7 Things We Loved About 2017
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This year was quite and eventful one for us! We visited more places in 2017 than we had in our entire lives thanks to our 40 day Grand Tour of Europe! We tried speaking new languages, ate new foods, explored new places, and had once in a lifetime experiences.
With 2017 coming to a close, we took some time to reflect upon some of our favorite adventures. Here’s our 7 things we loved about 2017.
1. Starting this Blog!
For years, we have enjoyed exploring and learning about the world around us. Even though we are both students, we make traveling possible by budgeting our time and money. We wanted to couple our love for learning and travel by starting a blog that focuses on being a “student of the world” because to us, the world is our largest classroom. We want to share with others how to enjoy traveling as an educational experience to open your mind to other cultures, in addition to being a vacation.
2. Spending two weeks at the Outer Banks.
The Outer Banks in North Carolina has been one of our favorite places to visit in the United States.
We have been traveling there since we were little, so it’s always great to go back and stay in the same house every year. After we both graduated, it was nice to take a vacation where our only priority was deciding when walk out to the beach. More blogposts to come on the Outer Banks!
3. Seeing Les Mis on the West End.
Talk about being shook to our core. Seeing Les Mis on the West End was definitely a highlight of our year. Seeing a show on London’s West End is like seeing a show in New York City on Broadway. The amount of talent in the show was unbelievable! We were fortunate enough to be in the third row! The show was amazing, we both cried for the last half hour because it was that good!
4. Exploring 11 countries and 22 cities in 39 days.
Thanks to EF Ultimate Break’s Grand Tour of Europe, we were able to explore so many places in Europe in a short amount of time! This trip was truly a trip of a lifetime. We had been dreaming of a trip like this for years and we are so thankful we got to have this experience. We got to see and experience so many places like London, Paris, Switzerland, Florence, Southern France, and Spain to name a few. Doing a trip of this scale was exhausting at times, but completely worth it!
5. Carrying Dutch Clogs Around Europe.
When we were in Amsterdam, we did a day trip to Volendam. Here, we booth two pairs of wooden clogs. We didn’t have them shipped home so we ended up carry them around in a backpack for 30 days until we headed home! With only two backpacks and two carry ones, we were resenting our clogs for the last half of the trip! Shipping them home was too expensive, so carrying them around for a month has become a running joke. The clogs made it home, and are currently on display in our living room!
6. Staying in an old Welsh Cottage.
After visiting London, we went to Wales to stay in our aunt and uncles cottage. Wales was so beautiful, it’s full of so much green and so many sheep! We had spent a month exploring cities, so it was wonderful to spend some time in the countryside. The small town and stone cottage made us feel like we were in another century.
7. Visiting Rome twice.
Not only did we get to see Rome once, but we went twice! Rome has always been one of our favorite cities, so exploring twice in one year was amazing. We love seeing all of the beautiful ancient history, while indulging ourselves in all the gelato and pizza! Even though we have been to Rome so many times, there were still new, exciting things to see and do! And we still plan on going back to see more!
And most importantly, we learned a lot of lessons about travel, blogging, and ourselves this year. Anytime you travel, you learn things about the people around you and a little bit about yourself. We learned the tips and tricks of packing, how design and host our own blog, and how to manage our time between being students and travel bloggers.
We loved 2017!
2018 has great things come for us and we look forward to more traveling and learning! With that being said, we are ready to go everywhere forward in 2018!