My Friends and Me

During my husband's military career we made several trips across the country---coast to coast. Each trip, a two-week vacation, followed a different route allowing us to see a great deal of the United States. Eleven years living in Hawaii covered that state and Alaska was visited in later years. A European tour of duty never materialized so I tackled that in retirement.

Not able to psych myself up to cross the Drake Passage, after an awful sea-sick episode on the way to Roratonga, is the only reason that Antarctica is the only continent I've not visited.
I've swum with dolphins, seals and penguins, petted kangaroos, held a baby kangaroo and a koala as well have ridden a camel. I've hiked in and stayed in several rainforests, and have ventured into the jungle 3-4 times and transited the Sambu River in the Darien Jungle in a cayucu (dug out canoe). I've slept in hostels, barracks, on boats, in small hotels, Victorian hotels, Motel 6 to five-star hotels and everything in between, a haunted hotel. a brothel, in tents, a jail, and in the Grand Canyon I chose to sleep under a full moon and the canopy of a star-filled sky.

In 1988 I sailed on the ill-fated Galaxie when her crew mutinied. We left the ship in San Jose, Costa Rica. Another time a travel agency absconded with my money and when we came back from the Sea of Cortez we learned we had no hotel reservations, or tickets for taxis or the Copper Canyon Train. But we did just fine with the help of a wonderful English speaking fellow in El Fuerte and thoroughly enjoyed our trip home.

Over the years I’ve made many trips alone. Elderhostel, now renamed Exploritas, was brought to my attention years ago when I was taking a series of retirement classes at my local college. The organization, started in 1975, has trips all over the world for senior learners . It’s a safe and comfortable way for single, especially women, to travel.

My first service trip, commonly called a working vacation, was a bottlenose dolphin research project in Belize. Nearly having gills myself, I thought what fun that would be. It was, and Belize provided the very best snorkeling I’ve ever done. My roommate on that trip was Kelly from New Jersey. We immediately liked each other and made 7-8 trips together before she died.
This trip was early on in my adventures and where I learned the value of those address stickers that keep coming in the mail. Both Kelly and I had disposable underwater cameras. We each put our camera in a special place where we would know where it was. Come time to pack we each thought the other had our camera. With no way to differentiate, we each took a camera, had double prints made and mailed a copy of prints to each other resulting with each of us having twice as many pictures. An address label has marked many an item since then!

When Kelly and I were hiking the Swiss Alps, Jan and her friend, Carol, always occupied the hotel room next to ours. Janice had been designated Jan by a baby sister when she was little, and the name has stuck for about everything except legal matters. As it turned out Jan and I paced pretty evenly while hiking and fortunately Carol and Kelly did likewise, albeit a bit slower. You can imagine how much yakking Jan and I did while hiking those gorgeous mountains. We became fast friends and over the years have made 21 trips together . What fun we have had and what great stories we have to tell.

Since much of my domestic travel was done years ago when I kept limited and sketchy diaries and journals, this blog will concentrate on fun international experiences.