My Most Memorable Trips

I travel a lot. I have visited some amazing places and seen, and photographed, lots of wonderful wildlife.

But of all the trips I have taken, three stand out as particularly memorable. And none involved beautiful landscapes or wildlife.

The first memorable trip took me to Spain, where I walked and hiked 50-some miles of the 500-mile Camino de Santiago. Although not a religious person, I was very moved by the experience. Pilgrims first walked the Camino in the early 9th century. 

The Way of St. James takes two routes. One begings in France, the other in Spain. My group took the Spanish route, beginning in the Basque city of Bilbao. Both routes end at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia. Along the way, we saw that our route was marked by scallop shells, either on the ground as in this photograph, painted on wooden signs or carved and painted on concrete pillars.

Walking either of the routes in full takes from 30 to 35 days. I met pilgrims from Italy, Australia and several other countries. I saw a man walking the Camino on crutches. This was a spiritual experience I would like to repeat. I think I'm too old to attempt the entire route, but doing 50 or so miles of the Camino definitely appeals to me.

My second memorable trip was a visit to the ancient pyramids and the Sphinx of Egypt. I have wanted to visit Egypt for several decades, and last year I finally got the chance to go. I wish I had been given more time to photograph the sites, but we had a lot to see and long distances to cover, so I made the most of the limited opportunities I had. Standing inside the tomb of a king who ruled his country more than 3,000 years ago was an amazing experience. The brightly decorated walls held incredible works of art. Walking in the Valley of the Kings, despite the rushed visit, was spectacular. We also visited the ancient temple at Luxor, as well as the temple of the female pharaoh Hatshepshut. I would love to return to Egypt on a photographic excursion.

Entrance to Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp

The third trip that will always be with me, and that had the greatest impact, is a trip to Berlin and Oswiecim, Poland. In Berlin my group visited sites connected to the development and implementation of Nazi Germany's efforts to eliminate all Jewish people, as well as others considered unworthy of life, from Europe. In Poland, we spent several days learning about the Holocaust, visiting the two main Auschwitz camps on in-depth tours, and learning about the ongoing work to preserve not just the camps, but the belongings of prisoners that were left behind when the camps were liberated in January 1945. I don't think I will return to Auschwitz, as I shared the experience with a wonderful group of people and I doubt I could find a better group of people. The trip was mentally and physically tiring. 

I found that I had a love/hate relationship with Auschwitz. I hate what happened in those camps, but I found myself drawn to the main camp during our free time to explore on our own. I valued the time to wander on my own, to photograph things that had meaning to me, and to reflect. I wish there had been opportunity for self-exploration of the bigger camp at Birkenau.

I love visiting Yellowstone National Park. I love visiting Kenya and Tanzania. I know I will always return to those places. But the three trips described above have had the greatest impact on me. 

And that, I believe, is one of the greatest things to be gained from travel. I don't go somewhere just to sit on a beach. I love visiting places that leave a lasting impact on me, whether it is the location's incredible beauty, unique wildlife, or an experience that makes me think, educates me and creates life-long memories. 

The Joys of Travel

I love to travel. And my travels have brought opportunities to do some things I never have done before.

Here are some of my top experiences (in no special order).

• Ride a camel (in Jordan and in Morocco at sunset)
• Go snowshoeing in Yellowstone National Park
• Touch a baby elephant
• Get 'kissed' by a Rothschild giraffe
• Have tea with a Bedouin family
• Fall asleep to the sounds of lions roaring, hyenas laughing and hippos snorting
• Hear wolves howling from both sides of a road
• Ride in a helicopter over northern Kenya with the side door open
• Visit the Sphinx and the pyramids of Giza, Egypt
• Stand just yards away from a mother grizzly bear and her two cubs
• Do a service project at Auschwitz death camp
• Visit the Church of the Nativity in the Palestinian Territory
• Ride in a restored, hot pink 1957 Chevrolet in Havana, Cuba 
• Walk on Omaha Beach, France, scene of the D-Day landings in 1944
• Sit among a large group of gelada monkeys in Ethiopia
• Watch a tiger from just a few yards away
• See two lionesses catch and kill a wildebeest (not something I want to see again)
• Spend days learning about the Auschwitz death camps and going behind the scenes to learn about preservation and archive efforts
• Be in a 4x4 vehicle as it was chased by an angry bull elephant
• Live in a private home with a Cuban family
• Stand just a few feet above polar bears in Churchill, Canada
• Serve as a perch for meerkats in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana
• Tour Highclere Castle, aka Downton Abbey
• Photograph endangered Ethiopian wolves
• Visit the American Military Cemetery in Normandy, France
• See the aurora borealis in far northern Canada
• Visit Jerusalem's Western Wall and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher
• Complete 50 miles of the Camino de Santiago in Spain
• Walk on a glacier in New Zealand
• Visit the Wansee Center, where Heydrich, Eichmann and their fellow Nazis planned the 'final solution' to rid Europe of all Jews
• Stick my foot into the Jordan River in Israel, then see the river again from the Jordan side
• Walk among the magnificent ruins of the ancient city of Petra
• Visit ancient Roman ruins in Turkey

Yes, it's expensive and sometimes exhausting to reach some of these places. But the experiences I have had while traveling are priceless. My travels also have allowed me to make some good friends. I can't wait to see what 2020 will bring.

