Jill's Journey Journals

Sister trip in Mexico City

I love my sister.

We grew up together, but we could not be more opposite. Shelly loves being around people. I need my alone time. Her idea of a good time is a day of shopping. I hate shopping. My idea of a good time is curling up with a good book or hiking up a mountain. Shelly has too much energy to read for long periods of time. And hiking? Well, read my story on taking my sister up Mt. Leconte. Shelly is always fashionably dressed. I live mostly in jeans and sweatshirts. She loves a pedicure. I can’t stand having my toes touched. Her house could be in an interior design magazine. My house appears……lived in. Have I made my point?

A few years ago, I had made plans with my friend to go on our first global meetup with the Wanderful group. Wanderful is a world wide community of women who love travel. They have global meetups once or twice a year. There is one scheduled activity each day, but the rest of the time is yours to spend the way you want to. Women often come to these meetups alone, knowing that they will have a community of women to do things with and they will have the time to do activities on their own, if they choose. I like the idea of solo travel. I’m just not brave enough to try it.

My friend, who was also a member of Wanderful, and I had planned to go on this trip to Mexico City together. But she ended up getting sick, and she decided on the Tuesday before our Thursday departure that her health was not going to allow her to go. I panicked. Was I brave enough to go on my own? I am very uncomfortable when I am in a group of people that I do not know. I was tempted to just cancel, knowing that I would not be able to get back any of the money I had already spent on the trip. I was talking on the phone with my sister, telling her about my situation. A few hours later, she called me and told me she had requested off work and she would be able to go to Mexico City with me. Since Shelly was not a member of Wanderful, I emailed the founder, told her about my situation, and asked her if Shelly could go with me. She responded with “Absolutely!”

My sister and I were off to Mexico City! Another way my sister and I are different is the way we travel. Shelly likes to stay in very nice hotels or in her very nice time share. While I occasionally enjoy some luxury, my typical travel often involves finding unique places to stay, trying to get the best deal, and looking for ways to live like a local. One thing I had not tried yet was staying in a hostel. I had checked them out a time or two when I was planning a trip, but the reviews for the ones I had seen were not good. I didn’t know enough about hostels to know how to discriminate the good ones from the bad ones. One of the reviews I read said the pillowcases were dirty. Ew.

Wanderful had booked a block of rooms at the Selina Hostel in Mexico City. I checked out the hostel online, and I did not see any reviews of dirty pillowcases, so I was willing to give it a shot. My friend had wanted a private room rather than staying in a shared room of four, so I booked a private room as well. Shelly and I arrived in Mexico City and took an Uber to the hostel. The hostel was very nice and seemed like a really fun place. Shelly was staying in the room my friend had booked. Her room was on the second floor and mine was on the fourth floor. We went up to our rooms to settle in and to get ready to go to the welcome party. When I walked into my room, a very creepy feeling came over me. I quickly put my stuff down and went to the lobby for the welcome party. We met the rest of the group and enjoyed some food and music. A couple of hours later, we went to our rooms to go to bed. When I walked into my room, I experienced that very creepy feeling again, and I knew there was no way I was going to be able to sleep in that room. I called Shelly, told her about the room, and asked her if I could stay in her room. She replied, “of course!” and I moved down to her room and stayed there the rest of the time. The only time I went back to that creepy room was to get more towels and toilet paper. Believe me when I say it was a very quick trip. I ran into the room, grabbed the towels and toilet paper, and ran back out in record time, looking over my shoulder the entire time.

The next day, we joined a group of women and walked to the Bosque De Chapultepec area. We walked through the park and saw some beautiful flowers. This area has several museums, including Castillo de Chapultepec (the National Museum of History) and Museo Nacional de Antropologia.

There are two art museums-Museo Tamayo and Museo de Arte Moderno. There is a zoo and lakes, paths, and monuments.

Later that day, Shelly and I went shopping. It had been suggested that we wear some traditional/dressy clothing for our dinner the next night. It wasn’t required, but I thought most of the ladies would have something appropriate. I had not brought anything like that with me, so I had to go shopping. Ugh. I hate shopping. I had looked online for suggestions about what I should wear. We had trouble finding something that I considered appropriate. I finally found this flowery dress that looked somewhat like the examples I had found online.

This is not exactly the type of dress I typically wear. It still hangs in my closet, and I have not worn it since that trip. But I guess there is always a chance that I will have another occasion to wear it someday……maybe.

That night, we were scheduled to go Lucha Libre at the Arena Mexico. Shelly had asked me what that was, and I told her I thought it was some family friendly event. I had in mind a variety show type thing, with dancing and singing. I had no idea what it really was. It was raining that night, so by the time we got there, we were soaked. There were vendors selling souvenirs outside the arena. I found one that was selling socks, so I bought a three pack.

The pictures on the socks should have given me a clue about the event, but I just wanted dry feet. I gave Shelly a pair, we both changed out of our wet socks, and we went into the arena. This is what we saw.

Not quite the family friendly event I had anticipated. There was dancing, but not exactly the type I was expecting. And there was not singing. Lots of grunting, yelling, and verbal threats, but no singing.

These were some of the comments that showed up in our group’s WhatsApp that night during the event.

I think everyone was a little surprised by this event. It was definitely a new experience!

We went back to the hostel to get some sleep. Each night, we fell asleep to the music from the party room downstairs. The music literally shook our room. Since the hostel had no air conditioning, we had to keep the window open to get some cooler air, so we were able to hear the sounds from the street outside as well. Surprisingly, we slept pretty well all week.

The next day we went on a tour to the Teotihuacan pyramids. Teotihuacan is an ancient Mesoamerican city, located approximately 30 miles northeast of Mexico City.

It was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987. The city was founded as early as 400 A.D., but it is unknown who built the city. Some scholars believe it was the Toltec civilization, and others believe it was the Totonacs. The Aztecs found the city in the 1400’s and named it Teotihuacan. Teotihuacan means “the place where the gods were created.” Teotihuacan appears to contain features of various cultures, including the Maya, Mixtec and Zapotec. Some important structures in the city include the Pyramid of the Sun,

the Pyramid of the Moon,

Ciudadela (“Citadel”) and the Temple of Quetzalcoatl (the Feathered Serpent).

We went to a place nearby that grows the agave plant. Most of the women tried the tequila shots that were offered, but I declined. I’m not drinking anything that sometimes has a worm in it. Ick. I did get a beautiful quilt that is made from the fibers of the agave plant.

The lady at the agave shop told me the colors would never fade. I’m hoping she is right. I have not actually used it as a blanket yet because I don’t want it to get dirty. I don’t want to test her claim by having to put it in the washer.

We got back to Mexico City and cleaned up to go to dinner. Dinner was at Salon Tenampa in the Plaza Garibaldi. Our Wanderful leader, who was from Mexico City, had recommended that we take an Uber rather than walk to the restaurant. She told us we would have to walk through some sketchy areas. However, we were not able to get an Uber. Several of the ladies decided to walk. Most of the women in this group were very well traveled and many of them were solo travelers. They were a very confident group of women, so I decided we would be fine walking with them in a big group. I wore my fancy new dress. I was a little concerned that I was the only one in the group with a fancy dress on, but I was hoping the other women who had gone earlier would be more dressed up. Shelly fell a little behind the group. She was gazing around, looking very much like a tourist. I reminded her to put her purse in front of her and to stay with the group. I didn’t realize that telling her that would freak her out, but I found out later that it did. Anyway, we arrived safely at the restaurant.

We arrived at the restaurant. I was the only one in a dress like mine. Most of the women had just normal clothes on. A couple of them had flower wreaths in their hair, so they were a little more festive. I felt rather self-conscious in my fancy, flowery dress.

We had dinner. Well sort of. Those of us who had ordered vegan or vegetarian meals waited for over two hours for our food. I guess that is not a popular menu choice at this restaurant. During the meal, some staff members came to our table with this box and some cords. People stood in a circle, holding hands, and the electric charge was gradually increased until someone in the group could not stand it anymore and let go of the hands, breaking the circuit. Does this sound like fun to you? I did not think being electrocuted sounded like a good time, so I opted out of this activity.

Since we waited so long for our food, and since some of our group was enjoying being electrocuted, this meal lasted a really long time, so it was late when we left the restaurant. Shelly and I decided to take an Uber back to the hostel. Since the restaurant was in a plaza area, we had to walk through the plaza to the street to get an Uber. It was very busy on this street. My app said the Uber driver had arrived, but I did not see him. I called him to find out where he was. He did not speak English, and my Spanish is not great. I finally managed to communicate with him well enough to tell him where we were waiting. We arrived back at the hostel and went to our room. As soon as the door closed, Shelly started crying and screaming at me. She said she had never been so scared in her life. I was taken by surprise. I had no idea she was upset. I stood there with a confused look on my face. She was really upset. She was shaking and crying and yelling at me. This was part of our conversation.

Shelly (while crying, screaming and shaking): “I’ve never been so scared in my life! I thought that Uber driver was going to take us somewhere and murder us! He didn’t say a word the whole time we were in the car!”

Me: “HE DIDN’T SPEAK ENGLISH!!”

I went into the bathroom and stayed for a while to give her a chance to calm down. I considered taking my chances with the creepy room on the fourth floor, but decided against it. I have fought with my sister before, but I didn’t know what the ghosts upstairs had in mind, so I decided to go with what I knew. When I decided it was safe to come out of the bathroom, Shelly said, “I may have overreacted.” I agreed, but I didn’t think it would be a good idea to say that at the time. I don’t think Shelly has forgiven me for supposedly putting her in danger. She still mentions it from time to time. What can I say? Sisterly love.

The next morning was the last day of our trip. We went to brunch in the Canals of Xochimileo.

The Canals of Xochimileo are the last remnants of a vast water transport system built by the Aztecs. We rode in trajineras.

Our Wanderful hostess arranged for her family to serve us brunch. We floated down the canals in the trajineras, ate brunch,

and listened to the music from bands playing on other trajineras. Other trajineras floated by with souvenirs we could buy.

Later that morning, we went to the Frida Kahlo Museum. Frida Kahlo was a Mexican painter. Her life was very interesting. I wish I had known more about her before I went to the museum so the exhibits would have made more sense. After the trip, I bought a book about Frida Kahlo and learned more about her and her life. We also went to explore the markets at Mercado Coyoacan. This is a huge market. It is two stories, and has hundreds of stalls that sell art, bags, fruits and vegetables, snacks, and handmade trinkets.

We stayed one more night in Mexico City and flew back home the next day. My sister and I had survived a girls’ trip together and we had a lot of fun!

Tips:

I wish I could always remember to research places better before visiting them. But usually, I am more motivated to learn about the places after I visit them, especially if someone else is planning the activities. I’m a little better about it if I plan the activities. So after I got back from this trip, I bought books about Teotihuacan and Frida Kahlo and learned more about them.
Find out more about the Frida Kahlo museum at http://www.museofridakahlo.org. There are several tours offered, but we just went through the museum on our own. If you want a guided tour, you can find them at getyourguide.com, http://www.viator.com, and http://www.tripadvisor.com, to name a few.
It’s probably best not to scare your sister when traveling. You will continue to hear about it for years to come.
If your Uber driver does not speak your language, he’s probably not going to talk to you during your ride.
Just because your Uber driver does not talk to you, it does not mean he’s going to murder you.
I did not arrange the tickets for Lucha Libre, but I did a little research and found that tickets can be found on http://www.stubhub.com, http://www.ticketmaster.com, and http://www.viagogo.com. Don’t expect a variety show.
I recommend visiting Teotihucan pyramids. Tickets for tours can be found at http://www.viator.com, http://www.tripadvisor.com, and getyourguide.com. These same websites can be used to book tickets for the trajineras rides in the Canals of Xochimileo.

Anniversary in New York

Greg took me to my first Broadway show shortly after we were married. We saw Phantom of the Opera at the Fabulous Fox Theater in St. Louis. That was the beginning of my love for theater. I buy season tickets to the Fox every year now. It’s one of my favorite things to do. Greg has been a good sport for most of our marriage, but he opts out of most of the shows now. He doesn’t love theater like I do. My daughters and friends are my Fox buddies now.

For years, one of my dream trips was to stay in the Plaza Hotel in New York and to attend a Broadway show.

I really wanted to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. In 2022, I heard that Phantom of the Opera was going off Broadway at the beginning of 2023. I HAD to see it before it was gone.

Our 36th anniversary was in November of 2022, so I thought it would be fun to celebrate our anniversary in New York. I approached Greg with the idea, (actually I just told him we were going), and he agreed (as if he had a choice). Greg really wanted to see the 911 Museum and the Statue of Liberty, so I made sure I worked those activities into our plans. When I called to make the reservations at the Plaza Hotel, the lady making the reservation asked me if we were coming for any special occasion. I told her it was our anniversary and she said they would do something special for us. My initial intention was to book the hotel for just one night, because the rooms at the Plaza are pretty pricey. But I got caught up in the moment and booked two nights instead. I booked one additional night at the Hampton Inn in Manhattan, which was much more in our price range.

We arrived in New York and took an Uber from the airport to the Hampton Inn. The Uber driver pulled up to a hotel, but it was not the Hampton. He didn’t speak very good English, so we had a hard time communicating to him that we were not in the right place. He indicated that we were where we were supposed to be, and insisted that we get out of the Uber. He drove off, and Greg and I stood with our luggage on the sidewalk on a dark street in Manhattan, wondering what we should do next. We decided to go into the hotel that was not a Hampton and ask them if they knew where the Hampton was. They told us that the Hampton was on the other side of the block. We went back out to the dark street and carried our luggage around the block to find the Hampton. We found the hotel, checked in, and walked down the street to find something to eat.

