I am beyond thrilled to announce that my first ebook Instagram as your Guide to the World – How, What and Who to Search and Follow on Instagram to Help You Travel the World just published this week and it is now available on Amazon.com for an introductory price of $4.99 for a limited time. You can also sign up for my newsletter and get a shorter version for free later this summer. I will be giving a free short version of the book as a .pdf for my newsletter subscribers for free of charge sometime during summer 2013. You can sign up for my personal weekly email here.

Million Little Travel Guides

I was honored to have the
New York Best Selling Author Chris Brogan to write the foreword for the Instagram as Your Guide to The World-book.

Katja is leading a movement of sorts, one to help others create a million little travel guides. But this isn’t entirely about Katja. She’s just our “point of view character,” as they say in movies. She’s actually here for you. Because when you’re done, you’re a recruit. You’re part of the movement. And you have work to do. The world needs your perspective, your take, and your inevitable greatness. We are, after all, creating a million little travel guides, and your work starts now.

says Chris Brogan about this book.

Chris Brogan is CEO & President of Human Business Works, a media and education company helping equip the Personal Business Revolution. He is the New York Times bestselling author of six books (so far) including The Impact Equation.

YOU become a travel expert

My easy-to-read ebook will help you to learn to use Instagram effectively as a travel guide. I will teach you how, what and who to search and follow on Instagram to make your travel planning a much more pleasant, even fun, experience. You will learn to connect with real travel experts; tourists exactly like you and local people. They can tell you the secrets the tourist guide would never reveal. This book gives you a fresh new way of seeing how, what and where people, like you, travel. It also helps you to find an amazing community of people and see different perspectives of our world.

I will also recommend a few supplementary tools that you can use in addition to Instagram to get the most out of your experience. This book is mainly a technical how-to-book, and you can skim through the topics and the tips pretty quickly if you are a seasoned Instagram user. In addition to the technical tips I have added a few travel photos and short travel stories in this book to highlight what this book really is about: an inspiration for you to discover the world! This book isn’t just about new technology and social media, but about discovery, community, and experiencing the world.

After reading this guide YOU will become an expert in finding exotic places to visit and insider tips on what to do – anywhere in the world. My hope for you is that you will not just find a new way to find photos and travel destinations, but that you are also able to make new friends around the country and around the world. I also hope you will learn more about different cultures and see just how different our beautiful world can be – and also see how similar things can be on the other side of the world.

The best thing about Instagram isn’t the technology. The best thing about Instagram is the people who use it. Take time to connect with the people behind the photos.

Remember to also share your own photos! I want to see your pictures from your travels, so remember to connect with me on Instagram, my username is Skimbaco. You can also tag your next travel photos with #IGTravelBook to share them with other readers and travel experts mentioned in this book. I would like to invite you to join our community of Skimbacoers, and share the pictures of how you enjoy life with the #skimbaco hashtag.

Join me in living life to the fullest, and sharing our world travels!

Get the Instagram as your Guide to the World-book now and learn more about the Instagram as Your Guide to The World-book here.

I hope you enjoyed the few Instagram photos I posted from my trip to France. Stay tuned for many more photos and my new discoveries from France, including my tips for Paris, pictures from Burgundy and the towns we visited during our trip.

Trendy way to see Europe: River Cruising

One of the trendiest ways to cruise these days is cruising in slow pace on the rivers of Europe. Europe has over 1,300 rivers, and 14 of them are over 600 miles (1000 kilometers) long. You could probably spend a year or two just cruising the rivers of Europe. Not to mention that many European cities are by rivers, including Paris, Prague, Vienna, Lyon and London, offering so much for you to see. What really sets river cruising separate from sea cruising is the significantly smaller vessels, much more intimate settings, and the opportunity to truly see the scenery and experience European countryside and cities in a way impossible done by any other method. Instead of getting on a tour bus and driving to the next town and constantly checking in to a different hotel during your journey, the river boat is your floating hotel where your own private chef and waiting staff are waiting for you with a cocktail when you arrive back from a day of sightseeing.

Many river cruise vessels carry over 100 passengers per boat, offering a more affordable way to river cruise and you can also find many day cruises around Europe to get your river cruise feet wet figuratively speaking. The real top-of-the-line of river cruising is with smaller river barges that carry less than 15 passengers. The real luxury isn’t just the private chef and floating hotel room on the river barge, the real luxury is the slow way of traveling forcing you to slow down and relax, and truly to enjoy the local lifestyle, scenery and cuisine. River barges offer a much more relaxing way of traveling than the larger river boats.