19th Century Wisdom

The great 19th century American author Mark Twain once wrote:

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

I believe this statement is just as true now -- perhaps even more so -- than when it was published in 1869, in his book The Innocents Abroad. We now have a president who seems bent on curtailing America's involvement with the rest of the world, and who has already taken steps to limit the programs set in place by his predecessor to increase people-to-people interactions between Americans and Cubans.

I am a well-traveled person. I have visited Africa several times, as well as Europe and the Middle East. I haven't yet made it to Asia or South America, but those places are on my list of places I hope to visit. I learn something and I make friends wherever I go. I have Facebook friends -- people I have met in person -- from Turkey, Russia, Ireland, Kenya, Scotland, England, Germany, Costa Rica, Spain, Chile, Botswana and France.

By visiting these and other countries, I have gained a better understanding of other cultures and people. I am more informed when I see a news story about something that happens in one of those countries. When I heard about another attack on a French police officer on the Champs Elysees, I knew where that is because I walked down that well-known Paris boulevard a month ago. When I heard about a military action against protesters on Istanbul's Taksim Square, I can relate because I was there just two weeks previously. When a story surfaced about a knife attack at Jerusalem's Western Wall, I can see the wall in my mind, as I visited Israel three years ago.

Travel provides a real life education and broadens one's horizons. It has increased my self-confidence and ability to be flexible and to take things as they come. The rest of the world doesn't necessarily do things the way Americans do. Although I usually travel with a group, I also spend time exploring on my own. Yes, a friend and I were lost in Istanbul; neither of us knows a word of Turkish. But we found our way. 

Traveling makes me see more similarities and fewer differences in people regardless of where they live. People care about the same things regardless of where they call home: family, education, food, shelter and safety.  Don't we all want those things, regardless of where we live? 

I travel with a variety of companies and for a variety of reasons: photography, adventure/hiking and just plain tourism. I wish more Americans had the opportunity to travel abroad and experience other cultures. One culture is not 'less than' or better than another. Our American isn't better than the cultures of Peru or Kenya or France. Learning about other countries and cultures can broaden our horizons and make us better informed citizens of the world. And the more we know about other lands, the less reason there is to fear them.

The People You Meet

I travel for the opportunity to visit new places, to learn about different countries, people and cultures, and to be able to photograph these places.

My computer hard drive is filled with tens of thousands of digital images. But one of the things that stands out from my travels, even years after my return home, is the people I have encountered. I'm far from being a 'people person,' preferring my solitude and quiet to being in the thick of things. But every so often, I meet some memorable people during my travels.

I am still in touch via Facebook with my guide from my first trip to Kenya in 2014. We hope, his schedule permitting, to meet when I am again in Nairobi this summer. And I remember the conversations I had with some Russian women in Moscow when I lived there for a few months in 1999. One was an old lady sitting on a cement wall near a McDonald's restaurant. She was holding a sign asking for money to help feed her very old dogs, who rested near her feet on a piece of cardboard. I remember a brief conversation with another older woman near a famous Moscow convent. She was feeding a stray dog a cheese sandwich. When I told her that I would like to buy a bag of dog food for her from a nearby grocery store, after explaining that I carried dog food with me to help Moscow's many homeless dogs, she declined. She explained that while she lived on a measly pension, she wanted to help as best she could, and that whatever she did had to come from her.

I also remember sitting on a bench near the sea in Split, Croatia, during some free time. An older woman asked whether she could join me. In her broken English, she told me about life under the communist government of the former Yugoslavia. When she learned that I speak Russian, she recited a poem in Russian that she had been forced to learn while in school.

More recently in Ireland, I was in the small coffee shop of my hotel in Cork, having some tea and waiting for my room to be ready. A woman seated nearby engaged me in conversation and invited me to join her at her table. We decided to have lunch together. After lunch, she invited me to join her on a trip to the nearby marina. On the way, she treated me and the cab driver (whom she knew) to ice cream. I asked her for suggestions about what to see and do during my one full day in Cork, and we stay in touch via Facebook.

While in Kenya on safari last February, I fell and broke my wrist. The nurse who took me from my room to surgery introduced himself as Barack. I learned that he is a real student of American history, and he kept my mind off the incredible pain in my wrist by discussing American presidents. I told him he knows more about American history than do most Americans.  

The Scottish woman who was my tent mate during last year's trip to Kenya has become a friend, and we will once again share accommodations during this year's return visit to Kenya. We will be joined by an English couple we met on that trip. And I'm still in touch with a Kenyan man who works for the Save the Elephants group in Nairobi who kept me company as I waited to be discharged from the hospital following surgery. I was injured at the camp run by Save the Elephants, and the camp manager asked this man to keep me company. He assisted me in finding the correct office to accept payment for my stay, took me to lunch and then drove me to the airport to meet up with the camp manager and her husband, who flew me to my next destination.

