns… Read the rest

Edinburgh Day Trips: 15 Best Day Trips from Edinburgh Scotland

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After three years in Edinburgh, we’ve put together a guide to our favorite day trips from Edinburgh Scotland. There are so many things you can do and see on a day trip from Edinburgh, which include exploring castles, touring whisky distilleries, teeing off on a famous golf course, exploring historical attractions, birdwatching, hiking in national parks, and visiting filming locations for popular movies and TV shows like Outlander, Harry Potter, and Downton Abbey. We suggest ideas for 15 day trips from Edinburgh that cover a range of interests as well as a wide array of regions from the Scottish Borders to Glasgow to the Scottish Highlands. For each day trip from Edinburgh, we provide all the information you need about how to plan your day out, from how to get there to things you can do there. We provide information on traveling by car, bus, train, and as part of a… Read the rest

Belfast Travel Guide: Top 40 Things to do in Belfast Northern Ireland

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Belfast is the capital and largest city in Northern Ireland, and there are so many things to do in Belfast! Belfast is probably best known for being where the RMS Titanic was built as well as for the violence and suffering here during The Troubles in the later part of the 20th century. However, today the city offers a lively historic city center, the famous Titanic Quarter, fun pubs, excellent museums, hundreds of street murals, beautiful gardens and green spaces, Victorian architecture, and a growing tourism industry. Belfast is perhaps not as well-known as Dublin to international travelers, but the reward of visiting here is a less crowded city where experiences feel more authentic.  We’ll share our guide to Belfast attractions, highlighting all the top things to do in Belfast, from central Belfast to the surrounding area. We’ll also share information about how to get there, when to go, public transport options,… Read the rest

Travel Photography: Best DSLR Cameras for Travel 2019

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DSLR cameras are a popular camera choice for travel photographers, as they offer great battery life, excellent image quality, a wide range of lens options, and full manual controls. They allow the photographer to take a lot of control over their travel photography and are available at a wide range of price points to suit most budgets. We’ve put together a detailed and helpful guide to the best DSLR cameras for travel. As professional travel photographers, we’ll help you decide if a DSLR camera is a good choice for you, provide advice on how to choose the best DSLR camera, and share a list of the best DSLR cameras currently available across various price points. We also give advice on how to make the most of a new DSLR camera, point out camera accessories that may be useful, and provide tips for protecting your camera while you are traveling. Choosing… Read the rest

Travel Tips: A Guide to Doing Laundry While Traveling

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Travel is fun but doing laundry while traveling can be a tedious chore. However, washing your clothes during a trip gives you the advantage of being able to pack less, rewear your favorite travel clothing, and return home with less dirty laundry. If you are going on a trip of more than a week, you’ll probably be thinking of laundry options. It can be difficult to figure out the best way to wash your clothes on a trip, and you don’t want to waste much of your vacation time on laundry. We’ve done trips of 6 months or more at a time, so doing laundry while traveling was essential! We’ve put together a guide to washing clothing while traveling for all budgets, whether you are a backpacker or luxury traveler. We cover all your options from hotel services to laundromats to hand washing in the hotel sink to camping solutions. We… Read the rest

Top 20 Things to Do in Huntsville Alabama

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Following a recent 5 day visit, we decided to write a travel guide to the top things to do in Huntsville Alabama. Although Huntsville is best known for its space-related attractions, we discovered that there is much more to see in this city than rockets and space shuttles (although rockets are awesome!). Huntsville is a city in northern Alabama that initially grew because of its cotton and railroad industries, but today it is best known for its military technology and aerospace industries. It was here that scientists designed and tested the Saturn V rocket that would send men to the moon for the first time. Today, the city is full of rocket scientists and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center continues to be at the forefront of U.S. rocketry research and construction, earning Huntsville its nickname “Rocket City”. Huntsville’s top visitor attraction is definitely the excellent U.S. Space and Rocket Center and… Read the rest

