Almost a year ago to the day, I made predictions about where I would find myself traveling to for the year ahead. As we kick off 2014, I thought it would be a good idea to review how I did according to my predictions…and where in the world I went over the last year.

So overall, I have to say I am very happy with my year in travel, but I also have to face the harsh reality that I definitely should NOT go into a career as a psychic reader.  Out of the 12 countries I predicted I would visit, I only really made it to four of them. Yikes!  But let’s not focus on my failure as a fortuneteller, OK? Let’s focus on where I did manage to find myself.

Aside from traveling to Brazil, Lebanon, England (three times) and the Netherlands as I predicted, I also managed to fit in Ireland, Spain and an inaugural trip to Armenia. Seven countries in all…nicely above my annual 4 country minimum.

And it is not just the number of countries I visited, but also the experiences I had along the way. In 2013, I:

• Had my first public speaking experience as a travel blogger at the Travel and Adventure Show in Long Beach, CA

• Attended my first Travel Bloggers Conference which happened to take place in Dublin, Ireland

• Participated in my first all expenses paid press trip to the beautiful country of Armenia

• Had my first published article on the online travel magazine Travel Noire.

And I did all of this while holding down a full time job (imagine how much I would have done if I had a job that was location independent!!).

All in all not a bad year and I’m so thankful for it. Of course I’ll have to do even better in 2014. Keep an eye out for my 2014 plans (clearly I can’t use the word predictions after this past year’s performance) in my next post.