I am still Facebook friends with one of the guides I met during my first visit to Turkey in 2013, and she has invited me to visit her and her family, something I hope to do. And an American woman I met during that trip has met me in Africa three consecutive years to explore that vast continent. She won't be able to travel in 2017 due to a medical issue, but we hope to meet again in Africa in 2018. 

I'm also still in touch with my Costa Rican guide from November's trips, as well as a British-American woman from Kenya who now lives in France. Last summer, I was fortunate enough to meet for dinner in England the delightful couple I met on a safari in South Africa.
And of course, I can't forget the several wonderful Americans I met during various travels with whom I am still in contact. 

Travel truly does make the world a smaller place. It broadens one's horizons and opens us to different ways of life. And it connects us to people we might otherwise never have met. When I hear about terror attacks in Kenya and Turkey, I can better relate because I have visited those places and I have friends who live there. Travel has taught me the value of making friends, and shown me that despite our differences, people are all the same.
 
I've heard it said that it is experiences, not things, that really matter and that we will remember. My life has been enriched by meeting these people, even if only for a few minutes. I treasure the relationships I have formed with those with whom I am still in contact, and I'm looking forward to creating more experiences and friendships in 2017.

Memories of a Lifetime

One's destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things. -- Henry Miller

I love to travel, and I have been fortunate to do a lot of international travel the past two years.

I have visited Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Poland, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Costa Rica, New Zealand, Israel, Jordan, Turkey, Spain and Canada. Of course, my time in some of these countries was limited to just a few days and I got to visit only a few places, but I enjoyed each country.

Traveling to other countries has really opened my mind to current events in places I would not have given a second thought had I not visited there. The terrorist attacks on Kenya have been so much more painful after meeting and spending time with the warm, friendly people of Kenya. I have witnessed the beauty of ancient mosques in Istanbul, and I experienced places of great horror and sadness such as Auschwitz and Birkenau, as well as seeing the factory in Krakow where Oskar Schindler saved the lives of hundreds of Jews by employing them in his enamelware factory. I have walked the ancient streets of Petra, Jordan, and gazed in awe at the Treasury and other centuries-old buildings. I visited the town of Bethlehem, now part of the Palestinian territory, and viewed the huge white wall erected by Israel to keep its enemies out. I walked the thousands-of-years-old streets of Troy and I marveled at the engineering feats of the ancient Romans, whose cities such as Ephesus and Pergamum still stand in silent tribute to their builders.

I got to watch elephants swim across a river in Botswana and look on in awe as five young male lions set out on their evening hunt. I watched the graceful self-confidence of a pair of cheetahs moving silently through the tall grass. I saw evidence of the mighty power of elephants that had uprooted and demolished a large baobab tree. I visited a school in rural Kenya that was lacking in every modern amenity, including electricity, lights, solid floors, computers, printers, copiers, even textbooks. And I was struck by the eagerness of the children, who ranged from kindergarten through high school, to learn despite the hardships they faced.

I have had the thrill of watching a grizzly bear meandering through a meadow in search of food before its long winter hibernation, and stood in awe as a pack of wolves ran silently through the snow as darkness fell. I stood silently as several wolves -- all unseen -- howled to each other early one autumn morning. Most recently, I was thrilled to watch polar bears exploring around and under the tundra lodge -- a wheeled lodge placed on the Canadian tundra each season as the bears start to gather in anticipation of the freezing of Hudson Bay. I was mesmerized by a female polar bear who looked directly into the eyes of the people on our polar rover, as she spent a good 20 minutes entertaining us.

I stood outside, night after night, in far northern Canada, waiting for the northern lights to appear. It was so cold no one could stand the cold for more than a few brief minutes before dashing inside to thaw out.

I walked part of the Camino de Santiago -- the Way of St. James -- in Spain, an ancient pilgrimage route that has been used since Medieval times. I experienced the unbridled joy of a man named David, who shed his worldly possessions and now lives a simple life of service to the thousands of pilgrims who pass his way. Of my many trips, this was perhaps the most memorable and had the greatest impact on me.

I stood by Jerusalem's Western Wall and placed a prayer on a tiny, rolled up piece of paper in a crack in the ancient wall. I rode a camel with a nasty streak in Jordan and trudged through the mud of a rain forest in Costa Rica.

Travel has expanded my interest in learning more about a lot of things, including great rivers of Africa and African wild dogs. Simply put, travel changes us. It isn't just about the places we visit or the sights we see. It's about so much more. It's about experiencing a new culture, trying new foods, seeing new things and getting to know, even superficially, new people. As Mark Twain wrote, "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness."

What did I bring home from these trips aside from a greater curiosity and knowledge? Thousands of digital images, a coffee cup from each country, and oh so many wonderful memories and experiences. The memories, most of all, are what I treasure.