Traveling Rosie

11/01/2025

In love with these handmade gifts from friends in New Delhi, India! I’m so lucky for the love from around the world! Thank you 💚

11/01/2025

For my traveling friends who live in the LA region and suffering from the devastating wildfires... A bit of helpful information for those who've been evacuated.

09/01/2025

: Restroom access laws!! Something I don't often share as I don't want folks to think I'm incapable, I am both celiac and have a rare form of colitis. When I travel I keep my steroids on me but I really hate taking them as the side effects are even worse so I try to live without them. Recently, before a tour of the Brooklyn Heights, I found myself needing a bathroom and my go-to places had all closed their bathrooms to the public. This has been a major frustration in NYC since the years of the pandemic. Recently I had a tour guest who had survived colon cancer and often needed a toilet. A bit of googling, and I found that in 21 US states it's now illegal for a business to refuse the use of an employee bathroom (there must be 3 employees or more working). It's called Ally's Law in the USA (not named after me). Similar laws also exist in the UK and Australia, I haven't yet researched other countries. For all three countries a card (physical or mobile) can be ordered to alert businesses. If you're like me, download the cards and research your rights before traveling xoxo The more you know 🌈

People living with Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis often suffer from debilitating urgency to use a restroom immediately, or risk having an embarrassing accident. The Restroom Access Act seeks to ensure that people with certain medical conditions have access to employee-only restrooms when a ...

07/01/2025

from the Maldives, PUMPKIN CURRY! Eleven months ago a travel buddy and I found ourselves on one of the islands, searching for a place to eat dinner and had one of the best dinners of our travels, many inspired by a mix of South Indian and local foods. All the dishes were fabulous but one was a pumpkin stew. And during this winter cold season, I've found pumpkin can be good for the immune system. Unfortunately I can't ask the restaurant for it's exact recipe (no cook loves to share their secrets!) but below is on that tastes similar. Happy cooking!!

1 1/2 cups fresh pumpkin or if not avail, 1 can pumpkin
1 onion sliced
1 clove garlic minced
5-10 curry leaves (I've learned curry powder is not the same)
5-10 pandan eaves (bay leaf can be substituted)
1 chili
1/4 cup oil
1/2 tsp chili powder
2/3 tsp turmeric powder
2/3 cup coconut milk (thick)
1/2 cup water
a pinch or two of salt
rice to serve with

In a pot mix oil, onions, garlic, curry leaves, chili and pandan leaves until they turn light brown. Add turmeric and chili powder, make sure the flame is low and stir until the raw smell disappears. Add pumpkin, stir for a minute. Add coconut milk and water, cover the pot and let it cook for 10-12 minutes, if using fresh pumpkin make sure the pumpkin slices have softened. Serve with rice :)

06/01/2025

Looking back on 2024 adventures!! There were some ups and downs but... 5 new countries, a return to Berlin for the first time since my studies there, the Olympics!!, my 50th US state, first time scuba diving, friends old and new, family time, so much theater, music, art, food, culture, so much learning, and of course many, many bevels 🩵 🇺🇸🇵🇱🇩🇪🇸🇪🇮🇳🇲🇻🇫🇷🇱🇺

03/01/2025

What are your favorite travel, cultural, country, historical books to get lost in?? 📚

Myself, I just finished the YA book WALK TWO MOONS (yes I read YA, there's some gems there!). An easy read about a young girl going through trauma and the places she takes in while on a journey across the northern USA. And am currently making my way through DEAD WAKE: THE LAST CROSSING OF THE LUSITANIA by Eric Larsson who became one of my favorite authors after reading DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY. I love the way he mixes history with story, history that shaped the world into what it is today.

01/01/2025

Happy New Year 🎉 Oh, the places we'll go in 2025!!

30/12/2024

The history of New Year's Eve in New York City and how the Times Square Ball Drop came to be!

25/12/2024

Merry Christmas, Chanukah Sameach, Heri za Kwanzaa y’all!! Thank you for being travel buddies ❤️💚🩵🖤

22/12/2024

NYC Fun fact!! It is 10 degrees F (-12C) outside and yet it’s so warm in my 100+ year old apartment that I have to open the windows (I’m not complaining!). This dates back to the 1918 pandemic, when folks first started to realize that fresh air could help stop the spread of the disease… Buildings were mandated to overheat the building so folks would open their windows. And how I do love fresh air!! (Perhaps next summer I’ll repaint the radiator.)

20/12/2024

The real NYC mafia…

17/12/2024

Some very important travel info! The UK is now requiring an electronic authorization before travel, even if one is just passing through! I've been to the UK a number of times without needing such and could easily find myself traveling without checking on requirements. This happened to a friend of mine on the Germany/Czechia border years ago when rules changed while we were traveling and she was kicked off the train. Always double check!!

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20241211-the-big-changes-coming-to-uk-and-european-travel-in-2025

PHOTO: Paddington Station, London, summer 2023

16/12/2024

The is by the author of The Wizard of Oz! This delightful tale of the person who is perhaps one the few who have traveled the entire world - and all in one night!! It’s also a story of love and sharing in the face of selfishness and evil. The original novel is fun and the one I have, the graphic novel (thanks mom) is as well. Happy Holidays to y’all, whatever you celebrate or if you don’t celebrate 📚💚

09/12/2024

On this dreary, wintery New Jersey day, looking back on this heat wave in the South of France and a day visiting Palais des Papes in Avignon! Built as a fortress in the 14th Century it was also briefly the center of Catholicism in Western Europe. Today one can tour with not just an audioguide but with an ipad that in each room will recreate what it's thought the room once looked like in its glory while listening to the history. It was a hot but a glorious day!

05/12/2024

To move, to breathe, to fly, to float
To gain all while you give,
To roam the roads of lands remote,
To travel is to live.

~ Hans Christian Anderson

04/12/2024

in honor of and 🍪 I was inspired by the blog linked below created by Indigenous Chef Tawnya. Often I skip over reading the explanation of a recipe on a blog site but I strongly recommend reading her history of this recipe! Cookies are currently in the oven…

https://www.cheftawnyabrant.com/post/indian-cookies

28/11/2024

As a New Yorker since 17, a world traveler, tour guests are always asking where I’m from and I simply tell them Northern California. They ask exactly where. And I tell them a smallish city but there’s so much more. Often they want to pinpoint me to one spot, that’s hard for me. I grew up in town and at the same time running the drainage ditch of the local farms, on ATVs roaming the ranchlands of Central California, trying not to be bit by a rattler in the foothills (still haven’t seen one!), riding horses and getting muddy and trudging through the snow in the Sierra Nevadas. As a kid I never understood how special all that was, today I’m thankful.

23/11/2024

For those of us who grew up a little bit wild…! I got two points, 1 for never having held a crayfish (shellfish allergy) and 1 for never having heard a rattlesnake despite everyone else in my family having stories of rattlesnake encounters 🐍