Tiny Peruvian Night Monkeys in the Amazon all cozied up in their hole. They remind me quite a lot of how I felt about getting back to international travel in 2022! But we got back out there! And have big plans for 2023!

2023 Looking to Travel Ahead!

January 3, 2023

2022 People were back traveling, with reports of full planes, festivals and fairs running out of parking and food, and rising prices.

2023 We can expect more travelers and crowds at popular destination, which means more than ever people need great advice to choose good destinations make their trips the best! I get my advice from great travel advisors and I use trusted travel companies to take remote of group tours. Please see our list of trusted travel specialists here.

2022 In Review

Back to travel for us in 2022! After no travel in late 2020, and traveling primarily domestically, we finally got out of the country in 2022.

January Return to Walt Disney World

Click to see our trip report! Celebrating WDW’s very extended 50th anniversary celebration

March Yellowstone in Winter

Click here to see our trip report A wintery visit to Yellowstone and Big Sky was cool in every way!

April and December New York City and Broadway

See our trip reports April here
Click here for December
A pair of trips to see Broadway shows…quiet in Aril, but the crowds had returned in December!

May and June Peru

See our trip report here. The Supay Cano in the remote Peruvian Upper Amazon Basin. Our first “big” international trip ended with a covid infection and 5 day quarantine in Iquitos, a market town that is a gateway to the Amazon. But the week on the Delfin 2 along the remote Amazon upper River Basin included pie eyed primates, secret ox box lakes, troops of monkeys leaping through the canopy, enormous flowers, tiny frogs and swimming with pink dolphins was memorable!

September Maine Wildlife Camp

Our Report from 2020 here and 2021 here and a gallery of our photos from 2022 below

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October Quebec City

Chateau Frontenac from La Citadel, in Quebec City. An anniversary trip to Quebec City in the fall? OUI!

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November Back to Ocean Cruising

It took some guts to get back on board a large cruise ship, but after contracting covid while on a small ship with just 21 passengers, I concluded, “size doesn’t matter” and with a recent “new booster” chose to take the plunge. We had a fantastic experience, re discovering our love of the open sea and adventurous ports in Caribbean Mexico.

2023 Plans

Some of our plans have been in motion for months, while others are last minute (or will be) choices. In the last 2 years so many trips were rescheduled and moved up, that we’ve decided to plan a few larger trips that depend on a lot of logistics and do some smaller explorations last minute.

Space Coast and Walt Disney World

Vermont Skiing and Ocean Cruising to Mexico and Grand Cayman

Hoping to chase away winter blues by “embracing” winter with a cross country ski trip to Vermont (pictured) and “escape” winter with a cruise into Mexico and Grand Cayman.

Hawaii

Our last foray into Polynesian landscapes and culture was in 2012, to Tahiti (and Moorea in the distance)aboard the Paul Gaugin cruise ship. Now more than 10 years later, we plan to visit Hawaii and explore under water, along the shores and up into the volcanic mountains. We will be cruising on the Uncruise expedition ship Safari Explorer (36 passengers) and crossing the Pacific to Vancouver aboard Royal Caribbean Quantum of the Seas (with over 4ooo passengers!)

Balloon Festival in Mane

A bucket list adventure! We have a weekend planned in northern Maine where we hope the weather cooperates and we can take a balloon ride and photograph mass balloons launches! (stock photography)

The Back 1/2 of 2023

We are open to adventure! Our biggest adventure will exploring our LAST CONTINENT - Antarctica in early 2024! In just over a year we hope to explore Patagonia and cruise to South Georgia Island and the Antarctic peninsula.

Many more adventures to come, so long as we are blessed with good health! Thank you to our followers who have engaged with our content through the years and especially to our friends who participated in out “Go See It People” interviews. Please share where your next adventure will be!

Thank you to all our friends and readers for following along, and we wish you good health and exciting adventures in 2023!

Editor and Publisher: K Klofft

All photos: J klofft (unless noted)

What's Wrong With Their Home?

December 27, 2017

That's the question people might ask if they took a look at our travel schedule in 2017! Luckily, we love our home...but we also like to explore the world. We especially love to explore it with people we love and meet new friends all over the globe. Travel is all about connecting with people all over the world, and we feel very fortunate to have met and traveled with so many incredible people. We are grateful to all the people who followed our adventures and those who shared their corner of the world with us! We especially want to thank the folks who shared THEIR trips with us in our GoSeeIt People interviews. (You can find the interviews here) We love hearing about your travels too! THANK YOU! We hope you have many safe travels in 2018 and wish the very best in the coming year!

Over the last year here are some of the places we've been able to explore. Click on any link to see more photos in our posts and learn more about each destination! (Next week, we will share where we are headed next!)

What A Year!

