I haven’t yet written about this here but I am a minimalist traveler. I rarely check a bag and pack as little as I possibly can. Because of that, I don’t often buy souvenirs.
Except sometimes I do.
In August 2018 we sent our younger teen off to college. A couple of weeks later, my husband and I went on our first-ever vacation without children. Not only were we celebrating having launched our final chick from the nest, but we were also celebrating his 50th birthday. We started off with a week in Barcelona, then finished with several days in London.
(Why yes, milestone birthdays do require a major trip to celebrate.)
Before the trip, I was really nervous about being so far from my children. What if something happened and they needed us? It is relevant to know the following:
Both of our offspring were at universities within two hours of our house.
My parents lived 15 minutes from one of our students.
One of my brothers was 15 minutes from the other one.
My other siblings lived within two hours of both universities.
If that vague unnamed something were to happen, there was plenty of family coverage until we could get home.
What can I say, I’m a worrier.
We went to Barcelona and had a fabulous time. Then we flew to London and settled into our flat.
Meanwhile, a hurricane was brewing in the Atlantic and moving closer to the East Coast of the U.S. We live in Virginia, so it’s not uncommon for hurricanes to affect us even though we’re three hours from the beach.
When we woke up in London that first morning, we had a message from one of our daughters letting us know that her school was closing because of the coming hurricane. Students would be required to evacuate, but the school was not providing the resources to do so. (Don’t even get me started.)
(The next day, our other offspring’s school would also close down, although they at least didn’t require evacuation.)
We responded to our daughter’s initial message, then went about our day. Because we were in London, where there’s abundant free wifi, we had decided against getting SIM cards for our phones for the few days we would be there. What we did instead was download the Starbucks app because it showed us all their store locations in London. Starbucks is an excellent option if you are in a foreign country and need free wifi. You don’t even have to be a customer.
Let me just add here that generally speaking, I am not a Starbucks customer. I rarely go to Starbucks at home and instead go to local shops, and when I travel, I want to support local coffee shops.
My husband and I decided to spend our day along the Thames in central London. We took the Tube to where we wanted to start exploring and began walking. We climbed the monument to the Great Fire and admired the views, then continued east along the Thames path. There’s a Starbucks next to the Tower of London so we stopped there for wifi in order to check our messages.
By that time both offspring were awake and the texts were zipping back and forth, so we ordered coffee and settled in for a bit.
(Yes, I know I said the wifi is free, but I felt like it was polite to buy coffee since we would be there for a while.)
Side note: Our family uses WhatsApp for texting. It’s a free app used all over the world and not only has it been helpful for us to communicate with, say, Airbnb hosts when we’ve traveled, but we also use it to communicate with friends around the world and also within our household. (As I type this, my phone is buzzing with Whatsapp texts from both of my offspring, one of whom is down the hall from me and the other one is downstairs in the kitchen.)
We spent about 45 minutes at the Tower Bridge Starbucks texting our offspring and family members about evacuation options. The hurricane was still a few days away and there was a lot that was unknown, so we wanted to make sure that both of our college students had what they needed, regardless of the scenario.
We eventually left Starbucks and continued our mega walk. We passed the Tower (we’ve visited several times, so skipped a tour this trip), crossed Tower Bridge, and started walking west along the Thames path. HIGHLY recommend this walk because the views are gorgeous and there’s just a lot to see on the south bank of the river.
We had lunch at a pub and used the wifi there to check our texts. Later we popped into another Starbucks for a few minutes to use the wifi. All in all, we walked around 6-7 miles that day, which was awesome.
This pattern continued for the next few days: sightseeing and walking, while using wifi in museums, pubs, and occasionally Starbucks.
At the end of our last full day in London, I stopped at one last Starbucks. This time it wasn’t to use the wifi — by that point, the hurricane was clearly not going to be a threat to Virginia and we were no longer worried about anyone’s safety.
Instead, I bought a Starbucks mug as a reminder of this part of our vacation and in gratitude for all the wifi we used. I had been looking for a new mug — one that was bigger than most of the ones in our kitchen — so why not pick up one as a travel memento?
So that’s the story of one of the rare souvenirs I’ve brought home from my travels. I carefully wrapped clothes around it and packed it in the middle of my one travel bag. The mug made it home safely and has become my favorite mug.
What about you? Do you buy souvenirs? Do you have a story about one in particular?
When we were in Bavaria with 3 very small children, we took a tour into a salt mine. I do treasure the tiny salt shaker they gave each of us as a souvenir from the tour. It reminds me of the fun we had. I'll have to find the photos and write a post!