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Europe Italy

A Road Trip Through Umbria

After Warsaw, I headed to Italy to meet my parents! We met up in the airport in Rome and drove straight out into the countryside. I’ve been to Italy once before, with my cousin Megan, and the two of us did a very on-the-beaten path itinerary – Rome, Florence, Venice, Cinque Terre, Pompeii, Pisa. It was such a cool trip, and it was all of the places in Italy I’d always heard about. So this time, I took advantage of the fact that I’d already gone to the well-known areas and I planned an itinerary that was away from all the crowds. We were focused on one thing: finding good food.

For the first day, I wanted us to get away from the airport and the city right away, so we headed to Bracciano. It’s about 45 minutes from the airport, in the direction we were going, and I thought it would be a good balance of easing into the driving but still going somewhere more interesting than the area around FCO!

Despite trying to ease into the driving, my parents were a little overwhelmed at first with the experience of the Italian roads. The drivers can be pretty aggressive, and the narrow streets in the towns can make it more challenging to drive than the US. Nonetheless, we made it, and we found a nice place in town to grab a light dinner.

We stayed at the Hotel Villa Clementina, which was so charming, and they cooked us a beautiful breakfast before we headed out the next morning into Umbria! When we finished up with breakfast, we headed out to our next stop, Oriveto.

Orvieto was beautiful. It’s at the top of a hill, so we parked and then took a series of escalators up to the old town. From there, there are so many twisty medieval streets to explore. We went in a lot of local shops and stopped for lunch. One of the things that I love about Italy is the al fresco dining – it can be hot there, especially in the summer, but in the shade and with a breeze, it’s so pleasant to eat outside for every meal. We also saw the outside of their famous cathedral, although we didn’t end up going in.

From there, it was on to the main event! My mom has always had a dream of staying in a castle somewhere in Europe, and this trip seemed like the perfect place to do it. I found one near Perugia, called Castello di Monterone, and we stayed there for a couple nights.

It felt pretty magical to stay at a castle! It’s the kind of thing that you imagine when you’re reading fantasy books or learning about the history of royals. It had beautiful grounds, including a garden and an courtyard where we sat and had some drinks and some snacks. That first night, we had dinner at the restaurant at the castle, which was delicious.

The next day, we headed off on a tour. This was something I was super excited about – we did a cooking class and wine tour! We started at someone’s home for the cooking class, which was pretty amazing. Megan and I had done one in Tuscany, as a day trip from Florence, so it was cool to get the chance to compare and contrast. Italy has so many different regional culinary traditions. I think you could take classes all across the major cities and get unique experiences each time. I made pasta in both classes, but the one in Tuscany was flour and egg-based and this one was semolina and water-based. After we learned how to cook the pasta, the woman teaching the class showed us all the different ways it could be shaped, which was incredible. She could take a spoon and make it into some sort of perfect corkscrew that I can’t imagine being dextrous enough to shape. We made eggplant and stuffed peppers and pasta with asparagus and chicken, and for dessert there was tiramisu. It was so good!

From there, we headed to a winery for a tasting. The woman at the winery was so knowledgeable, and taught us all about Umbrian wine and the different regions across Italy. We got to try a lot of different varieties, and even got some to drink back at the hotel! It was such a good day. And the next day, we headed off to our next adventure – a whole different country, San Marino!

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Europe Poland

Exploring Warsaw

I’ve been to Poland once before, back in 2014. I went on a class trip that visited Krakow, which was a really fascinating experience. After that, I’ve wanted to return and explore more of Poland, and especially Warsaw. Because the Croatia birthday party and meeting my parents were both set dates, I found myself with a couple days in between to make my way from Split to Rome, and the flights worked out for me to stop over in Warsaw!

I find their “new” Old Town to be very interesting – their original Old Town and the castle were razed to the ground in WW2 and so they rebuilt it to replicate it exactly. What’s funny is that if you didn’t know this in advance, there’s nothing obvious about their Old Town that would indicate that it was redone in the 1950s. They did a spectacular job making it look just as it must have before WW2. It matches a lot of places that you would see in cities across Central Europe.

