About Me

Born in Puerto Rico, I moved to Redmond, WA in 2006 after I married my husband in the wedding of my dreams. We lived in Washington for almost 7 years and recently moved to San Jose, CA. We have 2 four-legged kids, Diego & Valentina. We are a couple in our 30s, that enjoy running, camping, hiking and of course, traveling. I consider myself a planner. I'm always planning something, but the things that I enjoy to plan the most are our trips. My husband used to get mad at me because I tend to plan our next vacation while we are actually on a vacation. He's like "you need to enjoy this trip, before planning the next one". Now he understands that is not because I'm not enjoying myself that I'm planning a new trip, it's simply because I'm passionate about it and simply can't stop thinking about where I want to go next. When we are not traveling, I work as a Human Resources professional and my husband is in the software industry. We have other passions, like doing wine tasting, and believe me when I say we are taking full advantage of living just an hour away from Napa. 

I would describe our traveling style as very down to earth. We don't believe in luxury travel. We prefer to backpack, although I don't like to put ourselves in just that category, because every once in a while we like to indulge in a nice meal or hotel, but most of the time we eat at local food stands and sleep in hostels. We believe that the simpler we travel the easiest is to get inmerse in the culture and meet wonderful people.  I like to plan the trips myself without the help of a travel agent, because I believe that the process of planning is as fun as the trip itself. I buy 2-3 guidebooks for each coutry we visit. My favorites are the ones from Lonely Planet, "Rough" guides and Rick Steves (for Europe). I also visit Trip Advisor and Lonely Planet's website. Everything else I find thanks to Google.

For our travels we take a backpack and/or a 20" carry on. We pack light (or so I prefer to believe). As a girl, packing light is hard, very hard! For me is hard to not bring 2-3 pairs of high heels, my collection of make up, my hair dryer, flat iron, laptop, etc, etc, etc. But the more we travel the more I realize I can leave my hair "au naturel" . I learned to love my curls (OK, only when necessary and always when I'm abroad) so I don't have to bring my flat iron all the time. I also created a basic make up kit, I take only 2 pair of shoes (I leave wearing one of them) and my husband and I share a laptop (to store our photos). We still have a lot to learn because I know we can do way better, but it's a slow process and we are getting there.

Another thing is that I don't go crazy shopping everywhere we go. I purchase the very minimal (a book as a souvenier for my nieces, a toy for my nephews and a Christmas tree ornament for ourselves), so we don't have to worry about our stuff not fitting back in the luggage. We love food and love to try local dishes of the countries we visit. In preparation for our trip to Argentina, I started eating vegetarian 2 weeks before just so I didn't get tired of eating meat there. A friend told me that all Argentinians eat is meat, so I took it very seriously and wanted to make sure I was eating meat during the entire trip, so I did. Also, I will always remember the most amazing dinner I've had which was in Paris. But it was not at the top of the Eiffel Tower or in a fancy restaurant. We purchased 2 crepes from a food stand close to Champ de Mars and we sat in one of the benches that looked right at the Eiffel Tower. It was January, and as you can imagine it was freaking cold, but we didn't care. We were in Paris and were having dinner with the most beautiful view of the city and the best part, it cost us less than 10 euros. So that's how we roll. Trying to keep it simple and bring home with us an imaginary bag filled with unforgettable experiences. Experiences I hope to share with you in this blog.