Hey friends,

Am I the only one who can’t believe 2019 is already coming to an end? I hope you guys all had a great and productive year. I can’t wait to see what 2020 has in store. I honestly feel like I did the most I could possibly do this year, but I hope to do so much more next year.

Before the year officially comes to an end, I wanted to give you guys a quick little story time. I wanted to share the not so “insta-worthy” moments of my travels this year. I know Instagram has a way of being a highlight reel of everyones lives, especially while people are traveling. A lot of Instagram feeds highlight the most breathtaking moments of travels, including mine. And while traveling is almost always a breathtaking experience, that’s not always the case. Just like any other experience in life, traveling has its not so good moments too.

As you guys may or may not know already, I try to travel at least three new places every year and in between I go places I’ve been already. But, I definitely always make it to three new places. This year I probably traveled more frequently in the first six months of the year than I ever have but I’ve also had more mishaps as well. This year I had a death in my family, my friends and I had a few milestone birthdays and weddings. And of course we threw in a few random trips because my friends and I clearly can’t sit still for more than five minutes so I got on a plane and took road trips more than I probably wanted to. I don’t have pictures for the moments I’m about to share and some I’ve touched on briefly in other blog posts.

But, did you die though?

In January, my friend invited us to Ecuador to celebrate her birthday. To be very honest, Ecuador was never on my list of places I HAD to see but it was my friend’s birthday, flights were cheap, I had vacation time and seriously who’s turning down a trip with their best friends to a foreign destination? Nobody, I hope. Plus, I’ve been trying to become fluent in Spanish for quite some time now and it seemed like the perfect excuse to brush up on my Spanish. My friend is Ecuadorian and her parents set it up so that we had someone to drive us around and make sure we were okay overall.

During our trip we really didn’t need much. We pretty much lounged around the whole trip. All we did was eat, drink, swim and repeat until the trip was over. IT WAS A MUCH NEEDED RECHARGE. On our way back to the airport it was raining and I remember the windows being down slightly. Looking back on it, I have no idea why the windows were open while it was raining but that’s besides the point. I remember talking to my friend in the back seat and saying how I loved the rain (because I really do) and she was questioning the fact that I liked it in that very moment. She was saying that it was scary. As I’m enjoying the rain I remember our car getting really close to the median and next thing I know I’m holding on to the back of the driver’s seat saying, “OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD” as the car just continued to spin around in circles. I just kept thinking what if the car flips over? How would we make it home? I mean, imagine being in a foreign country in the middle of the night needing medical attention? * AHHHHH * Then the car stops spinning. My friend to the right of me wakes up and says “what just happened?” and my friend to the left of me says “I’m about to pray” as her neck pillow is turned around her neck the wrong way. Meanwhile I prayed the whole time and was just wondering where all the stuff on my lap had flown to. At this point, I just wanted to teleport back to Texas. I called my mom the minute we got to the airport and asked her to pray with me for a safe flight home. We had a few hours before our flight and the whole time I was thinking this might be it for my travels. I thought it was a sign that I shouldn’t travel anymore. But, once I touched down in Dallas I was ready to book my next flight. I realized that it literally could’ve happened anywhere in the world. And in fact, if it had happened in Texas it probably would’ve been much worse. Seriously, what are the odds that our car was spinning around in the rain in the middle of the night and no one hit us?

Seriously, who knew Colorado was at a different altitude?

I’ve been dying to go to Colorado forEVER. I mean, who doesn’t want to go hiking, snow tubing, and swim in a few hot springs? But, I could never find anyone to go with me. Most of my friends live in New York and weren’t too thrilled about going somewhere even colder. I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do for my birthday, plus as I mentioned in my previous post I was kind of sad about turning 25. I finally decided to take a low-key trip to Colorado, plus I had family there so it was a great time to bond with them. The day we were planning to leave was a Saturday once I got off of work. I looked out of window in my office and it randomly started hailing, in the middle of April?! It was a perfectly sunny day and then all of a sudden hail starts falling out of the sky the size of golf balls if I remember correctly. I know Texas weather confuses me too. Of course I started receiving emails that my flight got delayed, but the emails said to still be there on time in case the flight was moved up. By the time we were headed to the airport, the sun was shining again so I thought we would be good to board on time. Our flight got delayed more than six times. By the time we finally made it to Denver it was the next day! Obviously, everyone dreads being stuck in the airport BUT we had just lost a half a day of our trip and we were only staying for a short time.

My cousin kept telling us to drink plenty of water and I just COULD NOT understand why. Then finally I found out it was because we were at a different altitude and the more water we drank the less sick we would feel, I guess?  Was the fact that we were going to be at a different altitude something I was supposed to already know? I usually research a ton before I go places just to find things to do, but I did not see that in my research. *So if you plan on going to Denver remember that* I felt fine the whole trip until we made it to the airport. The minute we sat down at the gate my throat started hurting, I didn’t think much of it I just took some cough drops and waited for the flight to board. The flight from Denver was SHORT and the MINUTE we touched down in Dallas I felt like the flu had taken over my body, I felt HORRRRRRRRRRRRRRIBLE. I was sick for TWO WEEKS, not your ordinary cold sick. Every time I coughed my ears felt like they were going to EXPLODE. I even went to the doctor and they gave me medicine that took a very long time to kick in apparently. I spent my whole week off of work sick and a week after that. I literally spent the entire rest of my vacation in my bed. I had a family brunch for my birthday and I was ABSOLUTELY MISERABLE. I could not hear out of one ear then it went to the next and I had NO VOICE for days. Needless to say, whenever I finally do make it back to Denver I’ll be more prepared but that honestly probably will not be for a while.

Did I drown?

My last and definitely most ridiculous moment of the year goes to Austin. As you guys saw in my Austin post I loved it so much and I know I did because even after my dramatic experience I still can’t wait to go back.

I’m sure by now you guys know I’m a big kid. Anything that seems slightly amusing I want to try. So that explains my excitement when we found out about the Water Loo Adventures! I called them ready to book our tickets to their bounce house obstacles on the lake and asked a ton of questions, including if they had meatless options and they said yes. I’ll tell you right now, they BARELY had any meatless options. Maybe some chips and a veggie platter. And, this was a whole day activity that you had to get on a boat to get to so there was really no leaving back and forth. Honestly, I had a wonderful time but I definitely underestimated the Texas heat plus our AC in our hotel was barely working all weekend, so this was bound to happen. I struggled to do any of the obstacles because for starters I don’t prefer to swim in the lake and I also can’t really swim — but I did have a life jacket on. The first time we went out it took me a while to inch towards actually doing the obstacles (because they were harder than I thought), but by the time I started enjoying it the time was over. So we bought more time. I remember meeting some girls there and going into the water and going to the trampoline they had on the water. I remember being on the trampoline and the sun beaming bright into my eyes. Then that was it. Next thing I remember is waking up and a number of random people standing over me force feeding me celery and pouring gatorade down my throat. I woke up and asked if I drowned. Can you even drown with a life vest on? I had gotten heat exhaustion in the middle of the lake from being out in the sun for so long. They literally had to carry me to a car, get me on the boat, and get me back to our car. Needless to say, we made it back to Dallas and I ended my night in the ER extremely dizzy with an IV in me. * I HATE needles*

I hope you guys appreciated my transparency and got a little laugh out my story time. Feel free to share your not so “insta-worthy” travel stories with me in the comments. Memories like these make for great laughs later ~sometimes~.

Talk to you soon,

Theknowledgeableother