To be honest, I didn’t do much in the way of “tourist” things in Warsaw. I went to cafés and wandered around, and I ate pierogis as often as I could. They’re so good there!

I did also make sure I went to go see the Palace of Culture and Science, which is another one of the most fascinating parts of Warsaw in my opinion. When it was completed in 1955, it was the eighth tallest building in the world, and it is really impressive with its art deco vibes.

The Palace of Culture and Science was a gift from the Soviet Union and was formally dedicated to Joseph Stalin. When I was reading the Wikipedia about it to make sure I didn’t miss any important points about it, I found a delightful anecdote on how they decided on the height of the building. They apparently decided that they needed to properly visualize it, so they sent a small airplane that was towing a balloon to fly over the city, and then the architects kept telling the plane to fly higher. It was finally set at 778 ft / 237 m high.

All in all, I had a very nice time in Warsaw! I think Poland is underrated – while it isn’t my top country in Europe, I think people often forget about it when they’re planning and it does have a lot to offer. I had a great experience in both Krakow and Warsaw and I look forward to eventually returning for the smaller cities and towns as well!

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Croatia Europe

Celebration in Croatia

This summer, I got to spend a couple weeks in Europe! It was an amazing trip, and it started off with a great weekend in Split celebrating my friend’s birthday. While I had spent about two weeks in Croatia back in 2023, that was an area I didn’t spend much time in, so I was excited to have a chance to visit again.

Before that, though, I had another cool start to the trip – I got to fly Polaris! Polaris is United’s business class. Before the trip even begins, you get access to the Polaris lounge at the airport, which has all kinds of perks, including fancy cocktails, nap pods, showers, and even a fully functioning restaurant that you can sit down at for a complimentary three course meal.

From there, the experience on the plane is pretty nice too. It was fun to get a glass of champagne before we took off, and then the plane food is actually quite good. What Polaris is known for, though, is the ice cream cart, which is one of those things people like to talk about from flying back when airlines first started that made the experience so luxurious. After eating my ice cream, I got to try out the lie-flat seat, which was really a game changer.

I definitely won’t be able to do this consistently – it’s more of a game of whether or not I can use my miles and cash to get an upgrade that isn’t outrageously expensive, but it was a really nice way to travel. My priority, as you can probably tell, is traveling more often, not necessarily traveling in the fanciest manner, but nonetheless. If Polaris is in your budget and that’s where you want to splurge on a trip, it was pretty great!

I don’t have as many photos from the birthday celebration, because I was mostly busy having fun and meeting all of Harry’s friends from his normal life, since he and I met traveling in West Africa! But we had such a great time in Split. The first full day, we all hired a boat to take us around, which was beautiful.

We went swimming, ate good food, and drank good wine, which is really all you can ask for!

With our second full day, we got a bit of a late start after going out to the bars the night before. We wanted to do a beach day, but the beaches in Split were too crowded, so we ended up heading down to Podstrana. That ended up being the right move – it was so much more relaxed than Split, and we had food options where a larger group of people could actually sit and talk.

I love Croatia. It can be touristy, it is much more expensive than the regions that surround it, but everywhere I’ve been is so stunning. And you can still get off the beaten path if you try! I am sure I will return again some day in the future.

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North America United States

Delaware, America’s First State

For a long time, when I would try to name all 50 states, I would get to 49 and the one that I inevitably would have forgotten was Delaware. And then one of my best friends moved there! So not only did I have to remember that Delaware existed, but we would often meet halfway in Wilmington. It’s only about an hour from DC by Amtrak.

One of the quirky things about Delaware is that it is where almost every single US company is incorporated. Under their tax law, a company incorporated in Delaware can avoid paying state taxes. Not only are most companies incorporated there, but most companies also use the same registered address: 1209 North Orange Street. I know this because the company I work for uses that same registered address. I’ve filled it out on plenty of forms! 1209 North Orange Street is officially home to over 285,000 businesses. I cannot even fathom how much corporate mail they must get.

