Hi! I’m Ashley and welcome to my travel blog.
I’m a 22 year-old Michigander and next month I am moving to Paris.
I created this blog to document the next nine months in France. I plan to share all my weekend getaways, observations of Parisian life and of course, lots and lots of French-inspired food porn.
Another reason for this blog is to provide travel tips and ideas for other travelers or those who are thinking about their first trip. I remember sitting on the floor of Borders weeks before my first backpacking trip, reading through every travel guide to acquire the info I needed.
Travel information for young female travelers on a budget is hard to find so I hope I can offer it here.
Un petit background
I adore travel, despite my first trip abroad at 15 being a complete fail challenge. I took a month-long trip to Ecuador in which I was cold, dirty, hungry and penniless the entire time (picture Oliver Twist). Strangely enough I came back hungry for more travel.
I followed that trip up with a home-stay in the south of Spain, a classic European backpacking trip, an empanada-filled semester abroad in Argentina, many trips to Chile to visit my then-novio and three summers working in Paris for the coolest family EVER.
This trip to Paris is the longest I’ve ever been away from home. I plan on learning lots of fattening recipes and offending as few Parisians as possible with my horrendous French.
I also want to take lots of weekend trips. My to-travel list for this year includes Budapest, Morocco, Croatia, Spanish Basque Country, little cow-towns in France and Austria for Christmas. I’d also really like to get down to Senegal, but we’ll see how many euros I manage to save.
Contact
Please send me any questions or suggestions you might have at ashleyabroadxgmailcom. I would love to hear from you!
Quick facts about me
- I love, love, love street art.
- My favorite country is Spain and the least interesting place I’ve ever been is Helsinki.
- I prefer traveling alone in most cases because you tend to meet more people. I also am a huge fan of couchsurfing.
- My favorite foods are goat cheese and ceviche (but not together, of course).
- I have no sense of direction and get lost all the time.
- My happy place is probably a plastic table on a Mexican beach with a pile of seafood in front of me.
- I’m really close with my family, especially with my little sister, Bee.
- My dream is to end up in San Francisco working as some kind of writer. Fingers crossed.
Ashley Abroad © 2012
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So you want to learn a second language? Good. In my humble opinion, everyone should learn another language. But let me first say- it’s not easy. In fact, it’s really hard. But, it’s also incredibly satisfying, fun and rewarding. And not to mention useful. What is fluency? Fluency- spoken or written with ease. Able to speak or write smoothly, easily, or readily. Flowing, as a stream. Fluent is one big step above conversational; not only can you get by, you can communicate easily in all verb tenses and understand...
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What’s better than a day spent on a sandy, windswept French island strewn with colorful lighthouses, ponies and daisies? Well as they say in La Belle France, absolument rien. While my mom, little sis and I were staying in the seaside town of La Rochelle, on France’s Atlantic coast, we decided to take a day trip to the nearby island of Île de Ré. Our first stop on this French island road trip was Saint-Martin-de-Ré, the island’s most bustling town, populated by a whopping 5,000 inhabitants. There were pastel-colored...
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Spring- a magical season wherever you may be, but one that feels particularly magical in Paris- do you know what a relief it is to feel sunshine on your face and squish grass under your toes after the dreariest, greyest winter of your life? In our own Parisian form of sun-worship, we headed to the crowded park to soak up some vitamin D, listen to some tunes (Sublime somehow felt very appropriate), and feast on every French goodie we could get our hands on- goat cheese, goat cheese chips, pink champagne and baguette all very much...
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While driving south with my mom and 13-year old sister on our epic French road trip, we passed sign after sign for the châteaus of the Loire Valley. “Want to stop at one of the Loire Valley châteaus, mom?” “Sure. I think it would be good for your sister to see one.” Thus began the most random road trip stop of my life- the Château de Chambord. The château was built in the 1500s as a hunting lodge for the mighty French Renaissance King, François I. While I had read that the Château de Chambord is the largest...
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