TRAVEL! Where?

Parent Cafe
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<p>In my short time on the Earth, I’ve been blessed to have been given the opportunity to travel (many times for free, as geologists by nature get to travel a lot) quite often. </p>

<p>Most of my travels have been field-work related, which is excellent to get you off the beaten path of most travelers. </p>

<p>For a totally relaxing trip, I totally recommend Puerto Rico. I’d personally stay away from San Juan and the northeastern beaches though and go to Ponce and the southwestern forest. I’d also recommend spending a day in the rainforest, it’s one thing I really wanted to do while I was there but didn’t have time. Puerto Rico was truely one of the few field excursions that was 100% relaxing and had something for everyone!</p>

<p>Another great field excursion for me was in western Ireland. I haven’t been to eastern Ireland, but western Ireland has numerous landmarks that are must-sees and of course has the beautiful country-side unique to the British Isles!</p>

<p>Things to see in western Ireland include the Cliffs of Moher, the Burren, Croagh Patrick (mountain St. Patrick climbed barefoot), the Aran Islands, and Galway. I spent 6 weeks stomping through the fields of western Ireland with a few days to check out the typical tourist localities (which also happen to be geologically fascinating) and had a blast, it was the defining trip to make me decide to attend graduate school!</p>

<p>For a truely life-changing experience, I believe everyone should experience a third world country first-hand! </p>

<p>Probably the most life-changing event of my life was when my family decided to travel to Calcutta, India for a short-term missions trip to help out Mother Teresa’s Sisters of Charity for a month (my mother and I only stayed two weeks). Spending two weeks in Calcutta was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever had to go through, seeing poverty beyond my expectations and absolute filth! At the time, it was hard, but now I realized why my family made the trip…to help others much less fortunate than ourselves and to make us experience first-hand how people in poverty live in third world countries. </p>

<p>Though my experience in Calcutta was horrible, the rest of my family can’t wait to get the funds to go back to help out more! </p>

<p>I’d write a better synopsis of the experience, but I’m sick and probably should get rest…</p>

<p>But before I go a few honorable mentions:</p>

<p>Moab, UT
Nashville, TN
Memphis, TN
Hiking anywhere along the Appalachian Trail (but preferably the section that goes through the Blue Ridge)
Toronto, ON
Barcelona, Spain
Bangkok, Thailand</p>

<p>And one place I saw from the airport and can’t wait to actually visit:</p>

<p>Zurich, Switzerland</p>

<p>Oh yeah…and I really want to honeymoon in Costa Rica! My dad recently did a missions trip there and absolutely loved it!</p>

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<p>We had a house in Kenya. Not in Karen, but in Nairobi, near the Muthaiga Country Club (if you’re familiar with “White Mischief” or “Out of Africa.”) We lived there from 1988 to 1992 and for best-years-of-my-life it was right up there. You asked for stories so here goes. </p>

<p>Living in a place gives you more freedom to travel and the ability to go more than once to a favorite spot, which was wonderful. You can read about the key spots – definitely worth seeing — such as Kenya’s Masai Mara and Tanzania’s Ngorongoro Crater — in travel books so I will tell a story about a less visited spot. We used to drive from Nairobi to Lake Naivasha to stay at a small hotel on the water’s edge with our sons and another expat family. The drive alone was spectacular, since the road overlooks the Great Rift Valley, cradle of mankind and all. You can spend a peaceful weekend doing nothing but reading books by a swimming pool or gazing out at the lake, watching men fish and hippos rise up and yawn. But you can also hire someone to take you out to a lake island for a picnic. Sounds idyllic, no? We piled kids and picnic baskets into a boat the first time and hired someone to take us out to the island, keeping little hands out of the water to avoid the hippos and crocs along the way. From the boat, you can see that the island has no buildings or inhabitants other than small herds of giraffe and zebra grazing; we were the only visitors. It felt like something out of a story book — a picnic alone on an island with flat-topped acacia trees and the zebra and giraffe …and it would have been lovely had the reality of the place not sunk in after we got off the boat and started looking for a spot to picnic. A spot under a tree? No, the acacia trees drop wicked two-inch thorns and they were everywhere. The clear area? Whoops. Herds of animals are beautiful but they have bodily functions, if you know what I mean. Big piles of giraffe and zebra poop. Like a minefield. We scurried back to the lakeshore and ate there and were pretty happy when the boat came back an hour and half later to pick us up. That night we were eating dinner at the hotel and watched a mother hippo and baby come out of the lake to graze near the veranda where we were eating and then slowly plod back to the water. </p>

