I Disappeared For 3 Months. Here’s What I Was Up To…

If you’ve been wondering where I’ve been since February, the short answer is: Europe.

Before we go any further, I should mention that what follows includes two falls, a damaged knee, a Lamborghini factory, three grandchildren, and entirely too much luggage. In hindsight, this should probably have been my first clue.

But, in other words, pretty much a normal trip.

Every winter, my hubby and I head to Europe for an extended stay. This year, 2026, we left the U.S. on February 8 and didn’t return until May.

What started as a reasonably civilized three-month itinerary somehow evolved into a multi-country adventure involving France, Spain, Italy, Austria, England, family visits, old friends, new destinations, and several moments that belong firmly in the “you can’t make this stuff up” category.

First Stop: Paris

As always, we started with two nights somewhere. By “somewhere”, I mean in the hub city that our transatlantic flight lands in. In a hotel. In a nice hotel.

After an overnight flight, this is a personal rule of mine – go to a hotel. Not an apartment. Not a charming fifth-floor walk-up. A hotel. Before traipsing off to other places.

This year the “somewhere” was Paris, which performed its usual duties beautifully.

Next Up: Bergerac

From Paris, we headed to Bergerac, located in the Dordogne region of France, for eight nights.

This was a new destination for us, and I thought it was a worthwhile stop.

What I did not know at the time was that our Airbnb required climbing two flights of rickety stairs. Normally, not a huge issue. Except that four weeks before leaving home, I had a spectacular fall that completely messed up my right knee.

Nothing was broken, but after three weeks of physical therapy, I was still climbing stairs one step at a time and hanging on to the railing for dear life.

Now add two flights of rickety stairs, with luggage. Too much luggage.

This would become a recurring theme.

Bordeaux, Biarritz, and a Friend From Home

Next came Bordeaux, where we met a friend joining us for a week in France.

Bordeaux remains one of my favorite French cities, and after a few nights there, we continued to Biarritz, another first for us. Biarritz is located on France’s Atlantic coast, not far from the northern border with Spain.

I love discovering new places, and this trip included several. Biarritz definitely earned a return visit.

After dropping our friend back in Bordeaux, it was time for a long train ride. Girona, Spain, here we come!

Back to Girona

Every year, we spend an extended stay in Girona, Spain. By extended, I mean at least a month, and once we spent 2 months. At this point, it feels less like a destination and more like returning to a second home.

If you’re not familiar with Girona, it’s located in the Catalonia region of Spain, and about 40 minutes by train from Barcelona. We’ve been visiting Girona for about 11 years now, and love it for its beautiful, medieval city center, good food, walkable streets, high-speed train connections, and enough familiarity that we can stop feeling like tourists for a while.

We stayed for a month this time, settled into our familiar apartment, and enjoyed the routine that comes with staying put for a while. What’s not to love about this sunset view from the balcony of our apartment!

Then things got interesting.

“The Horde” Arrives

At the end of March, one of our kids arrived with our three grandchildren, ages 17, 15, and 12. From here on out, I will refer to them as “the horde” because we are now traveling as a party of 7 vs. our normal party of just the two of us.

It was the grandchildren’s first trip to Europe. Watching someone experience Europe for the first time never gets old.

We spent a couple of nights together in Girona before “the horde” piled onto the train and headed for Narbonne, France. Narbonne is in Southwest France, and not far from the border with Spain. This is in a region referred to as the Languedoc.

Here, there were day trips. There were adventures. There were lots of memories made.

And there was the occasional reminder that traveling with “the horde” is a slightly different experience than traveling as a couple LOL.

Barcelona and Onward to Italy

After Narbonne came Barcelona. Since our “second home” of Girona is only about 60 miles from Barcelona, we’ve been there many times. But experiencing it with our family was wonderful.

Then, on April 5th, which was Saturday of Easter weekend, the family returned to the States. We headed to Trieste, Italy, on Easter Sunday, and Trieste was another brand-new destination for us.

We’ve been trying to get to Trieste for years, and finally made it happen. I absolutely loved Trieste. It may have been one of my favorite discoveries of the entire trip.

We stayed in an apartment in Trieste for 11 days, enjoying the city and the surrounding region with some day trips to various spots.

From Trieste, we continued to Vicenza, another new city for us and one that I’d happily revisit. Vicenza was chosen for logistical purposes. We were really en route to Florence to meet some friends, but we wanted to break up the long travel day that we would have had without a stop. So we found Vicenza, another wonderful city except for…..