The next day, we set out to do some sightseeing. The hotel was supposed to be in walking distance of the 911 museum. I had the museum pulled up on my google maps. Greg just took off walking, but he was going in the wrong direction. A little back story…

I am terrible with directions. I can get lost just about anywhere. And if I am lost, I am really, really lost. If I am on a highway that tells the direction, such as 64 West, I’m thinking I’m going west, but I’m never 100% sure. If not for Google maps, I would never get anywhere. On the other hand, Greg has a great sense of direction. If he gets turned around, he can usually find his way back to get to where he needs to go. He was able to do that without Google maps. He is able to look at the sky and know which direction is north, south, east and west. I don’t know how he does that. Typically, I have complete confidence in Greg’s ability to find his way. But in this case, he was going the wrong way. Back to the story…

I called Greg’s name a few times and tried to tell him we were walking in the wrong direction. Greg had never been in New York before, but he was marching along as if he was a regular New Yorker. He was not listening to me. At all. Which is understandable, I guess, considering my ability to get lost. I finally just stopped walking. It took Greg several seconds to realize I was not walking beside him. He stopped, looked around, and then turned back to see that I was just standing on the sidewalk. That got his attention. He came back and asked what I was doing. I very calmly informed him that he was walking in the wrong direction. He looked at my google maps, and decided I was right. We walked in the correct direction and arrived at the 9-11 Memorial and Museum in a few minutes. The museum was very impactful. We learned details of the attacks, saw artifacts and heard a lot of personal stories.

That afternoon, we checked into the New York Plaza Hotel. I was a little nervous, because I had never stayed in a fancy hotel like this. I think I was afraid they would take one look at us and know that we were not high society enough to be in their hotel. But they were so nice! The hotel was decorated for Christmas and it was beautiful.

They carried our bags to our room. When we arrived in our room, there was some complimentary champagne waiting for us since we were celebrating our anniversary. Greg and I are not big drinkers, but we didn’t want the people at the Plaza to feel like we didn’t appreciate the gesture. We opened the champagne, poured some in the glasses, took a sip or two, and then poured it down the sink. It was the thought that counted.

The room was so fancy and the bathtub was huge!

We ate dinner at the hotel. When we went down to the restaurant, they greeted us using our names. How did they know who we were? Most of the time, when hotels know our names, it’s because there has been some kind of problem. We hadn’t caused any trouble yet, as far as I knew. I ordered a salad, and Greg decided to have a burger. He thought the “Impossible burger” sounded interesting, as in “impossibly good.” I eat a vegan diet, so I know an Impossible burger was a plant based burger, but I didn’t realize that was what Greg had ordered. Greg does not eat a vegan diet-in fact he is the opposite of a vegan diet. He refuses to try anything that is considered vegan. He eats meat. His diet consists of pretty much only meat. After Greg ate the entire burger, he commented that it was good, but it tasted a little different. When he told me that it was the Impossible burger, I told him that it was a plant based burger. He confirmed this with the waiter. I think he was a little unsettled that he had willingly eaten a plant based burger, but mostly I think he was just mad that he didn’t think it was awful. I thought that might inspire him to try some of the food I cook, but it has been three years since then, and he is still refusing.

The Plaza Hotel is across the street from Central Park. I’ve heard so much about Central Park, so it was really cool to see it. We walked across the street and walked around a little, so that we could say we had been in Central Park.

We didn’t stay long in the park, though. It was really cold, it was getting dark, and I’ve seen enough Law and Order: SVU to be cautious about being in Central Park at night. I didn’t want to see any dead bodies, and I certainly didn’t want to become one. That night, we went to the theater and we saw Phantom of the Opera. It was wonderful! I’m so glad I had the opportunity to see it in New York before it went off Broadway.

We had some time to walk around Times Square and take some pictures.

The next day, we had plans to take the ferry to Liberty Island, and then we had tickets to go the theater again that night to see Beetlejuice. We had breakfast in the hotel dining room. They knew our names there too. Weird. We weren’t wearing nametags or anything.

I have a confession. I love little jars like this.

I have been known to take unused jars of catsup or jelly off room service trays that people have placed outside their room when they are finished with their meals. I mean…they’re just going to throw them away anyway, right? I bought a really cute Nutella one in Portugal and one with pumpkin jam. I haven’t been able to bring myself to open them and eat the Nutella or the jam yet because the little jars are so cute. But I left the ones at the Plaza on the table. I wanted the staff to keep remembering our names because we were guests at the hotel, not because I was caught stealing little jars. Knowing my passion for these little jars, the kids sent me this advent jelly calendar one Christmas. It was so fun eating one of these on toast every morning. Aren’t they cute? I may be a little obsessed.

Before we left for the day, we stopped at the concierge and asked him for recommendations for a restaurant for that night, since it was the day of our anniversary. The concierge asked us about the type of food we liked, and he said he would take care of it. Well, ok then.

We left for the day. We toured the Statue of Liberty and walked around the island for a while.

We were able to get some good pictures of the Manhattan skyline from Liberty Island.

We went to the Statue of Liberty Museum.

We hopped back on the ferry and went to Ellis Island. Greg looked in the Ellis Island archives for his ancestors who came to the US from Germany many years ago.

When we arrived back at the hotel, the concierge saw us walk in and motioned us over. He handed us a piece of paper that had the name of an Italian restaurant and the time of the reservation.

We got ready and left for the theater. At the Plaza, when we stepped outside the hotel, there was a man in a uniform and he asked us if we needed a taxi. When we said “yes,” he immediately flagged down a taxi and motioned us over. Wow. I’m sure we would have been standing there forever waiting on a taxi if we had tried to flag one down. We got in the taxi and went to see the show. It was so good! Greg liked it so much he was willing to see it again when it came on at the Fox in St. Louis.

After the show, we tried to get a taxi outside the theater, but there were hundreds of other people attempting to do the same thing. I don’t think we had the right skills to get a taxi in New York outside a theater after a show. The show ran longer than expected, and we were running a little late for our dinner reservation, so we desperately needed a taxi. Greg saw a pedicab, and decided we needed to take that. I thought it sounded like fun, so off we went. The driver gave us a blanket and he gave us a little mini tour of New York, playing Christmas music and pointing out some of the sights. Some people waved at us as we rode by. I’m not sure why they were waving, but Greg acted like a true midwesterner and waved back.

We ended up being late for our dinner reservation, but they held the reservation, mostly because it had been made by the concierge at the Plaza. When Greg asked the pedicab driver how much to pay for the fare, the driver said “$225.” Excuse me, what? ” $225 dollars?! Well, I guess that was a lesson learned. We went in the restaurant with our pockets significantly lighter than they were before the pedicab ride, but the restaurant staff was very friendly and attentive, and we had a really nice dinner. The restaurant staff arranged for a REGULAR cab back to the hotel, and we spent our last night in luxury at the hotel before heading to the airport the next day.

This trip was so much fun. We were able to have an experience that we had never had before. I’m all about budget travel and getting good deals, but every now and then it feels good to splurge a little. Especially for special occasions. I’m so glad Greg and I took this trip. However, when I take a trip, I don’t really check it off and say, “Ok, I’ve done that. I’m satisfied.” Taking a trip just makes me want to go back and do it again. Hopefully, I can do a trip like this again sometime in the future. But I may be done with pedicabs.

Tips:

To splurge on a really nice hotel experience, check out the New York Plaza Hotel. Find more information on the Plaza at http://www.theplazany.com.
The staff at New York Plaza Hotel remembers your name even if you have not caused any trouble.
I think you can swim in the bathtub in the rooms at the Plaza if you would like to.
Google maps is more accurate for getting around New York than a man from the midwest with a good sense of direction who has never been to New York.
Just because you walk in Central Park does not guarantee you are going to see Mariska Hargitay or Christopher Meloni of Law and Order: SVU. Disappointing, I know, but true.
Pedicabs are a fun way to see some of the city, but be prepared to pay a lot for the ride.
I recommend going to the 911 Memorial and Museum. Tickets can be found at https://tickets.911memorial.org
We booked our tickets for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island through Statue City Cruises. Go to http://www.cityexperiences.com.
There are a number of ways to book Broadway tickets. A lot of times, if I know the name of the show I want to see, I just google the name of the show, adding “New York” and some options to buy tickets will pop up. Other options include newyorktheaterguide.com, or http://www.broadway.com. Also, if you know the name of the theater, you can google the name of the theater and buy tickets there. Example, for the Majestic theater, you can find tickets at https://shubert.nyc/theatres/majestic/

Lisbon, Portugal-Tiles, Toenails, and Tons of Stairs

We traveled to Lisbon, Portugal for a week in August, 2024. Wanderful, a global women’s travel community, was having a global meetup there, so we planned our vacation around the event. I belong to Wanderful, and both of my daughters and my daughter-in-law belong to Wanderful as well. The global meetup had events planned for parts of four days. The women attended these events, and then we spent the rest of the time as a family vacation.

This was our first international trip with our grandson, Remy. He was eight months old and he did great!

Adding a baby to a vacation definitely makes the experience a little different. We rented an Airbnb that was within walking distance of anywhere we wanted to go in the city. We were close to shopping areas, restaurants, and city sights. As long as we were willing to navigate stairs. Lots of stairs. Long flights of stairs. Very steep stairs. So many stairs. Lisbon is known for its tiles, but there are so many STAIRS. Many of the stairs have a restaurant on one side of the stairs, and the tables and chairs where people eat on the other side. Not only does this make the area much more narrow to walk through, but you have to watch so you don’t knock over any servers carrying large trays of food. I had several close calls.

Greg was not fond of the stairs.

The day we arrived, we girls attended a welcome get together on a rooftop bar/restaurant, called The Art Inn, which is located in the center of Lisbon. It was nice seeing some familiar faces from previous Wanderful trips and we had fun meeting many new ones. The views of the city were great.

The next day was pretty full of Wanderful events. We went on a tour of Lisbon and learned a lot about the city and the tiles. Lisbon is known for its tiles. Making of the tiles was introduced by the Moors in the 8th century. It grew in popularity until Portugal became the primary producer of tiles in Europe. These beautiful tiles can be found all over Lisbon. Many of them tell stories of Lisbon’s history.

We heard many more stories about Lisbon.

We took a cooking class. We learned to make pastel de nata at Pasteleria Batalha, an award winning bakery. Pastel de nata are Portuguese custard tarts.

They were delicious, and we all decided we were going to make these a regular dessert when we got home. As far as I know, none of us has made any more since that day. But it was a good thought, and maybe some day….. We did take the guys back to the bakery later that week so they could have some too. The guys mostly stayed at the Airbnb that first day, and they were ready to go out and find something to eat when we got back. We found a really fun restaurant and had a nice meal.

Remy was ready to eat. The restaurant was called El Santo Mexican restaurant. It had Lisbon neighborhoods on the walls.

The activity planned by Wanderful the next day was scheduled for 4:30 pm, so the Halls had most of the day to get in some sightseeing. We visited the Carmo Convent.

The Carmo Convent is a former Catholic convent, built in 1389. It was the largest church in Lisbon. In 1755, an earthquake caused significant damage to the convent, but it is one of the main remaining ruins from the earthquake that is still standing. The original convent housed a library that had about 5000 books, but most of the library was destroyed in the earthquake.

There is also a small, archaeological museum. The museum has a replica of what the convent looked like before the earthquake.

The Wanderful event was a visit to Lisbon’s first winery, Adega Belem. We were given a tour of the winery, and we learned how the wine was made. We enjoyed a fado performance while we ate. Fado is a musical style from Portugal, with melancholic melodies and lyrics that speak of loss, longing, love and everyday life. Maybe not the most uplifting concert I’ve been to, but it is a tradition in Portugal. And to be honest, the words were in Portuguese anyway, so how did I know if they were talking about something sad or if they were saying this was the best day of their life?

The Wanderful event ended the next morning, with a farewell breakfast at Local Santos restaurant. The rest of the week, the Halls were on their own. Here we go….. But the rest of the trip actually went fairly smoothly for a Hall vacation.

When I retired from my job of 35 years, one of the gifts I received was a deck of travel cards.

Each person on the trip is supposed to pick a card, and then we have to do what the card says. I thought that it was a great way to explore and try new experiences. The rest of the family was not convinced, but they each took a card. Ryan’s card was called Splashing Day. The instructions were “Find a place where you can do a water activity such as surfing, kayaking, sup or snorkeling. Enjoy a day in the water.” We were planning to go to the coast anyway, so that was an easy one. We always have to touch the water wherever we are, if there is a body of water available. We did not have time to spend the whole day in the water, but we did put our hands in the water. We decided that counted.

Another card was titled Local Market. The instructions were “Go to a local market. While exploring the market stands, you have to ask five questions to locals about their business the items they sell or about their personal life. You will be amazed by the answers!” We were able to complete the activity on this card. We were walking through a park that had an area where local artists and vendors were selling their goods. Ally bought a painting from a young artist at one of the tents and she talked to him about his art.

Another card was titled Watch the Sunrise. The instructions were “Wake up early and go watch the sunrise in a beautiful place. It will be the best way to start your day.” We were on vacation. That card was not happening.

The next card was titled Share Your Food. We were asked to “Cook a traditional dish from your country, share this meal with local people.” Do frozen pizzas count? We did cook some of those, but again, we were on vacation. No one (and by “no one,” I mean me) wanted to spend hours in the kitchen cooking a meal. We didn’t invite anyone to our apartment to share our frozen pizzas, so I guess we failed with this card as well.

