Viva la Vida Travel with Carmen Schaffer

I'm a pursuer of experiences; any and all experiences, good, bad or otherwise are welcome because at the end of the experience there's always something gained. That being said, I decided that I would check out a meditation Meet Up group in my city. Meet ups is a pretty cool idea. It's basically a website where you can search for pretty much anything that interests you and find like minded individuals and share experiences focusing on those interests. I decided to venture into a meditation Meet up group. I can't say that I have officially meditated but I have zoned out and intentionally focused on myself ~ maybe that's meditating, I don't know, but I decided that I needed to delve deeper into myself ~ for self exploration and general grounding purposes. I drove into the city to attend my first meditation group and as I entered the side door of the Minneapolis Center of Light, I'd have to say that my first thought was, " This could totally be some crac

As I made the career switch from the ever glamorous social worker career to travel agent, there were a fair share of nay sayers that doubted the future of my new venture. To be honest with you, a career change is scary no matter what direction you take and blocking out the negative Nancy's and forging ahead with the new goal is not always the easiest task but is by far the most important thing to do, keeping in mind the reason for the career change in the first place.  www.vivalavidatravel.com Why would I choose to be a travel agent and compete with the mega travel booking sites such as Expedia, Travelocity and the like? Why would I do that to myself? The answer: I love travel and believe it to be a catalyst for personal change, growth and renewal and I need to be part of that change! Sure, it's tough competing against the big box vendors but that's exactly what they are : big, brown, generic boxes of travel. Ain't nothing personal going on with Expedia or Travel

As a traveler as well as a travel agent, there's only so much a person can go to fancy shmancy hotels, eat delicious food, lounge in luxurious surroundings and get waited on hand and foot. If you're a person that needs to be stimulated both physically and mentally, too much lounging wreaks havoc on your body as well as your psyche. After a while lounging gets boring. I know you're probably thinking that is an INSANE statement but it is true. This is not to say that beautifully appointed resorts do not have a place in the travel industry because THAT statement would be insane. Of course they have a place in the travel industry ~ everyone needs to be pampered and taken care of from time to time and everyone needs to relax and unwind from their hectic daily life routines.What I am saying is that when you've reached a plateau ~ a saturation, if you will ~ of vacationing at resorts and lounging until you can't lounge any longer, perhaps you may want to consider another v

I'm home now. . . one week post Mexico trip to Chiapas and Oaxaca for the ATMEX travel trade show and I'm having a few regrets. They are trivial regrets, mind you but they are travelers regrets. I rarely walk away from a journey regretting what I have done; on the contrary, I usually regret what I didn't get around to doing or in this case, buying. While I was in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, there were hundreds of runny nosed, long, braid-filled haired, beautiful soulful eyed women and children pounding the pavement selling everything from hand knit Nemo dolls, woven bracelets, seed necklaces and reposos which is similar to a scarf but cooler because it's name is Reposo and it simply sounds better than scarf. Those sweet women and children would circle me as soon as I made eye contact with one of them. . .which I always did because honestly, their little souls spoke through their eyes and called me in like sirens. I bought bracelets, a few reposos, and a beaut

Traditional indigenous medicinal practices have always fascinated me. How did people figure out that X plant lowers blood pressure or that if you wrapped X leaf around a wound that it would heal it? It must have been a doozy of trial and error mishaps and successes that brought them to where they are today. Down in Mexico, I was privileged enough to experience some of that traditional Mexican medicine on my own ~ and NO, it wasn't just in the form of tequila! Sheesh, in Oaxaca, they drink Mezcal, which is good for clearing the lungs, helping you sleep, making you feel more handsome/pretty and in general, the perfect tonic for what ails you. As I wandered the roads of Oaxaca and Chiapas, Mexico, it was clear to me that traditional medicine continues to play a huge part in Mexican culture. Up in the Sierra Juarez mountains of Oaxaca lies beautiful "pueblo magico" ~ Spanish for magical town. Pueblos Magicos were created by the secretary of tourism of Mexico to promote tour