Oh man, do I spend gobs of time on the internet as I try to figure out trains and lodging. It gets a bit crazy.

For lodging I look at Expedia, Booking.com, United (since we fly United), and eventually get to the lodging companies’ own sites as well. I compare prices. I compare cancellation dates. And I try hard to figure out bed sizes. United States bed sizes aren’t the same as other countries’ bed sizes. A double might be small. But it also might be two twins pushed together. Maybe. You just never know! I check VRBO. I write to the people renting a place to ask. And then I wait and hope things are still available when I finally hear back.

And maybe some of you can answer this: when a site says the bed could be “one double or two twins” does that mean you don’t know until you walk into the room, or does that mean it’s the kind where they push two twins together to make the double? Pondering ….

Because we do carry-on only , I love to find places that have a washing machine on occasion. Most of my clothes are hand washable, but Dan’s shirts and jeans take too long to air dry. (I don’t usually travel with jeans because they weigh too much and dry too slowly.)

I’m currently looking for one of those VRBO places with a washer and dryer. I thought I’d located the perfect place, but then saw that their cancellation policy was a bit on the risky side. (It was two months before our arrival.) What with having had to cancel out of things during the worst times of Covid, I’m no longer into risking hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully places during Covid were allowing cancellations right and left. That has since changed.)

I also had to read descriptions and then reviews of places carefully. One looked so good until I read that the flights of stairs (a third floor climb) were so skinny you couldn’t walk up straight up, but had to kind of walk sideways. Um. No thanks. I have to make sure, too, that we aren’t so far on the outskirts that we’d constantly have to call a cab to get anywhere. (We are hoping to use all public transportation and not rent a car.)

So today I looked and looked and didn’t make a single reservation.

Still I find it fun. It’s almost as if I traveled to one of the cities we’ll be visiting. Funny how that happens!