Monthly Travel and Life Recap: December 2024

An annual review is a great way to reflect on the year and plan for the next.

But it’s hard to remember every little detail or highlight for each month.

Enter monthly recaps.

This is a new series of posts where I recap the life lessons, travel and photography highlights for the month.

At the very least, it serves as documentation of our time abroad.

But more importantly, I hope to give you tips, recommendations and insights from the perspective of a travelling photographer and a expat experiencing American life.

The overall theme for December is family and travel.

My husband’s family were visiting from afar to hang out with us for Christmas and ring in the New Year in the US.

Social events over the festive period

A highlight was my husband’s company end-of-year holiday party at The Houston Country Club.

It was our first time visiting a country club in Houston, so it was great to get a sneak peak into what life on the other side looks like.

The holiday party theme was Casino Royale and the dress code was black and white. The company went all out with “gambling” tables, candy cigarettes and chocolate cuban cigars. The buffet was not as good as last year, but still a nice free feed.

We returned to a local haunt, Postinos Wine Bar, with a couple of expat friends.

It used to be a regular Friday gathering spot, before a bunch of our expat friends moved back to Perth last year.

Lastly, Rumi’s Kitchen came highly recommended and I finally visited it with a few friends.

Rumi’s served up some delicious Persian and middle-eastern food. Mostly share plates.

Family visits us in Houston

The whole family gang from my husband’s side visited us over the Christmas and New Years period, travelling from the other side of the world.

It was our chance to show them around Houston and take them on a roadtrip to visit some popular cities and sights around Texas (Austin, San Antonio, Fredericksburg).

When we were putting together an itinerary for their time in Houston, it made us realise Houston has a pretty fantastic restaurant scene.

You can get almost any cuisine you want in Houston. They didn’t have a ton of time but we did take them to a few of our favourites, Ninfas, Uchiko and Pappa Bros. Steakhouse. Both of which they really enjoyed.

Pappa Bros. Steakhouse didn’t make the cut for a Michelin star when Michelin came to Texas in November 2024.

But the sommelier of Pappas Bros. Steakhouse did win the Michelin Guide Texas Sommelier of the Year. My husband’s side of the family are big fans of delicious steak and good wine, so this steakhouse was a quintessential restaurant to take them to.

Pappas Bros. Steakhouse had a hefty wine menu filled with 35,000 bottles to choose from.

You can’t leave Texas without trying Tex-Mex food. Ninfa’s is a great example of Tex-Mex in Houston.

We also took them to watch an NBA game at Toyota Center downtown—Houston Rockets v. Miami Heats.

I’ve always enjoyed watching the basketball. It’s impressive to see all that on-court talent. Watching it live at the stadium with the rest of the crowds is truly a unique experience.

<Rockets images – phone>

It was an exciting game, where the score went back and forth between the two aggressive teams.

There was even a few big fights between players (and coaches) from both teams towards the end of the game.

Unfortunately the Rockets lost the game at the end.

Airport chaos before Christmas

Houston IAH Airport was in chaos the Friday morning before Christmas week.

We were meeting family in San Francisco to start our Napa Valley, California trip and almost missed our flight to San Francisco that day.

I’ve never seen Terminal C that crowded with travellers.

United Premier bag drop line snaked right out of the airport, doubling up on itself.

Hundreds of people were in line waiting to drop their bags off (And the line was not moving very fast).

We arrived at the airport around 2.5 hours before our flight expecting it to be busy. Even then we wouldn’t have made it through bag drop, and then TSA security in time for our flight.

The only reason we made it was because my husband found the United standard bag drop counter on the other side of the terminal and the line was very short.

The TSA security line for slow but moving.

But it got so crowded that staff were yelling out to tell travellers to go through TSA at a different terminal to get into the airport.

We were grateful to make it to our gate with half an hour to spare.

December 2024 Travel Highlights

San Francisco

We were in San Francisco for a grand total of 24 hours as a meet up point for the whole family since we were all travelling from different parts of the world.

But 24 hours was plenty of time to grab some good coffee, good food, explore the hilly San Francisco roads and try out a self-driving Waymo!

Unfortunately, it was rainy and gloomy during our time in California (including when we were in Napa Valley).

