Ernest Hemingway was a cool guy. He was also two big buckets of crazy, but we don't need to talk about that. The dude went everywhere. Before planning this trip, I knew about his house in Key West and the famous Hemingway cats (he had such an affinity for polydactyl cats -- cats with extra toes -- that they are now commonly referred to as "Hemingway cats" and something like 42 of these cats continue to roam his home in Key West -- which has been turned into a museum -- freely), I did not, however, truly understand the scope of his European presence.
I knew that Hemingway had spent an incredible amount of time in Paris -- one of the hubs for the Lost Generation -- and that that's where he met F. Scott Fitzgerald and numerous other writers who we all suffered through in high school or a freshmen lit. course in college but will undoubtedly come to appreciate in twenty years or something when we realize what a luxury reading books is. France was not his only haunt though -- he also spent years in Italy and Spain and all of these places heavily influenced his writing. As I am reading my guide books and trying to create itineraries that maximize my travel time in each city, I'm discovering just how many places boast about their connections to Hemingway. Whitney has already told me that we are not traveling through Europe based on famous writers and where they liked to have breakfast or where they once brushed their teeth, but I have realized that there is probably a market for big, old nerds like me.
This revelation has led me to do some serious Google searches where I have discovered that no one has taken advantage of this niche market. I figure that people take Shakespeare tours all around Europe to see the places he wrote about, so why not Hemingway tours? I could make bank just taking people around France, Italy and Spain to give them a full Hemingway experience.
But, in all seriousness, welcome to Hemingway Tours Incorporated.
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