Took a quick trip to Tulum for my birthday back in February. Yucatán is as beautiful as ever.

#travel #travelphotography #tulum #mexico #womenwhotravel

Across the fjord is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a stave church from the 11th century.

A local hostel owner did trick us into believing riding a manual bike there would be easy. But in fairness to him, Norwegians do seem to be in incredible shape. Maybe the aggressive uphill trip doesn’t hit the same.

#travel #travelphotography #womenwhotravel #norway #westernnorway #fjords

There were basically three places in Norway I beyond a shadow of a doubt want to revisit and this idyllic little town on a fjord, with this tiny ferry and hotel right next door is one of them.

It was absolute magic.

#travel #womenwhotravel #norway #westernnorway #fjords #travelphotography

Something really stunning about Norway are the glaciers and the fact that you can walk right up to the glacier from the hike.

If you schedule a tour with an experienced glacier guide you can even walk the glacier. I’ve done a glacier trek in Patagonia so for me I was happy just to view it.

But again, the hiking is unparalleled. The landscapes are stunning. And the hikers in Scandinavia are so friendly when you run across them (which is infrequently to not at all).

It hasn’t been a year yet and I’m seriously considering when I could realistically go back.

QOTD: have you seen a glacier yet?

#travel #hiking #norway #westernnorway #glacier #naturephotography #womenwhotravel

I wouldn’t characterize myself as a big hiker, but my favorite type of hike is a forest hike.

#norway #westernnorway #travelphotography #travel #womenwhotravel #naturephotography

Back to my new favorite travel topic, Western Norway. I’m so pleased we got to stay in one of these grass roof buildings, because they were so prevalent around the country.

This was one of my favorite stops. As you can see pictured, there were fireplaces in the rooms and you could also sit by the fireplace in the main house.

This was situated at the bottom of a hike, so you could go hiking from the property (though they warned you need to be an experienced hiker and that was definitely true).

From here we were also able to go hiking up to a glacier. And as you can see, even though this was early September, the vibes were pretty autumnal in this area, which was one of the things that really stunned me about Norway at this time of year.

Just by traveling you can experience late summer and early fall depending on where you stay. You’ll see our next stop was pretty summery.

QOTD: do you like cozy fireside vacations?

#norway #westernnorway #travel #womenwhotravel #vacation #hygge #cozyhotel

Photographs from a day at Trollstigen.

Our first full day really out in Western Norway we went ebiking to the famous Trollstigen lookout. Unfortunately due to the likelihood of landslides it wasn’t possible to travel the famous switchbacks pictured here, but you could view them.

The thing I really enjoyed about being in Western Norway was the way the vastness of the landscape never stopped. We were basically alone on the road ebiking for miles, stopping to gaze around at the fjords. We met a Polish photographer who was driving to Trollstigen and wanted to share a stunning shot he had just taken.

And that’s a sort of interesting thing about being somewhere where there aren’t a lot of people is that you all find yourselves sort of sidling up to each other to get the social interactions where you find them, and that’s obviously very different than New York, where we all ignore each other because to try to engage with everyone would be too overwhelming.

#travel #womenwhotravel #norway #westernnorway #trollstigen

Travel has become something really important in my life as I’ve settled into a career where I don’t need to move every few years, and the single most transformative trip I think I’ve been on in my life was to Norway this summer.

I cannot stop talking about it, thinking about it, which is funny because I had never thought “oh, I need to go to Norway” until suddenly and urgently I wanted to go this year.

It was nothing I expected. These are photos from our first day in Älesund, where we stayed the night in a lighthouse?!! My husband found and booked this one, so it was a total surprise, and completely magical (for one night, it’s also small and people are constantly trying to let themselves in).

We spent the trip traveling through the fjords of Western Norway, and surprise, there was a royal wedding in the area while we did it, so it was a really unique time to be in the area.

We basically kept hearing about it and being asked if we’d seen anything because we happened to be in Älesund the night of some wedding event there. Sadly, we had no idea and had no gossip to offer. We also kept getting the question “was it crowded?” Which, maybe it was? But coming from New York it didn’t feel crowded at all. In either case, it serves as a kind of time stamp, and if we had nothing to offer at least it served as a conversation starter.

Have you been somewhere that you can’t get out of your mind?

#travel #womenwhotravel #norway #westernnorway #travelphotography #lighthouse #Älesund