And yes, I am the kind of nerd who had to go see the address in person!

Wilmington has a charming little downtown. They are clearly trying to develop those public spaces, including both the Riverfront and Brandywine Park. As my friend is a mom, we spent a lot of our visits either at the Children’s Museum or at the Brandywine Zoo, both of which were pretty solid day trips for a toddler.

Brandywine Park was quite nice, and I do think the zoo punches above its weight considering how small Wilmington is and how many significantly larger cities there are nearby.

I don’t have as many photos from the Children’s Museum or the Riverfront, since I’m not posting any that include Emmy’s child, but I do leave you with one of the fun facts I learned from the Children’s Museum: Delaware’s state fish is the weakfish, which is a very funny name for a fish.

I wouldn’t have gone to Wilmington so many times if it wasn’t for Emmy, but it was always a nice day trip! And if you, like me, are interested in going to every state, there’s definitely enough there to spend a nice day or weekend there during a visit to the East Coast.

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North America United States

Weekend at Crater Lake

For Memorial Day weekend, Sam and I headed west! Now that I live on the East Coast, it’s so wild to me how long it takes to get to the Pacific. It’s a 5 or 6 hour flight just to get across the country. We took a redeye flight to San Francisco and then a short hop up to Medford, where we met up with some friends. Our friend Chelsea has been working her way through the US National Parks, and it’s been fun to tag along when we can.

For this trip, we based ourselves near Klamath Falls. I wasn’t sure what to expect – the thing about small towns in America is that there is a huge variation on how well they’re doing, economically, and so sometimes you have the charming, Stars Hollow-style Main Street, the platonic ideal of a small town, and other times you have a version of that that’s been abandoned and left to rot for 40 years. In any case, Klamath Falls seems to be thriving because of its proximity to Crater Lake, and it seems to function as a bit of a hub for the hikers and tourists in the area. It’s very charming! There were a lot of nice local restaurants and bars, and we tried several while we were there. We ended up at the farmer’s market one of the mornings when we went into town for coffee as well.

Our top priority was to visit Crater Lake, so that was the first thing on our itinerary! As it turns out, late May is still winter season in Crater Lake, so we were a bit more limited in what we were able to do and see while we were there. I had been once before, a long time ago, and my parents and I were able to walk all the way down to the edge of the lake because we visited in late summer. On this trip, there was still a lot of snow, and so most of the roads around the crater were closed.

I’m glad to have gone in both seasons, because there are pros and cons to both. There’s obviously much more to do in the summer. I wish we had spikes or snowshoes for this one, because I would have happily walked along the trails if I wasn’t afraid of slipping all over the snowpack. But having the snow surrounding the lake was absolutely spectacular!

After we walked around for a bit, got our stamps, and had lunch, we had basically done everything that was possible to do at Crater Lake, so we headed back to Klamath Falls. We went to the Klamath County Museum, which was cute. It was in what appeared to be an old high school gymnasium, and you could still see the lines of the basketball court on the floor. It was fairly thorough considering how rural Klamath is, with a little bit of all of their local history and a section on the natural history of the area as well.

The next day, we crossed the border into California! It was less than an hour to Lava Beds National Monument. After the snow of Crater Lake, it was strange to be in that level of heat. Lava Beds has a lot of lava tubes and caves, including ice caves because of the way that they’re structured. Walking from the surface down into where the ice never melts was a wild experience.

We also went kayaking in Klamath Lake! I love kayaking, so it was nice to get on the water. It was a beautiful place to do it. There were mountain views all around.

Our final activity of the weekend was going for a wine tasting! Oregon has some fantastic wineries, mostly in Willamette Valley south of Portland, and we were excited to try some local wine. We found one close to Klamath that had great reviews and went for a tasting. I also did a tasting of olive oil and balsamic, which was a fun experience.