My card was titled, “Offer a Coffee,” with instructions to “offer a cup of coffee or tea to a stranger. Sometimes a small gesture can make someone’s day!” We saw a homeless lady sitting near the bottom of a really long flight of stairs. We went to the nearby McDonalds and got her some food and a drink. We thought that counted as completing the activity on this card.

The last card was titled Smile Challenge. The instructions were to “Say hello or hug people.” Umm, I don’t think so. Well, I could say hello. But I’m not hugging a random stranger in a foreign country. That’s a good way to get your face punched in.

Even though we did not complete all of the cards, it was still a fun way to do some things we might not have done. I think these cards may become a regular thing on our family vacations. I’m sure my family will be thrilled.

We visited a few museums. One was a pharmacy museum, Museu da Farmacia, that Kelly wanted to visit. Kelly is a nurse and has also worked in a pharmacy, so she really wanted to visit this museum. The museum was interesting. We had lunch at the restaurant outside the museum. Remy was trying to decide what to have for lunch.

Ally, Sarah and I visited the National Tile Museum.

This museum is housed in a previous convent. It shows how the tiles have evolved over centuries. It doesn’t seem like looking at a bunch of tiles would be very exciting, but the museum was actually pretty interesting.

Kelly and Ryan opted out of the museum and decided to go shopping that day.

Greg had had enough of the stairs and decided to stay in the Airbnb. Sometimes, everybody needs to just do their own thing.

You may be wondering what toenails have to do with Lisbon, Portugal. Nothing, really. Except in my story. The month before this trip, Ally, Sarah and I had hiked Mount Kilimanjaro. (You can read the story in my blog). As a result of the hike, I had injured my toenail and it was going to fall off, which is a pretty common thing that happens to hikers. If anyone has ever lost a toenail, you will know that it takes several weeks for the toenail to actually fall off. Well, my toenail decided to fall off while we were in Portugal. The problem was, I could see that it had fallen off, but I couldn’t find the toenail. I wanted to find it because I didn’t think it would be very nice to leave it lying around for the cleaning crew to find after we left. Ally was completely grossed out.

She walked around the apartment like the toenail was going to jump out and bite her. I couldn’t even mention the toenail. I never did find it. I’m hoping it came off in the shower and went down the drain. Ick.

We spent one day on a tour to Sintra and the surrounding areas. Our Airbnb owner arranged the trip for us. We had a wonderful day on this tour. We were picked up at our apartment in a private van and we had our own private tour guide. She was very knowledgeable about the area and she enthusiastically showed us around.

We visited part of the Sintra-Cascais National Park, and saw some beautiful views of the coast.

We explored the Sanctuary of Peninha, an ancient site in the Sintra mountains.

We then went into Sintra and visited Quinta de Regaleira.

Quinta de Regaleira is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is a blend of Romantic, Gothic, Manueline, and Renaissance styles.

There is a palace, chapel, and a park with lakes, caves and underground tunnels.

It was a little claustrophobic in the tunnels. Ally does not seem sure about these tunnels. There is a lot of esoteric symbolism in the chapel, which I think creates a more interesting and mysterious atmosphere to the tour.

As I mentioned previously, this vacation went pretty smoothly for a Hall vacation. However, at the airport on our way home, it turned into more of a typical Hall vacation. We had a layover at Heathrow airport in London on our way home. Our layover was not very long, so we were in a bit of a hurry to get to our gate. Now, Heathrow has very tight security, understandably. We had to take all of our liquids out of our bags and put them in one plastic bag. We knew the guidelines for liquids, so I didn’t think it was going to be a big deal. While we were frantically stuffing all of our liquids into the one bag, Greg said, “I’m going to put this in your bag.” I didn’t pay much attention, and I put my bag in the bin with my suitcase to go through the x-ray. They pulled my bag aside, so I had to wait for them to inspect the contents of my bag. I had no idea why my bag did not make it through. I was in a bit of a panic because we needed to get to our gate to catch our next flight. I sent everyone else to the gate, while I waited for my bag to be inspected. The woman who was supposed to look through my bag could not have moved any slower. I told her that I didn’t have much time, but that only seemed to make her move slower. The more agitated I became, the slower she moved. She moseyed over to straighten a hat, talked to a co-worker, and pretty much ignored me. I was ready to lose my mind. She finally decided to take a look at my bag. She pulled out a tube of toothpaste. A normal sized tube of toothpaste. Not the travel size that is allowed. A NORMAL SIZED TUBE OF TOOTHPASTE. And it did not belong to me. GREG. The toothpaste is the thing Greg put into my plastic bag at the last minute. He was in SO MUCH TROUBLE. I told her to throw it away, took my suitcase, and sprinted through the airport to the gate. I was not very nice to my husband when I arrived, panting, at the gate. Luckily, our flight was a few minutes delayed, so I was able to make the flight. Greg has since bought tiny tubes to store his toothpaste in when he travels. He is still not allowed near my plastic bag.

Tips:

Find more information on the Carmo Convent at https://museuarqueologicodocarmo.pt/. There are many options for guided tours, if that is how you prefer to visit, but we just did it on our own. There are multiple information signs as you move through the convent, so we were able to get plenty of information from those.
The website for the tile museum is https://www.museunacionaldoazulejo.pt/. It’s actually pretty interesting, even though a museum full of tiles does not sound all that exciting.
Always look to see what someone puts in your bag of liquids before sending it through security.
Information about the Museu da Farmacia can be found at https://www.museudafarmacia.pt.
Find more information about Quinta de Regaleira at https://www.quintadaregaleiratickets.com/history/
A toenail will not jump out at you, but finding it on the floor may gross you out.
There are multiple tour options for Sintra and the surrounding areas. Getyourguide.com is always a good option, in my experience, but there are others to choose from.

They Call Me Little Bull

I am not a fighter. As a matter of fact, I pretty much avoid confrontation at all costs if I can. But there have been some times throughout my life where confrontation has found me. Since my stories are mostly about adventures in travel, you may find the beginning of this story a bit confusing. But hang on-it ends up being about travel. And sometimes adventure happens close to home.

I carried the nickname “Little Bull” for most of my junior high and high school years. I acquired this nickname from a situation involving confrontation. My friend, Michele, and I have been friends since the fifth grade when I moved into her town. Michele was always the popular one. Everyone wanted to be her friend, and everyone wanted to be like her. She was tall, blond, pretty, and all of the boys liked her. Me? Not even close.

I have always wondered why she rode her bike to my house that first week after I started in my new school, but we have remained friends since then.

Michele had the great Farrah Fawcett hair. No matter how hard I tried, I could not make my head full of curls do that.

Here we are last summer. Some things never change…..

The “Little Bull” incident happened when we were in the sixth grade. We were hanging out in front of the school one day after school. This eighth grade boy named David (I can still sort of see him in my mind, and that was a LONG time ago), had a book with a dirty word in it. This may not seem like a big deal now, but in the 1970’s, having possession of a book with a dirty word made you pretty cool. He showed the page with the dirty word to Michele, and then he showed it to our friend, Julie, who was cool in a tough kind of way. Then it was my turn. I tried to look at the book, but for some reason, he would not show me the word. I can’t remember if I tried to grab the book from him, or if I said something mean to him, but the next thing I knew, he slapped me across the face. This not only surprised me, it made me furious. I went after him with everything I had. He was probably a foot taller than me, and much stronger. When I picture it in my mind, I imagine it looked like a scene from The Three Stooges, where one stooge was holding the other at arm’s length and the other stooge was kicking and swinging, but not able to make contact. He laughed and said, “Look. She looks just like a little bull.” In his defense, that is probably exactly what I looked like. Michele and Julie found the nickname amusing, and decided that everyone else needed to know the name as well. I was “Little Bull,” “Bull,” or just “LB” for years after that. I received t-shirts and sweatshirts with the name for birthday gifts from friends. I’m pretty sure if I would run into people I haven’t seen in 30 years, they would call me “Little Bull.”

Fast forward about 25 years. I decided to take my kids to the beach at Rend Lake, a lake about 20 miles from our house.

My two daughters, Ally and Sarah, each brought a friend. My son, Ryan, was outnumbered four to one that day. But he didn’t mind. He was used to it. He was enough boy to watch on his own-he always kept me on my toes. I didn’t get any pictures that day, but here are pictures of the kids at the age of the story.

Anyway, it was a hot summer day, and I thought some swimming and a picnic lunch sounded like a great idea. We arrived at the beach and the kids ran to the water. I claimed a spot on the beach and started putting out chairs and towels. There were two women and a little boy not too far from where we were. One of the women, with a can of beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other, was talking very loudly, using a certain curse word frequently. I know these days we hear it all of the time, but in the 90’s, this word was not thrown around as much as it is now, so it was very noticeable that day. I guess I offended her by looking at her, because she started yelling at me, in a three pack of cigarettes a day sort of way, “What are you looking at, you heifer?! Come on over here, you heifer!” Now this woman probably outweighed me by about 100 pounds, but I thought I had a pretty good chance, since it appeared she had already worked her way through at least one six pack of beer and a pack of cigarettes. I wasn’t so sure about the other woman. She was younger and looked like she was handling her liquor a little better than the older lady. She may have been more of a challenge. I decided to pass. My response was to move a little further away and just try to ignore them. However, they were not ready to leave me alone. They repeatedly walked across the sand in front of me, staring me down, and the older woman would occasionally yell something at me. I just ignored them. My kids were asking, “Mommy, why is that lady yelling at you?” The only response I could come up with was, “Because she is an idiot.” I probably missed an important teaching moment, but at the time, I was too angry to do anything else. They finally left me alone, and a little later, they sent the little boy over to ask if he could play with the sand toys we had brought. That seemed weird to me, but he was just a little kid, so I let him play with the toys. A little later, we went up to the picnic tables located between the parking lot and the beach to have our picnic.

A few minutes after we started eating, a car pulled up, parked in the spot next to our table, and cranked up some music containing multiple curse words. I assumed these were friends of the women on the beach. I was right, because a few minutes later, the woman joined them at the car. I decided to just pack up our things and leave. So much for our wonderful day at the beach.

Several years later, we took a vacation to Florida. Sarah had a dance competition in Jacksonville, Florida, so we planned a vacation around the competition.

After the competition, we drove down to Sea World for a day. I couldn’t find any pictures for this vacation either. I guess when people want to fight me, it makes me forget about taking pictures.

Ally was on crutches due to a knee problem at the time. I knew she could not hop through Sea World all day on crutches, so I needed to rent a wheelchair for her. I told the kids to stay with Greg while I went over to rent the wheelchair. As I was standing in front of the rental place, looking at the sign with the options and prices, someone came up and stood beside me. For some reason, I assumed it was Sarah. I lightly touched her arm and told her to go back and sit with her dad. I immediately heard, “Don’t you touch me.” In surprise, I turned to look and discovered this lady standing next to me, looking angry. I immediately apologized, saying, “Oh! I’m sorry. I thought you were my daughter.” Her response was, “Don’t you ever touch me.” I responded with, “I’m sorry! I thought you were my daughter!” She replied, ” Don’t you ever touch me. I don’t like people touching me.” I thought it was time to move on, so I walked away and got in line for the wheelchair. This lady followed me, got in line behind me, and continued to say, “Don’t you ever touch me.” Now other people were looking at us, probably thinking I was some pervert who had tried to grope this lady. I said through clenched teeth, “I SAID I thought you were my daughter, and I SAID I was sorry.” Greg walked up to see what the commotion was about. He asked, “What is going on?” This lady responded with, “Don’t you threaten me! You’re threatening me!” I didn’t really think the words “what is going on?” were threatening, but then again, I don’t think I’m at the same level of crazy. I told Greg to go back and sit down, because his presence was freaking this lady out. I asked the man next to me to trade places with me in the line, so I was no longer standing next to this lady. I rented my wheelchair and got out of there. We did see that lady one more time while we were in the park. She was yelling at her kids. Yelling seemed to be her preferred mode of communication. But we did have a really good time at Sea World.

Tips:

Seeing a dirty word in a book is not really worth acquiring a nickname for the rest of your life.
I would recommend that if you are a small sixth grade girl, you don’t attempt to fight a tall eighth grade boy. It will not go well for you.
Rend Lake is a large man-made lake in Southern Illinois. They have some nice campgrounds. There is a resort and there are cabins to rent. Activities at Rend Lake and nearby include camping, hiking, biking, fishing, swimming, and picnicking. There is a golf course nearby. You can go horseback riding, boating and water skiing. There are some nice playgrounds as well. You can find more information about Rend Lake at http://www.rendlake.com and http://www.recreation.gov.
If a person who is significantly bigger than you tries to fight you, give them a six pack of beer and a pack of cigarettes. It evens the odds.
Always look at the owner of an arm before you touch it.
If someone tries to fight you, take a picture. It gives you material for a story, and it may make them stop. Or they may beat you up because you took their picture. It could go either way.

San Diego-Beaches, Mountains, and….Possums?

I love San Diego, California. I love the weather, the food, the beaches, the mountains. I have been to San Diego a few times, and I have enjoyed it every time.

Our first trip to San Diego was to visit our daughter. In 2013, our daughter, Ally, was working for an organization based in San Diego, so she was living there. We wanted to visit her for a few days. Ally was able to join us for most of the activities. We had a great time at the San Diego Zoo.

The San Diego Zoo has a Skyfari Aerial Tram, which is a gondola lift and a great way to see the zoo.