Slow traveling: river cruise on a barge in Burgundy

Our Global Inspirations writer Reeta and I had an opportunity to cruise in the Burgundy area in France last month with European Waterways, on their L’Impressionniste river barge on a three day press trip. L’Impressionniste is an old cargo barge turned into a luxury river barge for 12 passengers. Typically L’Impressionniste has one week long cruises in Burgundy with different themes, such as golf, wine tasting and family cruises. Our trip started with a stay at the Hotel Westminster in Paris, and after a Sunday morning in Paris, we were transported by European Waterways vans to Fleurey-sur-Ouche in Eastern France where the L’Impressionniste was waiting for us. The three days we were on board L’Impressionniste was not just an immersion to European river cruising but also to wines of Burgundy and falling in love with the beautiful French countryside.

The L’Impressionniste travels at around 5 mph giving you plenty of time to take photos and enjoy the scenic view as the barge slowly moves from one lock to another on the Burgundy Canal. The lock houses are gorgeous and usually the lock keepers live in the lock houses.

A lock keeper takes care of several locks in his/her area and was helping the barge crew to get through of all of the locks and once the lock was closed behind us, the lock keeper took his scooter and drove to the next lock to wait for our arrival to help opening the lock.

The slow-paced cruising is a hit among retired people, and the demographic of the typical barge-cruiser tends to be good 20 years older than I am. You might want to send this link as a recommendation for your mother or mother-in-law, but don’t just yet dismiss the river cruising for you either. If sitting on the deck of a river barge with a cocktail or wine glass in your hand and enjoying the views of French countryside is too slow-paced for you, you can choose also walk or bike by the path by canal until jumping back in on the next river lock again. During our walks by the canal we saw many other passenger barges, and local people enjoying the canal path by biking, walking or rollerblading.

One of my absolute favorite things on the entire cruise was to borrow the bicycles from L’Impressionniste and bike to the closest little towns to take photos and take a quick peek how life in the French countryside looks like. I’d say picture perfect.

Floating Hotel

Think of river barges as floating hotels, but instead of just paying for the nightly fee, your vacation is all inclusive. The daily trips, the food, the wine, everything included. No surprises whatsoever. The L’Impressionniste had been updated lately and has air-conditioning but no TVs in the state rooms. The cabins are moderately sized, especially compared to Paris hotels. The mood was “rustic French countryside on a boat” more than anything else. The stateroom isn’t an inviting oasis where you want to spend a day, but the barge had outside deck, inner dining room and sitting area giving you plenty of space for reading a book or having some quiet time.

Breakfast was served in the dining room each morning and we enjoyed café au lait with panne au chocolat and croissants like you do when in France. The lunch and dinner was cooked by Chef Selbey each day, who surprisingly was British but mastered the local cuisine like Coq au vin or Quiche Lorraine. I was equally delighted by his perfectly cooked lamb with minted peas. Each meal was thoughtfully paired with Burgundy area wines, typically white for starter and red for main course. We enjoyed local wines from Hautes-Côtes de Nuits to Moulin-à-Vent and everything in between, and with each wine the hostess of the night would tell us more details of each wine we enjoyed. Each evening I realized I did need at least ten more years of wine drinking training before being able to keep up with the wine drinking pace on board L’Impressionniste.

Wait, there is more. Our days we filled with more wine tasting and visits to local vineyards and towns. Stay tuned for more details of our French culinary tour, the wine and the day trips we took during our river cruise. To make sure never miss a travel post, please subscribe to the Skimbaco Travel Feed.

European Waterways

Prices for a 6 night cruise aboard the 12 passenger hotel barge L’Impressionniste are from $4,750 per person in a twin/double en suite cabin, including all meals, wines, an open bar, excursions and local transfers. Full boat charters are also available.

Contact European Waterways: Toll Free 1-877-879-8808 and check out www.gobarging.com for more details.

Disclosure: I was a media guest of the European Waterways, and received a free one night stay at Hotel Westminster, flights and the river cruise on L’Impressionniste. All other costs associated with this visit are my own, and my opinions are always my own.

