Sophie À La Carte!

Our last few days in Estonia were a trip to the first national park, Lahemaa, and a stopover in University town Tartu on our way to Latvia. On the morning of our Tallinn departure, we stopped by the Balti Jarma Turg again to pick up provisions for our nights in the park. We bough chanterelle mushrooms at 6.50 euro a kilo, a half kilo of pickles that the seller scooped out of a bucket and into a plastic bag for us, some tomatoes and zucchini, and the salmon. Oh the salmon. We stopped by the fish market to shop for some smoked salmon to take with us and due to a miscommunication with the woman ended up with two entire bone-in smoked salmon filets, maybe 4-5 pounds. We paid less than 5 euro for it, and it would become the main component of our meals for the next two days. We rented a car for 2 days to drive out to Lahemaa National Park- we booked it a few months in advance, and the total was about $80 for two days. We picked it up at the Tallinn Train Station and headed out east ...

Hello friends, I don’t know where to start with Estonia. Scott and I spent only a week there, and I wish we had more time. Here’s a zoom-through of the places we visited and some interesting observations about the country. I won’t get into the depths of history, but Estonia was having a rough 20th Century before it regained its independence from the USSR. A close neighbor to Finland, many parts of northern Estonia have a Nordic-esque feel to it. And after years of occupation by Germans and Russians, Estonia looks ready to reclaim its Nordicness. We landed in Tallinn Monday afternoon and checked into our Airbnb, an apartment owned by Peeter, a newspaper graphic designer and freelance artist. Jetlag was not treating me well, and I was feeling kind of cranky, but combined forces of Scott’s urging and my own “wtf you can’t stay inside” led us into the Old Town for a nice stroll. Tallinn has a lot of great fortress-y structures, rebuilt and original, that satisfy any medi...

So far the trip has been pretty great. We’ve made it into Latvia, and have plenty to catch up on. Traveling through the Baltics hasn’t been too difficult, and our only regrets so far is not having enough time to see everything. My partner Scott and I spend plenty of time together, but not since last September/October when we bopped around Barcelona and Ukraine for two weeks have we had this much “us time.” And on this go-around, we’re stuck with each other for three weeks. I think both of us are looking forward to seeing if/when we crack. Before I dive into specifics of how things are going/all the quirky things we’re learning about Estonia, I wanted to give you an overview of how we planned and budgeted for this trip. To start off, we ended up picking the Baltic States because we found fairly cheap tickets over. Through Momondo, we found roundtrip flights to Tallinn/from Vilnius for $700 through the Delta/KLM/Air France Skyteam, and booked them back in January. For me, I...

Hello, friends- long time no update! Accurate picture of me stepping into CDG Exactly two years ago today I touched down in France and began my 15-month adventure. It’s been almost 9 months since I’ve been back, but that trip touches me every day in some capacity, especially when I get lost in my own thoughts. This time of year gets me thinking back to sweltering away at American Village , the camp I worked at for two summers. I miss it, in some weird way. Just thought I’d give you a quick update on what’s happening in my life, what’s coming up (spoiler: a lot) and how I’m “coping” with being home. After a crazy legislative session, I’m working part-time with my government relations firm through the end of July. I’m also working part-time with a University of Minnesota research project to collect data at farmers’ markets, and I recently became a shopper at Instacart to earn extra cash (it’s like Uber for groceries). I’m training for a half marathon which is NEXT ...

I've been pretty terrible at keeping the blog updated since I arrived back in the states. Part of my lack in updating comes from sheer laziness, but I think part of it has something to do with the end of my trip and feeling a little down about that, so I haven't had the motivation to update to the end. But here it goes! August - The end of my time at American Village was welcome, though I was sad to leave the camp and the people I worked with. I definitely was not as burnt out as I was the year prior, which was great, but it was still time to move on. One of my favorite activities of the summer came during the last session, we hiked out to an open area to camp overnight. I eschewed the tent in favor of sleeping under the stars, which was pretty amazing. I had never done anything like that before, and it was surprisingly comfortable! At the end of August, I said farewell to kids and counselors alike an embarked on a high speed train back to Paris, where I met up with m...

Hey friends, I've been back in the United States for a month. It's been an emotional whirlwind of ups and downs, a little more stateside travel, some serious readjustment, a major binge of Parks and Rec (how have I never watched this show!?), and plenty more that I'll get into later. Last backpack photo! (At 4:30am, after pulling an all-nighter) You may have noticed it's been a while since I've last updated the blog. I've started drafts of the remainder of my time in France and Spain, vaguely thought about relaying my epic adventure through Ukraine with my partner Scott, and imagined how I would handle documenting my return to the states and trips to New York and Denver. However, I haven't been able to bring myself to publish anything. I think I've been in a bit of a funk since I've been back that I can't really define or describe. Instead of attempting to catch up, I figured I'd start from where I am now and write more about my final ...