Enough pandemic stupor. Time to move your butt and go somewhere Lately, Eric Burdon and The Animals' 1985 hit "We Gotta Get Out of this Place" has been echoing in my head. Download and play the video and you might feel the same. It's not that we want to pack up and abandon our very …
Stew and I had the good fortune to be able to retire at age 57, several years earlier than most of our work colleagues and friends, which afforded that much extra time to satisfy our appetite for traveling. Though we've not been to the Far East, we've traveled from Iceland to Antarctica, and the Galápagos Islands …
I realize many folks don't like to read whiny blogs, but whining a bit is just what I feel I need to do right now, and since this blog is my baby, why not?Or to paraphrase the lyrics of the late Lesley Gore's semi-memorable1964 pop hit, "It's my blog and I'll whine if I want …
There are all sorts of safari packages available in Botswana, Namibia, Kenya, South Africa and other countries. Ours was organized by the Rotary Club of Polokwane, a town on the northeastern corner of South Africa, as a fundraiser for a local school for blind children.The link between the Polokwane Rotarians and San Miguel de Allende …
The very thing that Stew and I love about big cities, and New York in particular, is their heady diversity. Entering such places feels as exciting, and revealing, as diving into a sea teeming with all sorts of creatures you've not quite familiar with. Yet it's precisely that diversity, all those differences, that so many …
Continue reading The melting pot is alive and well in New York City
What are people addicted to the thrills of foreign landscapes and cultures to do when news from many of those places is ominous or at least unsettling? Get travel insurance in case trips are cancelled because of terrorism, popular uprisings or other mayhem? Look into medical evacuation policies in the event they get shot by angry …
"Serendipity," with its musical ring, is a word that sounds like fun even before you know what it means. Literally it means "unexpected good luck" or stumbling into something terrific that you didn't imagine. Yet we often turn away from serendipity, our demand for certainty preempting many pleasant, even wondrous, surprises.During a recent trip to …
For all the breakthroughs in communications—how did people ever buy plane tickets or make hotel reservations before the Internet?—travel is still a bone-wearying affair especially for people like Stew and me who are well past the age of pretending to enjoy spending the evening at a hostel with erratic hot water and deodorant-challenged guests.Two days …
Though thousands of foreigners visit Cuba every week, for most Americans the island remains a mysterious corner of the family attic where, for the past fifty years, they have been told not to go. They may have heard some reasons why--something about Communism, missiles, bearded revolutionaries and terrorists--but it's been such a long time it's …
El Rancho Santa Clara 