All in all, an excellent weekend! It’s harder to go all the way to the west coast for a weekend trip now, but this definitely made the long flight worth it. Oregon has so much natural beauty, and it was great to explore it with some of our friends!

Categories
North America United States

Mackinac Island

This year, my book club decided to do a group trip! We decided on Mackinac Island, which I was thrilled about. I’ve always wanted to visit Mackinac Island, and it was the perfect destination to slow down and spend some time with my friends.

First views off the ferry!

If you don’t know anything about Mackinac Island, what makes it so unique is that it has banned basically all cars except emergency vehicles on the island, so all of the transport is done by bike or horse-drawn carriage. It feels like stepping back in time, into a quaint, Main Street-style America, with general stores and fudge shops.

Pellston airport is so cute 🙂

Getting there was a bit of an ordeal – Sam and I flew from BWI to Chicago, and then boarded our flight to Pellston. That flight got diverted to Traverse City, which was a new one for my own personal flight fuck-up bingo board, and then we sat on the tarmac for a while. They couldn’t let us get off the plane because we were a United plane at a Delta gate, and they told us that if they let us get off, they weren’t sure they could get us back on the plane without issue. I was just nervous because if we missed the last ferry, that was going to be a problem. But we did finally get back in the air, made the short trip up to Pellston, and then took a bus to the ferry terminal and a ferry to the island. It was a long day.

But it was all worth it to make it to the island! After checking it at our hotel, we headed to the iconic Pink Pony for our first dinner. This is one of the ones that Steph had discovered in her research and we were all excited to try. The food was good and the atmosphere was even better, with fun pink decorations throughout the restaurant.

The next morning, we rented bikes so we could cycle around Mackinac! It’s only about 8 miles, and it was the perfect way to see the whole island in a fairly short period of time. We made lots of stops so that we could take pictures. The only negative is that this time of year has a lot of black flies in Michigan, and it seemed as though every time we stopped, we would get swarmed. At times, I was biking while holding my hand over my face just to try to keep them away from my nose and mouth. Thankfully, they didn’t bite.

The bridge that connects Michigan’s Lower & Upper Peninsulas

After a post-biking lunch, we headed up to Mackinac Fort! I loved the views from the hill. We watched a couple demonstrations on old-timey weapons and explored the museum exhibits about Mackinac’s history.

Of the various demonstrations we saw, my favorite was the blacksmith! He talked to us about the techniques used as well as what it’s like being a blacksmith in the modern era. He mentioned that doing something like this, where he gets to talk about the history and older techniques, is the only way he gets to make certain types of objects – something like a handmade hammer, for example, is prohibitively expensive compared to one made at a factory, and there’s no specific reason why handmade would be better. So this experience has been great for him to actually get to make some of the things he’s always wanted to try.

One of the mornings, we went up to Arch Rock. That area also had a visitor center, with more of a focus of the geography of Mackinac and some old photos of the early inhabitants of Mackinac at the rock.

Mackinac was charming, and there is plenty to keep you occupied as a tourist. Lots of museums with exhibits on their history, natural sites to visit, and cute boutique shops. That said, for me, my favorite parts of the experience were the aspects that showed more of what it would be like to live there. One of the days, we walked inland, outside of where the tourists stayed and into the part of town where primarily locals and summer workers lived. It was so interesting to get a small look at what it takes to run a place that is seemingly set in the past. The play between traditional and modernity – the horse-drawn cart pulling Amazon packages, the police bike parking, the Starbucks sandwiched between fudge shops that gets its ingredients by ferry and horses and bikes. Part of me wants to get a job there for a summer or something, just to experience the daily rhythms of life there for a few months.

It was an amazing trip. Mackinac is truly special and unique, and I was so happy to spend some time there with people that I’ve been friends with for almost a decade. I would definitely recommend it if you’re looking for a summer lake destination!

Categories
Albania Europe

South to Gjirokastër

On my last full day in Albania, before taking a flight that left at 6:55 am, I took a day trip from Tirana to Gjirokastër, a cool three hours away by car. Who needs rest, anyway? That’s not what my vacation days are for.

