January 2020 - ann travels a lot

a perfect rainy (or snowy) day in Washington, D.C.

Don’t be discouraged when you note that the Jefferson Memorial is a little out of your way – it’s worth the trip (and, they have the NICEST restrooms….just FYI)

Rainy days can be cozy and contemplative. A little drizzle outside can provide a terrific backdrop for a hot cup of tea, a good book and curling up in a warm spot. Nevertheless, it’s not always optimal when your plan was to tour a new city. Are you just a little disappointed when that happens? I am. Obviously, rain means wet clothes, bad hair, umbrellas….and let’s face it: The same is true of snow. Sure, it’s pretty for a second and it would be great if snow stayed in solid state. Unfortunately, though, it’ll turn to wet momentarily, which means everything I just said about rain. Inclement weather days can be to your advantage (i.e. fewer crowds) if you know how to structure them. Here are my ideas for salvaging a wet vacation day in Washington, D. C.

I’ll walk you through a day that I think could suit the most disheartened traveler and one that she’ll come to remember fondly. Reminder: Always know the local weather and look it up before you pack. Just like we’ve talked about before, keep a travel umbrella stashed in your suitcase …always. And, wrap it in a reusable plastic bag. This way, when you transfer it to your carryall for a rainy day, you’ll have a way to store your wet umbrella without leaving it at a storefront, or loose (and dripping) in your bag. Before you even leave home, you’ll want to know the rain and snow chances so that you can pack shoes and jackets accordingly. With this safely accomplished, I feel certain you’re dressed appropriately and ready to stroll out your hotel door.

Where to start:

My favorite place to stay in DC lately is The Mayflower Hotel. It’s part of Marriott’s Autograph collection, which means it’s a boutique hotel with special little touches throughout. We once spent Christmas in one of their one-bedroom suites. The separate living area was a spacious room with a sectional sofa that pulled out into a bed. And, it surrounded a working fireplace. The rates are surprisingly affordable. So, say you switch off your fireplace and pull on your galoshes, head down to the lobby and get a cup of complimentary joe to go. Assuming you want to start your day with a hot breakfast, I’m going to direct you to Kramerbooks and Afterwords Cafe. It’s walkable from the hotel and open for breakfast until well past dinner. Aside from having really good food all day, the café is nestled within a book store.

Outside Union Station is the US Postal Museum – if you’re waiting for a train to depart and find yourself with time to spare, treat yourself to a visit with Owney.

DC is easy to navigate by train, and I’ve started you out between 2 convenient stations. Pick your favorite topic and I assure you the Smithsonian has a FREE museum to interest you. Ask my son his favorite stop, it’s always the Air & Space Museum, followed closely by the Botanical Gardens. I can’t pass up a chance to see Marie Antoinette’s jewelry in the Natural History Museum. And, you can explore American pop culture through the ages at the Museum of American History. Avoiding crowds probably isn’t much of a possibility, but I always find the Portrait Gallery to be calming – at least it’s usually quiet. This is also true of the National Archives.

If you’ve planned ahead, you should also consider the Holocaust Museum. It’s not part of the Smithsonian system, so you’ll need to obtain an entrance time. This museum is not to be missed.

Mid-day Diversions:

If you’re undeterred by the weather, and conditions are not worsening, I’d say head over to the Jefferson Memorial. You can’t walk there from the mall, but you can take a train ride or an Uber. I delayed seeing this monument for a long time because it’s not as walkable or readily accessible as the others. I’m assuming that you spied the vast majority already while moving amongst the Smithsonian museums. So, take the time to drop in on Jefferson – he’s got some pretty good digs. We were surprised by how large the monument is both inside and out. As compared to the Lincoln Memorial, which you can pretty much walk up to and say you saw it, Jefferson encourages you to stay and explore a bit with interior exhibits, giftshop, etc.

No time or energy for more sightseeing? I highly recommend settling into the E Street Cinema. It’s one of my favorite art house cinemas. They have a full bar and snacks that are not your typical movie theater fare. Their film selections are exceptional. I’ve been known to see one….or two…films on a bad-weather day. And, I’m not at all complaining.

