05 Mar 2015 2 Comments
A Paleo Girl at a Vegan Retreat
Nothing but vegetables AGAIN?!
Oats, rice, wheat, corn. Again. Yogurt and oats. Peanut sauce. I knew it would be a challenge to keep myself fed for a three-day vegan meditation retreat, but I was tired of trying to get full on veggies alone. Now, there’s not much to complain about when I’m spending glorious silent time among soaring redwood trees and stunning Buddhist temples. I thought of it as a good test run for being in a foreign culture, and it was.
I practice meditation, so I was excited to learn that my meditation teacher was holding this retreat in California while I was staying within an hour and a half of its location. It was a no-brainer to go and a nice opportunity to quiet my busy mind, get out of the concrete of Silicon Valley, and connect with the familiar damp greens and browns of the redwood forest. I ate a big meat-based breakfast before I left on Friday, because I knew the only meat I’d see for the next three days would be walking around on legs or flying on wings.
So I wasn’t all that surprised when I was greeted at the gate to the mountaintop retreat’s 373 acres by a huge flock of enormous, colorful turkeys. Yes, colorful! You ever seen those suckers up close? H-U-G-E. Colorful. And every single male had a full-on spread of tail feathers. What a greeting! These guys had seen several Thanksgivings come and go. I didn’t get a pic because I was driving, but I did see this flock several times throughout the weekend. Those males are very, very proud of their tail feathers. Keep reading!
09 Mar 2015 10 Comments
The Minimalist’s Ultimate Guide to Travel: What NOT to Pack
You have to take that shirt.
You wear it almost every day. It’s your favorite one. It goes with everything.
And your favorite pair of jeans. How could you NOT take those? You live in them.
Everything is laid out in perfect stacks on the bed, travel bag nearby, its gaping maw wide open, laughing at you.
You look at your stuff. You look at your bag.
You look at your stuff. You look at your bag.
You do this two, three, four more times. Every time you look at your stuff, there’s more. Every time you look at your bag, it’s smaller. You wonder, how can I possibly pack everything into a carry-on bag?
How many times have you traveled with an over-full bag—or, worse yet, multiple bags—because you just didn’t know how you’d feel each day/what the weather would be/which soirees you might be invited to, so you had to take several options?
Remember when you had to step aside at the airport check-in counter and try to get your checked bag under the weight limit? You were frustrated, not to mention embarrassed, at having to pull out your clothes and shampoo and shoes and try to figure out what you could take out and shove into your carry-on bag.
All that careful packing gone to waste, and when you arrived, everything was balled up and wrinkled and nothing was where you put it in all that careful packing you did to make sure everything fit.
You swore you would never over-pack again. Well, didn’t you? Keep reading!
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by Vagabond Queen in Around the world, dreams come true, RTW, Solo female travel, Solo travel, Travel blog, Travel tips, Wanderlust, What to pack, World travel Tags: Adventure, around the world, Budget travel, Mardi Gras, Paleo Lifestyle, paleo travel, RTW, Travel Planning, world travel