Maeve Hanley

We woke up on our own at 5:30am this morning. Still getting over the time change, we decided to walk down to the beach at our resort to watch the sunrise from Waipouli Beach. It was gorgeous. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. We got a late start hitting the road, half intentionally (since the views of the Na Pali coast are most vivid in the afternoon hours) and half because we’re going at our own island pace. It was 10:00am when we hit the road going east on route 50 toward Hanalei Bay beach and then the Na Pali coast hike entrance at Ke’e beach. We’re going to hike 4 miles each way (8 miles round trip) up to the 300’ secluded Hanakapia’I Falls. As we got closer to Hanalei Bay, we can see ... read more

Today is the day! We get to explore Machu Picchu! I wake up to my alarm at 2:30am in the morning. Michael is growling. He couldn't really sleep as he has been affected the most by the altitude in Cusco. Cusco is 11,200 feet above sea level. It does make it difficult to breath and I find myself taking deeper breaths than normal in order to get enough oxygen. Cusco is higher than Machu Picchu, which is about 8,800 feet at Huayna Picchu's peak - so hopefully he will feel better there. Michael takes an Advil PM and a pill for altitude sickness - hopefully he'll be able to sleep in the car. Our driver is waiting for us at 3:00 am. We have to leave this early because there is a strike on the road ... read more

Next up on the ‘before we have kids’ travel bucket list is...drumroll please… Machu Picchu, Peru! With excitement in January 2014, I began to research flights from Philadelphia to Peru. To my disappointment, flights to Peru for March out of Philadelphia International Airport were averaging about $1,100 a ticket. A friend of mine traveled to Brazil recently from Newark Airport by taking the Amtrak train from Philadelphia (they now have a stop), so I decided to check if I would find better fares from there. I was incredibly grateful to find a pair of non-stop tickets leaving from Newark at 2:00pm on March 22nd. I booked those tickets and a set of Amtrak tickets for the 660 train leaving from Philadelphia at 9:23am. 4 ½ hours should be plenty of time, even considering time allotted for ... read more

Well, for this year’s vacation we decided on the complete opposite adventure from Egypt. Lush rainforests, stunning waterfalls and vast active volcanoes – we’re in Costa Rica! We boarded our flight to Liberia, Costa Rica via Atlanta, at 5:45am today. It’s a complete coincidence that we’ll be exploring the jungle on Earth Day – a pretty cool coincidence. When we boarded our flight in Philadelphia the stewardess for Delta Airlines immediately moved Michael and me to the exit row for the journey because of his height. I ended up sleeping most of the time in wondrous relaxation. Then after our very short layover in Atlanta we boarded the 4 hour flight from Atlanta to Liberia and, once again, Michael and I were moved into the emergency exit row so that we could have a more ... read more

At 6:30am this morning the conductor on the sleeper train starts tapping on the door asking if we would like our tea. I thought to myself ‘Not at 6:30!’ but kindly accepted the tea, though I did not drink it. We still had another 2 hours before arriving in Cairo. I was unable to fall back to sleep after that, so I sat at the window watching the farms on the Nile. Egyptians were up and about tending to their lands pulling goods along the tracks in their self made carriage pulled by a donkey. We drove passed villages situated along the Nile. The homes really had nothing to them, but I did notice that they had very nice doors. Each home had a big iron door with intricate designs in bright colors. The rest of ... read more