1600 Pennsylvania Ave, Washington, D. C.

Winding Down for the Evening:

No matter how you feel about the President, and chances are you’ve felt one way or the other about each one, the White House is an impressive sight at night. I always walk past it in proximity to the Willard Hotel. You’ve seen a lot of history today – even if you only made it to the cinema – you can’t throw a stone in D.C. without hitting a historic landmark. But, I’m awed every time I enter the Willard. Leadership from both sides of the Civil War sat down together in their lobby to discuss terms for ending the conflict. Let that sink in. The north and the south. Sat there. Talking. During some of our nation’s darkest hours. To me, this epitomizes the history that surrounds me in D.C. That’s a lot of thought and introspection…so, head up to the Round Robin Bar for a pre-dinner cocktail.

I don’t often recommend chain restaurants. I think most of you know my position – I love for each city to be unique. But, occasionally, a small chain catches my eye. In this case, it’s Mari Vanna. We went the first time simply because it’s next door to the Mayflower. It’s since become a favorite D. C. spot – the opulence when you walk in is present throughout. The staff has always been authentic, too, as are their dishes and their VODKA. How about more than 100 flavor-infused vodkas to sip? You might be there awhile. But, it will be worth it. And, if you’re thinking right now that you don’t like Russian food, I’d challenge that maybe you just haven’t really had it. We’ve dragged our kids there under extreme duress only to have them change their tunes as they dug into caviar, or tender meat-filled dumplings. Trust me.

One Last Thing:

Well-satiated, you need only walk a few steps from your excellent meal back to your hotel where the doormen will great you warmly. Treat yourself to a nightcap (…or cup of tea?) at the Edgar just inside the lobby. Legend has it, and their website confirms, it’s so named because J. Edgar Hoover dined here daily. Hm. I don’t know about all that, but I can tell you, we’ve overheard an intriguing conversation every single time we’ve been there. Stopping in is an imperative. Keep your ears and eyes open – I doubt you’ll be disappointed. And, when you’re done, make your way back to your room and that cozy fire you left this morning. You earned it.

when you’re not traveling

I was grounded last year. Has it been awhile since you considered “being grounded”? In the business travel world, it’s not necessarily punitive the way it was when you were a teen. I wasn’t caught smoking or staying out past curfew. We had a re-prioritization of funds and discretionary travel was off the table. Twenty years ago, curtailing “discretionary travel” was different. Just to have a productive meeting meant traveling hours to be around a table together – that’s not now. Nowadays, you can, in fact, have a pretty productive meeting using Skype. You’re all talking in (almost) real-time with only minor delays. And, if you can muster the energy to dress from the shoulders up, you can use your camera and even see faces. So, it is literally the next best thing to being there. Thus, “essential” travel NOW means – there was no way to accomplish what I needed without being there. And, that’s few and far between these days. So, for those of us who truly love the nature, process, and experience of actual travel – it’s a little less fulfilling. How do we spend our time? Planning the next excursion.

I mentioned in a prior post that I had 7 trips on my TripIt for 2020 so far. One has now been completed, and there are 7 new ones on the horizon. A few of them require pretty extensive exploration and consideration, so that’s been an active process. Active in the sense that I use all my resources:

Ask friends
Consult TripAdvisor
Google-ize it
Delve into travel guides
Look at maps and airline/train routes
Consider Airbnb Experiences
Plot out open/closed dates for attractions; this is key

If you believe that the adventure is in the journey rather than the destination, then this is it – at least half of my journey begins well before I ever approach my Clear ambassador. And, I’ve found through trial and error that the destination is made exponentially better by having a plan in-place prior to arrival.

We used to laugh that my Disney trips came with Excel spreadsheets. By “laugh” I mean, they actually came with spreadsheets and some people laughed at me. But, you know what didn’t happen? We didn’t languish amongst the parks missing shows, lacking coveted dinner reservations, etc. We don’t live and die by the schedule, mind you. I provide a structure that becomes our fall-back. If your fall-back is pretty desirable, then you have absolutely nothing to lose. If, however, you say “let’s wing it” and you find yourselves eating dinner at a counter-service restaurant dining over high-boy stand-up pub tables, you’ve done it wrong. The goal on a “nice” vacation is not to get the food in as quickly as possible on-the-go. At least, it’s not for me.