Greg wasn’t sure about the ride, but could Ryan look much cooler? I thought it was fun.

We went to La Jolla and took a walk along the cliffs on the coast. It was so beautiful. La Jolla is an area that is fifteen miles north of downtown San Diego. It’s a beach town with cliffs overlooking the Pacific ocean, protected caves with seals and sea lions, boutiques and galleries. You can take a class to learn to surf, rent a bike, rent a kayak, or take a guided snorkeling tour. There are some luxury hotels in the area and several restaurants.

It was windy in San Diego, so my hair was really big the whole time we were there.

We visited the USS Midway, which is an aircraft carrier that people can tour in San Diego. This was one of Greg’s favorite activities of the trip. It was interesting, but I get “museumed” out pretty quickly, so I was ready to go way before he was. I think the kids were ready to go too.

We visited Coronado Island for a day. I loved Coronado Island. We visited the Hotel Del Coronado, walked through the town, and had a great meal. You can rent bikes and ride them around the island. If you’re feeling really energetic, you can ride the bikes all the way into San Diego. There is a park on the island called Spreckels Park. There are free concerts in the summer, plenty of places to have a picnic, and a large playground for kids. There is a Coronado Flower Festival held in the park in April, and local artists can display their art in the park.

Ally had to work on one of the days that we were there. The rest of us (actually, it was probably me talking the rest of them into it) decided to take the bus from near our hotel to a beach and a place to get acai bowls that Ally had recommended. In case you are unfamiliar with acai bowls, let me explain this delicious treat. Acai bowls are made with mashed and frozen acai juice, topped with your choice of a variety of fruits and toppings, such as granola, coconut, peanut butter, etc. I loved them so much that I learned how to make them at home. But they still taste better sitting near the beach.

It was too cold to swim, although there were some brave souls who were swimming, so we just walked along the beach. We came to a group of big rocks that jutted out to the water. Our choices were to walk in the water, which would have been really cold, climb over the rocks, or walk all the way up the beach to get around the rocks. Greg chose to walk all the way up the beach to get around the rocks. Ryan, being part billy goat, climbed up and over the rocks in no time. Sarah and I followed. The problem with this strategy was that I could see the waves getting bigger as they were coming in toward the rocks. I kept reminding Sarah that she needed to hurry because we were going to get wet. Sarah does not always do what I tell her to do. The water was getting closer and the waves were getting bigger. And then it happened. A huge wave came, going over our heads, and completely soaking me and Sarah from head to foot. I started yelling at Sarah to keep going, but Sarah froze and screamed, as another wave washed over us. Sarah’s cell phone was in her purse that she was carrying, and my phone was in the back pocket of my jeans. Both phones were ruined. Some kids who were swimming were laughing and pointing at us as we did the walk of shame off the beach. I was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, so my clothes were really wet and heavy. We were determined to get our acai bowls, so we walked to the acai stand, bought our acai bowls, and found a place in the sun to shiver and eat. Then we went to the bus stop, sloshed onto the bus, and went back to our hotel. We had to call Ally to let her know that we were going to need a little extra time to get ready for dinner. Apparently, she had us on speaker phone, because when I finished explaining our experience, there was a moment of silence and then we heard laughter from several people. So glad we could provide everyone with some entertainment.

I went to San Diego a second time in 2018 for a conference. Greg went with me. My friend and colleague, Mary, was also attending the conference. Her husband, Ken, two of her adult sons, and her adult daughter, joined them for this trip.

Just prior to this trip, I had some sort of allergic reaction that made my face swell and break out in a red rash. This was the second time this had happened. The swelling and rash had gone down somewhat by the time we left for San Diego, but I was still a little red, swollen and self-conscious. At that time, I didn’t know what had caused the swelling, so I was a little nervous about the food I was going to eat on the trip. When I returned home from the trip, I spent some time with an allergist and found out what was causing the allergic reaction. Here is the story….

As a behavior analyst, I do ABA therapy with children in their homes. I was working on a program with one of my clients that required a variety of scents on cotton balls. To prepare for this program, I had used vanilla, vinegar, lemon juice, and some old perfume that I had. Greg had bought this perfume for me many years ago. I never liked the the smell of this perfume. I especially did not like the smell of this perfume when it was on me. It was called Cinnabar. Greg thought it smelled really good, so I told him he could wear it if he wanted, but I could not stand the smell. I guess I had never thrown the perfume away because I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. Anyway, it came in handy for this program, since it gave off a really strong scent. The allergy test indicated that I was allergic to cinnamon, which was in the perfume. So each time I added more perfume to a cotton ball, and then unknowingly touched my face, my face would break out in a rash and swell up. Needless to say, the perfume went into the trash. I considered including some pictures of my face when it was swollen, but they still scare me, so I thought I would spare my readers that experience. To give you a little idea of what you are missing, my face was covered in a red rash, my nose was very bulbous and my eyes were swollen into little slits. Very attractive.

Along with the swollen face, another incident happened prior to the trip. I was doing some last minute laundry the night before we were leaving for the trip. As I was putting a load in the washer, I heard a hissing sound. We have a cat, but she does not hiss a lot and that did not sound like her hiss. I turned around, and THERE WAS A POSSUM IN MY LAUNDRY ROOM!!! I am an animal lover, but possums creep me out. I know they have some useful qualities, but they need to do their thing OUTSIDE. This one was in MY laundry room, eating MY cat’s food, and he had the nerve to hiss at ME? Rude! I jumped about three feet in the air, let out a “yow!” and scrambled up the stairs, yelling for my husband, Greg. I’m pretty sure possum removal is his job. I told him there was a huge possum in our laundry room. In my mind, this possum was about 50 pounds, but in reality it was a junior possum, probably weighing about 10 pounds. Greg is definitely the calmer one in these types of situations (not that we regularly have possums in our laundry room), so he got the cat carrier, put some cat food in the back of it, and waited until the possum became curious enough to get in the carrier. He then re-homed the possum to some woods at the edge of town. I have to admit, I was a little jumpy each time I went into the laundry room for the rest of the night. I stood outside the room, reached in to turn the light on, and peeked in before I stepped a foot into that room. We didn’t see anymore possums that night, and we left to catch our flight to San Diego the next morning, confident that our house was possum free. Turns out, we were wrong.

I was too upset to think about taking pictures of the possum at the time, so I had to recreate the scene.

When we came home the next week, we noticed that our dog would just randomly bark when she was in the dining room. Then we started hearing noises under the dining room floor. We live in an older home, built in 1936, and we have a crawl space under the house. Apparently, there is a ventilation hole in the foundation covered with mesh and some creature had chewed through it, so the possums got into the crawl space. The little one in the laundry room had found a small hole in the retaining wall and had managed to squeeze himself through into the laundry room. We were pretty sure that a family of possums was living in our crawl space. I read that possums were afraid of dogs, so for a few days, I periodically stomped around the dining room, making barking noises, hoping to scare the possums so they would leave. The possums were not impressed. Greg, being the great possum hunter that he is, crawled into the crawl space and set some humane traps. He caught a mama possum and three more babies. The possums are now living the good life in the woods, and Greg has done some major repairs to the foundation of our house so that no other creatures decide to make our crawl space their home.

Anyway, back to San Diego. Other than the swollen face and the few more gray hairs due to the possum scare, we had a great time. This was the view from our hotel. Since it was a conference, we were staying in the conference hotel, which was like a Hyatt, Hilton, or something expensive that we would not normally stay in.

The hotel was near the Gaslamp district, which has some good restaurants and lots of places to shop. Nearby, there is Petco Park, where the San Diego Padres play their baseball games. We didn’t make it there this trip, but I’m sure Greg would love to see a ballgame there some day. If baseball is not your thing, Petco Park also hosts some great concerts.

I’m sure the hotel appreciated this image. I washed out my jeans one day and they were not getting dry hanging in the bathroom, so I hung them out the window. Am I a sophisticated, big city girl, or what?

Greg and Ken visited the USS Midway one day while Mary and I attended the conference. They stayed all day.

I have to admit, I’m glad I was at the conference on that day. But they had a great time. Actually, I think Greg and Ken had a good time all week. This conference is always pretty intense, so Mary and I spent most of our week in workshops and sessions. We did manage to get in a little fun, though.

We visited the Mt. Soledad National Veterans Memorial. This is considered one of the most unique veterans memorials in the US. It is the only memorial that honors veterans, both living and deceased, that served from the revolutionary war to current day.

We went to the San Diego zoo, again.

Mary and I went to Coronado Island one evening. I just love that place. It seems so peaceful and relaxed. Some day I’m going to go and stay in the Hotel del Coronado and just relax on the beach. That trip is on my very long list of places I want to go.

We booked a bike tour in La Jolla.

This was a great way to see that area. We biked on roads that overlooked the coast and we rode through some beautiful neighborhoods.

We went down to the coast and we were taken to an area that had a lot of sea lions. It was a lot of fun!

There was a restaurant across from our hotel called Kansas City Barbeque. A scene from the movie Top Gun was filmed in this restaurant. I like that movie, but Greg loves that movie. He wanted to eat in that restaurant several times while we were there. Greg also likes barbecue, a lot. It was fun at first, but I got a little tired of it by the third time we ate there that week. This picture shows a little of how my face was still red and swollen the first couple of days that we were there.

The third time I went to San Diego, it was for another conference. My friend and colleague, Amy, and I went this time. We went in February, and we almost froze to death. I’m not as big a fan of San Diego in the winter. The wind was so cold. We shivered while eating our acai bowls, again. But at least our clothes weren’t soaking wet this time.

We took a little time off of the conference and visited Coronado Island, of course. Staying in the Hotel Del Coronado and relaxing on this beach is still at the top of my list.

This trip taught me not to try to do this trip in the winter. I do not want to hang out on the beach in my winter coat. Amy really enjoyed the food on Coronado Island.

I recommend San Diego as a great place to visit. The weather in the summer is great, and there are plenty of things to do.

Tips:

Find more information about the San Diego zoo at https://zoo.sandiegozoo.org.
The Kansas City Barbeque restaurant does have good barbecue and it’s fun to look at all the Top Gun memorabilia. You can find the menu and more information at https://kcbbq.net.
I don’t remember the name of the bike tour company. Here are some that are available. http://www.viator.com, bikeandkayaktours.com, sandiegotoursandrentals.com.
Find more information on the Hotel del Coronado at https://www.hoteldel.com. There are regular hotel rooms and they also have villas, which look really nice. There is a fire pit on the beach and when we were there at night, they had a fire going for the guests.
If you live in an older home, you may want to routinely check the foundation to make sure there are no openings that critters can use to get into your laundry room.
Possums like cat food.
Possums hiss.
San Diego is a great place to visit, but be prepared to spend quite a bit of money on food and accommodations. It’s a very expensive place to live.
It’s free to visit the Mt. Soledad National Veterans Memorial. There are great views from there and there are lawns surrounding the memorial that would be great for a picnic.
Find a schedule of events at Petco Park at petcoparkevents.com.

Our Aruba Vacation

In 2010, Sarah decided she wanted to go to Aruba for vacation. Since she was graduating from high school, she got to choose the vacation destination. Sarah was allowed to bring a friend, and my mom and my Aunt Carol were joining us on this trip. Our little vacation group included me, my husband Greg, our daughter Ally, our daughter Sarah and her friend Morgan, our son Ryan, my mom, and my Aunt Carol. What a crew!

On the flight to Aruba, Aunt Carol sat next to a man who decided it was a good idea to drink a few glasses of whiskey while we were in the air. He ended up spilling one of his glasses of whiskey on Aunt Carol, so she arrived in Aruba smelling like she had been on a three day drunk. Luckily, I had rented a condo that had a washer and dryer.

We stayed at the Oceania Condos. Our condo was on the beach and there was also a pool on the condo property. The weather all week was perfect, and we had a wonderful time.

This little guy enjoyed startling us all week as we walked out of our door.

We spent a lot of time on the beach. We love the beach. Well, I should say the kids and I love the beach.

Greg, Mom and Aunt Carol are not as fond of the sand and water. But they tried to be good sports. They spent a little time on the beach as well.

The kids rented jet skis one day. The minimum age to operate a jet ski in Aruba is 18. However, the rental company allowed Ryan, who had just turned 16, to operate the jet ski as long as I signed the liability forms. Ryan had been a licensed driver for about a month at this time. Driving with Ryan while he was learning was a little scary at first, but he had significantly improved in the year he had his permit, so by the time he got his license, he was a pretty good driver. So I said a prayer and signed the liability form.

We spent some time at the pool as well. Ally and Grandma on their way to the pool!

Mom and Aunt Carol are not big fans of water, but they were determined to have the full vacation experience.

We decided it would be fun to visit an ostrich/emu farm. Well, most of us decided it would be fun. Ally wasn’t sure it was a good idea. Ally has a somewhat traumatic history with birds. Here are a few examples of Ally’s experiences with birds.

Example #1: When she was about five years old, Ally found a robin egg that had fallen out of a nest, or that had been abandoned-we weren’t sure. She wanted to keep it and try to get it to hatch, but I told her the egg was probably bad and that is why it had been abandoned. I told her not to take it in the house. Now, Ally was usually a very compliant little kid, but this time, she did not do what I told her to do. I did not know it, but she snuck the egg into her room. A few days later, she came walking into the kitchen with this little egg in her hand. She held the egg up and said, “Mommy, look how cute this egg is” and at that moment, the egg exploded in her hand and rotten egg spewed up into her face and all over the kitchen floor. I knew where this was going, and since Greg was in the shower, I threw the trash can in front of Ally. She proceeded to throw up in the trash can, while I ran around opening windows and cleaning the floor with everything I could get my hands on that I thought might get rid of the smell of rotten egg.