Virtually Travel with me to Bali

This week make sure to check out my photos on Instagram directly from Bali, Indonesia! I will be in Bali as a guest of Le Méridien Bali Jimbaran and will be attending the hotel’s ribbon cutting and opening ceremony, and a press conference on Thursday to learn more about this Starwood Preferred Guest property. The Le Méridien Bali Jimbaran resort is located on the secluded, tranquil Jimbaran Bay on the south-west coastline of Bali and has majestic views of the Indian Ocean and Jimbaran Bay.

I’m Skimbaco on Instagram – let’s connect there! Make sure to give me YOUR Bali travel tips and also tag your Bali photos with #skimbaco hashtag so we can all see more photos of this gorgeous location. You can find the latest #Skimbaco Instagram photos here.

Read also Reeta’s posts from her trip to Bali, and stay tuned for a full recap here after my trip. Subscribe to Skimbaco Travel weekly feed email and never miss a travel post!

Photos: the statue photo by Reeta Laaksonen and the hotel pool photo by Le Méridien Bali Jimbaran

Disclosure: I am traveling to Bali as a guest of Le Méridien Bali Jimbaran and my travel and accommodation expenses are paid. My opinions are my own, as always.

Parenting Without Borders

I love this picture of my girls – my middle daughter is saying “I was born in Germany” and my oldest one is teasing her “but you don’t speak any German, I do!” taken from our last trip to Germany after 10 years we moved from there to United States. Now my oldest studies German in Swedish – at her school in Sweden. Our multicultural parenting styles have mixed even more in our nomadic lifestyle of moving from a country to another.

Today I’m excited about teaming up with Culture Mom Media, and the author of Parenting Without Borders: Surprising Lessons Parents Around the World Can Teach Us by Christine Gross-Loh and many other great moms to co-host a Twitter party tomorrow about parenting in different cultures and promoting Christine’s new book.

Our three children were all born in different countries (in Finland, Germany and USA) and my husband and I were raised very differently affecting our parenting choices. He grew up in a conservative family in Texas, and I grew up in a liberal family in Finland, and I remember when we first started talking about having children, our ideas of what raising children together would be like were as far apart as the geographical locations we were from.

Our first discussion about raising children together happened in 1998 and we have come a long way since that. We have developed our own parenting practices that neither of our parents fully approve. I think my in-laws think our kids are being raised by weird Finnish traditions, and my parents think our kids are raised by weird American principles. Nevertheless I kind of think they are proud of us for by doing so many things “wrong” we have somehow managed to raise three very intelligent, creative, tolerant, well-behaved and above all, happy, children. You know what I think? I think there isn’t one best way of raising children in any particular culture, but you as a parent have to make your own choices what’s best for your own child. I also realized that many of the “liberal” ways of Scandinavian parenting were very traditional and “old school,” and oddly many of the “conservative” American ways were actually on the bottom of the list how I wanted to parent my children.

It has been very interesting now when we have moved back to Scandinavia. I loved the freedom I had as a child, but after being a mother in the USA it was not easy to move to Sweden and be a mother in this very different culture, where children are given much more freedom to do what they want to and much less supervision and structure. It was easier for me to be the more Scandinavian-style mother when our children were young; I breastfed them all, we co-slept in a family bed, and we started education at home early on with games and riddles but wanted to keep the kids playing as long as possible and after a few months of preschool experience in New York for our first one, none of our children went to preschool. Scandinavian children are taught to be very independent from very early on when it comes to taking care of themselves, and being unsupervised for example.

Yet after living in the American culture for years I also realized that maybe some of the basic parenting advice from my own culture wasn’t that good after all. Let’s take “Saturday, candy day” for example. Many Finnish and Swedish kids have a “candy day” on Saturdays and while it’s great: it limits the amount of sweets eaten by the kids and it’s meant for their better health, it also teaches bad eating habits = restraining yourself and then binging. Many Finnish children grow up and they tend to take another weekday habit, called “a Friday bottle” – where the Saturday sweets-eating has turned into binge alcohol-drinking on Fridays. It shocks people here that we don’t believe in a candy day, and let kids eat candy when they want. The real shocker is that they are educated enough and probably eat less candy each week than an average Finnish or Swedish kid on an average Saturday.

There are so many different ways of parenting, and I do believe that it benefits every parent to learn more from other cultures and from other perspectives to ultimately make the best decisions.

Join us for Twitter chat!

Please join us for a Twitter chat on today Thursday May 2nd 9PM EST.

