making travel plans.

Published on by Quandie

It’s been a hot minute since I’ve written about travel here on the blog.

In fact, I even skipped right over a trip that my sister and I made to Orlando a few weeks back.

We had a great time, the weather was nearly perfect except for some very foggy mornings.

If you’re familiar with the Magic Kingdom, that was the view of the castle from the top of the Swiss Family Treehouse.  See it back there in the mist?  It was pretty thick.

But it typically burned off by mid-morning and then it was sunny and quite warm.

We absolutely love our Disney trips, but I recognize that most of you aren’t going to be even slightly interested in the details so I’ll spare you.

Except I do want to ask any of my gardening friends out there, do you know what this tree is?

Here, let me show you a close up of the flower …

Isn’t that gorgeous?  I saw it in Epcot, but I have no idea what this tree (shrub?) is.  I’m fairly sure we don’t have it in Minnesota 😉

Anyway, as you know, I am currently off in Nevada visiting my mom.  Once again, I probably won’t have much of interest to report from this trip either.  I just plan to soak up some warm sunshine and spend time with my mom.  My sister and I will be back again to visit her in April, so maybe we’ll do a few more interesting things on that trip.

But I do have a couple of trips planned for 2025 that might be of more interest to you.

First up, Mr. Q and I are heading to the Brandywine Valley in May.  I am super excited for this one because we’re going to visit both Longwood Gardens …

and Chanticleer.

I suspect we’ll miss most of the spring bulbs, but hopefully early May will still be a good time to see both of these amazing gardens.

We also plant to visit the Nemours Estate, the duPont family’s  47,000-square-foot mansion and their French-inspired formal gardens.

Now, you’re probably starting to think ‘poor Mr. Q, what does he get to enjoy on this trip?’

Well, not to worry, we are also going to visit the Brandywine Battlefield, as well as the Brandywine River Museum of Art.

Mr. Q has wanted to see their collection of Andrew Wyeth paintings for a few years now.

After exploring the Brandywine Valley, we are going to pick up our nephew who lives in Philly and then the three of us are driving to Gettysburg to check out that battlefield as well.

So I’m hoping we’ve created a nice balance of family time, battlefields, spectacular houses and gardens.

We also have a trip planned for the fall.  We’ll be taking an Azamara cruise in Canada.

We’ll be sailing round trip from Montreal and stopping in Quebec City, Gaspe, Charlottetown, Sydney, St. Pierre, Cap Aux Meules and Trois Rivieres.

We will be on the Azamara Quest which only holds around 710 passengers, so it’s a smaller ship which we tend to prefer over the big mega ships.  Best of all, we’re going to get a European sort of feel in Quebec, the French speaking province of Canada, while only requiring a 2 1/2 hour flight from Minneapolis to Montreal.

And actually, St. Pierre is still a French territory (who knew?) so technically we are going to France too.  Their currency is the Euro rather than the Canadian dollar, and they have their own time zone that is 30 minutes ahead of Newfoundland.  Weird, right?

I’m especially looking forward to the stop in Quebec City.  I’ve found a self-guided walking tour of the 15 prettiest streets that I’m hoping to check out.

And once again, Mr. Q will not be left out.  He’s looking forward to a trip to the Fortress of Louisbourg in Nova Scotia.

For now though, I’m just going to be content to enjoy a quiet visit with my mom this week and hopefully when I return home next week winter will be winding down.  Fingers crossed.

If any of you have tips on what we should be sure to see on any of our upcoming trips be sure to leave a comment and let us know.

18 thoughts on “making travel plans.”

  2. These trips sound lovely! Cant wait to read about the gardens and Gettysburg. These are on my bucket list. According to an app I have this is a Hong Kong orchid tree or Bauhinia. You need the Picture This app! It’s invaluable for identifying plants. Have fun with your mom and sister!
    Sent from my iPhone

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  3. Your trip plans sound so exciting! Look forward to hearing all about them. But I envy your trips to Disney with your sister. I love doing Disney as adults! °o°

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  5. Those both sound like great trips! We have never been on a river cruise. We would like to do that someday. I will PM you about our trip to South Africa. It was amazing😊

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  8. I am happy to hear you are visiting Canada and especially my home province of Prince Edward Island. We live in Summerside which is around 30 miles from Charlittetown where you will dock. Hoping you enjoy our beautiful province.

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    1. We are really looking forward to seeing your area. I’d love any tips you might have on how to spend our day there. Or if you have any tips on any of our other ports of call.

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  9. I live fairly close to the Brandywine and Gettysburg areas. You will love it. Longwood is spectacular. Bring comfortable walking shoes, there lots of gardens to see. My favorite, is Nemours. The interior of the house is so beautiful, furniture, dishes…..everything is original to the house. Mr. Q will enjoy the carriage house and old cars. The gardens are different than at Longwood. The museum at the Gettysburg battlefield has been updated. The driving tour around the monuments is especially nice late afternoon when shadows fall across the battlefield. The town of Gettysburg is quaint, lots of wonderful antique shops and good restaurants. Can’t to hear about the fun you had so I can remeniesce about my time there.

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    1. Yay! Thanks so much for those tips. I’m worried we haven’t planned enough time for Gettysburg with basically a day and a half there. We’ll definitely plan to do that afternoon drive!

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