But that didn’t stop us from having a good time.

We had the dinner at Boudin Restaurant at Fisherman’s Wharf (where I had another delicious bowl of clam chowder), a cheese burger from the iconic In-N-Out burger jot and fresh seafood from one of the restaurants lining Fisherman’s Wharf.

We walked through Chinatown, Little Italy and all the way down to Union Square.

It was really interesting to see how the streets and vibe of the neighbourhood transformed from one district to another.

Our last trip to San Francisco wasn’t during the Christmas period, so this time it was really great to see the giant Christmas tree in front of Macy’s in Union Square and experience the Christmas lights and atmosphere.

The walk back to our hotel would have been a good 45 minutes and at night. So we opted to experience our first self-driving car ride instead: Using a Waymo.

It was honestly such a calming and pleasant ride back to the hotel.

I would even go further and say it’s more pleasant than many of the Uber rides we’ve taken! I was impressed by the in car’s technology and seeing how the car detected other cars, people and objects to maneuver safely around it all.

Napa Valley, California

Our drive from San Francisco to Napa Valley was only an hour or so.

We stayed at Hotel Indigo Napa Valley for 3 nights.

The winery areas reminded me a little bit of Margaret River wine region back in Australia. But the Napa Valley region itself is actually quite large and populated.

So much so that it has the usual big city offerings like Walmart, Trader Joes and Target. Along with busy highways and lots of traffic.

A few highlights from Napa Valley:

• Visiting the modern and beautiful Opus One Winery and having the Courtyard Tasting experience.
• Visiting two lesser known wineries: Silver Oak and Quixote Winery.
• Checking off a bucketlist dining experience: dinner at French Laundry.
• Having some salty neighbourhood Chinese food for dinner after a few days of non-Asian food.

Something I noticed that’s very different to Australia is that all wine tastings are paid (and they’re not cheap, ranging from $25 all the way to $250 per person).

Nor do you don’t get the tasting fee back as a credit if you purchase any wine.

The wine tasting experiences in Napa Valley also felt more formal and “hoity toity”, instead of the down to earth and casual Australian style.

It was hard to get a wine tasting booking without booking in advance.

Yet while we were in Napa Valley, we felt the foot traffic and town was pretty quiet too. Staff at the wineries confirmed that since COVID, the visitor numbers hasn’t really returned to normal either.

Jackson Hole, Wyoming

We spent 3 nights in the ski town of Jackson Hole and the surrounding area.

Immediately upon landing at Jackson Hole Airport, I could sense we’ve just arrived at the playground of the wealthy.

The airport was small, but looked new and modern. Woodpaned ceilings, built in fire place, modern furnishings and high ceilings.

I was fortunate to be sitting by the window when we flew in to Jackson Hole, and the view from the plane of Grand Tetons and the surround mountains and lakes was absolutely stunning.

The day we flew in was unfortunately the only clear day we had in Jackson Hole.

So we were lucky to see the mountains on our first day.

The town of Jackson Hole is small and quaint. Plenty of restaurants and shops to explore for a couple of hours. It really was a bit of an old but fancy cowboy town.

A few highlights from Jackson Hole:

• Cowboy Steak House. A Jackson Hole institution containing a rowdy bar upstairs and a rustic and cosy restaurant downstairs. The food and drinks here were fantastic.
• Visiting the home of a family friend who’s a Wyoming local. The friend was a cowboy through and through. We got to see an amazing array of cowboy hats, guns and cowboy memorabilia. And hung out in a beautiful custom built wooden country-style home for Christmas.
• Two nights of some delicious Italian food: Osteria at Teton Village ski area and Glorietta in Jackson Hole town itself.
• Experiencing a real snowy white Christmas. Waking up to a few feet of snow outside, driving through a snow storm with low visibility and experience proper snow fall. It’s both extreme cold and beautiful.
• It was really fun to experience the cowboy culture in Wyoming in the few short days there.
• A 2 hour sleigh ride to see the elk near down town Jackson hole. The windchill factor was high, but it was worth it seeing the elk close up, just lounging around the reserve during the winter months.

Grand Tetons National Park is right at the doorstep of Jackson Hole.