<p>And those gorgeous photos of the thousands of flamingoes at Lake Nakuru? It is an amazing sight when they take flight and if you drive up to the lake at dusk you will see water buffalo and perhaps, a leopard on the prowl. But be prepared for the smell when you get to the lake shore and get out to take your photos. Tons and tons of guano, you see. </p>

<pre><code>One of the things I could have written on the “what do you regret” thread is that we never did get around to bringing the boys back to Africa when they were old enough to appreciate it more. They both came along on shorter excursions to Johannesburg, Cape Town and the wine country there, Zimbabwe, and the Seychelles but they don’t remember too much unfortunately.

We lived in Russia for a few years also, but those stories will have to wait.
</code></pre>

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<p>I’ve been to Haiti 24 times in the past 8 years. I don’t recommend it as a travel destination.</p>

<p>We also recently visited cheers in Paradise.</p>

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<p>jazzymom,</p>

<p>Parts of Africa sound absolutely wonderful! I would love to see it in the raw, so to speak. I have only been there once and that was for a few hours in Casablanca, Morocco when the boat we were sailing on, the SS Independence, back in 1964, made a “port of call” visit. With all that continent offers, I feel deprived! – but maybe one day…</p>

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<p>One of my favorite places is Wales. There is a wildness about the scenery that conjures up visions of Merlin. The fact that they have been dominated for a thousand years by the English, yet most still speak Welsh (as a first or second language) is amazing to me. </p>

<p>My next favorite place is London. I never tire of that city. (“He who is tired of London, is tired of life” rings so true.) And the best place in the city is the annex to the British Library. Standing in a place with the Guttenberg Bible, the Magna Carta, annotated musical scores in the hand of Mozart and Handel - it is truly, truly breathtaking.</p>

<p>As for interesting places that don’t quite make people’s cut-off: Oxford, Georgia, the original home of Emory University. The site of the filming of the TV show “In the Heat of the Night”. It’s got homes straight out of the Civil War, with the cemetery where both Union and Confederate soldiers are buried. It’s a homey, everyone-knows-everyone place. It defines small town southern living, with its mixture of truly educated next to truly not.</p>

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<p>My family is Hungarian, so I’ve gone there often to visit relatives and my family usually stops over to see another country as long as we’re on that side of the pond. This year we went to Transylvania (which no Hungarian would call Romania, of course) which was really beautiful.
As far as favorite places go, I am very partial to the Lakes Region in New Hampshire, most notably Lake Winnipesaukee, the Catalinas around Tucson, Arizona, and the gorgeous skiing available in the Rocky mountains in Northern Colorado/Wyoming. Outside the US my favorite place is Australia because it has everything I like about the US and Europe mixed together, plus it’s very nice weather and everyone’s so incredibly kind. As my reason to be there was visiting a studying abroad sister and I don’t want to do the exact same thing, I have my sights set on New Zealand in two semesters for my own adventures. I can’t wait! :)</p>

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<p>I’ve lived in Japan twice, and been to every major spot as far north as Tokyo and as far south as the southern tip of Kyushu.</p>

<p>And it all looks the same. The Japanese have the unique ability to make every city (with a few exceptions) look like the same concrete monsters.</p>

<p>Ugh.</p>

<p>So far my favorite trip was Washington, DC. How domestic.</p>

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<p>We go back to Washington DC again and again. There’s so much to do and see, and the numerous public museums and sites (which are free) make it an excellent value. We’ve gone as a couple and with extended family and have enjoyed it every time. Haven’t run out of things to see yet.</p>

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<p>I would like to go to Wales.</p>

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<p>Excuse me Digmedia:What the heck were you doing in Slovakia?</p>

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<p>Family is leaving for Playa del Carmen, Mexico tomorrow for a few days. I love the Yucatan but this will be my first time in Playa. We usually cruise to Cozumel but we haven’t spent much time here. It will be hot but fun I’m sure.</p>

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<p>Umm…ive been everywhere in the US except for the Mid-South and Midwest (west of Illinois).</p>

<p>Internationally, Ive been to England, all over France, all over Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Canada, Holland, Germany and the South Pacific.</p>