Europe

14 articles

Europe: the quintessential vacation for epic history. For culinary diversity. For cobblestoned streets. For scenic beauty. A small continent home to both the largest capital city and the smallest capital city in the world.

Christmas in Zürich, Switzerland

On our way to Alsace, France to see the Christmas markets in 2018, we spent a few nights in Zürich. Zürich is well-known for finance, luxurious lifestyles, and fancy chocolates. We visited just...

Our Favorite French Vacation

In 2018, we booked a last-minute long weekend vacation to France and picked La Rochelle and neighboring island, Ile de Ré, as our destination. Jeffrey and I both are descended from French Huguenots...

Journey Around Scotland

With a name like McCown, it may or may not be pretty obvious that I have some Scottish heritage. Scotland feels a bit like coming home to me – except it’s a little chillier than my home...

Hola from Spain

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There are so many reasons to love Spain: the varied and vibrant culture, the food!, the wine, the weather… We’ve been lucky to visit Spain several times and we can’t pick a favorite...

Salty + Spirited Portugal

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Portugal, often overshadowed by its Spanish neighbor, became one of our favorite travel destinations – so much so that we quickly revisited the small country as soon as we could. This seaside...

The Magical Land of Lake Como

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Three visits to the mesmerizing Lake Como region and I will never get enough of the charming cobblestone streets perched on a hill overlooking the lake. Every moment feels like the perfect time to...

Why I Love Tuscany, Italy

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Italy is one of the most popular destinations for American tourists and, whether you’ve been once, twelve times or not at all, there’s always somewhere new to see in the boot-shaped...

Fall in Provence, France

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After spending some time in the Alsace region, we slowly made our way to Provence, first staying in Nîmes (with a fun, spontaneous visit from our friend, Marie!) and then heading to the teeny-tiny...

