The Eiffel Tower is one of the world’s most iconic landmarks. The iron tower is both an amazing feat of engineering and an inspiring symbol of the City of Lights, and it’s a must see for almost everyone visiting 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. Security screenings can slow down the visiting process, and tickets often sell out. If you value your time, you’ll want to do a bit of pre-planning before visiting. Laurence and I have visited the Eiffel Tower multiple times together, including by stairs, by elevator to the second floor, and by elevator to the summit. I also first visited as a 16 year old on my first trip to Europe. This guide pulls together everything we’ve learned across… Read the rest
Guide to Visiting The Alamo in San Antonio Texas
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 missions and tips… Read the rest
Guide to the Best Places to Celebrate Burns Night in Scotland
Wondering where to celebrate Burns Night in 2021? 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 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
16 Best Day Trips from Edinburgh Scotland
After living near Edinburgh for four years, we 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 16 different day trips from Edinburgh that cover a range of interests and 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 guided day… Read the rest
Belfast Travel Guide: Top 40 Things to do in Belfast Northern Ireland
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
Best DSLR Cameras You Can Buy in 2026
My personal opinion? If you are buying your first interchangeable-lens camera in 2026, you should probably buy a mirrorless camera, not a DSLR. I say this as someone who has been shooting with DSLRs since 2008, when my first Canon EOS 400D (the Digital Rebel XTi) was my constant travel companion. I have since shot with DSLRs across over 40 countries, upgraded through multiple Canon bodies, and used them professionally for over a decade. For the last couple of years my primary camera has been a mirrorless Canon EOS R5, and I won’t pretend otherwise: for most people starting out today, mirrorless is the better choice. So why write a DSLR guide in 2026? Because DSLRs still make sense for a certain kind of buyer, and right now the used market is offering some of the best deals in the history of digital photography. If you know what to look… Read the rest
Travel Tips: A Guide to Doing Laundry While Traveling
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 25 Things to Do in Huntsville Alabama
Following a number of visits over the years, 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… Read the rest
Best Places to See Puffins in Iceland
Want to see puffins in Iceland? We spent over 3 weeks in Iceland during puffin season one year and saw hundreds of puffins at more than 10 different locations across the country. In this guide, we share everything we learned, including the 14 best places to see puffins, which tours are worth booking, how to watch them responsibly, and tips for getting great puffin photos. Short on time? Here are our top three picks: For the easiest option from Reykjavik, take a 1-hour puffin boat tour from the Old Harbor. For the closest up-close viewing on land, head to Borgarfjordur Eystri in East Iceland, where a viewing platform puts you within a few meters of nesting puffins. For the full experience, visit the Westman Islands, home to the largest puffin colony in the world. The Atlantic puffin has become one of the most recognizable animals in Iceland, and for good… Read the rest
Best Mirrorless Cameras in 2026
Mirrorless cameras have become the default choice for anyone serious about photography. They offer the image quality and creative control of a DSLR, but in a lighter, more compact package, with faster autofocus and features that DSLRs simply cannot match. Whether you are shooting travel, family, landscapes, street photography, or video, a mirrorless camera is the way to go in 2026. I’ve spent over thirty years working as a professional photographer, and across that time I’ve spent serious time testing cameras from every major manufacturer. The recommendations in this guide are based on hands-on experience across the major systems, current specs verified against each manufacturer, and what I think actually matters for travel photography (the features and trade-offs that change how the camera performs in real conditions, rather than what reads well on a spec sheet). Jess and I visit every place we write about and take all our own… Read the rest
Guide to the Best Coffee in Rome: 14 Top Cafés in Rome Italy
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, Vatican, 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,… Read the rest
La Garrotxa Travel Guide: 15 Things to do in the Volcanic Region of Catalonia
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
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
3 Days in London: A Tested Day-by-Day Itinerary with Map & Savings
Three days in London is enough to visit the major landmarks, explore two or three distinct neighbourhoods, and still leave time for a pub lunch in a park. We have visited London dozens of times over the past decade, and Laurence used to live there. This 3 day London itinerary reflects what we would actually recommend to a friend visiting for the first time. Over three days, this itinerary covers Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, Borough Market, the South Bank, and Windsor Castle, along with several free museums, scenic walks, and one of the best viewpoints in the city. Total cost for paid attractions on this itinerary runs roughly £150 to £200 per person depending on what you choose to visit, though you can cut that significantly with a London Pass (we show the exact savings breakdown at the end of this… Read the rest
Best Compact Cameras 2026: Top Picks for Every Budget
I have been a working travel photographer for 15 years, and Jess and I have built our two blogs around the cameras we actually carry on the road. The compact camera is the one I get asked about more than any other, and the answer has shifted a lot recently. For a few years, I was telling most people to use their smartphone. In 2026, that has changed. Manufacturers are making new models again, younger photographers are choosing dedicated cameras over phones, and for the first time in years there are good options at several price points. This guide is built from the cameras we have personally used or extensively tested across actual trips, not from spec sheets and press releases. If a recommendation here is on the list, it has either been in our bag or has been picked up, handled, and benchmarked against cameras we own. Where we… Read the rest