This trek combined mountainous agrarian culture and the occasional rumble of volcanic eruptions, with safari style camping and great meals. The Guatemalan Highlands is a place where you can find women dressed in vibrant traditional clothing, churches blasting music on weeknights, and people cultivating impossibly steep terrain, while lava shoots skyward in the background.
This area is dotted with craggy lakes, deep gorges, cascading waterfalls, and lush greenery, peppered with small towns and wineries. I lived in this area for over a decade and did lots of exploring. The Finger Lakes in Central/Western New York has so many places to check out that it is hard to pick just a few, but these are my picks for where I would take friends from out of town for a memorable trip:
Unlike nearly every other country we have visited, Nepali food is not something we see often in restaurants. Other than reading about some common dishes, we had very little idea of what the flavors would actually be like or what to expect. This was fun because it was completely uncharted territory, but unlike trying a new restaurant we didn’t necessarily have the option of just not eating on the trek if we didn’t like it. Our worries were completely unfounded, as we loved the food.
Kathmandu has vibrant culture and countless beautiful temples, but brittle infrastructure and hazy air. It is a hard place to describe since it is so multi-faceted. Each neighborhood had a personality and specialty of its own. The city was hit hard by the 2015 earthquake and parts of the city are still struggling to rebuild, while others have luxury accommodations.
On this road trip we mostly cooked for ourselves, but did try out some local specialties, and treated ourselves now and then.
In Vietnamese cuisine balance is important. Vietnamese dishes often have a variety of textures and heavy or fried food is generally accompanied by something light and fresh (ex. fried crepe in a lettuce wrap).
If you are looking for custom made products, shopping, night life, massages, and lanterns, this is the place.
The city’s mosaic comes through in the food as a melting pot of all different cuisines.
Whether you are shopping for food or souvenirs, or just experiencing the local culture, I recommend checking out the markets. Exploring local markets is always one of my favorite things to do and Peru’s markets are some of the most colorful I’ve seen and are perfumed with wonderful aromas of fruit and herbs.
You can easily find a multi-course filling meal for $5-$10 or a fancy meal for a fraction of what you would pay in the states.