We’re Tauni & Michele.
Our ‘What’
Our ‘niche’ is exploring *unique* world destinations while balancing families & full-time careers back at home (shoutout to our supportive spousesđź‘Ť). We are not full-time travel bloggers.
We actually refer to our getaways as ‘girls trips’ because we are, in fact, two women surrounded by our families full of males. So, ‘Girls Trips’–I mean, ok… But disclaimer: these trips are not the clubbing and beachy trips that come to mind when we think ‘Girls Trips.’
We walk a LOT (with plenty of coffee and wine breaks), and we prefer exploring via mass transit when possible. “24 hours in….” city visits are our jam.
Our ‘Why’
Michele: In 2016, when Tauni was trying achieve ’50 countries before age 50,’ I offered to ‘help’ and I proposed a girls trip in the week between Christmas and New Years. Our spouses gave their blessings and we gathered points, miles and deals to fly to Milan as our base city. We hit up Liechtenstein, Warsaw and Monaco besides Italy. Michele flew home and Tauni went on to Portugal.
It was exhilarating to research and see as much as we could in a city in about 24 hours. And this, our first girls trip, we got along through the miles. We were emboldened to do it again, as she was closing in on 50 countries. Helpful ME remained ready to assist!
Our ‘Where’
We focus on lesser-known/visited destinations. There are great blogs that focus on Paris, Rome, Madrid, London. We prefer to discover less mainstream destinations like: Kyiv (<3); Liechtenstein; Monaco; Warsaw; Thessaloniki; North Macedonia; Bulgaria; Romania; Moldova. Azerbaijan; Georgia (the Tbilisi kind); Armenia…. you get the idea.
Our ‘When’ & ‘How Long’
Due to our corporate (Tauni) and public school (Michele) jobs, we thrive on the rush of planning the most efficient tour plans we can in our limited time frame–usually a week-ish and always on school breaks.
Our ‘How’
We book as much as possible with miles/points/loyalty programs (definitely helps with spouse buy-in).
Here is a little about each of us.
Tauni
I caught the travel bug early, when my Spanish class in North Dakota offered a Spain trip for 3 weeks when I was just 14. The trip was life-changing for me – and I developed a live-long love for both travel and Spanish. I still travel to learn. To learn language – even if only a few words in every country, and to learn about the history and culture of different regions. I think you can learn so much just by walking a country, and being there, things you would never realize or feel by reading dozens of history books. The first time we were in the UAE, we went to hop on a subway to visit one of the tourist sites, and I was shocked that there was a separate car for women and children and I had to separate from my husband and son. I could have read about that … but not had the gut-punch of having to separate unexpectedly. [Don’t get me wrong – I love to travel alone, and I wasn’t scared to be alone – it’s more about the fear of not being able to find them again after being separated].
I love to travel and need to travel regardless of travel partners. I travel with my family – husband and son, or lately with just my husband as my son is now in his 20’s. I also travel with my sister-in-law – who is the co-founder and co-inspiration for #theeverywherelist. I also love to travel alone, whether as a side trip from a work trip [like Singapore on a weekend from an India work trip], or as a separate journey. Each form of travel brings with it different learning – and the itineraries are tailored accordingly. My husband loves the mountains and adventures, so trips with him will usually contain an element of hiking [Mt Triglav in Slovenia], climbing [via Ferratas in Italy, Spain], or skiing [Chamonix or Nagano]. With my sister-in-law or when traveling alone, the itinerary is tightly packed to make sure there is no space left where we might have seen something.
I am always in awe of the people who have sold everything and travel permanently – but that’s not me. I have a house, a job, and a family so I have travel in bursts of 10 -12 days at a time, even slipping away for a 3-day weekend where possible. I have been lucky to have a good job which allows me to afford travel, but I’m also very much budget-conscious. I shop for the cheapest tickets and always fly coach. We use points wherever possible for hotels, or if I don’t have any points, we find mid-range hotels that look comfortable and safe but wouldn’t be considered luxury. While I do like good food, I hesitate to call myself a foodie. I am a vegetarian and while the world is getting better for vegetarians, it has not always been that way.
If you also love to travel, and are looking for some interesting places to travel that are outside of the norm – we may not be able to rate every hotel or restaurant in the area, but we can tell you what we saw, and what we recommend, and perhaps inspire you to go to some places you might not have considered otherwise.
Michele
New Jersey born and bred, my main childhood travel experiences consisted of road trips to my dance competitions and the requisite station wagon pilgrimage to Disney World in the late 1970’s.
The Language Obsession: As a teenager, I discovered I loved languages, so I ended up studying French & Spanish all through high school, even adding Russian my senior year (it was during the cold war, after all). A university summer abroad in France gave me a taste of travel and I was hooked! I was amazed to see an entire society function in a language other than English! I learned 3 things that summer: 1) That travel is like one big Escape Room challenge; 2) that I adored France and would be back many times; and 3) that I would seek travel for the rest of my life.
As a public school French & Spanish teacher for the past 25+ years, my version of ‘traveling for work’ has mainly consisted of taking groups of students to France & Spain–not glamorous, but definitely gratifying. All told I have visited over 30 countries (about half of those with Tauni) and would love to get to 50 someday. Fun fact #1, I recently realized I’ve visited about 70 UNESCO World Heritage sites, so another goal is to see many more (there are over 1100). And fun fact #2, I can embarrass myself in a host of languages:)
To be honest, until recently, apart from trips to France, Spain & Holland when our sons were little, most of our traveling with them was to Disney World (once even to Disneyland Paris:)). Now that they are taller than I am, we’ve taken them to some of the usual places, but also to some less usual ones like Chamonix, Tangiers and Gibraltar.
My family has been fortunate, of course, to have solid jobs and a plan for saving as much as possible. The game changer for us, however, has been that my husband Pete has become quite the genius at maximizing credit card and mileage points. This has allowed us to travel to places we could never afford to fly a family of 4 to (I’m looking at you, Hawaii). The points/miles game has also enabled my recent mid-life crisis explorations with my sister-in-law Tauni. We hope that besides writing about unique destinations, that we can provide you some actionable tips and inspiration to empower you to get out there and explore more.