Pennsylvania Girl Abroad

The landscape changed dramatically on the four hour drive from London to Cornwall. When we had to stop the car to wait patiently for a chicken crossing the narrow road ahead, I knew we had arrived. I couldn’t wait for a relaxing, peaceful vacation in the Cornish countryside, and to explore the towns I heard […]

As we drove across the quiet, open highway, Abu Dhabi’s skyline emerged in the distance. Next to the highway I noticed a few bridges. Bridges that led to nowhere – at least temporarily. Day by day, brick by brick, highway by highway, Abu Dhabi’s expanding, replacing desert sand with new projects and infrastructure, preparing to […]

It’s difficult to find the words to describe the last year of my life, and even more difficult to avoid feeling overwhelmed as I attempt putting it all into words. 2013 was a whirlwind of a year – living in London, experiencing so many different cultures, and traveling to places that I couldn’t even pinpoint […]

For 32 consecutive years my Christmas holiday was always the same – a traditional Christmas Eve dinner at my grandparents’ house in small town Pennsylvania and Christmas Day at my parents house surrounded by family. Until Christmas of 2013 came around… Still living abroad in London and with a flight scheduled back to New York […]

Stockholm in December and my first ever visit to the country of Sweden. I expected a snowy festive Christmas atmosphere considering Stockholm’s northernly location in the world (& proximity to the home of Santa and his reindeer). In reality, temperatures hovered around 37 degrees Fahrenheit (3 degrees Celsius) and two out of the three days we visited […]

I had a very naive perception of the Middle East for the first 30+ years of my life, a picture that included arid land, deserts, camels and oil. Lots of it. It was never on my bucket list of travel spots as it seemed almost too foreign, way too removed from the world I grew […]

As adults, it’s often easy to forget the remarkable childhood capability we all once had to get excited by the little pleasures in life. Work, everyday responsibilities and our own “to-do” lists often replace some of the carefree-no-worries-in-the-world fun. While vacationing in the United Arab Emirates last week, I found a way to recapture all […]

While inside the Vatican complex in Rome, all I could see in front of me was an endless sea of humanity. Vatican security staff used ropes to block certain entrances and force the crowds to take the long route, away from the most direct entrance to the Sistine Chapel via a maze of small collection rooms within […]