At first I felt that it was in me to wax on the understated charms and bare knuckle beauty of this often overlooked post-soviet gem, but then I actually spent some time there. Considering it's approximation to other more deserving Eastern European heavyweights -- Vienna an hour to the west, Prague and Budapest equidistant on either side, and Krakow a few hours to the northeast -- who in their right mind would designate more than a 24 hour stopover to this highly unremarkable point of transit?

Better orientation. Better health. Better photos. Better sex.

One of the foremost reasons traveling can be such an insightful and life affirming experience is that it offers universal perspective. The universal perspective that travel affords can strike you in the least assuming of places -- It can blindside you in a sweltering bus terminal, under a towering coconut palm (hopefully that's perspective that just slammed into you, not a free falling super food), and in the throes of a Mexican standoff with...well, Mexican Authorities.

At the time of writing, we're negotiating how to travel from the western Romanian province of Arad to the Bulgarian black sea resort city of Burgas. Bulgarian looks like this: "какво, по дяволите ?" and the regional transportation website does not feature an English translation option. To complicate matters further, it's often been our experience that the info on such websites does not sync up with protocol.

When setting off from A to B, I used to apply the 'early bird gets the worm' mentality. You're flying to Chicago? Then you should DEFINITELY leave on that 5:30am flight. Going camping? Obviously you should leave before the sun comes up. The sooner the better. This ensures that you will be tired and cranky AND almost definitely leave something important behind. 

Although Transylvania deserves to have world recognition for it's alpine scenery and medieval charm, mention of the area most often inspires darker connotations. Thanks to the undying work of Bram Stoker, Transylvania has become synonymous with vampires. The basis for the fictional Count Dracula finds it's roots here in Sighasoara -- and is actually a bit scarier than our chocolate cereal spun off Hollywood vampire friend could ever hope to be.

We’re going up in a hot air balloon today, and the butterflies in my stomach have begun to spread throughout the rest of my body. By the time we reach the Voyager Balloon offices on the opposite side of the tiny tourist enclave of Göreme, I’m buzzing so hard that the Turkish coffee I quaff down hardly registers on my radar.

There’s no place in the world like the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. Exotic textiles, the finest handmade carpets in the world, jewels fit for royalty, aphrodisiacal teas, and treasures recovered from shipwrecks mark only a small portion of the vast selection on offer in this labyrinthine sprawl — it’s as easy to get lost in the colors and smells as it is in the virtually indistinguishable passageways that twist and turn upon each other in every direction here.

Traveling with your significant other demands a level of intimacy that supersedes anything your life at home together can possibly prepare you for. This isn't the kind of intimacy that you won each other over with in the first place, but rather zero privacy, sweat caked socks and underwear, diarrhea and fungal infection style intimacy. Gross.