A trip in the making

Before the trip comes the planning. And sometimes the plan is more fun than the trip.

Planning is a time for making decisions, which isn’t always easy. Settling on an itinerary, selecting lodging, figuring out transportation and choosing activities and sights. Sometimes that means making sacrifices. There’s never as much time as I want to go everywhere I want to go.

It’s also a time for anticipation, for imagining the trip and learning about the places I’ll visit.

When planning a trip, everything goes smoothly. I am never tired, my feet never hurt, I don’t get lost or miss a train or lose anything. Planning is like the perfect dress rehearsal.

Usually, the performance doesn’t end up going quite so perfectly. But that’s part of the adventure!

Heading Down Under (3/7/2024)

I wasn’t sure “Down Under” was the right umbrella term for my next trip. I was thinking “Down Under” might refer specifically to Australia. But according to Wikipedia,

The term Down Under is a colloquialism differently construed to refer to Australia and New Zealand, or the Pacific island countries collectively. The term originally referred solely to Australia and gradually expanded in scope.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Down_Under

In two weeks I’m departing on a month-long trip to Fiji, Australia, and New Zealand. There’s no question that these are all Pacific Island countries. So I’m going to call this trip “Down Under 2024.”

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Coming up next: Two weeks in Oaxaca (2/4/2024)

I’m getting ready to go to Oaxaca for two weeks. My main objective is a Spanish immersion program. My other objective is good food.

Here’s my plan.

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Another Mexican Road Trip: Querétaro and Beyond (12/3/2023)

I’m getting ready for another Mexican road trip. You may recall my last road trip, to see the Pueblos Mágicos in Zacatecas and Aguascalientes. This time I’ll be hitting the states of Querétaro, San Luis Potosí, and Guanajuato, and there are twenty Pueblos Mágicos on the itinerary. And Luis and Taco will both be along for the ride.

I’m sharing our itinerary here, but mostly I’m using this post to do the research so we know what to look for in each town and along the route.

Since we’ll have Taco with us, we’ll concentrate on outdoor sights, but there are a few museums that I hope we’ll be able to poke into.

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Egypt, Jordan, and Israel: Final Itinerary (9/2/2023)

I leave in about three weeks for my next big adventure: six weeks in Egypt, Jordan, and Israel. I’ve received my final documents from Overseas Adventure Travel, so I can now share all the details of my trip.

I’m taking two back-to-back OAT tours. The first is Egypt and the Eternal Nile; the second is Israel: The Holy Land and Timeless Cultures. This tour includes an optional pre-trip extension to Jordan and a post-trip extension to Palestine.

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The year ahead: 2023–2024 (7/16/2023)

I like to say that if I’m not currently traveling, I’m busy planning my next trip(s).

In this case, I have three upcoming trips in the next thirteen months, and possibly will squeeze in one or two more.

Here’s a preview.

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A Wee Bonny Adventure in Scotland (3/24/2023)

My next trip is a five-week adventure in Scotland. I’ll be traveling independently, mostly by train, and looking forward to enjoying great scenery, hiking, and relaxation.

My trip is scheduled for late April and all of May. This is the hottest time in my corner of Mexico, so I was eager to find somewhere cooler to get away. I think Scotland will offer cool temperatures. It will probably rain; I hope not too much.

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Coming soon: Panama and Colombia (1/1/2023)

My first adventure of 2023, a visit to Panama and Colombia, is just over a week away.

I had planned to visit Colombia as part of my trip to Machu Picchu and the Galápagos last year. Overseas Adventure Travel had an optional post-trip extension to Colombia for that tour, and I signed up for it. But they canceled the extension. So I started looking for an opportunity to visit Colombia on my own. And now it’s about to happen!

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An airplane with the Turkish Airlines name and logo, flying above clouds Turkey and the Caucasus: My final itinerary (9/5/2022)

With just nine days until I leave, I’ve settled on my final itinerary.

An itinerary is a constantly moving target. Things can happen, change is often necessary, and flexibility is absolutely essential.

Since I posted my original itinerary, things have happened, change has been necessary, and flexibility has come in handy. Some of the changes were based on decisions I made, and others were the result of things that were outside my control. And I added a number of activities to fill in some of the empty spaces.

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A rectangular flag with a field of red across the top, blue across the middle, and gold across the bottom My next adventure: The plan for Armenia (7/24/2022)

At the end of my last post I was in Akhaltsikhe, Georgia, and heading to Armenia. Here’s my plan for my four days there.

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My next adventure: The plan for Georgia (Part Two) (7/18/2022)

When last you heard from me, I was leaving Tbilisi, Georgia, on Day 26 of my trip to Turkey and the Caucasus. So I will pick it up there.

As I mentioned in Part One, I made some changes to my itinerary. I have decided to cut Batumi, the Black Sea resort city I was planning to visit. Read on to learn more about why. 

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