The Mean Girls take a FriendMoon

It’s been about 8 long and torturous months since you’ve last seen the good old travel blog.  I’m sure you regulars have noticed the new name and layout (both of you).  Domain name cred goes to Brett Boston.  New layout cred goes to YouTube and my new found friend, patience.

Today, I leave for two weeks in Sardinia and the French Riviera.  It’s not quite two months like the last trip, but now that I’m a contributing member of society again (overrated) I have to take what I can get.  I’ll just be proactive and go ahead and answer that question that I hate but everyone always asks: why are you going there?  My response is usually, why the fuck not?  But I actually have a real answer this time.  What started out as a week Munich and Prague took a left turn around April when I planned my friend’s honeymoon in France.  I was wrought with jealousy.  Now personally, I think the fact that someone married you should be enough, but you also get to take a bad ass trip?  I’m calling No Fair on this shit.  Frankly, I think people who get married should get me a gift at their wedding.  I’m the one who has to go on dates with dudes who lie about their height, have speech impediments, bring their fucking dog on a first date,  or turn out, unbeknownst to me,  deaf or in a wheel a chair (yes, these all happened).  So I think I deserve a little honeymoon too.  One problem: no honey.  Being the problem solver that I am, I have come up with a solution: the friendmoon.  So I am off on a romantical getaway with two of my favorite travel partners.  Let me take you back to how I met them….

It all started many years ago.  Back before I planned my trips in an excel spreadsheet and used a label maker to pack my toiletries.  Back in 2008 when The Mean Girls, as well call ourselves, took a break from our mundane lives of debits and credits and went on our first trip to Greece.  Since then, I have traveled the world with these girls. We have swam in the Amazon river, camped in the Sahara desert, snorkeled between tectonic plates in Iceland, and  biked through rice paddies in Bali, just to name a few.  So although my travel soul mate, Stina, is too busy being a responsible grown up with a job to make this trip, rest assured that the blog is still in good hands.  Lets meet the girls:

Yacht week pirates

Just an exfoliating mud bath between friends

Katie – codename: Jorgie.  Likes: watersports, carbs, wine, keeping Rory in line.  Dislikes:  Rory’s driving, Rory making her party until the wee hours of the morning, Rory stressing out when things don’t go her way on vacation.  Favorite vacation memory:  Bailing out our sinking canoe with a plastic cup while fishing in the crocodile and piranha infested waters of “Lago de la Muerte” in the Amazon.    What a risk taker!  She’s single boys!  And did I mention this poor girl not only travels with me, but lives with me?  Bless her patient and forgiving heart.

Back when Steph thought she wasn’t a beer drinker.

I haven’t been allowed to drive for a long time…

Stephanie – codename: Steph.  Likes:  Cheetah print everything, eating fish while I turn my nose up in disgust, her kindle, battery operated “Off” bug spray fans.  Dislikes: Rory’s driving (are you seeing a theme here?), activities involving an harness, monkeys….monkeys of all kind, being responsible for taking pictures.  Favorite vacation memory:  Buying black market wine in a hidden underground storage facility beneath a tourist shop in Morocco.  And then defending said wine with her life when all the other tourists on the desert tour realized they missed the BYOB memo.  This one is newly single – I think she actually made herself single in the hopes that we will find a group of boys with a yacht on this trip.   Although, so far the closest we’ve gotten to a free ride on a boat was a sinking dinghy in Croatia.  A mega yacht is obviously the next step.

Surviving the Amazon (barely)

Look at those 23 year olds!

We’re Back!!

Here we go!