Ordinary and Not: A Run-Down Home

At the Board Meeting in Slovenia

Eight Countries, Ten Weeks

(The Great Race it wasn't)

1) ITALY
Rome - 7 nites
Florence - 7
Highlight: Michelangelo's David - not an ounce of disappointment from over-saturation in the media. The cathedral in Florence and Underground Crypt at St. Peters at the Vatican.
Significant memory: meeting the two Aussie girls from Australia. One received a call that her mother was killed in a car accident.
A day with three generations of Italians in their olive orchard and simple villa.
Riding on cobblestones on a motorcycle (it wasn't a Vespa; bigger bigger bigger!)

2) SCOTLAND
Edinborough - 3 nites
Melrose - 4
Glasgow - 3
Isle of Arran, Lochranza - 8
Highlights: hiking with Sandra from Germany, 11 miles in the rain and wind. Loved it! Seeing Haley Berry in a movie shoot. The friendly smiling Scots. Riding a city bus with the school children!!
Significant memory: the Melrose Youth Hostel, in big bold red letters, had more older people staying at it than any hostel encountered. Met absolutely unforgettable real-life people. "A Diversion" - Phyllis and I took this incredibly long out-of-the-way detour, called a DIVERSION. We believed it was meant for walkers. It was not; it was meant for cars! We walked four miles out of our way to end up right back where we started! While catching our breath, a horse decided to attack. He actually stepped on the corner of my shoe - partially grazing my foot. The charming Russian professor, the expert in Leo Tolstoy, ran the other way while the horse had my backpack in his teeth (with apple inside). So much for academics!

3) ENGLAND
London - 4 nites
Highlight: the streets of London. My sister married a Brit and she has lived here. I missed her.
Significant memory: hostel from Hell. Free entry into Madame Tussauds - lots of laughs and photos. Dinner in St. Martin in the Field crypt. The history of Parliament and Westminster Abbey... Darwin buried in a church...

4) NETHERLANDS
Amsterdam - 5 nites
Highlight: Van Gogh Museum. His father a minister. Always been the allure...
Significant memory: Dave's Coffee Connection and Dave. A spirited entrepreneur.
Red Light District, men, drugs and drunks.
Anne Frank House. We walked on the same streets where people were rounded up by the Nazis.

5) GERMANY
Augsburg and Munich - 2 nites
Highlight: Oktoberfest - the energy, singing with the Swedes to a German band playing John Denver.
Significant memory: running into Travis (again); he was visiting whiskey distilleries in Scotland; I learned to appreciate the Scottish distillery.
Riding the rails home with mostly locals from Oktoberfest.
Dachau Concentration Camp - profound to stand in the square where 1000s stood for roll call and asundry cruelties. Standing by the blood wall and hedge where people were shot execution style. The endurance of the human spirit is beyond expression for it is eternal and internal.

6) AUSTRIA
Salzburg - 2 nites
St. Gilgen - 2
Highlight: a wonderful hostel with large private room, bathroom, view, and television (CNN English); huge common area.
Significant memory: Phyllis and I went our separate ways between Salzburg and St. Gilgen. After traveling together for five weeks, I had to re-discover my solo traveler strength. It was a nurturing and growing balance of five weeks with a friend and five weeks alone.
The music-less Sound of Music tour. We had to be the only group of the entire tourist season that had no DVD or audio on the Sound of Music tour. The tour guide felt horrible and was profusely apologetic and frustrated (in addition, he couldn't sing); it was not his company or bus. Hey, things happen...

7) SLOVENIA
Ljubljana - 4 nites
Highlight: meeting up with Joni's friends from Rotary. They live part-year in Ljubljana.
I love Ljbljana - there is a river ambience; it is safe, comfortable, inviting, romantic. It is a shared memory with oldest daughter because she as well, has visited and loves it.
Significant memory: approaching a man from the Netherlands and sharing several hours of walk and talk.
The funniest life-size display of men in suits, board members.
Watching and listening to the noise-interactive Slovenian street dancing.

8) CROATIA
Zagreb - 4 nites
Zadar - 1
Plitvice National Park - 2
Split - 5
Dubrovnik - 5
Highlight: hypnotic sea pipes in Zadar
Significant memories: running into Su Jin again on a most unlikely corner not in Old Towne, the colors of Plitvice Lakes, private accommodations vs hostels.
Spending the last two days of the ten weeks with Phyllis and Yellowstone Kathy and her friend Jean. We rendezvoused in Dubrovnik and shared the all-day boat to three islands (with wine in day-packs). When we met 2 seasons ago in Yellowstone, who could have forseen a joint travel venture in Croatia?

It was a fine finish to my trip.

Along the blue Dalmatian Coast on the bus to the airport, I was surprised at my overwhelm of emotion. It was the end to a trip that won't happen again in this manner, in this style. I am privileged to have journeyed in the way and with the people I did; once again, riding alongside, sneaking into, sharing life stories with, and in a setting generally reserved for the young.

All was not easy, but all was sacred...

I wouldn't change a thing. It is not the way for most people of my generation to travel anymore, but it was my way. The way that allowed me to take ten weeks and the way that I could interact and be fed by others journeying along life's pathway.