My late parents were true world travelers.
They eventually visited every continent except Antarctica, something my son Virgile matched by his mid thirties.
Virgile has done some truly amazing things when it comes to travel. In 2005, he spent half of his junior year of college in St. Petersburg, Russia. There was a 10-day break in the middle of the semester, and he and a friend decided to take the Trans Siberian Railway from Moscow to Yakutsk.
Trans?
No. Governor DeSantis, not that kind of trans.
The trip was more than 8,300 kilometers each way, and they essentially spent four days getting there and four days coming back for the chance to spend 12 hours in a city that most Americans only know because of the game of Risk.
He has been many places I will never go, including spending three years living south of the equator in Paraguay and taking two short business trips to Australia and New Zealand.
Of course my daughter, Virgile’s older sister Pauline, is completing 20 years in the Foreign Service. She has lived in Cameroon, Beijing, Indonesia, Jamaica, Guatemala and Tunisia. Her middle child — my grandson Lex — circled the world before he was a year old.
They make me feel like a hillbilly who has never been more than 50 miles from home, although I have probably been to more states and more foreign countries than most Americans.
My not sure when I will be able to add to this total, but I have been to 46 states and 14 countries.
If there is one thing that surprises me a little looking back, it’s that I have been to Europe six times and to my two favorite countries, France and England, four and three times respectively. I could actually say I have been to France five times, although one of the visits was to a non-European part of the country.
We spent a week in Tahiti and Moorea in 1999. Both are part of French Polynesia, which is known as an overseas department of La Belle France. The picture above is from Haute-Garonne, from a lovely rural area near my wife’s hometown of Toulouse. I took the picture in 2009, the last time we visited France.
We made one more trip to Europe two years later, but we only made it to the Netherlands and Greece that time.
We have been outside the U.S. four times since then, but all four were close to home to see our daughter and her family, twice to Jamaica and twice to Guatemala. We’re hoping to get to Tunisia to see them, and Pauline has one more year left in her tour.
If I were to make a list of places I would love to see in the years I have left on earth, I think I would divide them into three categories. Call them A, B and C, with the A’s the highest priority and the C’s the lowest.
The A’s
In this country, the sight I haven’t seen but would purely love to is to ride Amtrak’s Empire Builder Train from Chicago to Seattle and back. It’s a wonderful ride across the top of the country, although I have a feeling the only way I’ll be able to do that is if I have the misfortune to be a widower.
I suppose I would like to see the four states I have yet to visit — Alaska, Arkansas, Mississippi and Wisconsin. Obviously living in Georgia, two of those will be easier to see than others.
Outside the U.S., Tunisia would be an A, as would Australia.
The B’s
In this country, I would like to see some of the major league ballparks I haven’t been to, and I guess the priority there would be to visit Chicago and its two ballparks. It’s also a fairly easy run up to Milwaukee from there (which would give me Wisconsin as well). I actually lived in Chicago for more than a year, but I was a toddler and don’t have any memory of it.
I guess I’d like to see the Grand Canyon and Monument Valley, and I suppose New Orleans would be nice too.
Strangely, my B’s outside the U.S. would be three places I have visited numerous times — France, England and Venice. Nicole and I spent 10 days in Venice in 2003, one of the most wonderful trips in my memory.
The C’s
I would like to visit Ohio again. I spent half of my childhood there, but I haven’t been back since 1990.
Aside from that, I think I would like to take a cruise, although not on one of the massive cruise ships.
I know I won’t do most of this stuff, but it’s nice to still have things to look forward to.