Our Next Big Trip: Brazil 2014?

Posted on August 20, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

In 2009, it was backpacking around South America for 2 1/2 months.

In 2011, it was visiting my sisters in Denmark and Spain.

In 2012, it was our honeymoon in Asia.

In 2013, it was our friends’ wedding in Ireland.

But as of right now, it’s the first time in awhile* that Aaron and I haven’t planned our “next big trip,” and it’s starting to freak me us out!

One of the ideas that we’ve been kicking around (yes, pun intended) is going back to Brazil for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. Aaron and I spent a little over a month in Brazil in 2009 and covered nearly everywhere that we had wanted to go: Manaus in the Amazon, the hammock boat trip to Belém, Jericoacoara, Natal, Maceió, Salvador, Rio, Búzios, and finally Foz do Iguaçu.

Brazil 2009

However, we didn’t have the greatest weather while we were in Rio, so we knew that we’d have to go back some day. And really, what better time is there to visit Brazil, the country that absolutely worships soccer, than while it hosts the World Cup?

Okay, okay, yes, there are plenty of better times to visit Brazil, we know. We are aware that the price of everything there will surge. We know that the host cities are going to be extremely crowded. We’ve read about (and experienced**) street crime and other potential dangers. The first round of matches will take place in June, when it will be winter down in the Southern Hemisphere.

But despite all of the negatives, we still can’t help but be intrigued! I used to play soccer growing up and was lucky enough to go to a World Cup game in 1994 at nearby Stanford, but Aaron has turned into quite the soccer fan himself recently and I think that he’s even more enthusiastic about the possibility of going to a World Cup match in Brazil than I am!

So by no means are we going to go through with this idea for sure, but I did just want to mention that starting today you can register online to apply for tickets. And if you want more information about the ticketing process, check out this page.

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Peonies to Palm Trees is now on Twitter!

Posted on August 15, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Everyone is talking about how Prince recently joined Twitter, but did you guys notice that your favorite honeymoon blog just created a Twitter account as well?

Definitely not the Twitter logo… Ha.

That’s right, you can now follow me at @PTPT_honeymoons or by clicking the Twitter link in the sidebar of the blog.

Happy tweeting!

Oh, and you can follow Prince at @3rdeyegirl — my husband already is.

Have Your Honeymoon Featured on Peonies to Palm Trees!

Posted on August 9, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Have you, or someone you know, gone on an awesome honeymoon recently? Has it been a lifelong dream of yours to be featured on a honeymoon blog?

It has?! Well, today is your lucky day. Follow this link to get published on Peonies to Palm Trees: Submit Your Real Honeymoon

Why share your honeymoon online?

1) The blog post will provide you with a URL that you can easily share with your friends and family.

2) The Real Honeymoon posts on this blog are incredibly helpful to other couples deciding where to go on their own honeymoons.

3) It’s fun to reminisce : )

A huuuge thank you to everyone who has contributed to the blog already! You guys rock!

Honeymoon Reading Recommendations: Part II

Posted on August 2, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

It’s been nearly six months since my last post about books to read on your honeymoon (and it is one of the most popular posts to date!), so I thought it was about time to write a follow-up.

Remember, you’ll generally want to stay away from the dark and heavy stuff when it comes to reading material during your honeymoon so you don’t bum yourself out in paradise. Below are some books I’ve enjoyed recently that are honeymoon-approved:

– Where’d You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple (don’t let the silly cover art fool you, this book is great. I couldn’t put it down during my Panama trip. See below.)

Cold drink + great book = yes, please

– Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter (especially good for those of you planning honeymoons in Italy!)

– This Is Where I Leave You: A Novel by Jonathan Tropper (although seemingly not the best subjects for a honeymoon – the main character’s marriage just fell apart and his father passed away – it’s a really funny book about a dysfunctional family.)

– How to Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran (when gay men like Dan Savage recommend a feminist memoir, you know it’s going to be good.)