Example #2: About a year later, we had another traumatic bird experience. We had a cat named Sam who thought he was a great hunter. He liked to hunt birds. He was well fed, so he didn’t eat the birds, but he played with them until…well, you know. One day, the kids and I were outside when Sam came home with a little baby bird. We managed to rescue the bird from Sam. The bird was alive, but we were not sure how badly injured it was. It wasn’t moving much. We put the little bird in a towel and put it in a shoebox. We were getting ready to take the bird to the bird rescue guy in the area when the bird seemed to revive. Ally cupped the little bird in her hands, lifted her hands in the air, and said “fly little bird, fly!” The bird flew into our back yard, where our 75 pound lab mix dog jumped up and gulped the bird right out of the air. There was a lot of screaming and crying, and it wasn’t just the kids.

Example #3: When Ally was a freshman in high school, she and a few of her friends went to the Homecoming Dance as a group of friends. I had taken Ally to the beauty shop and she had her hair all fro-frooed up for the dance. Ally was all spiffed up in her purple gown and her fancy hair. We were walking out to the minivan to pick up the other girls. We walked under a tree and a bird pooped on Ally-in her fancy hair and down her purple gown. She just froze and screamed. I rushed her back into the house to get her cleaned off. When Greg found out what happened, he started laughing, which made Ally cry harder. We managed to clean her up and we did make it to the Homecoming dance.

Example #4: In 2008, when we were in Paris, Ally and I were standing outside a store waiting for my mom and my Aunt Carol to finish shopping. All of a sudden, Ally jumped and screeched. A pigeon that had been sitting in the rafters had pooped on her shoulder. Out of all of the people in Paris, the pigeon decided to poop on Ally.

So you can see how Ally might be hesitant to go to a farm with the biggest birds in the world. This one looks a little angry.

It was probably after Ally. Ally managed to survive the day. We were allowed to hand feed the ostriches.

This was not one of Ally’s favorite experiences.

We decided to go parasailing one day. Mom, Aunt Carol and Greg were not interested in parasailing, but they were willing to go on the boat. The rest of us were all excited to go parasailing. Ally went first and seemed to have a great time.

Then Sarah and Morgan went up together. There was some screaming, but they seemed to have a great time.

Ryan and I went next. Parasailing seemed like a really good idea. Until I was in the air. The sun went under a cloud, the wind picked up, and we were tossed around in the air like a couple of rag dolls. One of us remained calm and enjoyed the ride. It was not me. I was sure the two of us were going to be hurtling toward the water to our deaths.

Well, it was way less dramatic than that. The guides simply reeled us back in to the boat.

Then Greg decided he wanted to try it. The clouds moved on, the wind calmed, and he had a very enjoyable ride.

It was a really fun day. Well, except for the near death experience.

One day, we went on a snorkeling cruise. We went on the Black Pearl sailing, snorkeling, lunch cruise. It was a really fun day. We loved the boat ride.

For two people who don’t really like water, Mom and Aunt Carol were really good sports.

We went to a great snorkeling spot.

We were able to see the sunset from the boat.

We all got the t-shirt. Here are Sarah and Morgan modeling the shirts.

We did some shopping. Of course we did some shopping. Shopping is not my favorite thing, but we needed some souvenirs.

Greg and Ryan even did a little shopping.

I have no pictures of Mom and Aunt Carol shopping. Once they are in shopping mode, it is difficult to get them to stop long enough to take a picture. Shopping is their thing. They much prefer shopping to activities involving water.

We went to an outside market. I found a cute jumper at one of the stands. I tried it on, and it fit perfectly. When I went to pay for it, they put it aside and gave me another one, indicating that this one was the same. I should have insisted that they give me the one I had tried on, but I really didn’t think much about it and merrily went on my way. I was just happy that I had experienced, what I thought, was a successful shopping trip. Well, once I got home and decided to wear the jumper, I discovered that the one they gave me had uneven armholes. One armhole was huge, giving the jumper a very lopsided look. My $20 jumper ended up costing me an additional $30 to get it fixed so that I could wear it. Shopping. Ugh.

I found an oceanside restaurant. After all, we were on an island-we had to eat at an oceanside restaurant. We loved it.

Another beautiful sunset.

Sadly, we did eventually have to end our vacation and head back home. Airports are always so much fun.

What a great vacation!

Tips:

We stayed at the Oceania condominiums. The website is oceaniaarubarentals.com. It appears these are now rented through Airbnb. These condos are on the beach and they were very nice in 2010. Hopefully, they still are.
From our condo, it was just a short walk down the beach to restaurants, ice cream shops, jet ski rentals, boat rentals, etc. It was a very good location.
The snorkeling experience with Black Pearl was a lot of fun. You can find information about the experience at aruba-sailing.com.
If you are interested in the ostrich farm, you can find information at http://www.arubaostrichfarm.com. Just make sure you are sensitive to anyone in your group who may have had a negative experience (or multiple negative experiences ) with birds.
Aruba’s motto is “One Happy Island.” I have to agree. The people who lived on the island were very friendly and the overall feel of the island is very laid back and calm. It is definitely a very relaxing place to have a restful vacation.
I don’t remember the name of the parasailing company, but there are several in Aruba. We did not drive at all while we were there, so I’m assuming it was a rental place on the beach. Here are some places that are available now. http://www.artswatersports.com, http://www.delphiwatersports.com, http://www.skyviewwatersports.com.
Don’t let anyone switch an item out for you when you are shopping. You may end up with a defective item when you get home.

Girl Trip to New York

I have mentioned Wanderful before. It’s a women’s travel community, but it’s more than that. Wanderful supports women who love to travel, with webinars, chat, and virtual meetings. They also offer global meetups that allow women to get together in various locations around the world to meet other travel minded women. Wanderful offers support to women who are in the travel business, including creators and small business owners. Wanderful supports women owned businesses around the world. They have local hubs in many cities that provide an opportunity for women in the area to spend time together.

Wanderful is the parent company of Women in Travel Summit (WITS).

This is a conference focused on women who are in the travel business. There are workshops and presentations by women who are successful in the travel business.

There are opportunities to build collaborations with businesses. They have an awards ceremony called the Bessie Awards, during which they recognize women who have had significant impact on women working in the travel industry.

I have really been enjoying writing this blog. But, let’s face it. I really don’t know what I’m doing. So I decided to attend WITS this year, hoping to get some tips about this whole blogging thing. The conference was in New York this year. They have a Beginners Bootcamp that I thought would be perfect for me. I signed up for the conference and booked a hotel room. I booked a room in one of the hotels where they had reserved a block of rooms. The hotel was near the conference venue, and, although I could have probably found a cheaper room, I wanted a hotel near the venue since I might be going to New York by myself. I was determined to go, and I knew I was going to have to be brave about traveling by myself in case no one was available to go with me. Thankfully, Sarah was able to go, so it became a girls’ trip!

Sarah was not planning to attend the conference, but she would be there to hang out with me when I was not at the conference.

I have to admit. I was very nervous about this conference. I definitely felt like I did not have enough experience and I was not good enough at blog writing to even associate with these women. I started fretting about this conference from the minute I registered. I read the information multiple times and tried to do everything they suggested. I attempted to memorize the directions to the venue, and the inside of the venue, since I get lost so easily. The instructions included bringing business cards. Business cards?! Is writing this blog really a business? The conference was going to have representatives from businesses with whom attendees could schedule a ten minute meeting to try to get them to hire them or partner with them to advance their business. I knew I was not ready for this step in any way, so I did not schedule any meetings. I did get business cards made, though. I am a rule follower.

I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with them, but I thought maybe I would be brave enough to talk to another attendee and maybe they would ask for my card. Who knew? I also had some stickers that advertised my blog, so I took those too.

I was trying to get into the spirit of things. So, armed with business cards, stickers, and my anxiety, Sarah and I left for New York.

Very funny, Sarah.

The first day was the bootcamp. As I was getting ready that morning, Sarah looked at me and said, “Calm down. You got this, Mom.” Was it that obvious? I took a deep breath, put on my brave face, and set out with my Google Maps to walk to the venue. I arrived at the conference a few minutes later, checked in, and took a seat in the room for the bootcamp. Since a big part of this conference is networking, I should have initiated conversation with some of the women around me. Instead, I sat nervously in my chair and just waited for the presentations to start. I watched as other women sat next to each other and talked, but I couldn’t bring myself to join in any conversations. I enjoyed the presentations and I learned some things, so the day was not a total loss. The next two days, I attended some of the other workshops and I wandered through some of the vendors. I saw the representatives having meetings with the attendees, but I quickly skittered past those. I kind of thought they would be able to tell how inexperienced I was just by looking at me.

Although WITS was a good experience, I should have made more of an effort to meet other women “in the business” and maybe network a little. I am planning to attend next year and hopefully I will feel more confident and make an effort to make the most of the conference.

Sarah and I had a great time in New York. We both love Broadway shows, and I had bought tickets to see Redwood with Idina Menzel.

It was a great show. Then, I saw that Moulin Rouge was playing, and Boy George was playing the part of Harold Zidler!

For those of you who know me, you might be surprised to find out that I was a big Boy George fan when I was younger. I snagged some last minute tickets and Sarah and I were going to Moulin Rouge! I told her I wanted to get there early so we could find where the stage door was. I wanted to get to the stage door after the show to try to get Boy George’s autograph! We located the stage door, and then we went in to watch the show. It was so good! After the show, we hurried to the stage door area. They had it roped off, so we could only get so close. We managed to get right up to the ropes. As we were standing there, a guy came and squeezed himself up in front of us, saying, “I’m here!” I don’t care where he was, as long as he was not standing in front of me, who was already “here.” I think I said something super aggressive, like, “really?!” Sarah, on the other hand, had much more to say. I pleaded with her to not get us arrested, since I really wanted to see Boy George, so she backed off. Then Boy George came out. I was so excited, but I couldn’t really see him very well because of the “I’m here!” dude that was in front of me. “I’m here” got his autograph, and then Sarah said to him, “Hey, my mom has been a Boy George fan for over 40 years. Could you move now so she can get his autograph?” To his credit, “I’m here” moved aside and let me get up to the rope. I had my playbill ready, and I was going to try to get a picture with him, since I saw that he was letting people take selfies with him. I snapped a few pictures of him as he was making his way around.

Just when he got near enough that I could hand him my playbill, this very tall, very excited lady behind me started screaming and jumping up and down. She was hitting me in the head with her IPAD when she jumped. I heard Sarah say, “Hey! You’re crushing my mom!” By this time, I was using my hands to cover my head rather than handing my playbill to Boy George. Sarah plucked my playbill out of my hand and gave it to Boy George, so I did get his autograph.

Boy George said, in his awesome British accent, “Someone needs to help her.” I don’t know if he was talking about my physical safety or this lady’s mental health, but either one applied. I started to leave and Sarah asked me if I was going to try to get a picture with Boy George. I had given up on that idea. I just wanted to make it out without a concussion.

Sarah and I did some other New York things while we were in town. We visited Chinatown.

Neither Sarah or I have any sense of direction, so this little trip into Chinatown was a bit of a challenge.

As we were standing on the sidewalk trying to figure out the GPS directions on our phone, a man drove by and said, “The roads are like spaghetti, aren’t they?” That was a good description. But I’m a little concerned that he noticed how confused we were. We did manage to do a little shopping,

and we had some delicious fruit that was covered in some sugary syrup.

The Wanderful women were having a meetup at a restaurant that night before the Bessie Awards. We attended the meetup and enjoyed visiting with the women for a little while.

The next day, we took the ferry to Liberty Island and Ellis Island. We enjoyed visiting these famous sites.

This is Sarah’s reaction to crowds.

We had some really good food while we were in New York. Sarah told me that I should always take pictures of my food first. Good luck with that. I don’t really get that excited about pictures of food in blogs, although it seems to be a thing with bloggers. I actually have a hard time remembering to take pictures of people. I’m trying to get better about the picture taking, but hopefully anyone who is with me will be willing to share their pictures with me. Sarah regularly reminded me to take pictures of my food, so I did get a few. This was from a really good breakfast/brunch place that Sarah found. It was called Hole in the Wall. We both had a smoothie, Sarah had coffee and mushroom toast, and I had hot chocolate and avocado toast.

There. I posted pictures of food. I think that makes me an official blog writer.

I really enjoyed my trip to New York with Sarah. I had been to New York a few years before with my husband (stay tuned for a story about that trip), but that’s one of the great things about traveling. Each trip is different and wonderful in its own way. We had a great time and, like most trips, I can’t wait to go back!

Tips:

We booked our tickets for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island through Statue City Cruises. Go to http://www.cityexperiences.com.
There are a number of ways to book Broadway tickets. A lot of times, if I know the name of the show I want to see, I just google the name of the show, adding “New York” and some options to buy tickets will pop up. Other options include newyorktheaterguide.com, or http://www.broadway.com. Also, if you know the name of the theater, you can google the name of the theater and buy tickets there. Example, for the Al Hirschfeld theater, you can find tickets at http://www.alhirschfeldbroadway.com.
I recommend the Hole in the Wall restaurant for breakfast or brunch. It is an Australian cafe. The food was good and the service was very friendly. Their address 15 Cliff Street in Manhattan. There are a few more locations in New York.
Be sure to have your GPS if you visit Chinatown.
Apparently, the workers for the train that goes from New Jersey to New York were on strike while we were there. This information does not seem like it would have affected us. But it did. Not having the train as an option meant that there was much more car traffic in New York, which meant that an Uber ride took much longer than usual. This caused me to have some anxiety about getting to the shows on time. You might want to check on things like that before your visit, so you can plan accordingly. I wish I had.
If you are in the travel business, from blogging to entrepreneurs to business owners, you should consider attending WITS. It is a great way to meet other women in the business (although you do have to be brave enough to initiate conversations), and they have workshops and presentations that are full of great information.

