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We love to travel, as do many people. Some travel forums focus on the flights - the process of getting someplace. We are interested in the destinations, not just the flights. We take relatively brief trips, often triggered by a cheap airfare.
Taking an ocean cruise is apparently a great way to see the world, but not the way we do it. Most of all, we have watched too many cities change character when a large cruise ship arrives... change from what we see as normal, peaceful, and economical, to congested and commercialized when the ships add thousands of people to a quaint city or historical area.
Mostly we have traveled on our own - making our own travel and local tour arrangements. When the alphabet is strange, so we cannot look up words, we have taken a formal tour. We especially like Overseas Adventure Travel - OATTRAVEL.COM We have used them in Morocco, China, and Ancient Kingdoms (Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam). They consider 16 people a large group, provide one guide who remains with you for the entire trip, plus specialized licensed city guides for each destination. We have also enjoyed Viking River Cruises - a maximum of 190 passengers on each ship, broken into 4-6 groups for shore excursions; food on board is extraordinary, with free beer and wine at lunch and dinner.
If you have not traveled with OAT or Viking, let us recommend you - earning a bonus for us and a discount for you.
For a couple years we tried to share our travel stories as a blog, so there could be an easy dialogue. We only got three comments that thanked us, and hundreds that were spam (such as "I like this. Click here to get a loan"). The travelogues are off the blog, and back here. We would still like to have a dialogue, so we ask you to do it by email.
Trip 1 - Visit Charlie's Sister Rita in Maryland January 26-29
Trip 2 - Dog-sit in Sachse (Dallas) for a mini-vacation for our son and wife March 18-26.
Trip 3 - Eastern Europe on the Danube from Bucharest to Budapest (the Balkans) April 15-26.
Trip 4 - Empires of the Mediterranean, a Viking cruise from Athens to Venice on the Adriatic Sea July 21-31, 2024
Trip 5 - Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin to visit family and celebrate a birthday August 8-15
Trip 1 (also trip 10 of 2022) Tokyo January 16-24 2023
There were several trips to Decorah Iowa in 2023 in addition to the two trips in 2022 to help Jenny's brother with his divorce and marriage.
Trip 4 was to Las Vegas for our Granddaughter's wedding
Trip 5 was to Iowa/Minnesota/Wisconsin for Jenny's high school reunion.
Trip 6 was to Ancient Kingdoms - Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam - September 21 - October 11
Trip 7 Christmas (markets) on the Rhine December 7-15
Trip 10 - Tokyo - for counting mileage January and February 2023 are in this year - so this is trip 10 of this year but Trip 1 of 2023.
Trip 9 - Munich for the Christmas Markets, November 30 - December 7
Trip 7 - October 10-17, Trip 8 - November 3-10: Decorah Iowa to help Jenny's brother with his divorce
Trip 6 - Turkey. Canceled
Trip 5 - Berlin (again) August 17-25
Trip 4 - Chicago for a funeral July 15-17
Trip 3 - drive to a family visit in Iowa and reunion in Minnesota June 11-21
Trip 2 - Geneva Switzerland May 11 - 19
Trip 1 was to the Baltics, St. Petersburg, and Moscow. Russia and Ukraine got cranky, so there were no flights to/from Moscow. The trip was canceled.
This year the trips are far less exciting... we are not venturing outside of the country because of the complex and changing pandemic regulations. We were planning on taking more domestic trips as we got old, at 76 and 78 we don't feel old yet. Unfortunately we are using up the domestic destinations too early!
Trip 8 - Napa California November 8-12 where we toured and tasted wineries, and had a surprise find in the Charles Schulz (Peanuts) museum.
Trip 7 - Charleston South Carolina We spent several days (October 26-29) touring this historic city. The travelogue only includes a sample of the many houses we saw.
Trip 6 - South Dakota October 6-10. Mount Rushmore was first on the list, then the badlands, Minuteman Missle sites, and The South Dakota Air and Space Museum
Trip 5 was an auto trip July 18-27 to visit Jenny's brothers, one in Minnesota and two in Iowa.
Trip 3 was to Nashville June 10-12. We explored the town, the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Ryman Theater, and attended a performance of the Grand ole Opry in their new facility outside town.
Trip 2 was to Birmingham Alabama to visit a friend May 11-12
Trip 1 was a driving trip to Houston April 23-24 to see the Pompeii exhibit and other museum exhibits, since the brief trip to the Shiner brewery the previous week didn't satisfy our wanderlust.
Trip 1 - Ireland February 12-19 including Dublin (East) and Dingle (West Coast). Someplace between London and Dublin Charlie crossed the 2 million mile mark with American Airlines and their partners. Beware of car rentals in Ireland.
And then the world closed down for Covid 19
Trip 9 - We went to New York City again this year, December 16-20.
Trip 8 - Vienna (Wein) Austria November 14-22. We were delighted to find the many Christmas Markets opening while we were there.
Trip 7 - Singapore (for the third time) - September 15-24. We didn't realize we were going to be there for the F1 Grand Prix (night race through downtown streets), but we had fun despite the number of street closures.
Trip 6 - Munich Bavaria Germany - August 19-26. The "home" of Oktoberfest is Munich, about a block from our hotel. Fortunately we were there a month before it started, and fell in love with the city.
Trip 5 - Vancouver Canada - July 28-31, for a chance to get some relief from the Texas heat.