Shanghai, China

Savannah

Florida

Spring Break Cruise to Honduras, Belize and Cozumel

Some of the most fun we had all year, was acting like kids with the college kids aboard Rhapsody of the Seas. After years of hearing how grownups should avoid "Spring Break", we went tubing, zip lining, and dancing with the Spring Breakers and had a great time!

The rest of our posts from Honduras and Belize, including our Pack for a Purpose school supplies delivery to Roatan click here!

Vermont

NY Finger Lakes Region

Statuary in the Orchid House at the Sonnenberg Gardens

NYC

A trip to visit our daughter in NYC took us to some of the less visited places in NYC...Flatbush, Harlem, DUMBO. See our trip report here! And about the more popular places in NYC here and here.

White Mountains in New Hampshire

Venice

Slovenia

This small country offers environment from coastal to alpine, as is seen here at Lake Bled, as well as one of the prettiest little European capitals, Ljubljana.

Croatia

Montenegro

Corfu

Malta

A Maltese balcony on Republic Street flies the EU and Matlese flags.

Sicily/Mt Etna

An incredible day hike up Mt Etna with 3 mountaineers, wine and homemamde parmigiana!

Amalfi

Rome

Montreal

The Notre Dame Basilica reflected in a decorated window

Joyeux Noel Montreal

December 7, 2017

There are few places warmer than Montreal at Christmas! Fireplaces in nearly every restaurant and fire pits all around Montreal Vieux (Old Montreal) blaze, inviting guests to warm their hands. The stores are decorated with colorful displays for the holidays and the local chamber of commerce map even includes a "Light Tour" you can walk during the evening and see the city's historical buildings lit all year long. During the Advent and Christmas season, expect even more lights! Montreal put on a warm welcome for our recent visit!

Rue St Paul decorated for the Christmas holiday!

We checked into our Montreal Old Town hotel, the Marriott Springhill Suites on a Friday night. It was ideally located on Rue Jean-Baptiste, almost dead center of the historic Old City. The rooms were comfortable and clean and an expansive breakfast buffet was included.

I was waiting for Jeff to fly into town and it was my job to find a restaurant for dinner. I selected a restaurant using the "walk around and see where the locals are" method. This is easy to do when "off season" touring. (For more on off season touring tips see our post here) During busier seasons, it's best to ask the concierge at the hotel, because restaruants could be filled with tourists who might not know better, and the concierge may be able to use their relationship to score a reservation on a busy night.

I found Modavie just a block away, and filling fast. It seemed even more promising when I was followed by the saxophone player into the bar. It seemed like a neighborhood kind of place, with the staff dispensing lots of hugs to regular patrons, and the parents of the hostess, sitting next to me in the bar, promised I would enjoy the jazz band that started at 7PM. Jeff met me just before I finished my drink and we asked the owner if we could get a table for dinner. We were placed in the convivial dining room, near one of those blazing fireplaces, surrounded by locals celebrating a 24th birthday and a young Emirates flight crew enjoying a night out on the town.

Click any image to expand Photos by K Klofft)

We were close enough to enjoy the 4 piece Jazz band, without being so close we couldn't converse. The specialty of the house was lamb, which neither of us eat, but everything else we ate was delicious, and the service was attentive without being pretentious. The waitstaff was so friendly, one even felt comfortable enough to photo bomb our selfie! It's not often you visit a place as a tourist and are treated like a friend! Modiavie's, Maitre d'hotel, Lorenzo, passed me his card and invited us back anytime...our very first dinner out in town showed the warm welcome we get from Montreal all weekend!

Montreal Vieux

The following morning we were up early explore Old Montreal.

A beautifully decorated shop window in Old Montreal

Place d'Armes and Notre Dame

One of our first stops was Basilica du Notre Dame. The Basilica was located in the Place d'Armes, which has several historic buildings, including the bank and several interesting statues.

The Maisonneuve Monument by L. Hebert in Place d'Armes. I particularly enjoyed the statues at the base commemorating other important residents of Montreal.

Be sure to take a peek at the base of the modern looking bank for two interesting statues that seeks to interpret the intersection of the relationship between the English and the French in Quebec!

There are a few ways to tour the Basilica of Notre Dame; there is a group tour run on the half hour as part of your admission. Or you could arrange a private guide. Or you could do what we did, which was to wander around and read the placards at each chapel to fill in the details.

Having recently spent several weeks in Italy and touring many, many churches, decked out with statues of male Saints, knights and popes I was delighted that Notre Dame, wasn't just about one Blessed Lady! Throughout the Basilica are statues, paintings, and chapels all devoted to the a wide variety of strong French women, including nuns and beatified Holy women and Saints! As a woman who is 1/8th French Canadian herself, it was nice to see the woks and holiness of my ancestors! I know very well about strong French Canadian women who get things done and give selflessly to their communities and God!