Mission Trips to Haiti

In July, 2015, Greg and I went on a mission trip to Haiti. Our church was working with Gordon Montgomery who had started a mission called Farming God’s Way. He had been led to go to Haiti and teach them to farm their land. He was working with a village called Hati Coton. Gordon improves the soil using natural ingredients without chemicals. I know nothing about farming-I can’t even keep flowers alive-but the mission trip was not just about farming. We were going to do a vacation bible school for the children of the village. Greg was not really interested in going at first, but he decided to go with me on this trip. And after one trip, he was hooked. We absolutely fell in love with the people in Hati Coton. We ended up going to Haiti five times.

We arrived at the airport in Port-au-Prince. That was an experience in itself. As soon as we walked out of the secure area, we were approached by many men offering to carry our luggage. Gordon had already told us to say “no” and to keep moving. The men attempted to take our luggage out of our hands, so it took some determination to keep hold of our luggage. We made it out of the airport and to our ride. Our ride was in a vehicle they called a “tap tap.” This was their “taxi” service, but Gordon had hired one man to drive us while we were there. A tap tap is a small pick up truck that has benches installed on both sides of the truck bed. Most of them have a cover over the top with some metal coverings on the sides and some of the back.

People just jump on these trucks, often hanging off the side if all the seats are taken. Somehow, the driver gets paid by the passengers, but we aren’t sure how, exactly. Keep in mind, it is HOT in Haiti, especially in Port-au-Prince where there are a ton of people, lots of dust, and the streets are in really poor condition. There is a lot of bumping around in the tap tap where we are riding sideways. Perfect conditions for motion sickness.

We drove through Port-au-Prince, then through another smaller town called Ganthier, and we finally turned off the main road onto a dirt road that took us to the village of Hati Coton. We had to drive through another village before we reached Hati Coton. When we reached Hati Coton, the children started running after the tap tap, shouting “Blan! Blan!”

“Blan” means “white” in Creole, which is the language spoken in Haiti. The kids in Haiti are so happy. They frequently sing and dance, and they love to have fun. They would hang out with us all day.

Many of the homes in the village had thatch roofs, but some of the roofs were metal. Many of the homes were made of mud, so after a rain, the villagers have to reinforce the walls of their homes. The wealthier homes were made of concrete blocks.

Gordon and previous mission teams had built a mission house on the edge of the village, and our group was the first mission team to stay in the house. There was a small kitchen with a table, a shower/toilet room, and a bunk room.

Our water was well water, so we drank the safe water that had been purchased in town. We did not have air conditioning, of course. But once you got used to the temperature, I didn’t think it was too bad. It got cooler at night. I was the only one who had brought a blanket, and I was glad I did. One of the very hot natured ladies, who had the bunk next to mine, looked at me as she was lying in her bed with three fans blowing on her and said, “I can’t even look at you with that blanket.” It was actually kind of cozy at night, lying in our bunks inside our mosquito nets, and listening to the sounds of the village. Outside the walls of the mission house area was land that was being farmed by Gordon and the villagers. This is how the land looked the fourth year we were there.

We have so many wonderful memories of our trips to Haiti. The first two years, we did a three day vacation bible school for the children in the village. We had a great turn out both times.

The children were lining up early in the morning while we were getting things ready.

Greg did his best to keep the children entertained while we finished getting everything ready.

When the gate was opened, the children excitedly poured into the area. Women were handing toddlers over the fence to us. I’m thinking they saw this as an opportunity for a much needed break. This is the little guy that was handed to me.

I asked some of the older children what his name was. I was told his name was Bosh. I called this little guy Bosh for five years, and he answered to the name for five years. During our fifth visit to Haiti, an older child told me that Bosh’s name was actually Patrick. I wasn’t sure he was serious, because sometimes the older kids like to tease and kid around with us. I asked “Bosh” what his name was, and he said “Patrick.” So….this little kid had been answering to “Bosh” for five years when his name was actually “Patrick?” Oh well, my name is “Jill” and I had been answering to “Blan” for five years, so there’s that. During the vacation bible school, we taught the kids a bible verse. At the end of each day, we chose some of the kids to say the verse.

We gave a stick of gum to any child who could say the verse. I’ll never forget the first little girl who got a stick of gum. Rather than immediately putting the entire stick of gum in her mouth, she tore the stick of gum into seven little pieces and shared them with the children around her. Wow.

The third year we went to Haiti, we did not plan a big, organized vacation bible school. The focus was more on some construction projects, including building benches for the schools, painting, and digging a well. Our daughter, Sarah, went on this trip with us. She was the first one on this trip to throw up on the tap tap ride to the village from the airport. Congratulations, Sarah.

Another project we had planned for this trip was to spend a few of the mornings doing bible stories with the children. We thought it would be fun to have the kids act out the stories. One of the stories we chose was Daniel and the Lion’s Den. If you’re not familiar with the story, it involves Daniel, who was a man of God, being thrown into a lion’s den to perish because he continued to pray to God even though a law had been passed that forbid it. However, God sent an angel to keep the lions from killing Daniel. We asked for a few volunteers to be lions and one volunteer to be Daniel. We started the story, but when it came time to throw Daniel into the den, the story took an unexpected turn. Let’s just say, in the Haiti version, Daniel did not survive the lion’s den.

We finally dug through the lions, rescued Daniel, and made sure he was still in one piece.

The first two years we went to Haiti, there was no rain when we were there. However, this year, we had some rain. The soil in Haiti gets very slick when it rains. The roads in the village….well, they are not really roads. We had gone into town and we were on our way back when it started raining. Our tap tap driver was driving way too fast through the huge ruts in the “road.” As we were going through the village that was between the town and Hati Coton, the tap tap went into an exceptionally deep rut and we tipped all of the way over to one side!

Remember that a tap tap has benches along both sides of the back of the truck. I happened to be sitting across from one of our interpreters, who was pregnant, and I fell on top of her! I was so worried that I had hurt her! She assured me she was ok, and we all crawled out of the tap tap. In the rain…and the mud. The very slick mud. The people from the village quickly appeared and offered to help get the truck out of the rut. It ended up taking a really long time. Gordon sent most of our group off to walk the rest of the way to Hati Coton. In the rain….and the mud. The very slick mud. Sarah and Greg fell several times, and they were pretty much covered in mud by the time we got to the village, but they laughed it off. Oh my gosh. Greg. The hat. Thankfully, after this trip, he purchased a hat like Gordon’s and looked much more fashionable.

I had managed to stay on my feet until we were walking through Hati Coton. I slipped in the mud, my feet went out from under me, and I landed on my back in the mud. The only thing that kept me from slamming my head on the ground was the backpack on my back. As I was getting up, I saw some kids from the village pointing their fingers at me and laughing loudly. I was wet, muddy, my pride and my butt hurt, and I was not in the mood to be laughed at. I turned around angrily and said, “IT’S NOT FUNNY!” Emmanuel, Gordon’s right hand man in Haiti, turned and said something to the boys in Creole. I didn’t understand what he said, but since the boys quickly scurried off, I’m assuming it was something like, “She’s a crazy lady. You better run away before she attacks.”

This was also the year that there were chickens at the mission house when we arrived. Sarah named them all. Sadly, these chickens are no longer among the living.

One day, Pierre, one of the villagers, and his wife, came to the mission house and took the chickens. Even though they were very stinky, I felt sorry for the chickens, because I knew what was going to happen to them. The next night, the ladies that fixed our meals served chicken.

As we were eating, one of the guys mentioned that they saw Pierre bringing the chickens back to the mission house. Wait. I had met these chickens?! I couldn’t eat something I had met! I was done eating chicken on that trip. I almost got to experience a cow being butchered on that trip as well, but thankfully, I was advised to turn my head as we approached the area, so I didn’t have to see it. It was a party in the village that I was glad I had not been invited to. There were other celebrations that happened in the village. The entire village attended a soccer game, and the entire village turned out for a trash pick up that Gordon organized.

Since there was a focus on building a well on this trip, I wanted to participate in this activity as well. The men in our group and men from the village had been working on the well while we were doing bible stories with the children. The Haitian men were incredibly strong and incredibly hard workers, so they had made a lot of progress. I finally convinced one of the men to let me use a shovel. He stood there rocking from foot to foot while I dug up little bitty chunks of dirt and tried to toss them out of a ditch.

I only lasted a few minutes. Not only was this REALLY hard, but I couldn’t take the waves of frustration oozing out of this man. I gave him back his shovel, hung my head, and slunk back to the mission house to find something that I could actually do.

The fourth year we went to Haiti, we worked on some construction projects and the women focused on women’s ministry. I was really excited about the women’s ministry. Some of the women who had been on previous mission trips had very close relationships with some of the women in the village. I really wanted that. It didn’t happen for me that trip, but I still enjoyed meeting the women in the village and participating in our bible studies we had with them.

I love Haiti, but one thing I do not love is the bugs. They have both scorpions and tarantulas. We had to shake out our shoes every morning before putting them on to make sure there were no scorpions hiding in them. I came out of the shower one night to find a huge tarantula chilling on the wall outside the shower.

There may have been some screaming. Our interpreter, Wendell, had convinced me that if I had been bitten, I could have died. Then he did this.

I was shocked until he admitted that he had lied to me about dying, and although tarantulas were poisonous, they did not have enough poison to actually kill someone. Very funny, Wendell. I still kept my distance.

All of the other trips to Haiti took place in the summer. This fourth year, we went at the beginning of November. Voodoo worship continues to be prevalent in Haiti, and there was a group of people in Hati Coton who participated in voodoo. There is a big voodoo celebration at this time of year. We did not feel threatened during the day, but it was a little unsettling to hear the voodoo drums when we were lying in our beds at night. To get to the bathrooms from the bunkroom in the mission house, we had to go outside to the porch, down the stairs, around the corner and into the bathroom. Since there is no electricity when the generator is turned off, it is very dark at night. I have to admit-I was always pretty jumpy if I needed to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Not only did I have to worry about stepping on tarantulas, scorpions and lizards, my middle of the night trips to the bathroom this year were accompanied by the beating of voodoo drums. I bet Stephen King could write a great novel with this information.

The fifth year was a medical mission. We had two physicians on our team, and there were three nurses/nursing students. The rest of us filled in where we were needed. Most of people on the mission team were going to stay for four days and then they were heading back to the United States. Gordon, two of the young ladies, and I were staying for another week. The medical mission went very well. We spent the first day preparing and organizing supplies.

It seemed like the whole village turned out when we opened the clinic. They couldn’t all be sick, could they? But we were giving out little bags that had soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, etc. so once that word got out, everyone found an excuse to show up.

Greg was designated as the bouncer to try to maintain some order to the process. Notice the more fashionable hat he is wearing this year.

I was in charge of giving out reading glasses. We were giving out free reading glasses, and everyone came in for glasses, whether they needed them or not.

There were some people who actually needed medical treatment, and the physicians and nurses took good care of them.

Gordon provided some entertainment for the children who were waiting.

We did the medical clinic for two days, and then most of the team had to get ready to go home. Gordon was not comfortable leaving me and the two young ladies at the mission house while he took the group to the airport, so we all went to the airport in Port-au-Prince. We said our goodbyes, and then Gordon, Wendell (our interpreter/driver), the two young ladies and I headed back to Hati Coton. This year, the political unrest in Haiti was starting to heat up. On our way back, while we were still in Port-au-Prince, some men blocked the street, stopped our car and demanded that Gordon pay them a few dollars to get through. Gordon told Wendell that he was not going to pay the money and to just keep driving. Wendell hit the gas pedal, and the men in the street scattered. Thankfully, we didn’t run over them. We managed to get to Ganthier without any more incidents. We stopped in Ganthier to get more water. Gordon told Wendell to get out of the car, get the water, and get back to the car as quickly as he could. I had never seen Gordon nervous before, so I was a little freaked out. We got the water, and once we got back to Hati Coton, Gordon visibly relaxed.

For five years, I had seen these mountains, and for five years, I had tried to get Gordon to take us up in the mountains.

I love mountains. I decided that since there were only three of us that had stayed this time, maybe my chances of convincing Gordon to take us were improved. I mentioned it to Gordon in my most strategic way. I got a “maybe,” which is more than I had achieved in the past, so I was hopeful.

We had quite a few supplies left, so one day, we went into another village and did a little mini clinic with the people there.

Since the physicians had already gone back to the US, we were limited with what we could do. One of the ladies who stayed was a nurse, so she was able to do some wound care and we were able to hand out more soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste, etc.

We enjoyed serving lunch to the children at school in Hati Coton. Some ladies in the village prepared lunch every day for the school children. They were having fish and rice. They made sure there was a little piece of fish in each serving.

We were able to spend some time in the classrooms. It was fun seeing the instruction and participating in some of the activities. We loved spending time with the kids.

Later that week, Gordon took us into the mountains! Finally, I got to go into those mountains! They were beautiful!

We saw some random horses wandering around, which was a little confusing because we didn’t see any human or homes around.