Trip 4 - Driving trip to Wisconsin May 22-27 in our new Genesis car (2760.3 miles round trip in 47 hours driving, 27.9 miles per gallon of regular gas (better than we got with our previous diesel), average 58.7 mph). A high school graduation evolved to be a family reunion with all 7 of the Ott kids attending, with spouses.
Trip 3 - Milan Italy - April 16-23
Trip 2 - Jenny was going to travel to Minneapolis St. Paul briefly on March 30-31 for family issues. The trip was cancelled.
Trip 1 - London Feb 12-20 - a great time in the city, from a hotel based in Earl's Court. Chelsea was playing Manchester a few blocks from our hotel, so "team" bars were full with police protection, but the other half of the local restaurants were readily available.
Trip 8 - New York City December 11-15
Trip 7 October 6-8 was to Birmingham Alabama to visit friends.
Trip 6 was to Kansas City by Car, September 21-24, to visit with family but we also saw the national World War I museum.
Trip 5 to Denver, August 16-20, in part to escape the heat, but we also saw the Dead Sea Scrolls, a railroad museum, craft fair, and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (Charlie even found a Cray computer)
Trip 4 to China June 25 - July 16: Includes index to each part - Beijing Summer palace, Tinannmen Square, Great Wall, Xian: Terracotta Army, Doghan community, Panda sanctuary, Tibet, Yangtze river cruise (3 days) to the 3 Gorges Dam, Hong Kong (3 days)
Trip 3: Fairbanks Alaska March 13-20. We saw the Northern Lights, and lots of other things.
Trip 2 - February 14-22: Bangkok Thailand. This was our first trip of the year, but we count it as Trip 2 of 2018 since Trip 1 was canceled.
Trip 1 in January to Alaska to see the Northern Lights was canceled at the last minute since the weather forecast for the entire time of our trip was cloudy and extremely cold.
December 14-17 New York City for Christmas. Trip 11 of 2017.
November 9-15 Reykjavik Iceland. Trip 10 of 2017 (8 and 9 were family visits).
September 17-October 3 Morocco Africa. Trip 7 of 2017.
August 21-30 Japan. Trip 6 of 2017.
June 26-30 Juneau Alaska. Trip 5 of 2017
May 19-25 Paris France. Trip 4 of 2017, documentation coming.
April 20-25 Lima Peru, Trip 3 of 2017
March 31-April 1 Tubac Arizona. Trip 2 of 2017
February 3-15 New Zealand (North Island). Trip 1 of 2017.
October-November, 2016 a week in Amsterdam, with special sections on furniture of the Rijks Museum, and the red light district. Trip 14 of 2016.
September 2016, Seoul South Korea , including the DMZ, Trip 12 of 2016.
July 2016 Tallinn Estonia and Helsinki Finland was trip 8 of 2016. We split our time between the two cities, with a ferry ride between them.
April 2016 Porto and Lisbon Portugal, Trip 5 of 2016
March 2016: A reverse travelogue as we introduced a long-time friend from England to New York, Washington, and Central Texas; counted as our Trip 4 of 2016
February 2016 Hanoi, Vietnam, Trip 3 of 2016. An amazing trip.
November 2015 Northern England: Trip 13 in 2015
October 2015 Krakow and Warsaw Poland with special sections on Auschwitz and the furniture of the Royal Castle in Warsaw. Trip 12 in 2015
September 2015 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain: Trip 10 in 2015
August 2015 and August 2013 - Alaska: Trip 8 in 2015
July 2015 - Santiago Chile: Trip 6 in 2015
July 2015 - a brief trip to Boston, Trip 5 of 2015, with extra furniture page
May 2015 - a brief trip to New York City: Trip 3 of 2015
April 2015 - Singapore, Trip 2 of 2015, (with notes from the previous trip in September 2005)
February 2015 - Panama: Trip 1 of 2015
September 2014 - Hong Kong: Trip 7 of 2014
July 2014 - Calgary Canada, Trip 6 of 2014, with Glacier Park (Montana) and the Banff and Jasper Canadian national parks.
May 2014 - Berlin and nearby holocaust sites: Trip 4 of 2014
March 2014 - Buenos Aires, with a brief day trip to Uruguay: Trip 2 of 2014
October 2013 - Tokyo: Trip 7 of 2013
August 2013 - Anchorage, Fairbanks, and surrounding areas of Alaska
May 2013 - Cusco and Machu Picchu in Peru: Trip 2 of 2013
March 2013 - Paris: Trip 1 of 2013
December 2012 - Hawaii: Trip 6 of 2012
October 2012 - Netherlands and Belgium: Trip 5 of 2012
July 2012 - Montana and Glacier National Park: Trip 3 of 2012
January 2012 - England (again): Trip 1 of 2012
October 2011 - Italy including Rome, Florence, and Venice
May 2011 - Germany including Heidelberg, Trier, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Muenster, and Frankfurt.
October 2010 - Scotland
September 2009 - Riga, Latvia. Lots of history since my father was from there, including stories of my Father's worldwide adventures, and his Medal of Honor.
October 2007 - Budapest
February 2006 - Osaka, Japan (text only for now)
September 2005 - Singapore see April 2015
February 2002 - England
January 2001 - Australia - Wollongong and Sydney
July 2001 - Seattle, Washington
1997 - Iguassu Falls in Brazil (mostly just pictures)
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