ABOUT 2 MONTHS AGO • 5 MIN READ

📓 Travel with us in 2026, tiny countries, and Dolly Parton's highway empire

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Field Notes

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Travel with us in 2026, tiny countries, and Dolly Parton's highway empire

Hey friend,

Ask anyone what they remember most about Iceland and you'll get the usual answer: waterfalls, glaciers, and the northern lights if they got lucky.

Ask us, and we'll tell you about a trampoline.

Back in 2023, we led our first group trip. Twelve people, a week in Iceland, and absolutely no idea what we were doing. We'd planned the hikes, the hot springs, the glacier stuff. What we hadn't planned for was the moment after dinner one night when someone spotted a trampoline outside the restaurant and said "...should we?"

We should.

For the next hour, a dozen adults who'd mostly been strangers a few days earlier were laughing so hard we could barely breathe. No itinerary. No content. Just people being goofy together in a country none of us were from.

That's the thing about travel that's hard to explain until you've felt it. The best moments aren't usually the ones you planned. They're the random ones. The ones that happen because you said yes to something small with people who were also willing to say yes.

We came home from that trip knowing we wanted to do more group trips. We talked about 2024, then 2025. But then we bought a truck. Then we started driving the Pan-American Highway. Then life got complicated, as it does when you're trying to do too many things at once, and the group trips kept sliding down the list until they fell off entirely.

We're not proud of that. But we're also not going to pretend it didn't happen.

Now we're heading into 2026 with a little more stability (and a truck that's finally running properly, knock on wood). And the thing we keep coming back to is this: we want to travel with people again.

Here's what we're thinking. Two trips in 2026. One domestic, one international.

For domestic, we're looking at places like Utah, Seattle, Yellowstone, or Yosemite. The kind of spots that remind you just how beautiful the USA really is.

For international, we've got South Korea, Scotland, Iceland (yes, again, we're not over it), Costa Rica, or Christmas markets somewhere in Europe on the list.

But honestly? We don't want to just pick for you. We want to build this with you.

So we made a survey. It's short. It asks where you'd actually want to go, what kind of budget works for you, what you're hoping to get out of a trip like this. The answers genuinely help us figure out what to plan. We're not just asking to ask.

Take the Survey

If traveling with us sounds like something you'd be into, fill it out even if you're just curious. Even if 2026 feels far away (it's not). The more we hear from you, the better we can make these trips.

And who knows. Maybe we'll end up on a trampoline together somewhere.

Pro Tip:

If you're still hunting for airport SIM card kiosks when you land, stop. Holafly lets you set up an eSIM before you leave, so you have unlimited data the second you touch down. They're running a Black Friday deal right now: 3 eSIMs for the price of 2 with code BLACKFRIDAY (ends December 2nd). Great if you're planning multiple trips in 2026.

Get the deal here

👀 What Caught Our Eye

Point.me Travel Tuesday Sale: 40% Off Premium

We used point.me a few weeks ago to book last-minute flights home from Munich. Cash price? Around €4,000 per person. What we actually paid? 40,000 points + €150 in taxes each. Transferred our Amex points to Delta and had tickets within an hour.

That's what this tool does. You tell it where you want to go, it searches across airline programs and shows you what's actually bookable with points.

Right now, they're running 40% off Premium with code TT40, but it's only valid December 2nd and 3rd. If you've got points sitting around and a 2026 trip on your mind, it's worth a look.

Get 40% off with code TT40

✈️ Flights We’d Text to Friends

Here are a few that caught our eye this week:

Is there a city you wish we would feature for flights? Email us back and we'll put it in the next email.

We find all of these through Going. It is worth setting up alerts for your home airport. Most of these deals won't last long, so if one catches your eye, don't sit on it.

📍Worth Sharing

A few things we bookmarked this week

Thanks for reading Field Notes. We’re trying to make this a space worth saving, full of things we’d actually send to a friend.

If you ever want to pass it along, here’s the link to subscribe: chrisandsara.kit.com/chrisandsara

And if something in here made you laugh, think, or book a flight… we’d love to hear about it. Just hit reply or tag us @chrisandsara_ on Instagram.

More soon,

Chris & Sara

Field Notes

Join 10,000+ readers getting Field Notes. We're full-time travelers finding deals we'd actually book, bookmarking things worth your time, and writing honest updates from the road. You get the deals, the links, and the real stories—weekly.