Your Story Blog Hop: Your Travels

It's time again to share another story! Here is this week's prompt for the Your Story Blog Hop:  Where have you traveled? Have you been out of the country or is it to different states (if you're from the US)? When? Who did you go with? Do you prefer to use car, boat, or plane? Have you been on all three? 
Let's feed our wanderlust desires this week. Talk about any and every travel experience you've had, whether it's out of state, out of country, or on a boat or through hitchhiking.  ----------------------------------------------------- Four countries and four continents. If you count the U.S, every time that I have traveled to a new country it has always been on a new continent, and since I want to touch all 7 continents one day, I am currently at 4/7!  Philippines

View from our dorms in Baguio, Philippines when I visited for a mission trip

My family is from here, so of course this is the first place I traveled to outside of the U.S. when I was a kid. Because of the super long flights I had to take to get to the Philippines (14-16 hours I believe), I tend to favor long-haul flights over short ones, although everyone else doesn't seem to agree with me.  The Philippines has some beautiful and picturesque views of the mountains and beaches, but go into the cities or even provinces and there is lots of poverty. It is also pretty humid there, and considering that the weather and the city is the first thing you encounter when arriving at the Manila airport, it can turn some people off to the Philippines. Maybe it's because I traveled there a lot growing up, but I still love the Philippines despite that. It makes me feel more connected to my family, and plus, there is tons of cheap and great shopping options there, haha.  Australia
I went to Australia during the time of the 2000 Summer Olympics with my dad and sister, but we didn't actually watch it in person. We went because we actually have family who live in Sydney. I don't actually have any photos available from when we went (they're all printed photos hiding somewhere in my dad's house), but we visited places like the Sydney Opera House and the zoo so we could see the koalas and kangaroos in person.  Peru

Little Davíd had never seen a front camera before!

The view of Machu Picchu from the top of Mount Waynapicchu

The postcard photo of Machu Picchu

I came here last summer for a mission trip and it was an amazing experience! We worked with kids and other people around my age by singing songs with the kids and playing soccer with the older guys. Everyone was so nice and friendly and I miss it there terribly. After we were done working with everyone, we got to do some touristy things and go to the famous Machu Picchu in Cusco.  USA

We were literally in Vegas for only 8 hours to do a concert on the way home from Arizona.

Springtime in Portland!

Pike Place Market

Crater Lake, Oregon

The desert mountains of Arizona

I've had my share of traveling domestically. For my university's choir, I have gotten to travel around the West Coast for two spring breaks in a row! With them, I've traveled to Arizona one year, and Oregon and Washington this year. I've also road tripped with my family to Texas when my uncle and his family lived on the Air Force base there. And when I was really young, I visited Chicago to visit the family that I had there. I still have yet to go to the East Coast. 
My next travel goal is to go to Europe and/or a cruise to somewhere nice! I'm hoping to make those goals happen soon. (btw, this is the really short version of my travel stories. I didn't want to make this post super long otherwise I'd talk in so much detail about it).  -------------------------------------------------

RULES:

1. Respond to the prompt of the week, sharing as much or as little as you feel comfortable! I encourage using photos and would love to see photos integrated in your posts!

2. Link up! (Make sure you are linking your blog post, rather than your blog) using the widget below. 

3. I encourage you to read and leave comments for everyone’s posts, but I only require you to do so for at least one person who linked up! 

4. Follow your host (me!) on Bloglovin'. It's not required to follow me anywhere else but you totally can if you'd like. 

5. As an added bonus, I will retweet/share any of your social media posts that you follow and tag me in (Twitter: @krisellerhiax) (Facebook: Livin' and Lovin' - You may have to post your blog link/facebook post to my wall if you'd like me to see it). Don’t forget to use the hashtag #yourstorybloghop!

</p> <p> <a href="http://www.livinandlovin.com/search/label/Your%20Story%20Blog%20Hop" target="_blank"><img alt="Livin' and Lovin' Blog" src="http://i563.photobucket.com/albums/ss77/DUHHkrisellee/BLOG/aacf46ea-fe1d-41c3-8815-ad987b8b797b.jpg"/></a></center> Because this week's link-up launched a little late, the widget will be open until the end of next Tuesday, July 15th, at 11:55pm PST. I can't wait to read about your travels!