Inaugural Post: T minus 47 days

First and foremost, great news today!  My fiance had another follow-up MRI and he continues to show no regrowth of his brain cancer, which is awesome!  He's four years clean now.  This is a big weight off our shoulders going into our wedding and our honeymoon.

We have completed the primary planning stages of our trip, which included:
1) Agreeing on figuring out where to go
2) Figuring out how to get there
3) Figuring out where to stay

We decided on California since Nick (future husband) wanted to go somewhere with a beach (he wasn't too keen on my suggestion of Glacier National Park), and I wanted to go somewhere on Amtrak, since it is something that I've done several times with my family and have always had a good time.

I've never been to California at all, so that sold it for me.  Originally we planned to take the train to San Francisco, then rent a car and drive down to Los Angeles, where we could catch a different train home.  After much research and deliberation, however, we agreed that it would be simpler and more relaxing to focus our 10 day trip (really 6 days, if you take away the time spent on the train) on one city.  Then we looked at the price tag.  Holy priceless jewels, Batman!  A one-way trip in a roomette (the least expensive of the Amtrak sleeper car accommodations) for two people from Chicago to San Francisco was $700-$900, depending on how soon you booked it.

Stay tuned for the next installment, where I bore you with the details on how we bankrolled our trip, as well as other details!