2022 Travel Recap: The Year of Revenge Travel

As we start a new year, I can’t help but reflect on 2022. After about two years of travel limitations, 2022 was a big travel year for me. Happy the world was re-opening, I took plenty of domestic and international trips. 

In order, this is my 2022 travel recap:

Dallas, Texas, USA (January)

One of my good friends moved to Texas in 2021, so another friend and I took advantage of a long weekend in January to visit her. This trip was the first of 2022. She planned a full weekend full of activities and food. Highlights included:

• Visiting the historic Stockyards in Fort Worth and drinks and dancing at Billy Bob’s Honky Tonk
• Horseback riding at the famous Southfork Ranch from the TV show Dallas
• Vietnamese food (fun fact: the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area has the fourth largest Vietnamese population in the US)
• Fried chicken at Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken

Mexico City, Mexico (March)

Mexico City was a “revenge trip” originally planned for 2020. Pre-pandemic, my best friend and I had been planning a trip to Mexico City (and Oaxaca City). In 2022, we were finally able to take the trip to Mexico City! Oaxaca will have to happen at a later date.

I shared our full one-week Mexico City itinerary in a previous post. Some of the best parts:

• Riding hot air balloons over the pyramids of Teotihuacan at sunrise
• Getting lost in the historic Mercado de la Merced
• Riding a trajinera through the floating gardens of Xochimilco
• Cheering on wrestlers at a Lucha Libre show
• Taking a self-guided walking tour through La Condesa
• Eating the best tacos of my life

Big Sur, California, USA (May)

May was a big month because it was the month of our destination wedding in Montenegro! Before leaving for the wedding, we decided to take a day trip to Big Sur, which was where my partner proposed. We re-traced our steps and hiked the loop trail at Andrew Molera State Park. Unfortunately, the tide was too high to revisit the private beach where we got engaged, but it was still a nice hike. 

Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro (May)

The day after Big Sur, we headed to Europe for our wedding trip. We first flew into London, England. We spent the day outside London in Crawley where we mainly relaxed and walked around the small town.

The next day, we flew to Dubrovnik, Croatia for some pre-wedding fun. I wrote more about our week in Dubrovnik in a previous post. Some highlights:

• Walking the walls of the Old Town
• Visiting Lopud Island
• Hiking Mt. Srd to watch sunset over the city
• Taking the three-island tour on speed boats and visiting a local farm with a private wine tasting
• Finding familiar sites from Game of Thrones all over the city

During our time in Dubrovnik, we also rented a car and took a day trip to the neighboring country of Bosnia & Herzegovina. Here, we swam in the Kravica Waterfalls, visited the fairytale city of Mostar and ate delicious food.

Montenegro also neighbors Croatia, so we rented a bus to take us and our wedding guests who met us in Dubrovnik over the border. We’d previously spent a week in Montenegro, so this visit was just focused on the wedding. We rented a villa for three nights where we had our rehearsal dinner, wedding and post-wedding relaxation day.

Greece (June)

Greece is one of the easiest countries to fly to from Montenegro, so we decided to spend our honeymoon there. Our first priority was to relax, so we started out on the island of Naxos before exploring Athens.

I wrote more about how we decided to honeymoon on Naxos out of the many Greek isles, and about some of the things we did there. The best parts were:

• Relaxing on the beach for two days
• Hiking Mt. Zas to reach the highest point in the Cyclades
• Wandering around the historic village of Apeiranthos
• Visiting the temples of Demeter and Apollo

After about five days on Naxos, we took a ferry to Athens for our last couple of days in Europe. Highlights from our two days in Athens included:

• Visiting all the ruins included in the Athens city ticket, with favorites being the Ancient Agora and Acropolis
• Climbing the highest hill in Athens, Lycabettus Hill
• Eating gyros for lunch and dinner every day 

Kauai, Hawaii, USA (July)

In July, our friends got married in Kauai, which gave us a great excuse to visit Hawaii for the first time. Kauai is known as the “Garden Island” and is the island to visit for incredible greenery. Unsurprisingly, we spent most of our trip hiking and eating. Other highlights included:

• Attending a Luau at Lu’au Kalamaku
• Looking out over the Waimea Canyon
• Watching sea turtles come up to the beach at Brennecke’s Beach
• Relaxing on the beach in the South Shore

Peru (September)

Peru was another “revenge trip.” Before the pandemic, we put a deposit down to trek the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. Luckily, the trekking company allowed us to roll our deposit over to 2022, and we were able to check off that bucket list item this year. 

First, we spent three days in Cusco acclimatizing to the altitude and exploring the city. Highlights included:

• Visiting the Qoricancha ruins, though to be the most important Incan ruins
• Tasting a ton of chocolate at Museo Chocolate
• Learning about weaving traditions at the Traditional Textile Museum
• Taking a free city walking tour
• Eating delicious Peruvian food

From Cusco, we headed to the start of the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. The Classic Inca Trail is the trail the Incan emperor would trek to visit the ancient city of Machu Picchu on the solstice. Most of the trail is the original Incan construction, so you are walking in the footsteps of ancient Inca royalty. We spent four magical days trekking through the Andes to reach Machu Picchu. Then, we spent an extra night in Aguas Calientes to get a second entry to Machu Picchu and climb Huayna Picchu Mountain.

After our Machu Picchu experience, we headed to Lima. We only had one day to spend in Lima, so we took a day tour to see the city’s highlights. Favorites from this tour were:

• Tasting local fruit at a neighborhood market
• Petting cats at Parque Kennedy in Miraflores
• Seeing the murals in Barranco
• Visiting the Chorrillos District to see Lima from above
• Eating churros in the Historic Center

New York City, New York, USA (September)

New York City was just a quick trip. I spent three months living in NYC in 2014, so I don’t feel the need to do many touristy things when I visit. However, one newer touristy thing I did was visit Midtown Manhattan’s tallest skyscraper: the Summit. This building has three floors of sweeping views of the NYC skyline.

Lexington, Kentucky, USA (October)

We visited Lexington, Kentucky for another wedding. During our trip, we also got a couple of other quintessential Kentucky experiences.

• Horseback riding
• Betting on horse races at Keeneland
• Tailgating before a University of Kentucky football game
• Attending a University of Kentucky football game

Napa, California, USA (November)

Ever since moving to Northern California, I’d been wanting an excuse to visit Napa. This year, it made sense to visit during the long Thanksgiving weekend. Most wineries were closed on Thanksgiving day, so we spent Thursday hiking in Skyline Wilderness Park near the city of Napa. The fall colors of the vineyards were beautiful from above. Then on Friday, we spent the full days visiting three different wineries.

With all the revenge travel, 2022 was a pretty packed year, and I’m so grateful for how much I got to travel this year. 2023 will probably involve less travel, but I’m still excited to see what it brings!