We did see some farms in the distance, so the horses must have been wandering far from home.

Unfortunately, this was our last trip to Haiti. The next year was 2020 and COVID prevented us from going. The political unrest intensified, and it has not been safe to go into Haiti since then. I really miss the people of Hati Coton and I miss spending time in the village. Life happens at a much slower pace. Coming back to the village every year, I can remember the first evening of each trip, sitting on the porch at the mission house, and just feeling so glad to be back in Haiti.

It was always so hard to say goodbye.

I believe that one of the most valuable things about travel is meeting and getting to know the people that live in the place we are visiting. We start understanding that they are people who love their families and friends, laugh, cry, hurt, go to work and go to school, just like we do. The people in Haiti are really suffering right now. The country is being run by gangs who are stealing, hurting, killing and raping innocent people. While I recognize the need for rules and regulations about immigration into our country, I am hoping and praying that we can all remember to show compassion for all people. I hope that we can remember that the United States was founded by immigrants who came for an opportunity for a chance at a better life. We need to remember that the United States has been a refuge for people who are coming from countries where they are living in horrible conditions, including extreme poverty, starvation, rape, human trafficking, and murder. When we send some of these people back to their countries, we are sending them back to these horrible conditions. I want the United States to be a country that welcomes people of all colors, cultures, religions, and beliefs. There has to be a better way.

Visiting Alaska, Again (and hopefully, again and again and again…..)

In my story about an Alaskan vacation that I posted a few weeks ago, I mentioned that Ally loved Alaska so much that, the next year, she quit her job in Virginia, packed her bags, and went to Seward, Alaska to work for Kenai-Fjord Tours (KFT). This was the tour company we used for our day whale watching cruise when we took our family vacation in Alaska.

Since my kids have grown up and have moved out of the home, I can’t go more than three months without being able to put my arms around them. There have been times that each child has lived in a different time zone, so this has resulted in quite a bit of traveling for me and often for my husband, Greg, as well. Which is not necessarily a bad thing, as far as I am concerned. I’m not sure Greg necessarily agrees.

So naturally, while Ally was living in Alaska, I had to go visit her. Greg was not able to go, so I was traveling by myself. In July, 2019, I made plans to fly into Anchorage. Ally was driving the two hours from Seward to pick me up. My flight went from St. Louis to Dallas to Anchorage. The flight from St. Louis to Dallas was uneventful. I boarded the plane in Dallas, took my assigned aisle seat and settled in. A few minutes later, the man sitting next to me asked me if I would mind changing seats with his lady friend. He said she was flying for the first time and she was nervous, and it would make her feel better if she could sit by him. I agreed, before I realized that she was sitting in a middle seat. Oh well. I didn’t mind helping them out. I moved into her seat. The flight attendant walked by and noticed that I had changed seats and asked me about it. I explained the situation to her. She seemed more concerned than I was that I had traded an aisle seat for a middle seat. I settled into my seat, and a few minutes later, the flight attendant approached me and said she had an aisle seat available and she would like for me to have an aisle seat. I gathered my things, again, and moved into the aisle seat. That was very nice of her, and I appreciated it. I settled into my new seat. A few minutes later, another passenger approached me and asked me if I would trade seats with her friend. Was this a joke? Was I on video? What was happening? This time I was smart enough to make sure I was trading my aisle seat for another aisle seat. I gathered my things, again, and moved to the new seat a few rows up. The flight attendant walked by and expressed her surprise that I had moved seats again. I explained the situation to her and assured her I was not moving again. I settled into my new seat and a few minutes later, the plane took off. When the flight attendants began serving drinks and snacks, I asked for my Coke. I don’t know what it is about flying, but I always want a Coke. When the flight attendant served my Coke, she handed me a snack box. This was not the usual bag of peanuts-this was a snack box that costs extra, something I never do. I assumed the passengers sitting next to me ordered it, so I tried to give it to them. They said that they did not order it. The flight attendant told me it was a gift to me from the flight attendants because I had been so nice and willing to trade my seats to other passengers. How about that?

Several hours later, I arrived in Anchorage and was picked up by Ally and some of her friends. I had booked a room at the Breeze Inn. The Breeze Inn is near the harbor and cruises, so it was close to where Ally was staying. Ally had been provided lodging by KFT, which was kind of a dorm room situation that she shared with three other girls, so staying with her was not an option. This is a picture of the place where Ally was living.

Ally had to work the first day, so I was on my own. Now, anyone who knows me will assume that I stayed in the hotel room, reading a book, because I was scared to go out on my own. But you would be wrong. I went down to the front desk at the hotel and asked them to suggest something for me to do. They suggested the aquarium in town. This was a bit of a walk, but I was able to walk along by the water for a big part of it, and I was able to explore the little town of Seward.

Am I a solo traveler, or what? I went to their little aquarium

and then I walked back to the hotel. I wanted to get some snacks and drinks to have in my room, so I asked the hotel staff where I could find a grocery store. It was at the other end of town in the other direction. I set out on another walk and bought my snacks. I had now explored the entire town of Seward. On my own!

One of the first things Ally and I did together was take an evening dinner cruise with KFT. Ally was not working this cruise, so she was able to just sit back and enjoy the cruise. We saw whales, eagles and puffins. It was beautiful.

The next day, Ally had to work the day cruise, so I went on the cruise with her. I was a little nervous about this because she would be working all day, so I was going to be mostly without her company while on the ship. Is this also considered solo traveling? The seating on the ships is mostly tables with booths, so I was likely going to have to sit with people I didn’t know. I quickly found a booth and burrowed myself in, hoping that no one else would sit with me. But as the boat filled up, it quickly became apparent that I would not get to keep this booth to myself. I saw a family looking for a booth, so I got up and gave them mine. I sort of wandered around the ship, hoping to find a single seat somewhere. Ally noticed me wandering around and she found a place at a table with two couples-one older couple and one young couple. Ugh. Would I be expected to make conversation? Would they be rude? Nice? Annoying? But it was fine. It was fun seeing Ally at work. She got on the speaker to give instructions to the passengers, regarding life jackets, safety procedures, food, etc. She started out with, “Hi! This is Ally from the galley!” The older lady at my table said, “Oh, she’s so cute! I wonder if her name is really Ally.” And I had the privilege of saying, “Yes. That is really her name. That is my daughter.” They were all impressed and I was now the cool one at the table. I became even cooler when, later that day, Ally brought me some cups of warm cookie pieces left over from when they baked the cookies, and I shared them with my table mates. I am never the cool one in a group, so this was a new experience for me.

Ally also took me to meet the captain. She had warned me that he could be a little gruff and that I should not be offended. But he ended up being very nice. He showed me around the wheelhouse. We didn’t stay more than a few minutes though. Ally had to get back to work, but I also think she was concerned about how long the captain could maintain his niceness.

It was really cold that day. We did see some whales, but I did not spend a lot of time outside looking at them. I have my limits where cold is concerned. The return trip was very rough. A storm was rolling in, and the waves were huge. They hand out barf bags to all of the passengers at the beginning of the cruise, but I had given mine to another passenger who needed it. After all, this was my third KFT cruise. I was seasoned and I was way beyond getting sick because of a few waves. Right? Ummm, no. It soon became apparent that I may have made a mistake in giving my bag away. I made my way to the front of the ship where the cruise workers were standing. The ship was being tossed so much that I was walking like I had been drinking at the bar for a few hours. I didn’t even have to say a word. The staff member looked at me and handed me a bag. The green coloring on face was likely his best clue. At least I was in good company. I would not have wanted to be on the cleaning crew of the ship that day.

The next day Ally was off work, so we planned on hiking the trail to Lost Lake.

This was one of her favorite hikes in the area.

This is a very scenic hike with beautiful views of mountains and high alpine terrain. It was a long hike, 13.7 miles round trip, so we got up early that morning to get started. No one else was on the trail for quite a while. The clouds were very low-in fact, we were walking in them. We could feel the mist on our faces. We couldn’t see the mountains very well, but it was kind of cool walking in the clouds.

Ally seemed tense and a little grumpy. It was early morning, and I figured maybe the coffee had not kicked in, so I just walked along quietly. Being quiet is my best defense when it comes to Ally and her coffee. Later she told me that she had been worried about running into bears, since we were the only ones on the trail. She relaxed when we started seeing more hikers. I’m glad we didn’t see any bears. We could have tried to make ourselves big to scare the bear, but between the two of us, we barely make one tall person, so I think a grizzly might have just laughed at us. And then he would have eaten us. We reached the lake at the top of the mountain. It was beautiful! It was so quiet and peaceful. We could hear birds, bees, the water running over the rocks.

We stayed at the lake for quite a while, rested, had a snack, and just enjoyed the peacefulness and beauty of the area.

Then we began hiking back down.

This was a great day! My hands were numb when we got to the car, which I don’t think is supposed to happen. I probably didn’t drink enough water, which seems to be a consistent theme for me when I hike. I guzzled the rest of the water from my water bottle, pretty soon my fingers started to tingle, and I had full use of my hands again. We went to the restaurant at the Breeze Inn and had dinner with some of Ally’s co-workers/friends that night.

The next day, Ally and I took another hike. We went on a trail called the Tonsina Trail. The trail goes through a thick spruce forest. The trees have moss on them and the whole area looks like a page from a Dr. Seuss book.

The trail took us to Resurrection Bay. We spent some time hanging out by the water and then we headed back.

This trail was a lot shorter than Lost Lake. It was three miles, in and out.

I had to go home the next day. Ally and her friends took me to Anchorage, where I stayed at a hotel near the airport and flew out early the next morning. It was hard to leave her, knowing she would be so far away, but she was loving her time in Alaska.

A few weeks later, Ally called and said she was going to leave just a few days earlier than she had originally planned, which meant the people she had planned to caravan with would not be traveling with her. She asked if I could fly out to Alaska and drive home with her. Of course! In September, 2019, I flew back to Anchorage. Ally picked me up and we started our very long drive back to Illinois. The first day, we drove out of Anchorage with plans to stop that night in White Horse in Yukon, Canada. We had not booked any hotels ahead of time because we could not be sure how far we were going to get each day. But we had some loose plans. Ally was sick with a respiratory thing, so she wasn’t feeling very travel ready, but here we were. I tried to video our trip. I’m not much of a videographer, but I made an attempt. Here is one sample of my skill. After watching this, you will understand why I did not put anymore of them in this story.

The scenery was so beautiful for most of the trip. Here are some pictures from our first day of travel.

As we approached Yukon, Canada that first day, we started searching for hotels when we were able to get cell service. We booked a room at the Days Inn in the town of Whitehorse in Yukon, Canada. When we arrived, at about 9:00 pm, we could not figure out where we were supposed to park. Ally let me out of the car, and I went into the hotel and asked the lady at the desk where we were supposed to park our car. She said there was parking in the back of the hotel, where we could park and then enter at the doors back there. I asked her if the back of the hotel was a secure area. She responded by saying, “Yes. We have video cameras back there.” We drove around to back of the hotel where there was a very dark, scary looking parking lot next to a very sketchy looking building with a bunch of trash scattered around it. We reluctantly got out of the car and went to the door. The door had no handle. It was not designed that way-the handle had been removed. Not a good sign. We tried another door, hoping it belonged to the hotel and not to a brothel or something even scarier. It turned out that it didn’t really matter what was behind that door, because we couldn’t open it anyway. It was locked and we didn’t have a key. We drove back to the front of the hotel and told the lady at the front desk that we were unable to get into the doors in the back, and that we did not feel safe back there. She said, “Oh yes. You can get in. And it is safe-we have video cameras back there.” Somehow, just knowing that my murder will be recorded does not really offer me a lot of comfort. Ally drove back around to the scary parking lot and I went through the hotel to the back door with the front desk lady. She opened the door, we both stepped out, and she let the door shut behind her. She turned around to open the door to show me that we could get in and she said, “Oh. Someone stole our handle.” She went to the other door and said, “You can get in this door.” I told her we couldn’t get in because it was locked. She took out a key, unlocked the door, turned to me and said, “No. It is not locked.” I looked at her, paused for a second, blinked a couple of times, and said, “Well, it’s not now. You just unlocked it.” She left the door unlocked and went back into the hotel. So this door, that was locked for the guests’ safety and protection from the very sketchy area at the back of the hotel, was now unlocked so that the murderers could get into the hotel. I went back to the car and told Ally that I did not feel safe staying in this hotel. We got in the car and drove around the town and found another hotel. The guy at the front desk said they had one room left, but it was very small. We said that was fine. He wasn’t kidding. It was a very tiny room. But at least we didn’t feel like we were going to be murdered in our sleep. To be honest, I don’t think the murderer would have been able to fit in this tiny room with us.

We got up the next morning to continue our trip. We stopped at Watson Lake, at the Sign Post Forest, before we left the province of Yukon. The Sign Post Forest is a collection of over 85,000 signs left by travelers and highway workers. Kind of weird, but interesting.

We managed to find a plate from Illinois.

We entered British Columbia, Canada that day.

The views were beautiful here as well, although it did not seem quite as mountainous as the day before.

We stopped to take some pictures by the Liard River. The Liard River is a significant river in northwestern Canada. It runs through British Columbia, Yukon, and the Northwest Territories. It is named for the “liards” which are the poplar trees that grow along its course.

We stayed at Fort Nelson, British Columbia that night. To be honest, I don’t really remember much about where we stayed, so everything must have gone pretty smoothly.

The next day, we were planning to drive through Banff in Alberta, Canada. I had heard about how beautiful Banff was, and I was very excited to be going there. Everyone was right-it was beautiful.