On this day in 2013, we got engaged in Paris (this photo was taken while celebrating that night). On March 13, 2015, we were in Yangon, Myanmar. In 2017: happened to be visiting the Taj Mahal (photo 2). In 2019: Cambodia with an extra traveler (photo 3). There’s nothing better than traveling the world together🥰
NAME CHANGE ANNOUNCEMENT: Jeffrey & I started @weekend_blitz as two 20-somethings trying to record and remember our travels... just for fun. Now, I (McCown) am taking parts of that fun hobby (and all of our travel experiences) and turning it into a new business endeavor. I'm excited to let you know that I'm in the final stages of 6+ months of extensive training to be a professional travel advisor. Soon, I'll utilize my first-hand travel experiences along with my training and personal connections with thousands of hotels, cruise lines and travel destination specialists to create customized itineraries. And I’ll be able to offer un-Google-able experiences and exclusive perks, upgrades and favors that clients can't find on their own. We'll still post photos of our family's travels here (and more free travel tips + tricks), but stay tuned for more info on curated travel experiences... coming soon!
After Alsace, we slowly made our way to Provence, first staying in Nîmes (with a fun, spontaneous visit from our friend, Marie) and then heading to the teeny-tiny town of Fontvielle for day trips to Avignon and Arles. What can be said about the South of France that hasn’t been said before? We fueled up on pan au chocolat every day for breakfast then went on a hunt for every carousel in France. The hundreds of pink flamingos were Eliza’s favorite thing and the Roman ruins may have been the highlight for us grown-ups. Seeing the Greek Acropolis (built in ~4000BC) not long ago and now these Roman arenas in Nîmes and Arles + the Pont du Gard aqueduct bridge, time feels suddenly very fleeting… recently read a quote from Marie Antoinette: “nothing is new except what has been forgotten” and that feels very true in these towns. And in these days.
Luckily, our sweet friend and former au pair, Maureen, is from the Alsace region of France so we’ve been able to visit her hometown. This place is straight out of a fairy tale (and actually is the inspiration for Belle’s village in Beauty and the Beast). It’s right on the German border and the tiny little towns are dripping with charm. Highlights include local Pinot Gris wine for the 👩‍❤️‍👨 and pink macarons for the 👧 (Davis has most enjoyed chasing the birds). We got to spend quality time with our wonderful friend and her family and that was the best treat of all. We didn’t get the chance to rent e-bikes and zip from vineyard to vineyard trying all the wines but hopefully we’ll be back 🤞 Summertime has the most beautiful weather BUT during the winter time this region is 💥with Christmas markets that we’ve been dreaming of since 2018 when we first visited. Seriously, an actual snow globe. And the hot wine may be even better than the refreshing Pinot Gris 🤷‍♀️🤷🥂[last photo is from December 2018, in nearby Colmar]
With 227 Greek islands and just as many opinions on which ones are the best to visit, it’s hard to pick an itinerary for a vacation. We met friends in Santorini, so our first stop was an easy choice. We decided to focus on nearby islands with short transit times, so we hopped from Santorini —> Amorgos —> Naxos —> Antiparos & Paros. The highlight for us? Amorgos, hands down. With small kids in tow, the deserted beaches and lack of nightlife was a huge plus; there are way more goats than people on that island. For a bit more going on (but still a fun family vibe), Naxos had amazing beaches, sunset views + happy hour specials. Paros seems to be the favorite of many we met along the way: a bit trendier and fancier than Naxos but still more family-friendly than Mykonos (and easily accessible from Athens). Wish we had many more lifetimes to explore all 227 islands, but left with beautiful family memories and a couple of toddlers with a big taste for feta cheese.
First stop: Santorini! This picturesque + idyllic island is a bucket-list destination, for sure. Our friends happened to be in Greece at the same time, so of course we jumped at the chance to meet them in Santorini for a few days. While it’s definitely not the most family-friendly Greek Isle (and pretty tourist-centric), the cliffs of Oia are undoubtedly stunning and the Santorinian sunsets are unbeatable. Also, a quick side note to all the messages about making traveling with kids look easy: Traveling with toddlers isn’t easy and our toddlers (while we think they’re pretty close to perfect) are definitely not any more well-behaved than yours! We all know Instagram highlights all the good times (and there are SO many good times), but toddlers are still toddlers and… when they’re shrieking at dinner… you’re probably not taking a picture in that moment either, right? So, no, traveling with toddlers is definitely not stress-free. Sometimes it’s downright hard. But what sweet, sweet times we’ve shared together (and what fantastic life lessons my babies are learning!) that we wouldn’t trade it for anything. Our Santorini recommendations: 🏠 : Oia Sunset Hotel (amazing pool + perfect sunset views on your private terrace) 🍴: Roka Restaurant for delicious Greek food in a cozy atmosphere. 🌅 + 🍹: Naos is incomparable for panoramic sunset views… an absolute must do. Put this on the top of your list. 🚤: Santorini may be most beautiful from the sea. We went on a catamaran and stopped at volcanic hot springs + swam in the blue waters along with the fish. Not exactly stress-free with 3 toddlers on a boat, but it was worth it. 🏖: We took a taxi van to Perissa Beach for the day - it was one of my top 5 days ever: a fresh, seaside lunch + sharing a beach umbrella on (very hot) black lava sand with some of my best friends. Eliza had so much fun that she truly laughed the entire time. Belly laughed. It was heaven on earth.
Get yourself some friends who rejoice with you, mourn with you and drink key lime coladas with you. 🍹
No matter where we went in Colombia, one thing was true: everyone said we had to visit Salento. It's a tiny town in the coffee region (Zona Cafetera) that's a bit hard to get to (the nearest airport is over an hour's drive away), so even though we hadn't planned to rent a car, we figured that was the best way to reach Salento (most people take buses but we weren't sure that was the best idea for a wild 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 of 4...). This one-horse town (only metaphorically speaking because there are actually lots of 🐎 here) was colorful (shocker!) but the main town is surprisingly not the main focus of this stop. We stayed at a fantastic place down a dirt road about 1 km from the main town where the surrounding countryside is the ⭐️ of the show. Horses clip-clop all day long. The sun sets over hills and hills of vibrant green coffee trees. And the nearby Valle de Cocora was the highlight of our entire time in Colombia. Colombia's national tree, the wax palm 🌴, grows up to 60m (~200 ft!) high here and it's a stunning national park unlike any we've ever seen.
We weren’t planning to rent a car in Colombia but there are so many places we want to see! We jumped in the car and headed straight for Jerico. A tiny little town about 3 hours south of Medellin, it’s the perfect little “pueblo” to get a taste of small-town life. It surprises you with its color (is all of Colombia so filled with color?) and the town square comes to life in the late afternoons with old men in cowboy hats sipping tinto (dark + cheap coffee). A big Christ the Redeemer statue towers over the small town and, if you hike up to see it up close, most of the walk is through a beautiful botanical garden. A rooster woke us up each morning (Eliza now walks around saying “cock-a-doodle-do” all the time) and horses clip-clopped down the street in the evenings. There’s a pretty cool documentary about the women of Jerico (“Jericó: The Infinite Flight of Days”) and even if you don’t want to watch the whole thing, check out the 2 min trailer to get a small taste of life in Jerico.