Puffins in Iceland: A Guide to Where to See Puffins in Iceland

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Want to see puffins in Iceland? Well, we have the guide for you, and we’ll share with you all the best spots to see puffins in Iceland. Puffins can be found in all areas of Iceland, you just need to know where to look. The Atlantic puffin has become an emblematic animal of Iceland, and many visitors want to see this cute black-and-white little bird with its bright orange beak and webbed feet. Luckily, Iceland is one of the best places to see puffins as it is home to the largest colony of puffins in the world, and over half of the world’s population nest here each year. Although numbers have been sadly declining in recent years, it is estimated that over 5 million Atlantic puffins nest in Iceland each year during the spring and summer months. However, even though there are millions of these little birds in Iceland, they are… Read the rest

Travel Photography: Best Mirrorless Cameras for Travel 2019

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Mirrorless cameras are considered by many to be the perfect travel camera as they offer great image quality and functionality, but are lighter and more portable than DSLR cameras. We’ve put together a detailed and helpful guide to the best mirrorless cameras for travel. As professional travel photographers, we’ll help you decide if a mirrorless camera is a good choice for you, provide advice on how to choose the best mirrorless camera, and share a list of the best mirrorless cameras currently available across various price points. We also give some advice on how to make the most of your new mirrorless camera and tips for protecting it while you are traveling. Choosing a Mirrorless Camera for Travel Photography Before we go through our suggestions of the best mirrorless cameras for travel photography, we wanted to do a quick “mirrorless camera 101”, so you understand what a mirrorless camera is,… Read the rest

Guide to the Best Coffee in Rome: 12 Top Cafés in Rome Italy

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Looking for the best place to get a coffee in Rome? Italy is a great place to sample coffee as it is the home of espresso and has a very developed coffee culture. We’ve visited Rome multiple times, and on those visits we’ve drunk a lot of wonderful cups of coffee in the Eternal City. So we wanted to share some of our favorite cafés in Rome to get coffee, with a focus on central locations. Need a coffee break after a visit to the Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Spanish Steps, or Borghese Gallery? We got you covered. These locations vary from simple local cafes to a 18 century upscale historical coffeehouse to a former artist studio! Before we get into our cafe recommendations, we’ll first share a number of tips and advice on ordering and drinking coffee in Rome, including typical coffee drinks, how to order coffee in Rome, how… Read the rest

La Garrotxa Travel Guide: 15 Things to do in the Volcanic Region of Catalonia

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The volcanic La Garrotxa region of Catalonia lies between the Pyrenees & the beautiful Costa Brava region in Spain. La Garrotxa is best known for its well-preserved medieval villages, good food, outdoor activity opportunities, Romanesque churches, and volcanic park. La Garrotxa Volcanic Zone Natural Park is one of the best preserved volcanic landscapes in Europe, containing 40 inactive volcanoes. If you are looking for a rural escape from Barcelona or Costa Brava, La Garrotxa is a short distance away making for a perfect Girona or Barcelona day trip or weekend getaway spot. Scenic vistas, rural landscapes, and medieval villages abound here. With a large network of trails, Garrotxa is a popular destination for both hikers and cyclists. Laurence and I have been lucky enough to have visited La Garrotxa several times and we seem to be in the area at least once a year. In this post we’ll share all you need… Read the rest

Visiting the Covered Bridges of Madison County in Iowa

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During a road trip a few years ago, Laurence and I decided to make a detour to visit the covered bridges of Madison County Iowa. Madison County is located about 30 miles from Des Moines and is called the “Covered Bridge Capital of Iowa” for having the largest group of covered bridges in one area west of the Mississippi River. The bridges are historically significant and were all added to the National Register of Historic Places in the 1970’s. However, their popularity as a tourist attraction came in the 1990’s after the publication of the bestselling book The Bridges of Madison County by Iowa-born author Robert James Waller. The novel tells the fictional story of an Italian-American housewife Francesca who has a brief but life altering affair in 1965 with a National Geographic travel photographer who comes to take photos of the local covered bridges. The covered bridges reached even greater… Read the rest