Some of the questions covered:
How to build our own global village and answer the universal question: What is best for our children?
Do you ever compare your parenting skills to others?
Are you one of those people who pays close attention to how parents around the world are parenting differently?
Are you surprised to hear when different skills from across the globe can help or transform your own?

We’re thrilled to be teaming up with the author of Parenting Without Borders: Surprising Lessons Parents Around the World Can Teach Us by Christine Gross-Loh. In her book, she takes readers on a multicultural tour of the world’s best parenting practices – from Finland, Sweden and Germany to France, Japan, China, Italy and beyond to examine how international parents successfully foster creativity, discipline, independence, resilience and academic excellence in their children.

During this party, we’ll get right to the heart of and dissect the matters we care most about when it comes to raising children: life skills, eating habits, manners, expectations, mom guilt, sleeping and our obsessions with praise (too much? not enough?). We’ll learn what we’re doing right and what we’re possibly doing wrong, and we’ll all certainly come away with a new slate of practices and goals.

Three moderators guiding the discussion:
Carol Cain from Girl Gone Travel (@carolacain)
Mara Gorman from Mother of All Trips (@motherofalltrip)
Katja Presnal from Skimbaco Lifestyle (@skimbaco) (that’s me!)

Please RSVP here and talk to you on Twitter at 9pm EST on Thursday night at hashtag #ParentingWOB. Talk to you soon!

Photo by Legocontrol.

Repeat after me: there is no privacy online

I received an email from my daughter’s teacher urging us parents to take more notice what some of the children in my daughter’s class are posting on Instagram.
Last week a friend of mine was tagged in a very unflattering and inappropriate photo on Facebook and everyone was able to see it in her profile.
A few weeks ago I was chatting with my friend on Facebook in a language her husband doesn’t speak, yet he tried translating it with Google translate and greatly misunderstood our conversation and it resulted in family drama. The marriage drama had no cases for real drama expect the fact my friend didn’t have privacy to send private messages on Facebook.
A PR person from a respected company was featured in a major business website last week and a photo from his private Facebook page was featured and questioned for, and this may cause this person his job.

Rumors, published private information, poor judgement and bad behavior on social media result in lost jobs and ruined relationships and it has become part of our lives. A few years ago it was still front page news when people lost their jobs due tweets, Facebook photos or written blog posts, now it sadly has become part of today’s society.

Social media, internet and the way we are able to connect with people around the world has changed my life the past ten years, and I do publish personal stories, personal photos and information online, however, with a very strong filter to protect myself and my family. It might be easy to be mistaken that if you don’t have as many social media “followers” as I do that the filter isn’t as important. The filter is important for everyone.

Rules of engagement

My rule of thumb is that never publish anything that you don’t want your spouse (or future spouse) or your mother, your mother-in-law (or future mother-in-law) or your children (or future children) or your boss (or future boss) see.

Today’s Grandmothers are on Facebook, your children’s teachers are on Pinterest, your boss is on Twitter, and your children’s friends on Instagram, and every time you hit publish on any of these sites, think how these people will see you in all of these platforms.

Many argue for private profiles, private messages, and privacy settings and say that only a handful of friends are seeing what you are posting. Dear friends, there is no privacy online.

Sadly there is even no privacy when it comes to your emails nor text messages, or just read Damn You Autocorrect or other blogs where they publish screenshots of text messages, or embarrassing Facebook messages. There is always someone, or someone’s sister, friend or spouse with an access to your or your friend’s account, or Facebook has yet another privacy update removing all of our privacy all together. Always use caution when it comes to social media.

When it comes to my friend’s marriage drama and her husband’s misunderstanding, it would be easy to say that it was all of his fault for spying on her, and any marriage should base on trust. I agree on every marriage being based on trust. However, we all have to learn that there is no privacy online, however much we would like there to be. Even as close to home as in my own marriage, sure, I have seen my husband publishing things online that have made me angry and sad. And I am positive my husband has seen me to do the same regardless how much I try to be respectful in what I am posting.

Keep private things.. private and offline

It is a good reminder for all us to keep our private things private and keep them offline. What is put online has a funny way of always coming out, sometimes even weeks, months or years after the fact.

McAfee released findings from the company’s 2013 Love, Relationships, and Technology survey which examines the pitfalls of sharing personal data in relationships and discloses how breakups can lead to privacy leaks online. The study highlights the need for consumers to take steps to protect themselves from cyber-stalking and exposure of private information.

