yes, we went on a cruise for our honeymoon!

what a year 2013 was! so many weddings, so much travel, and yet, so little to say about any of the places we visited for wedding weekends. most of our attention went to the WEDDINGS themselves and to the wonderful friends and family we were lucky to be celebrating with!

having been together for ten years, tim and i did not view our honeymoon as a very important occasion. we believed that a honeymoon was traditionally a chance for a couple who had never traveled together (interpret 'traveled' in any way you wish!) to spend some time exploring a new destination. tim and i have traveled a bit together, and so we wanted to use the excuse of a honeymoon to see a new place and do something we would likely not otherwise do. we also wanted to spend very little money and use a variety of frequent flier miles and vouchers we had amassed.

....SO WE WENT ON A CRUISE! i could hardly believe it myself the day we booked it. but it made so much sense! we're both 'value for money,' people, and we don't love the idea of constantly spending, and spending, and spending every day. we also knew we'd be exhausted from wedding and bar exam preparation and the wedding itself, and did not think that we'd be up for backpacking or a long road trip. a cruise seemed like a great idea.

and it really was. i've been talking about putting this blog post together for a while, to outline how we used a cruise to be cost-effective and mix luxury with a bit of comfort and no camping. we had such a positive experience on holland america, which is viewed in the cruise industry as a "smaller, more intimate," cruise line. we started the trip in anchorage, where we spent one night, and then took an incredible train through mountains and valleys to seward, where we got on the boat, stopping in haines, juneau, ketchikan, and finally vancouver.

we did our research beforehand, which was CRITICAL to our enjoyment of the cruise thing. every time we stopped, we had a plan of attack, whether it be renting bikes for a day and traveling on a pre-determined route, hiking, swimming near a glacier, or seeing sarah palin's old house. we did not get sucked into the shore excursion sales pitch, nor did we have to spend any time with our fellow cruisers, who are not necessarily like minded, off the boat. the food was great, and we had so many wonderful sunset cocktail hours on the teak deck! 

couldn't do this with a backpack on.

strange, very unnatural experiences you can only have on a cruise ship. jumping into a heated pool in front of a huge glacier.

experiencing the wild of glacier national park, with the comfort of our wedding coozies

immediately after seeing orcas. warm blankets and sundowners!

the pacific northwest seems like a place i want to be!

why yes, yes i did marry this guy.

running for grilled cheese

i've been dreaming about april 15, 2013 all winter. i've been dreaming about april 15 while running in the rain with tim and the wonderful tufts marathon team, and up the newton hills, and while eating jelly beans during runs past wellesley college. i've been dreaming about april 15 in my sleep, while writing fundraising messages, and while thinking about which sports bra to wear on marathon monday.

i believe that the act of running a marathon is inherently self interested. it's personal. the motivation to run 26 miles can't come from outside of a human being--it has to come from within. and you have to focus within to get it done. it is something that i have done with tim, and as part of a team, and to raise money for a worthy cause. but ultimately, i did it for myself. i did it to prove to myself that i could set a goal, work hard, and accomplish something. i did it to conquer my habit of quitting, and to celebrate living--to become more aware of how lucky i am to be breathing and feeling the pain that comes along with running long distances. i also did it for the endorphins. and for grilled cheese.

i have never been in a war zone. i have never witnessed a shooting, and i have never even seen any real trauma. i've just imagined it. a lot. i always seem to be stirring up "worst-case scenarios" in my head. most of these scenarios are derived from things i've seen on TV or read in the news. 

funny, then, that the thought of something tragic like this happening at the boston marathon, at a place which is hallowed ground for so many runners who have experienced the euphoria that comes with doing "the thing that you thought you could not do," never crossed my mind. a person who constantly thinks of what could go wrong has only been thinking of the good that can come with the event. that says something about what the boston marathon stands for. and i don't think for a moment that i'm unique in this way of thinking. for all of the runners who have ever crossed the boston marathon finish line, the finish line is not a physical place. it is a dream. it is a moment of euphoria, of self satisfaction, and of gratitude.

