Where are we off to next?
Our upcoming travel plans for '23 and '24!
Bonjour from baguette-abundant and sun-kissed France 👩🏼🎨
This blog is the creative aftermath of a well-balanced lunch of ice cream, bread, and melon - in that order. We’re in France to celebrate the 35th wedding anniversary of Hannah’s parents in a lovely house with lots of friends and family from all around the world.
With that as a backdrop, we thought it’d be fun to give you an insight into the thoughts that most often circulate in our heads: our future travel plans.
Would we be real travel bloggers if we didn’t have a few holidays lined up? Probably not. There might be those crazy people who “spontaneously” decide where they’re going in two weeks, but that concept is quite foreign to us. We like to plan and get excited about upcoming trips!
So here’s what we’ve got planned for 2023 and 2024 so far:
A Mapping Memories First: Mike’s Going Solo
Mike has two upcoming holidays in 2023. First, he’ll travel to Israel for his first-ever solo adventure in November. It’s going to be a combination of exploring several cities in Israel, learning more about the history and culture, going hiking, and (of course, if you read the last blog, you know what I’m going to say next…. ) some diving!
The trip will take ten days and who knows, perhaps this will ignite a series of more solo travels in the future? Guess we’ll know soon enough :)
Cars Go ‘Vrooom’ in the Desert
At the end of the same month, Mike’s off to the Middle East again. This time to watch the Formula 1 race together with his brother and father in Abu Dhabi. Mike loves F1 and he loves traveling. It only makes sense to combine the two! The first time Mike did this was during the Singapore Grand Prix in 2019 and it was amazing. After that, he attended the races in Spa and Zandvoort, and the next track to cross off on his F1 bingo card will be Abu Dhabi.
Most of the trip will (of course) be spent at the circuit, but there will be enough time to explore the city when there is no action on the track.
Exploring West End?
Since Mike’s going solo, Hannah’s thinking of doing the same. But her idea is to go on a trip that is definitely not Mike’s style: a weekend filled with people singing and dancing on stage. A weekend exploring - and exhausting - London’s West End to watch as many musicals as possible. It truly sounds like a dream (to one of us). Because who cares about being in rainy London when you’re cozied up in beautiful theaters watching both tear-jerking and emotionally uplifting performances by the best of the best?
Luckily this can probably be planned quite spontaneously since single-seat tickets to musicals are usually the last to be sold. Who would want to sit by themselves in a room where everyone’s coming to have fun together with their friends and family? Yup, you guessed it: Hannah.
Crossing the Atlantic in 2024
Phew, are we planning for 2024 already? Feels like 2020 was just last week. Bring on another year with even more travel opportunities though. We don’t have too much planned for the year yet, but one important trip has been locked in.
For our (first) big trip in 2024, we will cross the Atlantic in May and head over to the country of maple syrup and ice hockey, Canada 🇨🇦! We plan to go there for a total of 3 weeks and alternate family reunions with exploring nature. Our first stop will be Montréal, to visit Hannah’s brother and his fiancee (whoop whoop!) He’s lived there for quite some years now, but because of the pandemic, we haven’t been able to visit yet. But that’ll soon be in the past.
After Montréal, we’ll head to Toronto and also visit Mike’s family who live around there. A cheeky visit to Niagara Falls can obviously not be missed and is definitely on the itinerary. We’ll end the holiday in Vancouver to explore the amazing National Parks over on that side. A sneak preview of our mode of transport can be seen in the photo below. We’re so excited to try out an entirely new way of traveling and exploring.
Oman Expedition with the Squad
Mike is also planning a trip to Oman with three of his friends somewhere in the early months of 2024. Oman is a country that you don’t hear often while discussing travel plans, and Mike got inspired by this video from Mark Harrison. Luckily his friends didn’t need a lot of convincing and Oman 2024 was officially promoted from the idea phase to the planning phase! It seems like you will soon be seeing pictures of wadis, souks, and sea turtles right here on Mapping Memories.
Wedding Season in the Balkans
An amazing reason to travel abroad is for a friend’s wedding. This year we got to travel to Crete, Greece for a Dutch/Israeli/Greek wedding and it was amazing. Queue the beautiful sunset overlooking the coast of Crete. Next year one of Hannah’s uni friends is getting married in Croatia. And the important conclusion here is: there are worse friends to have 😛
These Balkan weddings are also supposedly very big and every friend, cousin, neighbor, and household pet tends to be invited. It’ll offer a lovely opportunity to learn more about their culture. And have an amazing, massive, Balkan party!
It’s Hannah’s goal to combine it with a summer holiday together with that same friend group. First, we party and celebrate love, and then we relax at a pool with cocktails and celebrate some more. Sounds like a great plan right? She just needs to convince her friends of the same thing. If any of them are reading this: are you in?
So those are the trips we’ve got planned for ‘23 and ‘24 so far. Have you ever been to any of these destinations? Which highlights should we not miss out on when we’re there?
And how are your travel plans going? Do you also like to plan ahead, or are you one of those spontaneous (aka crazy) travellers? Let us know in the comments! We promise to only show curiosity and not a hint of judgement 💚