Nearly two-thirds of smartphone owners have personal and intimate information on their mobile devices, such as bank account information, passwords, credit card numbers and revealing photos, yet only 40% have password protection on their devices. This leaves a gap in personal data protection, which results in exposure.

We’re all aware of the cases involving celebrities, but you don’t have to be a celebrity to have your personal information exposed

said Michelle Dennedy, an online security expert for McAfee.

What about our kids?

What’s the most important thing about this is educating our children correctly about social media and being great examples. Online bullying didn’t exist when we went to school, and many parents might not have first hand experience or even know online bullying exists. We might also think that what we do online doesn’t concern our children, and your “online world” is separate from the “in real life parenting world.” You couldn’t be more wrong. Even if your child doesn’t have access to internet today, she/he will in the future and your online footprint can be found by your offspring (and for you younger single people – your online footprint can also be found by your prospective future spouse!).

As a parent you have responsibility not just learn about social media etiquette and best practices for yourself, but also so you can both educate and monitor what your child is doing online. If you are a parent and want to learn more, you might want to check out my friend Amy Lupold Bair’s new book Raising Digital Families For Dummies, out today.

I personally encourage my children for social networking and learning from day one how to do it correctly – before they are too old to make any big mistakes they might regret later in their lives. Our family’s favorite network is Instagram – and my son’s pictures are featured in the post.

Are you living your bucket list?

When somebody tells you that things in your bucket list are “impossible” or “never gonna happen,” don’t believe them. Anything can happen in life, and YOU are in charge of your own experiences and destiny more than anyone else. I have trust in you, you can make your bucket list come true.

When you think of words “bucket list”, or “adventure” or even “luxury,” it’s often small things that make the something a bucket list-worthy, or an event more adventurous, and luxury is often a sum of very small things (think extra inches flying on 1st class). I am not a real adventure girl, nor an adventure traveler. Yet when I look back what I have done, I know I AM an adventurer, I am testing my own limits, even if it isn’t mountain climbing or para-sailing. I was looking at old photos and found these 10 things that qualify for bucket list-worthy adventures for me.

I grew up in a small town in Finland only hoping someday to move to the capital of Finland, two hours away, and hoping to see some world too. I thought my dreams were big when I was young, but heck, I didn’t even know what dreaming big was! I never have really had a written bucket list, but if I did, all of these would be on it. So glad that I realized it – after I had already done them.

1. Take the ski lift – on the summertime!
Did you know that many ski resorts operate their ski lifts also during the summertime? It gives you the perfect opportunity to explore the mountain high, without actually having to hike up. In fact many ski resorts let you take your mountain bike up in the mountain with the ski lift for ultimate thrill ride down. Me? I took the ski lift up at the Canyons Resort in Park City, Utah and without a mountain bike. In fact, I was going up to the mountain for a cocktail party. Yes, I admit, my adventures often include wine.

2. See Thanksgiving Parade – in New York City
Who all like starting cooking early on Thanksgiving morning and watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade on TV? Me too. We did adventure to NYC one year for the parade in person. It was a cold day, we were not close enough to the parade, and got tired just standing on the side of the street, and after the parade it took us forever to get lunch in the little restaurant in the Upper West Side, not the best experience. The rest of the time we lived in New York we just watched the parade at home, on TV. If you go to see the parade in person make sure to do some planning where to watch it, and get there early enough to get a good spot!

3. Take a helicopter ride
Everyone has to experience a helicopter ride at least once in a lifetime. I recommend it for checking the views of your favorite travel destination, or to take you to the mountain top so you can ski it down. My one and only helicopter ride was after a date with my husband, who also let me sit in the front seat of the helicopter while he was flying it. We circled to see our hometown of the time, and the Christmas lights in our house. This romantic date idea is only recommended if your hubby has a few thousand flight hours under his belt.

5. Visit Elvis – in Graceland!
Years ago… we visited Graceland in Memphis and for any fan of the King, it is a must see. From Elvis-impersonators gatherings, to best milkshakes I’ve ever had (in the 50′s style diner), to shopping Elvis-memorabilia for a friend who loves Elvis, it’s an experience to remember.

6. Swim with the sea lions – in Mexico
Swimming with the sharks is too adventurous for me, but I have swum with stingrays. The most memorable swimming encounter is the swimming with the sea lions in the islands of Sea of Cortez in Mexico. The sea lions are huge and their size worried me a little, and I admit, I was just swimming the same waters watching them from afar, not really swimming with them.

