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I am about to share the last stop on my September journey. Paris. It had been awhile. At least fifteen years? How could that be? My favorite city for so many years. I was Paris enamored, enchanted, enthralled…yeah, all that. And yet in my travels in the 2000s, I only returned a few times, and they were early on. Why? Perhaps, afraid to have the memory diminished, the magic tarnished by the… Read More
September in Europe was comprised of three distinct passages. First a visit to the ‘young’ cousins in Kristiansand, the Setesdal Valley, and Neset. My ancestral stomping grounds. Can I call it home, even though I didn’t visit until age 46? Yes, why not? It feels right, especially since most of the names on the mailboxes of my Minnesota childhood road were Olson, Nelson, Gunderson, and Neset so it seems my grandfather didn’t… Read More
Back then: September 2024. An excellent time was had in Norway and in Paris. Coming up: November 2024. The end of the US as we thought we knew it OR we are saved by the skin of our teeth or in the nick of time or just barely…or whatever. But Now. October 2024. I’ve been intending to write three praiseworthy blog posts about my September trip. I published an Oslo introduction… Read More
Walking toward sun-sparkled water in the coolish warmth of an early September day in the north. Me. Oslo. I imagine people are smiling as I walk by them in my new Harris/Walz t-shirt, and I’m smiling too, and, you know what…I am happy. Hey brother Robert, it’s almost like those olden times we talk about—when our happys and sads had peaks and crevices. I’m feeling a little peak coming on… I love… Read More
Well not that it…which I’m pretty sure I never had in any case. But the “travel it” is damn near intact. I haven’t been on a substantial overseas trip by myself for a few years and, probably, I’m older now with perhaps some slight derangements previously unnoticed…but I appear to be with it! I am excited not to have lost all my travel chops…yeah yeah yeah. Creeping timidity, creaks and aches, nap-obsession…actually… Read More
Posted December 13, 2022: This is my last post of 2022, a not-very-good-posting-year. I’m here to tell you about the last covid-delayed trip of an oddly grueling twelve months. My long-long-long long-time travel buddy, Teresa, and I visited Bogota, Colombia; Quito, Ecuador; and Vinales and Havana, Cuba. The locations were just fine, the transportation nearly killed me—although some, like my trusty old grey horse, were worth the shooting pains extending from tailbone… Read More
Posted September 2, 2022: Morocco. We arrive in the afternoon in Casablanca, the main airline hub for Morocco, to be met by Mohammad, our sweet, if slightly too bossy, driver for the next 10 days. Sitting on our stateside couches, planning this grand adventure, it was going to be all trains, all of the time; in Morocco rail service is excellent. You remember my big red suitcase purchase in Johannesburg, and I… Read More
Posted August 29, 2022: I left you in the last post whining about cold South African mornings. Getting ready for meerkats—and, it turns out, one of my favorite mornings on the trip….almost as good as safari-time out in the Mara’s cold dawn back at Basecamp. But first, I do ask myself, why? It is early, dark, cold, no coffee. Surly, am I surly again? Isn’t there a meerkat show I could have… Read More
Posted August 21, 2022: The southern and northern edges of countries, regions, and continents have always intrigued me. Perhaps because I grew up on the northern border of the US, which was, of course Canada’s ‘deep south.’ For some unknown reason I found that fascinating—how could my cold home be anybody’s southland (after all, in my so-far short and mostly untraveled life, all information came from books and they told me places… Read More
Posted August 19, 2022: I need a reason to post more photos, so let me share a little more of Johannesburg and Cape Town. As I’ve written before, our Johannesburg arrival was traumatic (well, only for me I guess) but a few nice things happened in our time there. We were in a fancy suburb which wasn’t the plan, but, you know…there’s always a good side. Turns out one of Sara’s favorite… Read More