– The Last Girlfriend on Earth: And Other Love Stories by Simon Rich (also recommended by Dan Savage, this is an absolutely hilarious collection of short stories about relationships. I can’t wait to re-read it.)

And if you’re looking for something to “put you in the mood,” here are some other books that a good friend of mine and “self-proclaimed trashy romance connoisseur” recommends*:

– On Dublin Street by Samantha Young
– Easy by Tammara Webber
– The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay
– Ten Tiny Breaths by K.A. Tucker
– Beauty from Pain by Georgia Cates

What books would you recommend for honeymoon reading? Feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you’ve enjoyed recently.

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* I can’t vouch for any of those books. (Seriously.)

The New Vocabulary of Honeymoons

Posted on July 17, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Alright, I’ve already blogged a few times about mini-moons and I know about (and am simultaneously terrified of) baby-moons, but I was completely unaware of an entire subset of other honeymoon labels in existence until I recently came across this Jetsetter article. Maxi-moons, group moons, destination moons – excuse me? How was I so out of the loop?

To get us both up to speed in terms of new wave honeymoons, here’s a helpful breakdown:

The Maxi-moon

The lengths of the Real Honeymoons on this blog range from seven to 21 days, but a maxi-moon is the type of trip when the couple takes several months off to travel the globe. This usually entails quitting jobs (or being lucky enough to take a sabbatical), finding subletters or giving up apartments, and a lot of confidence that you and your new spouse travel well together. Although I haven’t received any submissions from this kind of honeymooner yet, I would absolutely love to hear from one. If you’re interested in booking this type of trip, check out this helpful blog post about buying round the world (RTW) tickets and then let me know how your trip went when you get back!

The Advance Moon

Remember Amy and Dave who went on an African safari honeymoon? They are the first (and only) people I know who did an advance moon – that’s right, a honeymoon before the wedding – and it worked out wonderfully*. While traditionalists will find the practice pretty strange, it completely makes sense to couples who have to schedule their wedding around school start/end-dates, job responsibilities, and other family obligations. Just make sure that you have all of your wedding plans mostly finalized before you leave so you don’t have to stress out too much when you get back from your trip.

(*Not only did they have an amazing trip, but Amy and Dave took some absolutely incredible photos while they honeymooned in Africa. Then they used those photos to great a personalized guestbook for their wedding. Everyone loved it!)

The Group Moon

What’s more romantic than a honeymoon with your new spouse… and a dozen of your closest friends? Jokes aside, I can see the appeal of this sort of trip… to a certain extent. According to Jetsetter, a group moon is when you rent a private villa for a few weeks, stay there alone with your spouse for half of the trip, and then invite friends to join you for the rest of the time. The idea is that you get a nice combination of private time as well as a social outlet that’s much more reliable than randomly chatting up other guests at a resort. What the article doesn’t explain is whether you invite friends to actually be your guests or you expect your friends to chip in on the costs, and I think it’s a bit presumptuous to assume that your friends will want to buy into your honeymoon.

The Destination Moon

Wait, what? What makes a destination moon different a regular honeymoon? It’s apparently what you call a honeymoon that takes place near a destination wedding. I didn’t know that sort of thing required a special name, but I guess it’s a thing.

Bring on the Whiskey and Guinness, We’re Off to Scotland & Ireland!

Posted on June 14, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Even though it feels like we just got back from Panama, we’re already about to embark on our next adventure. First up is Scotland, where we’ll explore Edinburgh for a few days and then take a train to Glasgow to catch a Bruce Springsteen concert. After Bruce rocks our socks off, we’ll fly to over Dublin to drink plenty of Guinness and celebrate our good friends’ wedding* in County Meath. Assuming that we recover from the wedding in time (rumor has it that Irish weddings often last until 7 AM the next morning), we’ll drive over to Galway and check out the Cliffs of Moher as well.