whoever chose to inflict trauma on all of us on april 15, 2013 must have known that. they were bombing an idea, and a dream, just as much as they were bombing a physical location on boylston street. and for many of us, this dream was personal.

it is a dream that the coach of the tufts marathon team, don megerle, has the opportunity to live out every year, as he stands at the finish line and waits for every single last tufts marathon team runner to finish (in one case, he says, this amounted to almost 10 hours of waiting). don does not believe in complaining. and i can't imagine that he has complained about what happened on april 15, 2013. even though that finish line means more to him than anyone i've come in contact with.

i am so grateful to the friends and family who supported my training over the past few months, and to coach don and the tufts marathon team for the incredible opportunity to participate in the marathon. most especially, i am grateful to my partner in life, tim, who provided many a pep talk throughout the process. finish line or no finish line, it was still an opportunity. a few months ago, i would have told you that having the opportunity to run the boston marathon was a "once-in-a-lifetime" thing for me. but i have a feeling that we'll be crossing some other finish line at some point in the future--because running reminds me that i'm lucky to be alive. something i'm even more aware of after april 15, 2013.

we didn't even realize it was freezing

i'm now convinced that whenever i travel to canada, it will absolutely be an honest-to-goodness winter wonderland. man, those canadians know how to do winter. long ago someone must have thought, "if its going to be cold, we are going to make the most of it." and they do. maple sugar wrapped around snow? okay, sounds good. outdoor ice skating with a fire blazing? sure. cross-country skiing as a commute to work? why not. my mom, my dad, tim, and i had a wonderful new year up in mont tremblant. and we didn't even hit the slopes! tim and i hadn't been there since 2005, and not much has changed!

i think it's now a rule that when one visits a french-speaking country, fondue must be had.

http://www.legrandlodge.com/

http://www.boisedulac.com/lavie/ (amazing restaurant in san jovite, the town that was not built by intrawest)

the town all ski towns are emulating

if there were ever a town in france that i thought tim would go nuts about, it would be chamonix. after a week in talloires, annie (a fletcher friend, wonderful travel buddy, and incredible woman, for that matter) and i headed back to the geneva airport and caught a ski shuttle up to chamonix for two nights. i don't even know what to say. it was just awesome.

we took the aigule du midi, an insane cable car, up to about 14,000 feet above sea level, and experienced light-headeness along with an incredible view of mont blanc. we walked around the insanely cute ski town of chamonix, and met some wonderful people in the local saturday market. we drank red wine! we tasted the local liquor, genepi! we ate FONDUE!

i don't even ski anymore, but i can't wait to go back with tim while he skis! (i apologize for the wealth of photos. i could not decide in this instance.)

les hommes francais are so romantic.

snostation- spa chalet (where we stayed): http://www.snostation.com/property.php?id_property=41&property_name=Mont+Blanc+SpaChalet

annie and i made a stop in to this wonderful relais & chateaux property: http://www.hameaualbert.fr/en/gallery

the venice of france

while in talloires for the week for a conference on leadership in humanitarian action, we had the opportunity to pay a visit to the nearby larger town of annecy, "the venice of france." i can't tell you too much about the town, because i didn't pay attention to the history lesson. but i can say that annecy it is absolutely beautiful, with beautiful canals, very friendly and warm shopkeepers, and colorful old buildings. also, if you enter a store that has liquors in large tubs with little spouts and it looks like you are allowed to fill your own bottles of liquor (see below), you are not, in fact, allowed.

bonjour d'annecy!

a week in tallories

i spent a week in the small town of talloires for a conference a few weeks ago. tallories is a small (and when i say small, i do mean very small) town on the shores of lake annecy in france, about an hour from geneva. i was there because tufts has a campus of sorts there, an old 16th century priory that an alumni donated to the school. it was an incredibly relaxing place for a conference. absolutely beautiful scenery, easy to get between our small french hotel and the priory for the conference, incredible restaurants where we had some amazing french meals, and not too much else to do!

the town of tallories was absolutely incredible, but the wonderful people i met during the week were really the greatest part of it all. and i'm not being cheesy. it was easier to get to know people being "stuck" in a small town together rather than being in a big city where people might have had friends or activities to partake in after conference hours.