7. Go to the Oscars and meet George Clooney
There are days I just sit at home and write, and think my life is so boring. Then there are days like today when I just sit at home and write, and think wow, what all have I experienced in my lifetime! Like the time I was reporting and live tweeting from the Academy Awards red carpet and George Clooney came and touched my hand. It was beyond even thinking of putting into my bucket list, until, you know, it happened. A reminder for all of us that even the weirdest wishes sometimes come true.

8. Horseback riding – in the Wild West
I took horseback riding lessons when I was a kid. I wore the fancy black helmet, and black long boots, and it was English style riding. While that to may sound exotic to many, that’s just the way we do horseback riding in Scandinavia, and the rest of the Europe. For me the real deal was getting to go horseback riding in the “Wild West.” The first time was on another romantic date with my husband at the Presnal family ranch in Texas (about 15 years ago) and the second time was at Paw’s Up mountain resort in Montana.

9. Beach vacation – with Minnie Mouse
If you know me, you know I have a weakness for Disney travel. I can’t say a Disney Cruise to me is a “once in a lifetime” bucket list thing, because I have been on several cruises. However, cruising the seas and visiting tropical islands like Disney’s own Castaway Cay with Mickey and Minnie Mouse is something that should be on every Disney-lovers bucket list.

10. F1 Race – in Singapore
Whatever your sports is – nothing beats watching the sport live instead from a screen at home. I’ve liked Formula 1 racing ever since I watched the races with my dad when I was just a kid, and seeing F1 race live was a phenomenal experience, especially because I got to do it in Singapore, on my first trip to Asia.

Your turn. Make a list of 10 bucket-list-worthy things you have done in your life!

River Cruising is the trendiest cruise form at the moment

River barge is the new cruise ship. Taking a river cruise in Europe is the fastest growing cruising niche at the moment.

Who doesn’t love a good cruise, right? But if you have read any of the news about the latest cruise ships in the USA (Carnival cruise ship disabled for five days in the Gulf of Mexico, or another one of their ships failing health inspections just this week), no wonder many are second guessing on booking a cruise on a major cruise line at the moment. I still would love to take the Mediterranean Disney Cruise with my children this summer on my favorite cruise line, but this week I am riding on the trendy wave and taking a river cruise in France.

The biggest difference between cruise ships and river barges is the size and the amount of guests on board – from thousand(s) of guests to less than a 100, often less than 20 passengers. The setting is much more intimate, the pace is slower, and yet the emphasis is actually seeing more of the European landscapes than on cruises that have many days on the sea. They both really have their own appeal, but I love ANY kind of boats and being on water, whether it’s a river, lake or sea, so I am beyond thrilled to try this kind of cruising. I live in Sweden by Kinda canal and see this type of river cruises all the time and river boats going by my house, and I also saw them on Main-river when we lived in Germany in the Main-river valley. I have always wanted to take a river cruise.

I am going on a cruise with Go Barging, on their L’Impressionniste river barge, and one of Skimbaco’s newest team members, Reeta, is coming with me. We are boarding on the L’Impressionniste in Fleurey sur Ouche on Sunday, and continuing on a wine tasting cruise through Burgundy. I can’t imagine a better ladies’ trip and a Skimbaco team meeting with brainstorming.

A few weeks ago I received a thick ship log book with all of the information about the cruise; the history of the locations we will be visiting, the information about the river barge, even the wine details (with wine tasting note pad!) and dinner menus (with recipes!) making me more than equipped for the cruise.

Instagram travel with me to Burgundy

Want to see more what this is about? Follow me as Skimbaco on Instagram the next few days and see my photos from the trip as it happens. Of course stay tuned for more information here on the site as well, after the trip.

Our itinerary is below!

Fleurey-sur-Ouche to La Bussière

Sunday, April 14 – Paris to Fleurey-sur-Ouche to Paris
You are met at the Hotel Westminster in Paris at 2.30pm and transferred to the elegant L’Impressionniste moored in Fleurey sur Ouche. A champagne reception welcomes you on board and provides you with a chance to meet the crew and perhaps explore the towpath.
Dinner on board.