I don’t plan on spending much time in front of a computer during this trip, but I do have a couple of really great Real Honeymoon posts scheduled for publication on the next two Mondays, and I’ll definitely write about our own trip once we’re back home. In the meantime, enjoy this Scottish/Irish travel playlist that my husband just created for our trip.

Sláinte!

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* Even though these friends live exactly one mile away from us in San Francisco, it’s so awesome that we’re going to celebrate their wedding over 5,000 miles away in Tankardstown! You just can’t find wedding venues like this back home.

Looking Back On Our Honeymoon: One Year Later

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

I can’t believe that this Sunday marks my first wedding anniversary. Seriously, where did the past twelve months go? My husband and I still live in the same apartment, work at the same jobs, have the same dog… things just don’t feel too different, but now I guess we’ve transitioned from “newlyweds” to an “old married couple.” Awesome. I have confirmed this in a recent conversation with one of my sisters. It went a little something like this:

Sister: “_____ is having a baby.”

Me: (gasp!) “Whoa, really? Aren’t they a little young?”

Sister: “Yeah, they’re pretty young, but they act so old.”

Me: (sarcastically) “So, like as old as Aaron and me?”

Sister: “No, not that old.”

Thanks a lot, Nicole.

Since it’s been a year since the wedding, it has also been a year since our honeymoon and I’m feeling nostalgic. In honor of our honeymooniversary, I’m going to reminisce about some of my favorite parts of our trip.

1) Indonesian kids love Aaron. I don’t know if they thought he was an NBA player or what, but a photo similar to the one displayed above was taken many, many times during the eight days that we were in Bali. I mean, this wouldn’t be unheard of if we were in a remote village or some other place where there weren’t tons of white tourists. But this was Bali. There are literally caucasian Australian tourists EVERYWHERE. Why were they so obsessed with taking photos with Aaron? Either it was just because he’s 6’6″, or perhaps they mistook him for a famous pop star we don’t know about in the U.S. (I think Aaron’s hoping for the latter.)

2) The burritos at Taco Casa in Ubud, Bali. Like most brides, I watched my diet and worked out a lot before my wedding. I didn’t do any juice cleanses or early morning bootcamp classes, but I did make myself give up burritos for a few months. Burritos are one of my favorite foods, you see, and I live close to some of the best taquerias in San Francisco, so this was no easy feat. But when we were on our way to our first hotel in Bali, I noticed a huge sign for burritos at Taco Casa. I didn’t care that we were in Indonesia which is probably one of the last countries in the world that I’d expect to produce good burritos, I was going to have one damn it. Despite having very low expectations, I thought my burrito was quite excellent. Maybe I’m just too burrito-deprived, I thought, but Aaron also thought his burrito was shockingly delicious. So coming from two San Franciscan burrito connoisseurs, we give Taco Casa two enthusiastic thumbs up.

3) The beautiful beaches in Hoi An, Vietnam – man, they were nice. The photo above was taken on the private beach of our hotel – Boutique Hoi An Resort. We stayed for four nights and absolutely loved it, so I’d totally recommend it to anyone who’s thinking about going to Vietnam. The hotel was pretty busy because a German girl and Australian guy were having a destination wedding there. Since we were still totally in all-things-wedding mode, we chatted with the groom’s parents who told us that the couple met at a hostel while backpacking in London. (That’s the story that Aaron and I are going to use from now on whenever we get asked about how we first met.) It was fun to (respectfully) spy on their intimate beach wedding.

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Just Not Feeling It This Week

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Ever since I started this honeymoon blog last September, I’ve consistently published at least two blog posts every week: one real honeymoon post and then whatever else I felt like writing about. Some friends have asked how I find the time to do it, but I always say that it’s easy because it’s a lot of fun for me. But as much as I love honeymoons and writing about travel in general, I must admit that I’m just not feeling it this week.

