Voila! An Easy Breezy Travel Vid

[trip style = any]

A few weeks ago Expedia came out with a COOL Facebook app to tell personalized travel stories using snaps from your Facebook or Instagram {or both}. So, I obviously took it for a whirl and made a one-minute video about my post-Christmas, trip style = sun escape to Palm Springs to dodge Jack Frost.

The nine-step process took me about five minutes {which makes it an accesible means of creating a pretty-darn-good travel vignette to share with your nearest and dearest}.

Whether you want to tell the tale of a past trip or a recent one; check it out. Reliving your best travel memories is better than a night at the movies. Just saying.

MY VIDEO {Click on the link then press down on the "bottom scroll" button to advance the vid. Takes a second to load.}

Stills Of My Video

MY VIDEO {Click on the link then press down on the "bottom scroll" button to advance the vid. Takes a second to load.}

[photos by @tripstyler, lead photo by expedia]

Hotel Cleanliness :: The Dirt You Won't Believe

[trip style = any]

Whether you pay $30 for an upscale hostel in Peru, $100 for a room via Priceline or $1000 for a posh villa in Australia, your room's cleanliness *should be* devoid of dirt, after all, you're p-a-y-i-n-g for a clean room {among other things}!

Most of my friends know I'm fairly germ-aware, and given that I travel all the time among a revolving door of people with DIFFERENT standards than me, I'm crazy careful what I touch {and DON'T touch} and where I put my stuff while on the road.

Last Friday night I appeared on CBC Marketplace {the Canadian equivalent to NBC Dateline} to discuss my grimiest hotel stays---one of which was a room with mold at JFK; two months later the hotel was condemned(!) and torn down---and what I do to make sure a room is Trip Styler clean. Regardless of my role in the episode, you've GOT TO watch the half-hour episode online. The findings will likely change the way you interact with hotel rooms.

In the episode CBC investigators and Guelph University microbiologist Keith Warriner tested 810 items in 54 hotel rooms {from budget to luxe} across the country. Their findings only confirmed the two-minute cleanliness sweep I do in every hotel room and the hygienic habits I *try* and use while traveling. Here's a refresher:

Hygienic Hotel Room Habits

• Don't touch hotspots like door handles, light switches, TV remotes or phones. *Try* and use your elbows instead.
• Only trust the comforter if it's wrapped in two just-washed sheets {this practice is very common nowadays at most 3* and up hotels}.
• Bring washable slippers so your feet don't touch the carpet or bathroom floors.
• Bring alcohol-based wipes to touch up high-touch zones: toilet seat, faucet, counters, hair dryer, etc...
• Place bathroom toiletries on a towel instead of directly on the bathroom countertop.
• Never use the in-room water or wine glasses without washing them first.
• I've said this before and I'll say it again, to avoid bed bugs {as much as possible} do not place luggage on the bed, an ottoman or a chair, and check for the critters on the headboard and mattress.
• Above all, wash hands frequently.

PS - If you read TS regularly you know I have nothing but respect for hotel housekeepers. They do SUCH a hard job, and are often pushed to the limit with the amount of room cleans they must complete on a daily basis. As I wrote in Hotel Guest Etiquette, please don't leave your room in a big mess and make their job more arduous!

Related Sanity In Sanitizing Bed Bug Proofing Your Hotel Room Travel Etiquette For Hotel Guests Using Your Hotel Room Like MacGyver KinderHop :: Making Hotel Rooms Work With Kids

[photo of CBC Marketplace episode]

Mexico: Get In The Zone

[trip style = all-inclusive]

One of the benefits of piloting Trip Styler is I get to be the first to hear about---and sometimes experience first-hand---new developments in the travel industry. Last month's five-hour jaunt to Puerto Vallarta was one such opportunity which I've been dying to dish out.

I went down with Nolitours, a Canada-based online packaged vacation company (part of the Air Transat group), to experience the first-ever noliZONE, a travel philosophy-come-product encouraging people to go beyond the gates and guises of the easy-breezy all-inclusive and inject a destination's soul into their week-long, cocktail-soaked beach-fest. To book a noliZONE-designated property {and optional program} is to use the all-inclusive as a base camp for local endeavours.

WAY beyond the butler service and buffets common in packaged trips, using the all-inclusive as a base camp is a concept I am behind 110%, especially having been bored to tears on day four of multiple all-inclusive getaways---no joke, once I tried to convince my husband to fly home early {being the wise man he is, he convinced me otherwise}---wondering what life lurked outside my coastal castle's drawbridge and fortified walls.

In Puerto Vallarta's noliZONE properties you get quickly acquainted with the outside world because they aren't a far-flung three-hour transfer from the airport, nor are they in the middle of nowhere flanked between banana palms and farmers' fields. Rather in Puerto Vallarta and neighbouring Nuevo Vallarta {interchangeable with Riviera Nayarit}, the all-inclusives are within 5-30 minutes of local restaurants, vibrant and historic towns and culture galore.