We started by driving west toward Durrës. Incidentally, if I hadn’t been there in March, I would have likely tried for a day trip there to go to the beach, since the Albanian Riviera is one of the next big destinations of Europe and looks spectacular. But, more importantly, a highlight of that drive is getting to pass the Amadeus Palace. This article is going to say it more eloquently than I can, but basically Albania got excited about tourism in 2011, whipped up some foreign investment, and built an insanely fancy hotel in the very outskirts of Tirana that never actually opened. It was a series of bizarre decisions and, if you’ve read this blog for any period of time, you will understand that I was beyond thrilled that we drove past it and I got to see it.

To find that linked article, by the way, I fully Googled “weird giant Albania hotel” and that was the first result, which is exactly what I was hoping for.

From there, we visited the Ardenica Monastery, which was a nice stop on the way to Gjirokastër. It was beautiful, with a good views of the landscape, which had vibes that were more similar to Tuscany than the mountainous ones I’d seen the two days prior. We got a quick coffee and hit the road again, continuing south.

We started out by walking around Old Town and grabbing lunch at a place that had a nice view over the city. Similar to Berat, Gjirokastër has distinct architecture and the overall effect of all the buildings is quite striking. Also like Berat, it is a UNESCO site.

From there, we headed up to the castle! It was a much more extensive grounds and museum than I expected. There was a whole section where you could see the jail cells, and ancient art, and all kinds of weaponry from all different eras in Albanian history. Some of it might have taken more if I had known more about Albanian history to begin with, but it was still interesting to learn as much as I could as we went through the exhibits.

Also, there were great views from the top! After that, we headed to one more museum, which was more of a historical house that was maintained with how the wealthy would have lived in Albania before the communist era, in a more traditional way. That was super cool, although they limited what we could take photos of so I don’t have much from there. With our last bit of time in Gjirokastër, I got ice cream with a few of the other people on my tour and watched the sun set over the city.

This particular day trip might not be for everyone, because it is a long day, and a lot of time in the car. Ideally, if your timeframe in Albania allows, it would be nicer to spend at least a night or two in Gjirokastër, because I’m sure there’s more to see in southern Albania. That said, I felt like between this, Berat, and my hiking trip, I got to see a lot of Albania in a fairly short amount of time! I thought all three day trips were excellent and would recommend this same set if someone was going for a similar number of days as I did.

I had a great time in Albania, but it was time to head back home! Overall, between Bosnia and Herzegovina, Yemen, and Albania, it was a really great set of countries that I got to explore on this particular trip.

Categories
Albania Europe

Exploring Albania

For the rest of my time in Albania, I based myself in Tirana and took a series of day trips outside of the city. Part of this is just based on how much time I had, and part of it comes down to the time of year – if it hadn’t been March, I might have tried to go north and do more hiking, but it wasn’t a guarantee that the weather would be good enough for that, so I stuck more to the cultural sites. I did do a shorter hike on one of the days though!

Day 1: Berat

Of the day trip options, this is probably one of the most common – it’s a UNESCO site and it’s not too far from Tirana, at only about an hour and a half drive away. We started with a short stop for coffee at Belshi Lake, and then headed to Berat!

One thing to know about the driving in Albania – it was wild. Some of the most aggressive and crazy driving I’ve ever seen. One of my guides for the day trips was telling me that essentially, no one ever formally learned to drive. Cars were not as common during the communist era, and then suddenly, when everyone could afford one, they all took to the streets and taught themselves, so it can be fairly chaotic on the roads there.

We spent the morning exploring the castle and the surrounding area, including a beautiful old church and the fortress walls. One of the best parts of visiting the castle is how high up on the hill it is, and there were some really amazing views of the area around Berat!

Once we had finished at the castle, we headed down into the town of Berat! We had some free time to explore and get lunch. I found a place that overlooked the historic old town and ordered myself some pasta and a glass of wine, which was so good.

