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After a whirlwind journey to South America in November and December, January was meant to be a quiet antidote. And it was — a busy month of working, wholesome residing, and beginning the yr off robust!
This month, I made an enormous purpose for 2024: I need to go to at the least one new vacation spot within the Czech Republic each month of the yr. I’ve been resolving annually to go to extra locations within the Czech Republic, and it hasn’t actually been understanding, so this looks as if a strategy to truly go to new locations frequently.
I determine that even in very busy journey months (and March goes to be one!), I can squeeze in a fast day journey someplace.
So I set to work this month, with a really snowy and wintry go to as much as Liberec.
![Kate taking a smiling selfie wearing a big winter coat with a furry hood. She's on a snowy square in Prague, a Gothic church behind her.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Kate-in-Prague-winter-1024x768.jpg)
Locations Visited
- Prague and Liberec, Czech Republic
![Balloon letters spelling out "Happy Ne Year."](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Happy-Ne-Year-1024x700.jpg)
Highlights
Getting actually, actually into closing my rings. Charlie bought me an Apple Look ahead to Christmas — one thing that I resisted for awhile as a result of I believed it will make me appear to be a Spy Child.
Nicely, seems I really like my watch, particularly the detailed well being monitoring data. I’ve change into obsessive about is closing my rings each single day. Now Charlie and I are each doing loopy dances when it’s time to get one other standing minute!
Between that and Dry January, it’s been a really wholesome begin to the yr.
I bought my eyebrows microbladed! That is one thing I’ve been considering of doing for years. Microblading is mainly a semi-permanent eyebrow tattoo that fills within the sparse areas in your eyebrows and makes them look extra uniform; most final round a yr.
I went to AR Aesthetics in Prague and completely LOVE how Alesia recreated my brows into a beautiful form. However proper now you’ll be able to’t inform I had something finished in any respect — post-scabbing, your brows look naked till the pores and skin finishes a regeneration cycle, which takes about 22 days. So I ought to see the ultimate ends in per week or so.
If you happen to get micro bladed, my large tip is to guide your self a blowout or haircut 5-7 days after the process, as a result of I wasn’t in a position to get my eyebrows moist till they stopped scabbing (took about 13 days), and thus couldn’t wash my hair. I bought by on dry shampoo till per week in and it was SO good to have another person wash my hair in a means that might hold my brows dry!
![A tall pointy tower shaped like a spaceship, covered with snow and surrounded by fog.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Liberec-Czech-Republic-768x1024.jpg)
Visiting Liberec. Liberec is a small metropolis up within the mountains, close to the German and Polish borders. It has a reasonably city corridor, some good coffeeshops, and a cool environment.
The large attraction in Liberec is simply outdoors city — a spot known as Ještěd. Ještěd is a bizarre pointy resort type of formed like a spaceship, and it has views over the mountains. Or in the event you go on as snowy a day as we did, you will have a view of simply clouds!
We had some outrageously scrumptious pumpkin soup (significantly, it tasted prefer it was filled with meat and cheese) and I beloved taking photos of the tree branches with completely frozen snow.
Enjoyable with pals in Prague. One other of my objectives is to do 50 new issues in Prague this yr (and no, I can’t go all in on eating places or it will be ALL RESTAURANTS). My good friend Janna and I hit up the Christmas Metropolis Cinema, which was placing on Bridget Jones’s Diary — certainly one of my all-time favourite films. And also you stroll in by way of a wardrobe, prefer it’s Narnia!
And my good friend Harvey came visiting and we hit up the Banksy exhibit, the Dvorak Museum, and sure, the Intercourse Machines Museum. All very a lot price visiting.
Enjoyable with the kitties. They’re simply one of the best. We additionally began them on Feliway this month on the vet’s advice and so they’ve been extra relaxed and happier to play with one another.
![Murray and Lewis, two gray tabby cats, both lying on Kate's outstretched black hoodie.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Lewis-and-Murray-Curled-Up-and-Cozy-1024x768.jpg)
Challenges
No challenges price mentioning right here this month. The hardest factor has been coping with the darkness of January and its consequential seasonal melancholy. 4 PM sunsets and no Christmas lights to cheer you up.
![Cement walls with Banksy's art painted on them, including a figure riding a horse with his cloak obscuring his face.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Bansky-Exhibit-Prague-1024x768.jpg)
Weblog Posts of the Month
There have been a LOT — most of them in regards to the Florida Keys and Montenegro. Are you prepared? I’m not going to summarize them as a result of the titles are kind-of self-explanatory.
My Favorite New Destinations of 2023
30+ Best Things to Do in Key West, Florida
13 Best Key Lime Pies in Key West
24 Fabulous Things to do in Key Largo, Florida
22 Fun Things to Do in Islamorada, Florida Keys
30 Most Beautiful Beaches in Montenegro
15 Best Things to Do in Budva, Montenegro
17 Beautiful Things to Do in Kotor, Montenegro
15 Best Things to Do in Monopoli, Italy
24 Cool Things to Do in Lenox, MA
12 Fun Things to Do in Stockbridge, MA
![Perfect frozen snow-covered evergreen tree branches.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Perfect-Snow-in-Liberec-1024x768.jpg)
E book Membership This Month
Our subsequent guide membership will happen on Sunday, April 7, at 1:00 PM Jap Time. Sure, I do know that’s a very long time from now, and I apologize for that — I actually have a dedication each Sunday till then (besides Easter Sunday, which I’m not touching).
We can be studying Nervous Conditions by Zimbabwean writer Tsitsi Dangarembga.
