Europe
Europe
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Camino Francés Full Journey: 46 Days Walking Across Spain
After 46 days walking across northern Spain, we finally reached Santiago de Compostela. This video is our complete Camino Francés journey from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port in France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. We walked the Camino slowly, averaging about 16 km (10 miles) per day with no rest days, staying mostly in private rooms and often choosing quieter off-stage towns along the route. If you’ve ever dreamed about walking the Camino de Santiago, this video shares what the experience really looked like for us: the beautiful landscapes, historic towns, difficult climbs, quiet mornings, pilgrim meals, moments of exhaustion, and the small experiences that made the journey unforgettable. Watch the Full Camino…
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Private Rooms on the Camino Francés: Full Cost Breakdown & Booking Tips
When we started planning our second Camino Francés, we knew we wanted more comfort and privacy at the end of each day, but figuring out private rooms on the Camino Francés was not as straightforward as we expected. Over 46 days, we stayed entirely in private rooms on the Camino Francés, tracked every euro, and learned what worked (and what didn’t) for a slower, more comfortable Camino. We’ve walked the Camino Francés twice, once in 38 days with rest days, and again in 46 days with no rest days, both times starting in early September and prioritizing private rooms. On this last walk we tracked our per‑day spending and total trip cost so you…
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Camino Francés Packing List: What Worked for Us and What We’d Change
If you’re planning to walk the Camino Francés, what you pack will shape your experience more than you might expect.On our first Camino, we overpacked and we felt it every single day. In this post, I’ll walk you through what worked, what we’d change, and our full Camino Francés packing list. If you’d rather watch than read, here’s our full Camino Packing video where we walk through our thoughts on packing for the Camino de Santiago. For our 2025 Camino Francés, we carried everything again, but this time we packed with intention. Not ultralight. Not minimalist for the sake of it. Just smart, practical choices that made 500 miles feel…
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Discovering Europe’s Holiday Spirit: The Ultimate Christmas Market River Cruise
Why a Chirstmas Market River Cruise is the best way to explore the Christmas markets to Germany, Austria, and Budapest.
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The Entire Camino Frances in 60 Seconds
Our 500-mile, 38-day Camino Frances from Saint-Pied-de-Port to Santiago de Compostela distilled down to 60 seconds. It was difficult to choose one picture to represent each day because each day had so many memorable moments. We hope this gives you a glimpse into the amazing journey that is the Camino: the hard parts, the rainy and wet parts, the silly parts, the beautiful parts, and the joy that comes from achieving your goals. Buen Camino! For more details about each day on the Camino de Santiago, check out our entire Camino Frances itinerary complete with Relive videos for each day.
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Camino Trivia Quiz: Saints, Miracles of the Camino Frances
Trivia quiz about saints and miracles along the Camino Frances, the French Way of the Camino de Santiago. How much do you know?
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10 Things we will do differently on our next Camino
Our 38-day Camino Frances trek was one of our best trips but there is always something to learn and room for improvement. Here’s our list of lessons learned in no particular order (except maybe the first one, this is the most important change we would make). We’ve also added a couple of bonus Camino Frances-specific tips at the end. Plan shorter days We learned pretty quickly that our feet do best when limit our distance to 10 to 12 miles. For this trip we had booked ahead the entire trip so were committed to a few long days. Now that we know 15 miles is too much for us we…
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Relive our Camino de Santiago French Way Trek
We recorded Relive videos on our fall 2023 pilgrimage from St. Jean Pied de Port to Santiago de Compostela. The trek took 38 days (including some rest days); the videos will give you a glimpse of what each day looked like, I’ve also added some thoughts about some of the days: lessons learned and things we’d do differently next time. The distance numbers are what we tracked on All Trails and will include any distance spent being lost and exploring (I sometimes started the Relive videos late so the numbers you see there might be different). Day From To Distance (miles/KM) Where we stayed Cost per Night (USD in 2023)…
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New Year’s in Paris: Fireworks and Pain au Chocolate!
After Christmas in London, we hopped on a train and headed to Paris for the New Year Holiday. This trip crossed a few things off the bucket list: The Chunnel, New Year’s Eve on the Champs-Élysées, and Raclette. We spent four days in Paris before taking the train back to London and flying home. We packed quite a bit into our short stay. Getting There and Back Again We left London early on December 31st to give us plenty of time to get settled in our hotel and work our way to the Champs-Élysées. Due to national rail strikes that were impacting The Underground, we took an Uber to St.…
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Christmas In London: Dickens, Museums, Afternoon Tea, and Christmas Markets
In December 2022 Bob and I traveled to London to experience Christmas in England. There are pros and cons to visiting over the holidays. The winter markets are open and offering holiday treats and mulled wines, everything is decked out with lights and holiday decor, and restaurants offer unique holiday menus. On the downside, many shops, museums, and restaurants are closed some or all of the week between Christmas and New Year’s, and the weather was a bit drizzly. Nonetheless, we had a terrific holiday in London and manage to pack quite a bit into our one-week stay. We stayed at a Premier Inn in the Blackfriars area in the…