We were not able to find a place to stay in Banff, so we drove on to Jasper and found a place to stay there. Jasper surprised me. It was a cute little area, and the hotel we stayed in was very nice. And expensive. The dinner we had was expensive. Everything was expensive in this area. But I am determined to go back to the gorgeous Banff/Jasper area to hike and backpack. That is a trip that is very high on my very long list of things I want to do.

The next day, we crossed the border into the US in Montana. We arrived at a hotel late that night somewhere in the US. I don’t remember where. The next day, we planned to drive the rest of the way back home. However, we ended up stopping at my friend Robin’s house in Kansas City, MO. We had been driving for over 12 hours and we simply could not drive another six hours that day. As usual, Robin and her husband, Brad, welcomed us into their home, where we stayed the night and woke up more refreshed to drive the last six hours home. (This was not the first time Robin had unexpectedly become my hostess for the night-that might be another story to tell later). We arrived home, very tired of driving, but feeling proud that we had accomplished such a long road trip.

Tips:

I highly recommend the Breeze Inn in Seward. The staff was really nice, the price was reasonable, and the rooms are clean. You can find them at www.breezeinn.com. Their phone number is 907-224-5237. There is a restaurant attached to the Inn.
The Lost Lake Trail is about five miles outside of Seward. It is also called the Primrose Trail at the north end. It is a popular hike for backpacking as well. I think this trail would make a great overnight backpacking trip.
The Tonsina trail is one of Seward’s most popular trails. There is a $5.00 parking fee at the trail head on Lowell Point road. In late summer, you may see salmon swimming up Tonsina Creek. The trail is open year round to hikers.
The name of the aquarium in Seward is Alaska Sealife Center. You can find more information about it at http://www.alaskasealife.org.
It is a LONG drive from Anchorage, Alaska to Southern Illinois. But the scenery is beautiful, and you can get lots of ideas of places you want to come back to and spend more time.
Jasper National Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is the largest national park in the Canadian Rockies. It is known for its beauty, wildlife, and unique attractions.
Banff National Park is Canada’s first national park. It is part of the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is a great area to camp, hike and backpack. It is also known for its beauty and wildlife.

Packing Tips

I am going to change direction just a little for this story. I have had someone ask me for packing tips, so I thought I would share some of my packing experiences and tips. I have been researching and practicing minimalist packing for the last couple of years. I still don’t have it completely mastered, but I am getting better with each trip I take. These are some things I have learned so far.

Tip #1:

Decide what kind of suitcase you want to take.

These tips are about minimalist packing. If you want to check a big bag, you can probably take whatever you want. If that is the way you travel, then you probably don’t need these tips. Or if you’re going on a trip that you will need extra gear, like a camping/hiking trip, you will have to check a bag. But if you want to avoid checking a bag, and you want to travel light, then you may get some ideas from my mistakes and what I have found helpful. My goal in packing light is to take only a backpack that is light enough, that even if I can’t check into my lodging right away, I can carry it comfortably while I am exploring. I have not accomplished this yet, but I get closer every time I travel.

I have traveled with a small, rolling, carry on suitcase.

The advantage to this is you have a little more room. There are disadvantages, though. If you buy the cheap seats on the plane, which I do most of the time, then you are often the last to board. This means no room left in the overhead bins and they make you check your bag. If you have a connecting flight, they will check it through to your final destination, meaning you still run the risk of your luggage not making it there when you do. Then there is the time it takes you to go to baggage claim to get it, which cuts into your vacation time. But I do sometimes take a rolling bag if I know I’m going to be able to check into my lodging right away, or if arrangements have been made for pick up at the airport and someone else will be worrying about my luggage.

Another advantage of a rolling suitcase is that you can carry a small backpack as well.

It’s hard to carry both a big pack with all of your things, and a smaller backpack. I find this particularly useful if I need to work during the trip. Working on a vacation is not advised, but if I’m traveling for a conference or if I have a long plane trip and want to use the time to get work done, I will bring my computer and some files, so bringing a smaller backpack to keep with me on the plane is useful. I can also use the backpack to carry other things that I want to be easily accessible on the plane-a book, snacks, ear buds, etc.

I have traveled with a travel pack. Mine is from Cotopaxi. I really like it.

I still had to check mine one time when the flight attendants would not make the passengers get their coats and small backpacks out of the overhead bins so that there was more room for larger luggage. My daughter was carrying the same bag. She refused to check her bag, stuffing it under the seat in front of her as far as it would go, and then propping her feet on it. Her body posture and the look on her face deterred the flight attendants from repeating their directive to check her bag. I wish I would have done that, because my backpack ended up being burned and torn up in the cargo hold.

The first time I used the travel pack was not very successful, however. I managed to get everything in it, but I packed it too full. It was so heavy, if I stood up straight, I ran the risk of falling backward. I had to walk stooped over the entire trip. I looked like a turtle. I have taken it on more trips after this one, and I have managed to pack it lighter so that it is more manageable.

Packing cubes are sometimes helpful. They work really well, but I only use them in my rolling suitcase. I tend to use them if I’m going some place where I need more clothes, such as a conference. I don’t use them with my travel bag because they make it too heavy. They can be used to pack down clothes so you can fit more in your suitcase. They are also good to organize things in your suitcase.

Tip #2:

Pack clothes that you can wear more than once. I have really struggled with this, so I understand how this can be a stretch for a lot of people. Let me explain. I have worked with children during my entire career. Now, children are great, but they do weird, and sometimes gross, stuff. For example, they will pick their nose. And if you’re not fast enough, whatever treasure they find will become a part of your outfit. Then there are the biters, spitters, pukers, and occasional lickers. I am not wearing those clothes a second time without washing them.

If you typically throw all your clothes in the laundry at the end of the day, wearing your clothes a second time without washing them could be difficult for you. But on vacation, hopefully no one should be spitting on you, wiping boogers on you, or licking you. If these things have happened on your vacations, you may want to get some help planning your next trip. Here are some ideas for making it more possible to pack fewer clothes.

Think about pants that you can wear to explore or hike, that will also look appropriate to wear to a nicer restaurant if paired with a dressier shirt.

Consider clothes made of merino wool. You can wear this fabric multiple times without washing and it does not smell bad. I know wool sounds like a winter thing, but you can wear merino wool in the summer. It is lightweight, moisture wicking, odor resistant, and quick drying. It has natural UV protection, and it can adapt to your body temperature, keeping you cool when it is warm and warm when it is cold.

Pack one dressy shirt/dress to wear anytime you need to dress up a little. No one will know that you have worn that shirt to multiple events. And if anyone notices, who cares?

Limit the number of pairs of shoes you pack. For most types of vacations, you can take one pair of comfortable shoes for when you’re exploring, and one pair of dressier shoes, if needed. Wear your biggest pair of shoes on the plane. You may not be the most fashionable person on the plane, but it’s easier to wear them than it is to carry them. Of course, depending on the type of vacation, you may need specific shoes, so you may need more than just the two pair. But still try to wear the biggest shoes on the plane. For example, my daughters and I wore our hiking boots on the plane when we were going on a big hiking trip. Not the best look, but they would have taken up a lot of room in our carry on suitcases.

I will also try to wear some of my bulkiest clothes on the plane. For example, if I’m taking a pair of jeans, I will usually wear the jeans on the plane to save room in my suitcase.

I tend to wear a lot of leggings and/or athletic pants on trips. They pack really small, and they can be worn with a variety of styles of shirts, sweaters or dresses.

If you are traveling someplace warm, pack one sweater/jacket/sweatshirt that you can use anytime you get cold. Actually, this item rarely makes it in my suitcase/backpack. I freeze in the airports, on planes, or pretty much anywhere, so I am usually wearing this item of clothing.

Packing for a cold weather trip is a little trickier, but try to pack as few bulky items as possible. Pack some lighter shirts that you can wear under a bulkier sweater, so you can wear the sweater multiple times.

I learned a lot from reading the book Wander Woman by Beth Santos. I like many of her recommendations. One recommendation she gives is taking a maxi dress. I will probably not take this recommendation. A maxi dress is not a friend of a four foot, ten and a half inch woman. It’s more of a tripping hazard. However, if you are an average sized woman, I think this is a good recommendation. The dress is comfortable and appropriate to wear for most places and events. This is her book if you want to check it out. There is a lot of useful information in this book.

The laundromat is your friend. If I am not staying in a place with a washer and dryer, I always find the closest laundromat. Even if you are staying in a hotel with laundry service, they charge by the piece and it is usually very expensive, so you still may want to find a laundromat. If you use a laundromat, you can pack half of the clothes you need, wash them halfway through your trip, and wear them again the second half of your trip. Besides, finding and using a laundromat can be an adventure in itself.

An alternative to the laundromat is a bar of laundry soap, so you can wash out clothes in your hotel room. I almost always bring one with me (actually, I bring half of one because the one I ordered was really big). One bar, or half bar, of laundry soap will last several trips.

Tip #3:

Consider minimizing the health and beauty products you bring.

Can you use the shampoo/conditioner at the hotel?

Will the hotel have body moisturizer and soap you can use?

If you’re staying in a hostel rather than a hotel, you may have to pack more of your own things. However, I would check out the hostel’s website to see what they offer. Sometimes they have a body soap dispenser/shampoo and conditioner dispensers available in the shower. You can often rent a towel from the hostel, which is well worth the couple of dollars you spend rather than having to pack your own and then trying to figure out what to do with the wet towel when you pack up to move or go home.

Can you reduce the number of facial care products you use, just while you’re on vacation? For example, if you use a different moisturizer for day and night, is there one that would work for both for a week or so?

Do your products come in a sample size that you can use rather than packing the larger size?

If you have to bring your own shampoo or other products, buy some small travel bottles and fill those. That should be enough for your trip, and you will be able to put them in a carry on and get through security.

If you are flying within the US, consider putting your medications in a daily pill container rather than carrying the individual prescription bottles. TSA does not require the prescription bottles. However, if you are traveling internationally, it is generally recommended to have the medication in the original prescription bottles.

Tip #4:

Bring as little jewelry as possible. I have brought necklaces, multiple pairs of earrings, and bracelets, and they never make it out of my suitcase. Now I only bring the jewelry I’m wearing on my body when I board the plane.

Tip #5:

Be sure to leave some room in your suitcase for souvenirs. There’s nothing worse than buying some great souvenirs and then having difficulty figuring out how you’re going to get them home.

Choose your souvenirs carefully. When you go to a place you’ve never been before, I know it is tempting to buy a lot of souvenirs. But I have learned to really cut down on the number of souvenirs I buy. I try to buy things that are very meaningful to that area-what that area is known for. For example, I bought lace in Bruges, Belgium,

and a small tile in Lisbon, Portugal.

Both of these were small and fit easily in my suitcase. A lot of times, if nothing else really impresses me, I will buy a sticker or a magnet that represents the area I’m in.

If you know there is one type of souvenir you always buy, be sure to plan for that in your packing. For example, I know I almost always buy a sweatshirt or a t-shirt on a trip, so I leave room in my bag and plan to add the new shirt to my wardrobe for the trip. Here are a few of the shirts I have collected.

I wear these all the time. My husband calls me a walking atlas.

My family makes fun of me because I tend to pack a lot of books when I travel. I should really start using a Kindle, but I have always had a very strong attachment to actual books. But if you like to read your books on a Kindle, it saves a ton of room. If you have something that you feel is very important to bring, just make sure you plan for that and cut back in other areas so that you have room. I love to visit a bookstore wherever we go, so I will bring fewer books from home and I will read my new books during the trip. But I have to remember to save room in my bag to bring those new books home. I also like to pack my sketch pad and pencils, so I have to leave room for those as well. As you can see, packing is very much different for each person, so you have to decide what is important for you to bring and then make room for it.

Tip #6:

Keeping your things safe.

I pack a very small travel purse in my suitcase. I’ve had this little purse for years. It has a long strap, so I can wear it across my body, carry it in front, and keep my hand on it when I am out exploring. It would be very difficult for someone to take this from me or for a pickpocket to get into it.

You may want to find a small purse that is more fashionable than this one. I’ve had it for over 30 years. I guess I may want to find a small purse that is more fashionable too. A positive to carrying this purse is that no one is going to try to steal it because they want the purse itself.

Having a small purse forces me to carry only a few things with me while out exploring. If the worst happens and my purse is stolen, I have additional money in the safe at the hotel.

When the purse is packed in my suitcase, I keep my wallet, passport, driver’s license, etc. in my carry on backpack.

I have also carried a little bigger travel bag while exploring. It has room for my wallet and a few other things. It also has a strap that goes across my body and rests in front. Having a strap that goes across my body and being able to carry your bag on the front of your body is very important when you are in an unfamiliar area.

Make a copy of your passport and/or license before you leave home. Put the copy in a different bag than where you are keeping your passport and/or license. You can also take a picture of your passport and/or license to have on your phone. I do both. I like having that paper copy somewhere other than with me.

If you are bringing cash, consider separating the cash and packing it in different bags. However, if I am checking a bag, I’m not going to put cash in my checked bag, in case it gets lost or opened by security. Once you get to the hotel, you can put some of your cash in the safe. Same thing goes for credit cards. If you are going to take more than one, you should consider keeping one in the hotel safe in case your primary one gets stolen.

I know this blog was not that exciting, but I hope these tips help someone with their packing. I am envious of those who can travel with just a little backpack, and I’m going to continue working on it myself. I may have more tips to share as I learn.

Happy traveling!