Monday, April 15 – Fleurey-sur-Ouche to Gissey-sur-Ouche
This morning experience your first day’s cruise along this enchanting canal, which also promises a walk or cycle along an ever-present towpath cruising past sleepy villages and pretty lock houses. After lunch we visit the Clos de Vougeot, headquarters of the esteemed Chevaliers du Tastevin, who every year award a special prized label to the finest Côte d‘Or vintages. On the way back to the barge, we visit one of the great cellars of Burgundy where we enjoy a private tasting of fine Burgundy wines. Dinner on board.

Tuesday, April 16 – Gissey-sur-Ouche to La Bussière
After breakfast, we take a walking tour of old Dijon including a visit to the vivid produce markets, mustard shops and the impressive Notre Dame de Dijon, or enjoy some excellent shopping time. Return to the barge for lunch and a leisurely afternoon cruise to La Bussière, where we will enjoy an exclusive tour of the magnificent 12th Century Abbaye de la Bussière. The ornamental gardens and lake, wine press, crypt and cellars are interwoven with ancient colonnades, stone staircases and huge stained glass windows. After a Kir Royale aperitif we walk back to the barge for dinner on board.

Wednesday, April 17 – La Bussière to Paris
After breakfast, disembark the barge and transfer back to Paris.

Disclosure: I am a media guest of the Go Barging, and received a free one night stay at Hotel Westminster, flights and the river cruise on L’Impressionniste. All other costs associated with this visit are my own, and my opinions are always my own.

One year in Sweden

A few days in a new place is enough to know if you ever want to go back.
Couple of weeks in a new place is enough to fall in love, and know a little how locals live.
A few months and you have a wonderful honeymoon period of learning the new ways, being excited about everything new.
Six months and the reality hits, and you start realizing what you left behind and the newness is gone and everyday grind starts settling in.
One year, and you are either ready to leave, or all settled in.

Or this is how it usually goes in expat or nomadic living. In our life it seems like nothing ever goes “as usually.” We hit our year mark this February, happy to be here, and feeling lucky and thankful for each moment. Then we got some dark clouds over our heads, just some stuff about work, visas, life and our rental house, and the past couple of months we have been going through 50 shades of anxiety about entire expat living. I unfortunately can not go into details, but let’s just say, funny things happen when you are forced to thinking differently. I literally went from loving every moment here to wanting to pack my bags and move out of the country. It didn’t help that my favorite part has been our gorgeous river view from our home here and our landlord gave us a notice to move out. Another expat family – returning to Sweden from California on short notice. What can I say? This is all part of nomadic living, and it’s not all sunshine all the time.

The perks of expat living way outweigh the cons though. And I am not talking about the perks that come with relocation packages, but about our lifestyle here. If I could describe our first year in Sweden, I think it would qualify for using word “epic” to describe it. I have been in 13 countries the past year (USA, Canada, Iceland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Italy, France, Monaco, Norway, UK, Vatican) and although many of them are current or past home countries, or tiny countries like Monaco and Vatican, they still count and tell a story how much we have been able to travel the past year. And no – we haven’t been gone all the time, in fact we spent almost the entire summer at home in Sweden, and we had visitors visiting us for over 5 weeks last summer, and we were able to do local day trips and got to know Östergötland part of Sweden pretty well. It has been an amazing year for our family, and ultimately we came here not for the career opportunities, but for the European lifestyle and focusing more in our family and what really is important to us.

This spring I learned that it might not always be good to settle in and be happy in the moment, but you have to remember to keep moving forward and dream big even when living in the moment. I am afraid that the past year I focused maybe too much in the living in the moment, and taking it all in and enjoying our new life in Sweden, that I got lost in the adventure. And I didn’t realize it until the status quo was changed by someone else by me.

Like said, I have loved living in our Swedish home by the river, but once we got that unfortunate call that we have to move out by the end of May, I remembered that when I drove to this neighborhood the first time I literally was swallowing my tears, and trying to hide what a disappointment it was to me to move from the US, a train ride away from NYC to the suburbs of small Swedish city. I had dreamed of sleek Scandinavian homes, maybe with less square footage but with minimalistic style, and while this house is nice and comfortable, it’s far from my Swedish dream house. And yet I had learned to love living here, and spent my days working by the window sighing how much I would miss this when we’d have to move out of Sweden and leave this river view behind us. Unreal how forgiving the river view is – I have been completely happy living in the suburbs thanks to the amazing view from one side of the house.