Berat is known as the Town of a Thousand Windows due to its unique architecture. If I’d had more time or wasn’t flying of Tirana a few days later, and was doing more of a itinerary that goes through the Balkans in this case, I would have loved to spend a night or more time in Berat. It had really nice vibes. But, as always, time is precious and the world is vast, so I got back in the car and my tour dropped me back off in Tirana for the night!

Day 2: Hiking

Again, this one felt a bit risky because I was worried it could be too cold in March (which, based on my experience in Serbia, was a valid worry) but I also didn’t want to go to Albania without at least trying for a hike! And as it happened, I got incredibly lucky with the weather, which was perfect for the entire time I was there. So I got picked up in the morning and we headed to Lake Bovilla for a hike up Gamti Mountain.

I had seen the photos, but I still couldn’t be prepared for spectacularly turquoise Lake Bovilla is. The drive there was pretty as well, as we started in the countryside and ended up winding through a canyon as we got closer and closer to the lake.

The hike itself was fairly short. The most stressful part was coming down the relatively steep hill at the beginning – otherwise, the majority was a series of stairs. If you have a fear of heights, you might struggle on these, as they are that metal kind that can look a bit rickety. A few of the other tourists there definitely were a little freaked out as they started making their way back down. The viewpoint was really pretty, though, and then I got lunch and a beer at the nearby restaurant.

All in all, it was a great day! It was great to get out into nature and see a little more of what Albania is known for.

My third day trip was all the way south to Gjirokastër, which I think deserves its own post – not least because it was a 3 hour drive each way. Stay tuned for that one!

Categories
Albania Europe

The Museums of Tirana

Before I started planning for this trip, I’ll admit I didn’t know that much about Albania. I would have guessed that it was part of Yugoslavia, which it was not, and the only thing I did know was that it is the homeland of Mother Theresa (although interestingly, not her birthplace, which was Skopje, North Macedonia). As it turns out, Albania actually has a very interesting and unique history!

It was once part of the Ottoman empire, but declared independence in 1912. During WW1 and WW2, the primary focus was on maintaining their independence, which was made more difficult by Italian and then German occupation. In 1944, Albania managed to free themselves from German occupation under Enver Hoxha, ushering in the next chapter of history in Albania: communism.

Hoxha led Albania from 1944 to 1985, leading an intensely authoritarian and isolationist regime. Albania toyed with the idea of allying themselves with Yugoslavia, the USSR, and China at various points in its history, but none of those lasted, as Albania tended to view the relationships as a threat to Albanian independence. Hoxha consistently told Albanians how every other country was out to get them, and wanted to invade them, and used that messaging to keep their citizens isolated and afraid. Albania built over 750,000 bunkers from the 1960s through the 1980s, which means there are still 14.7 bunkers per square mile in Albania.

Between Hoxha’s death in 1985 and the fall of communism across Europe in 1989, including but not limited to the fall of the Berlin Wall, Albania transitioned toward democracy in the early 90s. It was pretty rocky, though, as they weren’t financially stable, and it led to a brief civil war in the late 90s before they were able to stabilize. They’re now a NATO member and they have official candidate status with the EU.

An isolated culture and the lasting impacts of a dictatorship are both things that definitely check the boxes for me as a traveler, so I was really looking forward to the museums of Tirana to get a better perspective on Albania! Which is good, because I was there in March, when it would be a little too cold the main tourist activities of hiking and going to the beach.

I flew from Aden to Cairo to Athens to Tirana, in a flight path that my friends called “totally unprecedented” and “very weird.” I based myself in Tirana for about a week and did a few day trips outside of the city as well to explore more of Albania.

Tirana has an interesting vibe. There’s a lot of modern architecture and street art, which makes it fun to walk around and explore. It’s not a huge city. It was pretty easy to walk from my hotel to all of the major tourist sites and museums.