After hearing about the horrible explosions at the Boston Marathon finish line a few days ago, I’ve been in a bit of a funk. Even though I’m not a marathon runner myself (5Ks are just fine for me, thank you), my husband runs about two full marathons and a couple of halves a year, and I always look forward to cheering him on.* Despite having seen him, my uncle, one of my sisters, and many of my friends run plenty of marathons over the years, I still get emotional every time I watch them and the other runners achieve such an awe-inspiring accomplishment. Who am I kidding? I get emotional just thinking about marathons. I love watching the people who run in creative costumes (and still make it look so easy), the kids who cheer like crazy when they spot their parents, and the amazing guides who lead the even more amazing blind marathoners throughout the entire race (and the countless hours of training as well). At one race I even saw a runner stop just yards before the finish line, get down on one knee, and propose to his girlfriend who was completely taken by surprise.** Even as a spectator, I’m so grateful for all of the wonderful memories that marathons have given me.

All marathons are impressive, but the Boston Marathon is an exceptional race. As if being able to run 26.2 miles isn’t impressive enough, the Boston Marathon runners have all qualified by either running incredibly fast times during previous races or by running on behalf of some sort of charity. The route itself is no piece of cake either (they don’t call one portion of it “Heartbreak Hill” for nothing). It’s an honor to even be allowed to participate in the Boston Marathon. Everyone there on Monday, runners and spectators alike, had so much to be proud of, which makes this attack even more unbearable for me to even think about.

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Honeymoon Reading Recommendations: Keep It Light!

Posted on February 20, 2013 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Believe it or not, your honeymoon is not the time to bust out tearjerker books such as Never Let Me Go, The Road, or Little Bee. It’s also not necessarily the best time to tackle notoriously challenging books like Infinite Jest or Gravity’s Rainbow. In her recent Tahitian honeymoon blog post, my very wise friend Alix made an excellent point that I also want to emphasize: you’ve got to keep the reading selection during your honeymoon light.

The library at the Hon Tam Resort in Nha Trang, Vietnam

I recently polled a small group of friends to ask them what they read during their honeymoons, and the feedback was almost entirely unanimous:

1) Everyone likes funny books, especially comedic memoirs:

– Bossypants by Tina Fey (the audiobook, too, is truly amazing)

– Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling

– Anything by Chelsea Handler

2) Book series are so hot right now:

– The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins (although one friend mentioned that she would get so caught up in the books that wouldn’t want to put them down, which brings up a smart point that if you don’t want to turn your honeymoon into a reading marathon, you should bring along books that are good, but not THAT good.)

– The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling (these books are pretty clunky, so it’s probably best to load them on an e-reader)

– The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Trilogy by Stieg Larsson (a good story, yes, but definitely not the lightest/happiest subject matter)

3) “Romance novels” can help put you in the mood:

– The 50 Shades of Grey Trilogy by E L James (Oh my! Barf. I couldn’t even get through book two, but it sounds like all of my friends were equally curious about these books)

And I can’t personally vouch for any of the following, but the following books were highly recommended by a self-proclaimed trashy romance connoisseur:

– Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

– Beautiful Disaster by Jamie McGuire

– The Mighty Storm by Samantha Towle

– On the Island by Tracey Garvis-Graves

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Cheers to 2013!

Posted on December 31, 2012 by Peonies to Palm Trees

Happy New Year from my favorite city in the world: San Francisco!

Views of the Golden Gate Bridge never get old : )

As 2012 comes to an end, I feel very grateful for all of the traveling I did during the past year, especially my honeymoon in Bali and Vietnam.

But even though 2012 was pretty great, I seriously can’t wait for what 2013 has to offer. We already have trips lined up for Chicago, Scottsdale, Dallas, Los Angeles, and IRELAND (!!!), and I’m hoping to get up to Tahoe as much as possible during the ski season.

Here’s to a 2013 full of exciting travels and memorable adventures!