Worth Every Mile Travel Co.

09/18/2026

Real talk, it's been quiet over here and I wanted to explain why. Teaching is my actual full time job and the start of the school year eats me alive every single time; this travel account is very much the second job that happens in whatever cracks of time are left over. Vegas happened for us. Ashley made it out to Banff and she'll be posting that content soon, she juggles a few other jobs on top of this one too, so between the two of us things just take longer than either of us would like. There's also a whole stack of Europe footage still sitting in the camera roll waiting on an edit. None of it is gone, it's just going to trickle out on our down days instead of on any kind of schedule. Thank you for hanging in there and for all the support.❤️✈️

08/25/2026

Sagrada Família in Barcelona 🇪🇸 Every detail tells a story, and seeing Gaudí’s masterpiece in person was one of those travel moments that reminds you why you go. Absolutely worth every mile.

08/19/2026

Worth every mile at Széchenyi Baths in Budapest. This reel is just the outdoor pools, but the inside is a whole other world; a maze of thermal rooms, steam halls, saunas and mineral pools tucked behind ornate archways that make the place feel like a palace built around hot water. Locals playing chess in the steam while we floated around trying to process that this is a real place people do on a Tuesday. Worth it or not worth it? 100% worth it, indoors and out.
Ashley Miner Halley Parker

08/11/2026

08/09/2026

Italy travel tip: what NOT to do on train day.

We turned one simple train day in Italy into a full blown scavenger hunt, and honestly, we had it coming.

We got off the ship at Livorno and went straight to the train station to buy our tickets for Pisa, Lucca, and Florence, all at once, thinking we had the whole day figured out. Well, that plan lasted about one train ride. The first train matched our ticket time, but it was not the one that matched our plan. We ended up in Pisa first when we meant to go to Florence first, which meant our whole day got flipped backwards and we had to rebuy tickets one at a time just to get the order right again.

Here is the part that makes it worse. On the way from the ship to the train station, I actually asked our cab driver if he had any advice for getting around Italy. He seemed honest, not the type to just volunteer random tips, so when he told us not to trust the transportation system, especially the trains, because none of it ran on schedule the way it was supposed to, we should have listened closely. Instead it went in one ear and out the other. We were careful to check the schedule boards once we got to the station, but we still did not fully grasp what he meant until we were already on the wrong train.

Here is the lesson learned. In Italy, buy your train tickets one leg at a time instead of all at once for the day. The schedule looks solid on paper, but platforms change, trains get swapped, and your “sure thing” can turn into a game of catch up real fast. It worked out, we still saw Pisa, Lucca, and Florence, just in a different order than planned. But if you are heading that way, build in some flexibility and maybe a sense of humor too.

Worth every mile, even the backwards ones.

# wortheverymile

08/05/2026

There’s no better way, they say, than to spend a day roaming Pompeii.

08/05/2026

I promised you the good, the bad, and the real, mistakes and all. So let’s kick things off with the time we almost missed our own cruise, and it all started with a pair of shoes.
Steve needed last minute shoes before boarding day, so we taxied to a shopping center on a pier across the bay. My sister, Lindsay and I grabbed Starbucks and had breakfast while we waited on him. Simple morning. Nothing to worry about. Except for one small detail we hadn’t thought through yet.
We checked Uber to get to the actual port, and it said fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes, in a car, with an engine, on roads built for driving. Somehow my brain took that information and decided walking was basically the same thing, just slower. We had a good half hour before check in, so we figured, why not just walk?
That decision is where everything went sideways.
Here’s the part that still gets me. I know how massive the Norwegian Epic is. You cannot miss that ship. And yet I stood there looking across that water and could not spot it anywhere. I told myself a building or the curve of the coastline had to be blocking my view.
Except there was one, and I just hadn’t figured it out yet.
The ship was invisible because it wasn’t where we thought it was. Not even close.
So we started walking, and it took about thirty seconds to realize this was not the quick stroll we’d pictured. That bridge is not flat, it’s basically a hill with delusions of being a bridge, and it just kept climbing. No shade anywhere, just full sun and full luggage, so picture me dragging a suitcase uphill like I’d been signed up for a tourist Olympics event I never agreed to compete in.
And then I looked around and realized something even wilder.
We were not even close to the main characters of this disaster. There was an entire cast. Families everywhere doing the exact same walk, kids, grandparents, rolling suitcases as far as the eye could see, because apparently nobody had arranged transportation and cabs were not stopping. Buses kept cruising right past us like they were mocking our life choices. We were too deep in panic mode to stop and flag one down.
So we just kept walking, sweating, and watching the clock.
We made our boarding window with room to spare, thank goodness we always build in an early check in time for exactly this kind of chaos. But we walked onto that ship looking like we’d run a marathon in regular clothes, completely soaked through.
Lesson learned, and it’s a big one. Always arrange transportation to the cruise port ahead of time. Plan to arrive at least an hour early, not right at your check in window. Bring a coffee, grab a snack, and give yourself room to breathe instead of testing your cardio on a bridge in the Barcelona sun.
Worth every mile, even the ones that nearly took me out.
Video of the actual walk is below. You can hear exactly how well that was going. 🤪🛳️😅