...and did i mention there is an absolutely beautiful lake?

i'll be back, talloires. with tim next time.

hotel beau site http://www.beausite-talloires.com/
le cottage-incredible food and atmosphere http://www.cottagebise.com/

biking in acadia national park

i seem to be doing a lot of catching up after a few months of non-stop travel! this summer has been busy, but such a blast. a lot of activity outdoors and and a lot of learning how to eat more fresh veg!

my family went up to bar harbor on mt. desert island in maine for a few days of biking in acadia national park. amazing--one of the most beautiful places i have been to go biking, without a doubt. bar harbor itself was quite the cool town to dink around in. it felt like a mix of lake george village and chatham, ma. i would love to get up there more often, but it is a HIKE from boston.

in addition to biking straight up cadillac mountain, a highlight of the trip was meeting a south shore firefighter on a sunset sail on the margaret todd. he was such a nice guy, and was so much fun to talk to. apparently, firefighters spend a lot of time fighting one of the biggest problems we have in this country, obesity, and spend a lot less time fighting what they originally signed up to fight, fires. we ended up randomly running into him again on a stop during our lonnng drive back. it felt like we had really made a friend. ha ha. life is good.

view from the top of cadillac

cadillac mountain road- are we in the united states anymore?

famous blowhole of some sort

http://www.barharborinn.com/

paying a little visit to westport

we spent the weekend at camp dudley in westport catching up with some very dear friends. i usually return from weekends away exhausted and wanting to take a snooze. but not this time.

thought i would share a quote which was included in the sunday chapel sermon, delivered by a man i truly admire!

"This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.

I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.

I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no “brief candle” for me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations." 

-George Bernard Shaw

saturday market in sainte-foy-le-grande

we were lucky enough to have a few hours to spend at the weekly market in the town of sainte-foy-le-grande during our bike trip in bordeaux. the market is a huge part of the local economy--and the place where most of the people in surrounding rural towns buy their food for the week. the beautiful town is right on the dordogne river, and is one of the oldest bastille towns in france. don't bother asking me what that means, because i don't know--i wasn't paying attention during our tour.

i've been to quite a few open markets in my travels, and this was one of the best i have ever seen. the most fresh, beautiful veggies and fruits, fresh meat and fish, and also, the most expensive gummy bears that i have ever tasted. notably, related to my last post, i noticed that the meat in the marked actually looked like the animal it came from! and contrary to the idea that the french are unfriendly, some of the warmest, most friendly people we met during our trip. we had so much fun poking around. here are some of my favorite shots!

some of the oysters were opened to give customers an idea of what's inside!

we loved the look of these tomates

might have been ripped off b/c we looked like biking tourons, but 15 euro for a small bag of candy!

les animaux de aquitaine

as many of you know, i became a vegetarian (well, to be perfectly clear, a pescatarian-i'm still good on eating fish for now) last november. part of the reason for my decision was the realization that as americans, we are simply too far away from the food products we eat. we often don't internalize the fact that our cheeseburgers come from cows, our bacon comes from pigs, and our chicken nuggets come from....well, chickens. i had been cutting meat out of my life for some time, but after really considering the fact that meat comes from animals, i decided that i'm not interested in eating it any more. this might change in the future, but it is where i am now.

of course, like many other things, this mentality is very different in the rest of the world. i noticed that in rural france, people are very close to the animals they eat and use for milk and other animal-based products. in the US, our obsession with the idea that we need meat at every meal for "protien" has lead to the growth of commercial farming and poor treatment and living conditions for domestic animals. in france, the domesticated animals that we came across live with quite a bit more dignity than our animals do. here are just a few shots of les animaux from rural france! some were for food, and others were not, but were just plain cute.