Not about cheesy excursions like a two-hour bus tour to feed stingrays a bucket of fish {been there, done that}, noliZONE takes you from a trip style = beach vacation to travel on your own terms, meaning you can go 'off-base' as much or as little as you want on your own, or via the noliZONE suggestions.

STAY TUNED: On Monday I'm going to show and tell some of my favorite restaurants and experiences in Puerto Vallarta. In the meantime, here's a PV taster I published while I was in Mexico.

The Details

• Six noliZONE properties can be booked in Puerto and Nuevo Vallarta.
• noliZONE offers a weekly, locally-organized fiesta to all noliZONE guests, as well as a bevvy of prix fixe restaurant options, the opportunity to visit or bring a list of needed supplies to local orphanage, cooking classes and spa discounts.
• From Vancouver there are twice-weekly Air Transat flights to Puerto Vallarta from November 3rd until April 26th.
• The newly-minted noliZONE vacation concept is currently in select areas of Mexico, Cuba and the Dominican Republic.

{Per my editorial policy, I'm not getting paid to write this, it's just a travel concept I believe in and want to share with my flock of culture-vulture, aspiring jetsetters.}

[photo via riviera nayarit]

Remembrance Day

Today is a national Canadian holiday paying tribute to the soldiers who fought and fell to give us the world renowned freedoms we enjoy across our vast land. Remembrance Day is always November 11th---a moment of silence sweeps over the nation at the 11th hour on the 11th minute---where ceremonies mark the sacrifice of those both abroad and back home. Since November 11th fell on a Sunday this year, Monday is the observation and as a result, we will resume our regular posts this Wednesday.

Lest we forget.

[photo via cbc.ca]

School Is Cool In PDX

[trip style = urban]

Whether it's just-pressed apple juice, just-cured bacon, or just-foraged mushrooms, everything tastes better fresh. This farm-to-table approach to food defined my weekend at the first-annual Bon Appetit-sponsored Feast Portland, a culinary celebration of Oregon's biggest export besides music, hipsterdom and Pendleton. If you read TS regularly, you know that I'm a big fan of the place and its provisions, so when I got the chance to see the faces behind the food and the techniques behind the craft, I was in like {barrel-aged} gin.

Like iron sharpens iron, diners and chefs keep each other accountable in Portland. There's truth to the Portlandia sketch where Fred and Carrie sit down at a local restaurant for a chicken dinner and ask to visit the farm where the bird is sourced. Putting this to the test, when eating brunch yesterday morning at The Woodsman Tavern, I jokingly asked my server where my bacon was from and he responded with a cheerleader-like fist pump: "It's hyperlocal; the pork hails from a nearby farm and we cure it in house." Touché.

Attending Feast was like going back to school {except cool}. At "Feast U", the principal is a fashionable foodie magazine editor, the gym coach bartends, the teachers dish up 10 courses of passion and the dress code is denim-on-denim. After class, foodie grand central keeps boiling with grand-scale events---sans tuxes or gowns---and a baker's dozen chef-led tasting menus at restaurants like Luce, which was recently voted one of the top 10 new restaurants in the US by Bon Appetit.

Did my culinary classes measure up? My teacher evaluation would give four heaping tablespoons of YES.

A Taste Of Feast

{Thursday Night :: The Sandwich Invitational. Multiple chefs, a bajillion sandwiches. Shown: maple-glazed pork belly with pickled watermelon slaw on housemade semolina buns from Beast---the evening's big winner.}

{Friday Morning :: Coffee That Rocks with the guys behind Portland-based Stumptown Coffee, who demonstrated how to make the most of your morning ritual with five home-brewing techniques.}

{Friday Afternoon :: Strange Brew with local brewers, where I learned about commonplace to experimental craft brews, like lychee beer aged in white wine barrels, or cucumber and lime zest beer with hint of sea salt.}

{Friday Night :: Feast Portland Night Market. An outdoor street food party with corned duck pancakes from Departure, smoked salmon poofs from Bent Brick and a DJ on the side!}

{Saturday Afternoon :: Thai Street Food with Andy Ricker of the always-busy Pok Pok. Note: you can only get Andy's pad thai at sister restaurant the Whiskey Soda Lounge---across the street from Pok Pok---from 10pm onwards.}

{Culinary Techniques for the Home Bartender with Jeffrey Morgenthaler, experimental barman and cocktail blogger from Clyde Common.}

{Sunday Morning :: Brunch at The Woodsman Tavern. Shiffed eggs with local bacon.}

If you can believe it, I did a ton of eating outside of Feast too---my belt has since been adjusted accordingly. I'll share my best extracurricular meals on TS at a later date. Stay tuned.

Related
Fashion Friday :: Falling For Portland
PDX'ing in Pictures
Ace Portland
IMG_FRI :: Portlandia
Vancouver to Seattle Must-Stops

[photos taken by @tripstyler when in portland as a guest of oregon cvb]