At this point, Italy decided to remind us who’s really in charge.

The Great Air Conditioning Crisis of 2026

By now, a heat wave had arrived.

Unfortunately, Italy has rules about when hotels can turn on air conditioning.

The date had not yet arrived. The temperatures had.

This resulted in three nights spent wondering whether opening another window would help or simply allow additional warm air to enter the room.

The answer, as it turns out, was mostly more warm air.

Why Were We Doing This Again?

At this point, the trip became a mad dash toward the grand finale: our Danube River cruise. I would like to point out that we do work the entire time we are gone, for three months. Since it’s not unusual for our schedule to get a bit hectic, we enjoy scheduling a “treat” at the end of the trip. For a number of years, this has been a river cruise.

But first there was more Italy business. Florence. Then Bologna.

Wait, Bologna? Why Bologna?

Because our friends – affectionately known as our “problem children” due to their uncanny ability to attract travel complications – had decided they needed to visit the Lamborghini factory.

Apparently, purchasing a Lamborghini requires a pilgrimage. They had already purchased the Lambo and thought they would see it being built.

Eight months earlier, and almost certainly after too many glasses of vino, this had seemed like an excellent plan.

By April, exhausted, overheated, and dragging too much luggage across Italy, I was less convinced. But our “problem children” were cruising with us on our grand finale river cruise, so we couldn’t exactly ditch them, could we?

So we persevered, made it through Florence, then Bologna, then a flight up to Vienna, where our river cruise was departing from.

Finally: The Riverside Mozart

Whew! At long last, we arrived in Vienna for a 2-night pre-cruise stay, where we were entertained by friends who live there. Vienna was a delight, as always, and our good friends were great tour guides.

On April 26th, we boarded the Riverside Mozart for a seven-night Danube cruise.

Pure bliss.

After weeks of trains, apartments, hotels, logistics, and too much luggage, stepping onto that ship felt like a reward for surviving everything that came before it.

The Universe Was Not Finished With Me Yet

Remember my messed-up knee incident? By late April, my knee was finally feeling almost normal. I was walking well (huge sigh of relief)!

Life was good. We had a wonderful week on board the river cruise, and we were on our last full day before disembarking.

Naturally, this is when I tripped while leaving the ship and performed an impressive face plant onto Austrian pavement. The only thing that would have made this more impressive would have been if the river cruise staff had been lined up at attention, as they sometimes are when everyone boards on the first day. Thankfully, I was spared from that.

Fortunately, I did not re-injure the knee. Well, not THAT knee.

Unfortunately, I managed to scrape my left hand, left knee (badly), and twist my right forearm.

To make matters even worse, it was a holiday in Austria. We were docked in a dinky little village somewhere along the shores of the Danube. Not an open pharmacy in sight.

The ship’s first-aid supplies were less extensive than I would have preferred. Luckily, I travel with an emergency bag of stuff, like Neosporin and band-aids. But my band aids? Dinky. My scrapes? Huge. They were wounds, OK? I can’t work out why I packed such dinky, useless band aids.

The next day, I was traveling to London. With bruises galore and too much luggage. Again. This meant transfers, luggage carrying, public bathrooms, planes (ick), people….and all the stuff I would have preferred not dealing with until I had properly dressed wounds. Yes, wounds LOL! I don’t think I’ve ever had wounds before.

If you’ve ever tried hauling luggage through airports while one hand is scraped raw and the opposite arm can’t carry weight, you’ll understand why this portion of the trip was considerably less glamorous than I’d originally envisioned.

London Stopover

Yes, I survived the flight up to London. And despite all my trials and tribulations, I was really glad to be there.

You see, the last time we were in London was 2020, when we were en route back to the U.S. after being kicked out of Spain early because of COVID. That time, we had the brilliant idea to stop over in London, too. We didn’t know what was coming yet, of course, (pandemic). But London at that time was weird, spooky, because there were hardly any people around, and it was just so bizarre.

I’m glad we had a chance to see that London is back to normal and just as great as it’s always been.

Home Again

Three months.

Five countries.

Some good apartments, some not so good.

Countless train rides.

Countless hotels. Some great, some not so much.

Several new destinations.

Wonderful family memories.

One damaged knee.

One Austrian face plant.

And entirely too much luggage.

Would I do it again?

Absolutely.

Would I pack less next time?

I sincerely hope so.

We’ll see.