We did spend half a day driving along Highway 89 and stopping by the lookout points along the way. But with snow and low hanging clouds, visibility of the stunning mountains was poor and many of the internal park roads were closed.

Even so, what we did see of the Jackson Hole and snow-covered Grand Tetons was still stunning.

I can only imagine how beautiful the Grand Teton National Park would be in summer.

Fredericksburg, Texas

Fredericksburg is Texas’ answer to California’s Napa valley.

It’s the main wine region of Texas. Located around 4-5 hours drive from Houston.

Since our visiting family are wine lovers, we figured why not take them to Fredericksburg to check out the Texas wine scene.

A few Highlights for 2 nights in Fredericksburg:

• Experienced wine tasting at two wineries: Ab Astris Winery and William Chris Wines. They really enjoyed the experience and conversation with staff at William Chris Wines.
• Lunch at Alstead Brewery. While it’s supposed to be a German brewery, the menu was more American than German.
• Walking along main street in Fredericksburg town centre. Lots of quaint country-style shops to explore.

As we were in Fredericksburg for the last 2 days of 2024, we decided to stay in for dinner to ring in the new year of 2025.

How?

Buying a heap of almost ready-to-eat food from Costco on our way to Fredericksburg!

Costco is known for “wholesale” sized everything. So it was perfect to feed 8 people.

Austin, Texas

We were technically in Austin on the first 2 days of 2025.

But it’s part of this recap since it was part of one big family road trip around Texas.

This was our third time in Austin and it reminds me a lot of Perth in a few ways:

• A lovely riverside walk.
• Moderate temperatures.
• Lots of parks and greenery.
• A relatively small but bustling city.

Our time in Austin was relaxing.

The AirBnB we booked was made for groups and families. It was filled with activities to keep the everyone busy (e.g. pickleball equipment, board games, hot tub, a big backyard for the whole family to hang out).

We spent a fair amount of time just hanging out at home, especially since a number of places were closed on the first 2 days of the new year.

Our highlights from 2 nights in Austin

• Franklins Barbeque. Quite possibly the most famous BBQ joint in Austin with lines starting from 3am! Since we had 8 people to feed, we decided it was our chance to try it without waiting in line for hours. We pre-ordered 5 pounds of barbecue meats (minimum order amount!) to go. Overall, really delicious BBQ, but I think BBQ spots in Houston like Truth Barbecue can easily compete.
• Spent a few hours playing arcade games at Cidercade. You pay an entry fee and can stay to play unlimited arcade games for as long as you want. It brought back memories of 80s and 90s arcade machines, air hockey table and hoop shoot machines. But they also had more modern big-screen gaming machines too.
• Walking along South Congress, exploring the shops and getting coffee from Jo Coffee (a local institution!)
• Dining in at Home Slice Pizza. Excellent pepperoni pizza.
• Walking along the river boardwalk and enjoying the view of Austin’s downtown skyline.

After a year and a half in the US, we finally tried The Cheesecake Factory.

The overwhelm of the 100+ item menu is real! I played it safe and got myself a shrimp pasta. It was surprisingly delicious and small.

The dishes on the rest of the table could have easily fed 2 people per dish.

San Antonio, Texas

San Antonio was the first city we visited after arriving in Houston back in summer of 2023.

The summer crowds were thicker than this winter trip to San Antonio. The school holidays and colder winter weather of early January has probably drawn tourist away to warmer cities or snowy ski resorts.

So we could be in walking distance to the Riverwalk, we booked a couple of rooms at Homewood Suites Hilton along the river, and left our cars at a nearby parking garage.

If you’re driving or hiring a car for a trip to San Antonio, highly recommend parking at Houston Street Garage for $10 per entry.

That’s much cheaper than most (if not all) hotel parking fees.