My first stop was the Pyramid of Tirana! I love a weird landmark, obviously. This one was opened up as a monument to and museum for Enver Hoxha in 1988, and was the most expensive individual structure ever built in Albania at the time. When communism collapsed very shortly thereafter, it stopped being a museum and has been kind of a multi-functional community center every since, with a lot of iterations of what people use it for. They’ve even talked about demolishing it. But for now, it exists, and you can climb to the top of it for some pretty decent views of Tirana.

I also went to the House of Leaves, which I couldn’t take pictures in, but this one was about the surveillance systems that the Albanian government used on its citizens for decades. The secret police were very busy monitoring and arresting and torturing Albanians for all sorts of crimes, real and imagined. This, in conjunction with Bunk Art 2, gave me a very good overview of the communist era.

Bunk Art 2 is a museum located in a bunker in the middle of Tirana! There is also a Bunk Art 1, but that’s located a bit outside of the city and I had other priorities for my day trips outside of Tirana, so I missed that one. It was really interesting, and went more into the interrogations and torture that were done by the secret police, as well as the overall impact of the communist era.

Overall, I liked Tirana a lot, and it made for a great base as I explored the rest of Albania. I went to Berat, Lake Bovilla, and Gjirokaster from Tirana, the last of which was a very long day, but I think it gave me a good sense of Albania and what it offers. Tourism is definitely starting to take off in Albania, especially along the coast – from what I’m seeing in tourism trends, it is on its way to becoming the next Croatia in coastal beach tourism during the summers, but I felt as though I was still seeing some of its cultural sites in a more nascent stage of tourism. More on the day trips out of the city in my next post, but I definitely enjoyed Albania and would recommend it for any itinerary in the Balkans!

Categories
Asia Yemen

Ending in Aden

The initial itinerary for this trip ended with two days in Socotra. Socotra is certainly the most popular place in Yemen for travelers – it’s an island that’s quite far from the mainland, so it doesn’t have the same instability as the mainland, and it has a lot of beautiful nature and unique plants. But as we got closer to the trip, it became possible to go to Aden for tourism, and so the itinerary shifted so we could take advantage of that opportunity!

Aden is located on and in a caldera, so whenever we could get to high ground, we ended up with spectacular views of the city! Climbing up to the high ground in the abaya was not as fun, but so it goes.

It felt as though Aden was a much more relaxed city than some of the ones we had visited in the east. Women were walking around in just hijabs instead of niqabs, so we didn’t have to cover up quite as much even when we were in busier areas! We saw more men wearing western clothing as well.

One of the best activities was climbing up to Sira Fortress, which had amazing views. We hiked up to the top a little before sunset so that we could see the city in its best light.

The first night we were there, we went out to the night market, which was a late night. We ended up staying there until 2 or 3 am, and when we left, the market was still in full swing. It’s so interesting to see how the city becomes fully nocturnal during Ramadan. I am curious what the balance of normal life looks like when it isn’t Ramadan – even when I was in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, there was still definitely more life at night and less people out during the day just due to the sun and the heat. But it might not be quite so stark.

After the late night, we had a chill morning and did a little more sightseeing in the afternoon. We went to the Cisterns of Tawila and the Aidrus Mosque. We were going to try to go to the beach, but it seemed like some sort of VIP was already there and there were too many military checkpoints for us to continue. We ended up just going back for an early dinner, and then we found shisha and nonalcoholic beer (since Yemen is a fully dry country) that we could have on a nearby rooftop. It was a relaxing last day.

A film camera has never failed to make me look like a vampire

Our final morning was an early flight out to Cairo. We got a military transport for that last journey to the airport – I’d seen the men in front of our hotel, but I thought it was just some sort of hotel security or military that were based around the city. I hadn’t realized they were there for us!

All in all, Yemen was an amazing trip. One of my favorites, which is really saying something. It’s rare to find a place that feels completely unique, but Yemen absolutely does, between the culture, the history, the architecture, and the natural beauty. It was worth the constant heat and the heavy layers to get a chance to explore a place that does not see a lot of tourism or cultural influence from outsiders. I hope that things continue to get better in the north and that the country finds more stability in the future!