The entire thought sort of scared me – the view from one window had made me so completely happy that I had been blissfully ignoring the view from the other three sides of the house. What else I was looking in life through just one window? Was I blocking something else too?

I think what finally helped to get some disclosure for a few things, and us visiting back “home” in New York last week, it gave me clarity to see the “big picture.” I think part of our happy living in Sweden has been that we have also traveled and gotten out of the country. It’s not that we don’t like Sweden, we love it, but living in someone else’s land and feeling like an outsider is tough, however positive attitude you and the people around you have. It is important to be respectful of the new culture, get to know the culture and the traditions, and live in the new society, but at the same time it is important not to throw away what you came here with – your own traditions, your own values and your own culture.

Our adventure in Swedish will continue with a new chapter once we move to a new house next month. Looking forward telling you more about it.

To keep up with my daily life.. check out my latest photos on Instagram, you can find me on Instagram as Skimbaco and Katjapresnal.

New York!

Greetings from one of my favorite cities in the world: New York City. We are here only for a very short time, and spending some time also in Connecticut and in Beacon, NY in our old neighborhood. Follow me on Instagram to see my travel photos from New York and Connecticut. A reminder, I’m Skimbaco on Instagram.

News: my Instagram Travel book coming soon

I am so happy to announce that my book Instagram as your Guide to the World – How, what and who to search and follow on Instagram to help you to travel the world is almost done and I am so thankful for so many great people who have supported me in this book project during the writing period. Many of my Instagram friends have been very encouraging and they have been asking for a coffee table book with some of my photos from Sweden. I really appreciate the compliments and Sweden does make it easy for me to take great photos. The winter, the snow and the river view on my backyard have made it very easy to post “good morning from Sweden” photos everyday on Instagram. I typically post every day right after 6AM local time.

Here are some of my latest Instagram photos from Sweden, you can see all of my photos on Instagram, my username is Skimbaco.

My book is not a photo book, and it is only going to be an electronic book and can only be read via Kindle, iPad or computer, so it is far from a coffee table photo book, and it is more like a technical how-to-book how to use Instagram for a very specific use: to use Instagram as a travel guide. The book has plenty of my photos though – I traveled to Paris and Rome during writing this book and the book has examples of how I used Instagram as my travel guide for both trips.

I don’t know anything about book publishing but I have been listening to Chris Brogan very closely and his tips to anyone who wants to write a book are spot on. By the way, even if book writing isn’t for you, you might still like the newsletter Chris sends out on Sundays, and entrepreneurs will love his Mastering the digital channel classes.

Several travel bloggers on Instagram have given quotes for the book, and I will be featuring many of my favorite Instagram accounts both in the book, and here at Skimbaco Lifestyle during the upcoming months. I’ve felt very honored that so many people from the global travel community have shared their photos with the #IGTravelBook hashtag and shared their photos with others, and this amazing community is really the main reason for me wanting to write the book at the first place. I wanted to show people how to find your own “travel tribe” and what kind of amazing information you can find from Instagram if you just know how to search. Instagram changed the way I plan my travels, I hope it will do the same for you.

Fodor’s Follow Favorite

I was very humbled that Fodor’s travel site featured my upcoming book a few weeks ago and named my Skimbaco account on Instagram as Fodor’s follow favorite. Here are the bigger versions of the photos they featured with the locations where I took them.

Check out lots of more pictures from our VIP tour of the Vatican in my video on YouTube.

Get my Swedish semla recipe here, these sweet cardamon bun with shipped cream and almond paste are amazing.

This time we have lived in Sweden has truly been amazing. I traveled in 12 countries last year, and can’t wait to write more about my travels once my book is published.

Skimbaco Travel travel bloggers unite on Instagram

And there is more…
Our entire Skimbaco Team travels all the time and while we all have our own Instagram accounts for personal travel photos, we just recently teamed for a joint account. Now you can see travel photos from all of the travel bloggers in our team on SkimbacoTravel account on Instagram.

This week Wes is traveling in Spain (Wes_Holland on Instagram) and Adrienne in France (therichlifeonabudget on Instagram) and I highly recommend checking their travel photos out.

Here are the latest photos from SkimbacoTravel account. With team members traveling all the time and living in places like Norway, North Carolina, California, New York City and English countryside, you will truly get photos from all around the world.

Are you on Instagram?

Share your favorite Instagram travel accounts here and leave a link to YOUR Instagram account so we can all get connected!