So, I plan. I’ve recently decided that having 1-2 touristy adventures per day that are scheduled (booked with tickets purchased if necessary) and 1 sit-down dining experience per day is sufficient. That gives us a lot of time to flex and build in whatever catches our fancy. In Hawaii, this means that my husband and I might hike Diamond Head and then explore Pali Lookout one morning and spend the rest of the day on the beach, or taking a massage under a cabana while listening to the waves. Leisurely, we can make our eventual way to cocktails on a lanai somewhere en route to a dinner reservation I’ve been holding for weeks. If, as we did on our last trip, we decide to switch up the dinner location for another that’s caught our eye, we can. At worst, we end up at a place we carefully selected awhile back. What doesn’t happen is our ending up at Burger King or some walk-up window for fried shrimp because all the restaurants are booked up. The same was true in Paris – I scheduled a tour that would span a few hours and check off several must-see boxes on our wishlist while the rest of the day was ours to shop, sip, and wander until dinner. Each night before we wrapped for the day, my girlfriend and I would review the next day’s itinerary and decide what to keep and what to switch up. My point is, planning ahead gives you options. Keep them, or change them up. If you know me, you know that having options is one of my defining characteristics – being left with NO options is just the worst, IMO. THAT’S when I get flustered. And, grasping for a solution can lead to my ‘shut-down’, which manifests in my being short-tempered and irritable. It’s pretty ugly if I’m completely honest. To avoid this, just plan. It’s that easy.

Have an itinerary that includes everything – your lodging, your meals, excursions if any and combine it with your traveling companion for full transparency and collaboration.

Today, I’m going to actively work on details for 2 upcoming trips. For me, this provides a diversion from my routine and it’s productive. It’s going to save me time and hassle in the long run and improve the relaxation we enjoy when the expensive trip kicks in. I don’t know about you, but when I’m buying hotel nights and every meal out (as you do on vacation), I want it all to be pleasant, not ‘serviceable’. There’s a time and a place for both.

So, back to being grounded. What does a road warrior do when her wings have been clipped? Getting the neglected house in order covered about the first weekend at home…..then, I started plotting. In the end, I made the most of the rest of the year by visiting friends and family, and thoroughly decompressing at a nearby destination spa. Come to think of it, I did that twice – once by using Marriott (or Bonvoy) points, even. Since about November, though, I started planning 2020. And, while it’s now chock full of much more personal travel than business, it’s shaping up to be a somewhat new adventure for me that incorporates more domestic destinations for a change AND the prospect of some potential and novel career avenues. There’s no telling where travel will lead you – one is never made lesser by getting out and seeing the world.

tracking your travel

Who doesn’t dream of South Beach when it’s the 1st week of January?

So, we’ve wrapped up another year – in fact, this one was a DECADE. I saw a meme yesterday that said: 2050 is just as far away as 1990. I don’t think this is possible because 1990 was just yesterday, and 2050 is clearly a year beyond “Blade Runner 2049” even. And, THEY were interacting with androids and using flying cars, so clearly – that’s impossible. (insert eye roll of denial). Nonetheless, I do rather wonder what I’ve been doing with my time. Do you ever look back and take inventory as it were? Having never been a diarist, I tend to look back through past itineraries. I use an app for it – an app that helps me organize future travel and fondly reflect on past travel.

The app I use is TripIt. There are others, but when you do a search around the interwebs, this one shows up at the top of most lists because it’s so easy to use. It’s also a SAP product, so if your travel agency uses SAP Concur for your travel reservations, there’s an auto-interface (I’m not techy, so this sounds right to me – don’t chastise me if I’m way off base). What I mean is, my travel agent makes a reservation for air, hotel, rental car (pfft) and then *poof*, it’s there in my TripIt. I then re-name it whatever catchy name I have for the trip – like instead of “Irvine, CA”, I might call it “Q1 TeamF2F”. Toldja it was catchy. Within the itinerary that my agent started for me, I can add all my other details (e.g. dinner reservations, excursions, tours). It’s very easy because you:

Make a reservation
Receive confirmation of said reservation
Forward the confirmation from any e-mail account linked to your TripIt
It pops up in an itinerary with corresponding dates, or starts a new one

You don’t have to put context, or codes, or anything around the forwarded e-mail, which you send to: [email protected] . It honestly could not be easier. Sure, they occasionally don’t plunk it down just as you’d hope. When that happens, it gets stored in a separate file that you can move manually – it’s not hard. It’s not the magic that it ordinarily is, but when you’re dealing with foreign languages, or less formal confirmations from private vendors, it’s a minimal hassle that you can easily navigate.

