Continuing along Day 1 of our 3-Day San Francisco, Hearst Castle, Yosemite Tour!After the Travelers4Fun team wrapped up lunch in Solvang, CA, we were off to our next stop: Hearst Castle. Nestled atop a hill North of San Luis Obispo – about a two hour drive from Solvang – we arrived mid-afternoon. The Hearst Castle Tour is optional, and at $25 I would highly recommend it for anyone who loves art, history, architecture, or old Hollywood glamour. Many of the tapestries, paintings, sculptures, and mosaics are one-of-a-kind, and some pieces date all the way back to the 3rd century! A little history: Hearst Castle took just under three decades (28 years, to be exact) to complete. William Randolph Hearst worked closely with architect Julia Morgan to design a Spanish Revival-inspired estate. As a child, Hearst traveled through Europe with his mother, and inspiration from his travels can be found throughout the castle grounds. The towers of the main house are modeled after a church in Ronda, in the Spanish province of Malaga. During the 1920s & 1930s Hollywood stars an...

Day 1 of our 3-Day San Francisco, Hearst Castle, Yosemite Tour!<br/>The bus picked us up from LA, and then the Travelers4Fun Team was off! First stop: Solvang, a Danish village nestled about an hour north of Santa Barbara. A sunny spring day was a perfect backdrop for the colorful red, green, and yellow buildings and charming, wood-thatched wind mills. Once off the bus our tour group quickly dispersed, each of us following our noses toward a medley of delicious scents coming from all directions. From freshly-baked, authentic Danish pastries, to chocolates made on the premises, to home-made ice cream shops on every corner, Solvang was a sugar-lover’s dream. <br/><br/>I personally couldn’t resist Ingeborg’s Handmade Danish Chocolates, their display of giant chocolate Easter bunnies was too enticing to pass up. Two friendly chocolate-makers were kind enough to take me on a tour of the shop, letting me sample delicious confections along the way. After getting my fill of chocolates, Anna and I headed out into the sunshine, ready to explore everything...

Who knew that Washington D.C. had so many monuments and memorials! By the end of our trip I was nicknaming D.C. the memorial amusement park.  The Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, Korean War Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, Iwo Jima Memorial are just some of the amazing sites you can check out while in DC.  I was amazed to see just how much we fit into this day tour of D.C.  Not only did we see the memorials but we went into the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, one of the most renowned museums in the U.S! I’ve been obsessed with National Geographic since I was younger, and the Smithsonian is right up there in the ranks.  There are about a bazillion (19 to be exact) different Smithsonian museums in DC, each with their own area of expertise.  Some of these include the National  Portrait Gallery, Postal Museum, and an Air and Space Museum. We went into the Natural History Museum, naturally.    I felt like I was one of those kid extras in the movies that always get to go on school field trips to the Natural History Muse...

Bryce Canyon: home of the hoodoos.  If you don’t know what hoodoos are, then you are in exactly the same boat as me a couple months ago.  Actually, before this trip I had never even heard of Bryce Canyon (let the gasps of silence ensue). It’s funny actually, because it became one of my favorite places during our West Coast trip.  It was truly spectacular: one of those sights of nature that you just have to sit down for a moment to take it all in. Hoodoos are giant rock formations eroded from time.  The native americans believed that the hoodoos were actually spirits trapped in rock form, and that’s why many are given names that personify their rock shapes. It always amazes me that the forces of nature can create landscapes that look more like works of art.  In Bryce Canyon, for example, the giant hoodoo rock formations seem like something an ancient culture constructed out of some crazy dream.  People have even given these organic hoodoos names like: The Goblin, Fairyland, Thor’s Hammer, and The Hunter.  For those d...

Everyone dreams about the big city, the Big Apple, Manhattan, the “city that never sleeps”—New York City.  I’ve been to NYC many times, I went to school in New York and my mom lives in Manhattan, but with a city so bustling and full of things to do, it was definitely a different experience to see it on a Tours4Fun tour.  I saw so many things that I didn’t have the time to see before—or didn’t even know existed! The intrepid Air and Space Museum was one of these.  I would have never thought to go to this museum before, but I was so glad I got a chance to explore on my T4F trip.  It’s a pretty huge museum full of vintage planes and artifacts.  It almost felt like you were stepping back in time, in an old air hangar filled with war planes, fighter jets, and army helicopters.  It was a mix between Top Gun and Indiana Jones.  The hangars were dark and spacious, and you could feel an echo reach you from across the room.  The planes themselves were immaculate, as if they were fresh off the...