A few highlights from 2 nights in San Antonio:

• Walking around the river along the paved Riverwalk was lovely, especially without the summer crowds.
• You might think there isn’t much different between being in the river on a boat compared to walking along the river. But it really is a different experience taking a slow boat river and seeing San Antonio from the middle of the river (along with some commentary).
• Discovering a little cigar and drinks lounge called On The Bend Lounge and Bar just along the Riverwalk. After dropping the kids back to the hotel and the adults enjoyed a few late night drinks and conversation (and a few cigars for those who were that way inclined).
• We really enjoyed listening to dueling pianos at Pat O’Brien’s Piano Lounge in New Orleans, so this time it was a top priority to check out Pat O’Brien’s Piano Lounge in San Antonio. It was a smaller room and quieter crowd. A great experience to sit with family to enjoy the music over a few drinks. This time we even put in a few song requests.
• Howl at the Moon in San Antonio was really great fun the last time we were in San Antonio, so it was a no brainer to pay it a visit again. There’s a dueling piano set up, similar to Pat O’Brien’s, but it was much rowdier and louder at Howl at the Moon compared to Pat O’Brien’s.
• If you don’t go to the Alamo in San Antonio, you haven’t been to San Antonio. It’s the most famous thing to see in town. After living in Texas for a year and a half (and learning a lot more about the history of Texas and the US), I have a new found understanding visiting the Alamo the second time round. They’ve even completed some renovations at the plaza in front of the Alamo to show case more of the history of the Alamo.
• Made a quick stop by Mission Concepcion in San Antonio during our drive back to Houston. These 1700s Spanish missions in San Antonio are listed on the UNESCO World Heritage registry and is one of the oldest churches in the US that hasn’t fallen into ruin.

The two restaurants highlights in San Antonio were Morton’s Steakhouse and Pinkerton’s Barbecue.

Morton’s Steakhouse was a family favourite. They’ve all dined there at least once. It was my first time at Morton’s so I was intrigued by why it was talked up so much.

The food didn’t disappoint!

The children ordered their own dishes while the adults on the table shared a seafood tower and two huge steaks.

I’m not a huge steak fan, but the food was delicious.

Pinkerton’s Barbecue didn’t make the Michelin star cut, but it made Michelin’s Bib Gourmand list for good quality and good value food.

The family had yet to experience a dine-in barbecue house experience so we were hunting around for a barbecue place to try before leaving San Antonio on Sunday.

This was it.

It opened at 11am. We arrived a bit before 11am, but there was hardly a line to get in. Once it opened we got our trays of meats and sides pretty quickly.

The dining hall was really “Texas”.

It had a rustic cabin-like vibe, long communal tables and real stuffed animal heads for wall decor.

We ordered a wide spread of meats and sides so everyone could try a bit of everything: jalapeño cheese sausage, beef brisket, pork ribs, bacon mac n’ cheese, jalapeño cheese rice, coleslaw, potato salad.

My favourite of the lot were the potato salad and pork ribs.

The largest outlet in Texas

Between Austin and San Antonio is San Marcos Outlet Mall.

We were blown away by the size and sheer number of outlet shops in the area.

Technically San Marcos Outlet Mall is made up of two distinct outlet malls—The Premium Outlet and the Tanger Factory Outlet Center.

We only had time to check out the shops at the Premium Outlet side, but honestly you could easily spend a whole day or two if you want to check out every shop in both outlet areas.

The Premium Outlet had an impressive range of shops, including very high end outlets like Canada Goose, Ferragamo and Moncler.

As well as the usual brands you see at outlets like Adidas, Banana Republic and Brooks Brothers.

The sale prices were pretty good as well, I walked away with a few items that ended up being 70-90% off!

Lessons from December 2024

The strength of relationships comes from shared experiences

In adulthood, forming new friendships and maintaining existing relationships can be tough—people get busy with work, family, kids etc.

Without dedicated time and intentionality, these relationships won’t survive.

I was listening to a podcast interview recently that highlighted that a key component to strong relationships is having shared experiences.

That really hit the nail on the head as someone who’s been living abroad, away from family and friends for the last year and a half.

Whether maintaining existing friendships back home, keeping up with family relationships or making new friends in Houston, “doing stuff together” and as a result creating new memories and experiences together is what’s makes us feel connected.

• Taking my parents to their first live NFL game in Houston.
• Hanging out with friends for 4 days at an all-inclusive resort in Mexico.
• Experiencing a snow storm while driving through the Teton Mountain Pass with family during our Christmas travels.
• Spending an afternoon at a friend’s house having a barbeque or getting some takeout while watching NFL on TV with friends.
• Taking the extra effort to organise zoom calls with friends and waking up early in the morning for bookclub back home despite my urge to sleep in.
• Feeling frustrated at the gloomy weather, sharing our awe when the skies open up to reveal a stunning mountain and hiking Mt Rainier with friends.

