About The Blog

Hey! I'm MAdison

I've been travelling since I was a kid. A family attitude that prioritized vacations as quality time together and a little spiral-bound notebook that contained my bucket list started a life-long passion for travel!

The very first thing on my childhood bucket list is "go to all 50 states" closely followed by "go to Europe." This drive was first planted during family vacations to U.S. National Parks, where I excitedly wrote postcards to grandparents and got hooked on the best (read cheapest if you're my parents taking your travel-enthusiastic kid on vacation) souvenir around... the pressed penny. Hence the name of this blog, Postcards & Pressed Pennies, the humble roots where my passion first started.

Reading National Geographic Kids guides to National Parks and using the chunky early 2000s family desktop to help my mom plan our trips morphed into a dream-fulfilling study abroad trip to Spain in college. And then a trip to Italy... Greece... Texas... Scotland... The bucket list just keeps growing!

And after every trip, I keep getting the "Do you have any recommendations for..." question from friends and coworkers. Which leads to the Google Doc sharing... You know, the Google Doc every traveler has with links to everything you booked, every AirBNB you stayed in, every train you took, every dollar you budgeted. No? Just me?

That's when I realized I vacation plan a little differently, but in a way that makes it super easy to guide others with specific recommendations and timelines. But there's got to be a better way! Thus, my blog was born.

So this is for you... the family, friends, and coworkers who have received an intense Google Doc or longggggg copy and paste of my phone notes when you ask me for a vacation recommendation. This will be just as information packed... but hopefully more user friendly.

I hope this place can be a hub for the authentic adventurer - the one looking for the local experience, the less taken paths, the real smiles in the photos and not the Instagram fakeness. This is for the DIYers and the make-it-your own sort of planners, but also for the slightly intimidated vacationer who needs some structured advice. This is for love of our world... because wow, this is a big beautiful one!