A fish eye lens view of the ceiling of the Basilica from altar (left) to organ (right)

River Front/Old Port

After touring Place D'Armes and the Basilica and surrounding areas, we walked along the river front, along Rue De la Commune. This area was very quiet this time of year (and I imagine could be much colder than the 30's F we enjoyed) in the off season. We enjoyed the views to the mainland across the river, and the huge Ferris wheel, Le Grande roue de Montreal on Il Bon Secours.

A view up Place de Jacques Cartier to the Hotel De Ville (City Hall), with the closed down summer fun parks siting idle in the foreground.

Place Jacques Cartier

Downtown Montreal

We decided to make our way to Downtown Montreal, roughly considered things west of Rue St Antoine. With short daylight hours, we decided to go to Chinatown for a quick lunch of noodles.

Chinatown is bordered by two decorative gates on Blvd St Laurent

We were headed for the seasonal Christmas Market on Rue St Catherine E. located at Place de Festivals. Along the way we were encountered volunteers encouraging people to visit the Maison du development durable, where the entire building was filled with a pop up fair of local artist showing their wares, each using recycled or reclaimed materials to create their art. Most of the local artists only spoke a little English, but we had no trouble expressing our appreciation of their work in our limited French, and we did a little Christmas shopping! Then made our way to the outdoor Le Grande Marche Du Noel.

Above, "lightbulb" ornament, and recycled arts and crafts in the Sustainable Building Center.

Grand Marche Du Noel

Click the arrow below to see video of carolers at the Grand Marche Du Noel

Mdm. Claus awaits children young and old during Santa's coffee break

We enjoyed watching the local children sit on Mrs Clauses lap and ride around on a tiny train. We enjoyed "Snow on Sugar" a traditional maple sugar treat.

If you are visiting Montreal at other times of the year, this area of Rue St Catherine, is where you will find all of Montreal's excellent art museums!

Rue St Paul Shopping and Dining in Old Montreal

After enjoying the Rue St Catherine Christmas market scene, we headed back to Old Montreal for dinner and to take in the shopping scene along Rue St Paul.

There are high end galleries and accessible tourist shops along Rue St Paul, as well as many restaurants and bars.

A surprising addition to the window display... hockey rival's Boston Bruins hat shares space with traditional Montreal souvenirs.

If you look up at the historic buildings all around you, you might notice projections on the walls. We wondered what these interesting, artsy looking projections were, and we learned that it is a project called Cite Memoire, an outdoor projection walking tour app. Even without the app, we stopped to enjoy several of the projections which shared on the spot history of the building or area it was projected!

Part of the Cite Memoire projection tour in Old Montreal

For dinner we made a reservation at Auberge Saint-Gabriel, which had been recommended in a travel article by Christopher Murther in our local travel section. As I often do, I hung onto the article for months, and then referred to it choose a good restaurant within walking distance.

New art work, in this case, the "other" parts of the moose made into a lamp, meets old stone building (photo K Klofft)

We enjoyed the funky decor mixed with the historic building, according to their menu, one of the oldest taverns in the Northeast. In addition to a cozy atmosphere with a blazing fire, and cauliflower on an a open brazier, the service was friendly and professional and the food was very well prepared and tasty! They say it's difficult to have a bad meal in Montreal, and we found that to be true! It was enjoyable to have fine dining in a relaxed atmosphere with friendly, unpretentious service!

Cauliflower on the brazier, cauliflower and mozzarella appetizers, flank steak with rapini and fries, salted caramel and chocolate pie.

Our intention was to visit the speakeasy attached to Auberge St Gabriel, but staying awake for it to open at 11, seemed insurmountable when we finished dinner at 9:30 PM!

Mount Royal

After a good night's rest, we decided to visit Mount Royal Park, (200+ meters elevation) in the center of the city. The park is free to enter but there is a charge to park. We enjoyed the ride up to the park, driving through some lovely residential neighborhoods and McGill University. We were amazed at the amount of local people enjoying the park. Thirty to forty degrees in December is warm, and the local folks seemed to taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather!

There is also a skating rink and lake as well as miles of walking trails. Facilities including information staff, washrooms and cafes, can be found in Smith House and the Chalet.

The Croix atop Mount Royal, Quebec and Canadian flags

A little black squirrel, on an unseasonably warm Sunday in Montreal, getting ready for cooler days ahead!

We travel the globe with mantra that "there is no bad weather, only bad clothes". We were prepared with all our warmest clothing when we visited Montreal before Christmas. In the end, we didn't need much of it; the warm welcome of the Quebecois and the city of Montreal kept us feeling warm and cozy all weekend!