Another thing I adore about it is that you can share an itinerary with anyone. You just indicate right in your itinerary who you want to share it with. If they’re a TripIt user, too, it shows up in their app effortlessly. And, you assign rights to them. Just want to let them follow your travels? Don’t give them rights to edit your plans. If they’re a fellow traveler on that trip, they get to collaborate. It’s really effective for couples and small groups especially. My husband used to get frustrated when I didn’t tell him my plans, so now I share all of them. When we travel together, we can each contribute without inadvertently double-booking ourselves. And, I’ve mentioned before that I like having a way to track my flights outside of the carriers’ apps, so you can upgrade your TripIt and do that here, too. I haven’t gone that route, but when they’ve given me free trial periods, it does seem pretty snazzy.

The right travel app can ensure travel Zen almost as much as this Swarovski Buddha at the Kimpton EPIC in Miami. Almost.

Anyway – back to the reminiscing part. According to TripIt, I stayed pretty busy in 2019.

Sunny California in January? I’ll take it. I treated myself to a beach resort – makes it feel less like work.
Speaking engagement in Florida (both January and February)…someone had to go; at least one was walking distance to Downtown Disney with a HUGE variety of shopping, restaurants and bars/lounges.
Milestone birthday for a friend in New Orleans. Stayed at the exquisite Monteleone and ate some pretty incredible food. You do what you have to do to nurture friendships.
Oh, yeah – 91st Annual Academy Awards in Hollywood.
Vegas, baby – couple’s retreat. As I’ve said before – poolside at a posh or even semi-posh hotel, footsteps to fine dining and excellent shopping. Rarely do you even have to hail a cab in Las Vegas. That’s pretty relaxing.
Singapore and India – I think I’ve posted about those a fair amount already. The flights are long, but SO worth it.
- I do think one has to see countries in Asia. I thought I was well-traveled until I went there and realized how little I’ve really experienced to date.
TCM Film Festival – it’s a hi-light for my year. Located at Hollywood and Vine I get to indulge my obsessive passion for film as an art form along with other people who revel in old movies (and, movies that came out for us in highschool are now considered ‘old movies’, too, FYI). There’s truly nothing like experiencing movies in a group setting (aka: a theater) among dedicated fans.
College visits – helping them move in and out of dorms/apartments is, as I’ve said before, grueling work but so worthwhile. The one-on-one time as they start to forge their own independence is so fun to share.
Orlando (again) to meet with my department this time – I really love the folks I work with and I value the time we get to spend in-person. There’s too little of it. Someone once told me, ‘It’s too easy to hang up the phone and start letting a person’s disembodied voice become a constant irritation….yet, spend a couple days across the table from them and you start to remember what you liked about them.’ It’s true.
- Skype helps, but true face-to-face time, some wine, and a bizarre attraction to coordinating ponchos and interpretive dance does for a group what could never be accomplished via video conference….
Another milestone birthday for another friend and her desire to go somewhere she’d never been. We toured Brussels, Antwerp and Bruges. Old friends, new adventures – what could be better?
PARIS – have I mentioned I went to Paris last year? I stayed for 2 weeks. It was work and play. I won’t go on because I’ve bent your ear enough about it – but, I will take a moment to ask: Do you ever invite friends who aren’t your “bestie” to travel with you?
- It’s actually a really good formula. Because you’re not too close, you don’t tend to make decisions FOR them, or encroach on their good nature, etc. Of course we don’t start out to take over for our best and closest humans, but with familiarity can come that tendency. I would highly encourage you to take at least one trip this year with someone whom you simply know and trust, but who isn’t your best friend or partner. You’ll get to know them (or re-know them) better, discover a shared interest, and maybe gain some new insights. You might even find a new travel buddy.
Finally, a return to see cherished family now living in Tennessee rounded out my year. Take time to go see your family and friends who live far away.
- There’s something unique about a shared history – whether it’s your childhood, or your ancestry. There’s a unique bond there that you can choose to explore. When it comes to establishing these people in your life, that ship has sailed – the people you knew growing up are now set and finite. You can’t get new ones. The people who share your same ancestors – also set. There’s no one else who knew your grandparents, aunts and uncles when you were little. So, whether you love those folks already, which I do, or if you’re willing to GET to know them and share a laugh at the weird mis-steps and idiosyncrasies among yourselves and your extended family, there’s literally know one else who has as much skin in the game as you do. Cringe, cry and laugh about it together, but you don’t have to EXPLAIN it – that’s the beauty of it. They already get it.

Even a produce market in Asia can be breathtaking. Go see it – pictures don’t do it justice.

What will the new year, or new decade for that matter, hold for you? Now’s a great time to start mapping that out. I have 7 trips on my TripIt already. How about you?