“The groundbreaking first novel in Tsitsi Dangarembga’s award-winning trilogy, Nervous Situations, gained the Commonwealth Writers Prize and has been ‘hailed as one of many twentieth century’s most vital works of African literature’ (The New York Occasions).
Twenty years earlier than Zimbabwe would win independence and ended white minority rule, thirteen-year-old Tambudzai Sigauke embarks on her training. On her shoulders relaxation the financial hopes of her mother and father, siblings, and prolonged household, and inside her burns the will for independence.
She yearns to be freed from the constraints of her rural village and thinks she’s discovered her means out when her rich uncle provides to sponsor her education. However she quickly learns that the training she receives at his mission college comes with a worth.”
You can sign up here. Hope to see you there!
Most Standard Reel on Instagram
I haven’t been doing a lot on Instagram recently — simply feeling tremendous burned out in each different enterprise course — however I did create a reel about my new eyebrows! (Let’s simply hope that they stick round!)
For extra updates from my travels, you’ll be able to follow me on Instagram at @adventurouskate.
What I Watched This Month
I’ve a brand new favourite TV present, and it’s known as For All Mankind. It’s on Apple TV+. I didn’t watch it initially as a result of it regarded sci-fi-ish, and I’m not an enormous sci-fi fan — however belief me, it’s SO SO SO SO GOOD.
Don’t learn something about it — simply watch the primary episode. And also you’ll be hooked.
Charlie and I’ve watched a single episode for 34 of the previous 35 nights. Up to now the sequence has 40 episodes general (4 seasons of 10 hourlong episodes).
The showrunners say they’ve a seven-year plan for the sequence, and so they’ve bought that Apple cash, so I’m wanting ahead to the place they’re going to go!
![A cobblestone street in Prague, dusted with a layer of snow and surrounded by yellow buildings.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Snowy-Prague-Day-1024x768.jpg)
What I Learn This Month
Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld (2016) — This guide is a contemporary retelling of Delight and Prejudice, set in Cincinnati and starring a household of wayward sisters who hold operating into the identical two medical doctors, certainly one of whom is the alum of a current actuality courting present. Will journalist Liz have the ability to save her household from monetary break and her sister have the ability to discover real love, and can that terrible Fitzwilliam Darcy begin leaving her alone?!
I’ve been working my means by way of Curtis Sittenfeld’s books, and this was a beautiful one. A really trustworthy adaptation (and much more significant while you learn the afterward, which was about writing the guide for her terminally in poor health Austen-loving good friend). Delight and Prejudice is simply SO simply adaptable — I truly rewatched Fireplace Island after studying this guide, which is one other fabulous adaptation!
You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith (2023) — Poet Maggie Smith’s life modified after her poem Good Bones went viral worldwide. SO a lot occurred after that poem, and one unhappy and sadly predictable factor was that her husband couldn’t deal with her being extra profitable than him, had an affair, and left her and their kids. It is a divorce memoir.
I actually take pleasure in studying works of prose by poets, as a result of they take such care with each phrase. This guide feels on the identical time delicate and incisive, and I loved being in Maggie’s head for a bit, even when the subject material was bleak. That mentioned — that is one guide the place I need to see extra of the story past what she shared. Not as a result of I don’t consider her, however as a result of she portrayed her ex-husband in such an arch means that I can’t see what she or anybody ever preferred about him within the first place.
Everyone Here is Lying by Shari Lapena (2023) — On this thriller thriller, a nine-year-old woman goes lacking and captivates the nation. Her father appears a LOT like he might be behind her disappearance — however turns on the market are lots of people who might be equally believable kidnappers for this annoying-as-hell child.
I learn this guide as a result of Roxane Homosexual beneficial it in her e-newsletter. And it IS a fast-paced thriller that retains you guessing. I couldn’t cease listening to it. But it surely has certainly one of my LEAST favourite literary tropes — the precocious little one who talks, thinks, and acts like an grownup. My eyes almost rolled out of my head.
The Golden Couple by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen (2022) — Avery is a therapist who misplaced her license; she now acts within the capability of a advisor who isn’t sure to the legal guidelines and ethics of remedy. She begins working with a pair seeking to rebuild their relationship after infidelity — however quickly Avery is swept up in a a lot darker, extra sophisticated thriller than what she signed up for.
Eh. It’s a meh thriller. Not one of the characters me, and nowhere did Avery display how her lack of ethics may make her a greater therapist. The perfect a part of the guide was when Avery adopted a candy however hard-to-adopt pit bull, and the canine DID NOT die on the finish. Phew.
![Rue Cremieux, a small Paris street with brightly pastel-colored buildings.](https://www.adventurouskate.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/IMG_5664-1024x768.jpeg)
Coming Up in February 2024
My 2024 travels are kicking off in mid-February! First off, Charlie and I can be visiting London. I’ll be attending IMM UK, a journey business occasion, and we’ll be celebrating a belated Christmas along with his household, going to see the Arsenal girls’s workforce play, and gorging ourselves on Chinese language meals at Hunan and Indian meals at Dishoom.
Then I head to Paris alone for 2 days. I’m truthfully primarily going to do some procuring intel (aka check out ALL THE BRANDS I LOVE and see how I like them in actual life). Past that, I are inclined to lots of the identical issues at any time when I go to Paris, so this time I need to do all new issues. It’s been enjoyable planning.
So what’s going to my new Czech vacation spot of the month be? Mariánské Lázně! Charlie and I can be visiting this well-known Czech spa city close to the top of the month.
Like Karlovy Differ, Mariánské Lázně is likely one of the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Nice Spa Cities of Europe, although it’s extra standard with Czechs than worldwide guests. Winter looks as if a pleasant time to luxuriate in some geothermal waters.
Any plans for February? Share away!
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