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Two couples stand in front of a colorful cafe. potted plants in the front
A marshy green oasis filled with swampy waters, trees and bushes

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Sleepy Hollow

You’ve heard of Sleepy Hollow and the headless horseman, but do you know about the other Sleepy Hollow Cemetery? This one is in Concord, Massachusetts and there are so many famous authors buried there they named a section “Author’s Ridge.” As a taphophile, I had to visit. I recently visited Concord while traveling in my van on a two-year solo nomadic road trip, hiking, visiting historic sites, and staying in short-term rentals. I stopped at the homes and locations made...

A beige wood two-story house with nine windows and a door surround by green grass and bushes
The author stands gazing out at the edge of the pond next to green leafy trees

What to Know if You Visit Thoreau’s Walden Pond

Nearly half a million people from around the world visit Walden Pond yearly to see where Henry David Thoreau lived and penned “Walden,” and I recently joined them. Now a state park, the Walden Pond State Reservation area is an internationally famous National Historic Landmark and is considered the conservation movement’s birthplace. Today, many people use the area for swimming, hiking, boating, and fishing. In the two years, two months and two days Thoreau lived there from July 1845 to...

The exterior of the PEZ Visitors Center with three huge PEZ candy packs attached to the wall.

The PEZ Visitor’s Center is Pop Culture Nostalgia

PEZ candy dispensers have been an iconic part of childhood since the 1930s, but did you know there’s a PEZ Visitor’s Center museum dedicated to their history and cultural relevance? Not too far from New Haven, Connecticut, inside the PEZ factory, you can see hundreds of different PEZ dispensers and watch the famous candy being made. Which child doesn’t remember PEZ dispensers and the secret thrill of seeing those colorful, square sugar tablets pop out when you tip the character’s...

Three young boys in red tshirt pose with the Rocky statue, arms raised

10 Iconic Things to See in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Finding things to see in Philadelphia isn’t hard; deciding what you’ll do will be a challenge. Philadelphia is worth visiting because it’s, in many ways, the birthplace of the United States, where the founding fathers formed a new country. It’s also a UNESCO-designated World Heritage city. I spent several days rambling around during my nearly two-year road trip as a solo nomad, and each location in Philadelphia brought a new fascinating historical fact to add to my quickly increasing bank...

Monticello exterior with people walking up

11 Fun Things to do Near Madison, Virginia

There are so many fun things to do near Madison, Virginia; you may be surprised. When I recently stayed for a month, I was shocked at how places and activities on my ever-growing list of things to do kept expanding. It was astonishing since I’d never heard of the place before renting a little cottage there. But it ended up being an idyllic location in the Shenandoah Valley within just two hours of many premiere Virginia locations and attractions. Plus,...

the entrance to Luray Cavern looks like the inside of a whales belly

Inside Luray Caverns is the World’s Biggest Stalacpipe Organ

Luray Caverns in Virginia is the third most-visited cave system in the United States, and it’s the only one with a stalagmite pipe organ. I’ve said if you’ve seen one cave, you’ve seen them all, but this one promised to be unique.   I visited these caverns during my solo road trip through the United States, Mexico and Canada. Each day roughly 3,500 people from all over the world take the one-hour tour through Luray Caverns. When I recently pulled into...

sentinel at the tomb of the unknown soldier

Why You Should Visit Arlington National Cemetery

When you first enter Arlington National Cemetery, the tranquility is striking. Then, as you walk among the many perfectly uniform white headstones, you are quietly humbled and, finally, seeing the magnitude of our dead, sad but proud. There far many more graves than I could comprehend. There are 600+ acres in Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Though I knew it was large, nothing prepares you for the immensity of so many uniform graves. That they represent only a tiny...