"Your only limit is your mind." – Unknown
Portugal was the first country I visited in Europe. The city I enjoyed the most during my first overseas trip was Lisbon, Portugal. This beautiful coast side town has a lot to offer tourists. If you’d like to see what I believe are the things you should do when in Lisbon, keep reading.
2020 is now in full swing but I still wanted to write a post to reflect on my winter break trip for 2019-2020. Posts highlighting each place I went are definitely coming, as well as vlogs where I documented my trip. However, now that I’m back in my routine of work in Spain, I wanted to write down my thoughts on how everything went overall. So if you’re interested in how I spent winter break (17 days) solo traveling around Europe during the holiday season, keep reading.
Valencia is an amazing city that I knew I’d have to visit during my time living in Spain. When I was browsing at my work schedule and realized I had a long weekend in November, I decided to book a trip to Valencia. Valencia is a great cheap vacation spot for those looking for a relaxing weekend getaway, especially from busier cities like Barcelona or Madrid. If you’d like to know what you should do, see and eat in Valencia, keep reading.
The itch to travel has not shut up ever since I took my first major solo trip to Montreal, Canada in May 2018. Since then I’ve done several trips, big and small. I decided last minute to take a plane to Denver, Colorado to spend my birthday. Like my trip to Portugal, it was last minute (even more so) and I just went with my gut. I didn’t want to spend hundreds on an international flight and there are still many places in the U.S. I have yet to explore.
Since I’ve never been to that side of the country before, I thought visiting Denver would be a great choice. So I booked my plane ticket, a bed in a hostel and began putting together a Google Doc of my intended itinerary. If you’d like to read about my time in Denver, Colorado for my birthday, keep reading.
In April, I took my first trip to Europe by visiting the amazing country of Portugal. While there I visited many cities, but based myself in Porto and Lisbon. These are the two biggest cities of Portugal and thus extremely popular with tourists. I was lucky to have over two weeks to explore. However, others may not have as much time and could be faced with a tough choice: Porto or Lisbon?
Hopefully, after this ready this post, you’ll be able to decide which city is better suited for you. Both cities were great and are worth a visit. But if you’re interested in finding out if Porto or Lisbon should be next on your travel bucket list, keep reading.
If you’ve seen photos of Portugal, there’s a great chance you’ve come across the gorgeous castles in Sintra. Sintra is a beautiful town near the capital city of Lisbon. This makes a great day trip for people staying in Lisbon, which is exactly what I did during my Portugal trip. If you’d like to read about how to get to Sintra and how to make most of your trip, keep reading.
If you are a chronic over packer, please raise your hand! For even small 3-day trips I have trouble not stuffing an entire suitcase. So when packing for Portugal a few months ago on my first trip to Europe, I tried to go easy on what I brought with me. Traveling carry-on only is becoming more popular and people often say what they could have done without. However, I thought I’d mention what I am glad I brought with me when packing for Portugal.
So if you’d like to find out the travel items that I think deserve a spot in your duffel bag, carry-on or checked luggage, keep reading.