All Over: How To Pick Your Next Destination

SPOILER ALERT: I'm not going to tell you how to pick your next destination. Rather, this is my janky way of announcing where Jen and I are going next, telling you how we picked our next destination, which is really specific to us and probably won't apply to you at all. You can throw a dart at a map to pick your next destination as far as I'm concerned. As long as you get your ass out and see the world.

If I could go anywhere next, I'd go to Australia, but we can't always get what we want, now can we? Money and time limitations continue to keep me from the land down unda, but I also couldn't face a year sans HTJL travel.

So what to do?

Although Jen is absurdly good at planning completely affordable trips, we're both tight on money this year, what with Jen moving to Brooklyn and me questioning all my life choices. I also knew I wanted to run a marathon later this year, which meant autumn, which is when Jen and I usually travel. 

My college roommate, who is currently living in Germany, alerted me to the fact that there is a marathon there that runs through three countries. Naturally, I thought that would be the coolest, and maybe Jen and I could combine our trip with my race. But then I began to think of the actual logistics -- running my first marathon with jetlag, what Jen would do while I run for hours (and hours), how I would manage walking afterward, the fact that the race takes place between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur this year -- and it just began to look less than feasible for 2016.

In the meantime, Jen began searching other places where I could run races and came up with the unexpected Québec City Marathon. Ultimately, I decided to be basic and make my first marathon (LOL I say that like there will be more than one LOLOLOL) a domestic one in Chicago, but Jen and I had gotten ourselves excited by the idea of Québec.

A trip to Québec City and Montréal would solve a number of problems for us. Namely:

1. Flights to and from are cheaper than those to and from Europe.
2. Flights to and from are shorter which means more time in each city and less time in the air. (And minimal jetlag, if any at all!)
3. Canada carries less of a risk of worrying our fretful Jewish parents about terrorism, kidnapping, and/or zika.

And excitingly, Québec and Montréal have a lot to offer:

1. Poutine. Really, it is the birthplace of cheesy gravy fries. I mean...
2. It's like faux France, so we'd still be getting our Europe fix.
3. Great art and even better jazz.
4. Inexpensive train fare between cities.
5. Nearby vineyards for wine tastings.
6. Poutine tho.

Of course, planning a trip while Mercury is retrograde is never an easy task, so naturally we've already had a hiccup.

Yep, that's right. Delta was just like "Oh, BTDubs, minor change, you're leaving seven hours earlier than planned, LOLZY!" OK cool. Jen got it fixed though.

So Québec City and Montréal, we comin' for ya!

-Staci

YASSS.