Welcome to my Blog!  I’m excited to share my thoughts on travel with you.  This Blog will be particular to Europe, focusing on Italy, France and Ireland.  My husband Greg and I love to travel so much and we’ve been so lucky to get to tour throughout Europe for more than 25 years.  We got a late start but we’ve done our best to make up for it since our first trip abroad in 1990!  We’ve traveled with just the two of us, with our family of four, on business, for pure pleasure, with students, with vacationers, with friends and with adult learners.  Every time we travel I research everything I possibly can about where we are visiting.  My kids often thought it was pretty funny when I felt compelled to share with them all I had learned, while we were traveling!  I think they really appreciate it now, though.  Over the years, I’ve accumulated quite a collection of recommendations and information that I am really excited to share with all of you!

I really do want to give credit where credit is due.  I am a big supporter of Rick Steves (https://www.ricksteves.com) and always buy his newest guidebook before traveling to a new locale.  I got to meet him once, in Prague.  He was filming for his show in a market recommended in his guide book.  You would have thought he was a rock star the way I reacted.  I was so excited!  He had to tell me to please be quiet because he was filming!  Anyway, he offers excellent advice with a fantastic approach to traveling.  His books are a great place to start.  I also like Lonely Planet (https://www.lonelyplanet.com/europe) and Frommer’s (http://www.frommers.com/destinations/europe/) and all the area specific/topic specific guides and information I can find on the web, and SO much more.  You just can’t get all the information you need in one place and sometimes it takes a lot of digging to find just the right “gems.”   I’ll get into lots more details as we go along!  Welcome!  Please offer comments and feel free to share with other friends, foodies and travelers!