These shared experiences connect our memories to our friends and families.

They take time and effort. Planning and coordination. Saying yes to these experiences, means saying no to something else.

But that’s what strengthens our relationships.

Fate, free will and unpredictability of life

I finished reading Liane Moriarty’s novel, Here One Moment, as part of our Houston book club pick.

It was a surprising, thought-provoking novel based in Sydney and Tasmania, Australia.

The story kicks off with an ordinary flight domestic flight in Australia, that is until a passenger starts to predict the deaths of a few passengers on the flight.

For the rest of the novel, it jumps between the past and present of these different passengers. Including the one who predicted the deaths.

The novel is a blend of humour, drama and cliff hangers.

It dives into the themes of fate, human behaviour and our need to control what is ultimately unpredictable in life. Very enjoyable page turner book.

With my personal experience of how uncontrollable life really is last year in 2024, this novel was a good reminder of doing the best we can to live in the present moment, appreciating what you do have and the time you have left with important people in your life.

Don’t over indexing on the future and your plans.

Give yourself more buffer when travelling during holiday season

This is a no-brainer lesson learned.

But worth reiterating.

Despite giving ourselves 2.5 hours buffer time before our flight to San Francisco… It still wasn’t enough.

Next time, if we’re travelling over a busy holiday season like Christmas again, we’ll definitely need to give ourselves at least 3 hours for a domestic flight if we’re checking in bags.

The Fujinon 18-55mm F2.8-4 is still a favourite lens

For the last 4 years, I’ve been travelling with a workhorse of a camera setup: Fujifilm X-T5 camera and the Fujinon 18-55mm F2.8-4 lens.

Fujifilm has discontinued the Fujinon 18-55mm F2.8-4 lens and sell newer lenses and kit lenses that go with their cameras. Even so, the Fujinon 18-55mm F2.8-4 lens is still my favourite travel lens.

It’s got a good balance of being small, fast, high quality and versatile for different photo scenarios that you’ll encounter doing travel photography.

Our travel ranges from nature and outdoor, through to city escapes. So a flexible zoom lens has made it easy to capture photographs quickly.

If I was travelling to somewhere I’ve been before, then my go-to lens is the smaller and speedier Fujifilm 23mm F2 lens.

Because I’m not as concerned about “missing a shot” since I’ve been before.

I can slow down, focus on composition and being creative with the scene. All while enjoying that soft and creamy bokeh background that’s produced when shooting at a low aperture like F2.

Making Travel Planning Easier (Free Template in Notion)

A goal without a plan is a dream.

So the first step to start travelling and exploring more is to get organised and intentional about making a plan and locking in travel dates ahead of time so the trips actually happens.

But I get it. There’s a lot to juggling when it comes to travel planning—itinerary, accommodation, flight options, things to do, recommended food and drink places etc.

That’s pretty overwhelming to keep track of all in your head. I’m a big Notion fan and I use that to plan and track all our trips. I also use it for other things like meal planning, tracking my tasks and projects, and keeping track of my camera gear etc.

Notion is free to use, hyper customisable and saves you time by giving you the ability to templatise things you do often.

So you’re not reinventing the wheel each time you want to plan a new trip in Notion.

If you want to make travel planning easier, start with downloading my free Travel Hub Template System in Notion that’s been downloaded more than 824 times below:

Wrap up

December 2024 was a busy month will filled with travel and meaningful time with friends and family.

Catching up with friends before the holiday season kicked off for everyone and then celebrating Christmas and New Year with family visiting from afar, made me feel connected and grateful for 2024.

The overall travel highlight for December 2024 was experiencing a snowy Christmas in Jackson Hole, Wyoming with family. It was freezing cold but with the right clothes and gear, the cold weather was bearable. Jackson Hole was beautifully decorated with Christmas lights and decoration, really adding to the holiday season vibe.

And that’s a wrap, see you next month!

Janice.

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