North of the Arctic Circle, Wilderness Hotel Inari sits on the banks of Lake Inari, one of the largest lakes in Finland.

In early October we traveled to Finnish Lapland to try our luck at spotting the Northern Lights on the banks of Lake Inari, a tiny town under the aurora belt.

Lapland experiences a short blaze of golden yellow fall foliage in September; by October only the evergreens are left. The mornings start off clear, but a thick gray blanket of clouds rolls in by afternoon. It’s quiet everywhere.

Five years ago, we tasted a spicy Sri Lankan rice dish in Australia that I still think of from time to time…

Our first year of full-time travel took us from Boston to Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and Hawaii. This is our route – we hope you’ll find it useful.

We should have known in early February, when we evacuated my mother from China. We were in a small town in Colombia then with no running hot water, a world away.

On a continent that often proved frustrating, Mendoza, Argentina could not have been a more welcoming respite, a food and wine paradise with leafy tree-lined boulevards and the nicest people.

We had been traveling with a 40 liter Patagonia pack and a carry-on suitcase, but we figured we could simply buy new clothes with all the baggage fees we’d save.

We came to Nicaragua on a bit of a lark. We owned flights to neighboring Costa Rica, so we thought we should try to see Nicaragua as well. After a bit of research, we found out some Hollywood stars had vacationed near San Juan del Sur, a small fishing town on the emerald coast just across the border from Costa Rica.

We decided that during our time in Costa Rica, we should visit neighboring Nicaragua as well. It would be Aaron last country in Central America. So we headed off to San Juan del Sur, a rugged little beach town on Nicaragua’s emerald coast just over the border from Costa Rica.