We are flying from Arizona to Florida to attend my grand daughter’s wedding. Nice trip. Exciting event.  However it seems that every time I have an opportunity to go Somewhere, I can’t help thinking about the opportunities—to go Somewhere Else. Soon I’ll be sharing our trip to Somewhere Else.

Do you think that way, or do I have a detour built into the routing of travel thoughts in my brain?

Here are some examples.

OHIO TO NEW YORK

In the 1960’s, once a year we drove or flew from Arizona with our young children to visit our family still iin Ohio.  In 1964, that was a perfect excuse to go to the New York World’s Fair.

Boston to Cape Cod and D.C.

In about 1968, Ken was scheduled to go to Boston for a national bridge tournament.  We turned that into an extravaganza with his family joining us in Cape Cod and then passing us off to my family for a trip to Washington D. C.

Sweden to Russia

In the late 90’s, we decided to make a long delayed visit to Sweden to see some relatives of my sister-in-law. But of course that led to Somewhere Else–St. Petersburg Russia.

Singapore to Cambodia

Not to mention Hong Kong, Macau and Thailand.  As a club president, Ken took a Rotary-sponsored trip to Singapore in 2000.  Well, heck, if you’re going  Somewhere in Southeast Asia, you might as well add your life-long dream of visiting Angkor Wat–and stop in Singapore–and take a ferry to Macau–and spend a few days in Thailand–right?

Budapest to Bavaria and Austria

Hey, it was all once part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire after all! This one had a different start. Ken laughed when I said I had won a 3- night stay at an apartment in Budapest, thinking that was about the most remote possibility on our travel list.  However, after a bit of plotting and planning, we realized that we could get a long-delayed look at Austria and it just happened to be a big birthday year for Mozart, so Salzburg was full of music. And as long as we were going to Budapest by way of Austria, why not land in Munich and see Bavaria and the famous Neuschwanstein Castle as well.

Aegean Islands to Ephesus and Meteora

Looking back on it, some of our choices look just plain greedy.  After all, if one is going to rent a sailboat with friends and hire a captain and sail around the Aegean islands for ten days—isn’t that a life-time vacation?  Well, yes, but we went all that way—so why not extend just a big and go to Ephesus in Turkey. And as long as we’re staying a little longer, how about a jaunt up to Meteora in Central Greece, since Ken had never seen it.  We’ve never regretted our “travel greed.”

AND NOW

Oh, yes, where was I? I started talking about a wedding in Florida. Very nice state. But SO close to three states of the five I have not yet visited–so we will catch them with a Southern road trip. We’ve been wanting to travel to one of my favorite cities– Chattanooga,  and also to the Great Smoky Mountains, so we’ll go there before driving back through South Carolina to Atlanta and flying home. (The three states I had not visited–Georgia, Alabama and North Carolina. The two to go–North Dakota and Alaska.)

See?  Somewhere always leads to Somewhere Else.