Travel | Mostly Bright Ideas

Browsing All Posts filed under »Travel«

Getting Over My Down-Under Fantasy

June 19, 2013

There was a time when I wanted to go to Australia. This was back when my travel experience included nothing more than a couple of drives up and down the east coast of the United States, where much of the scenery was dominated by billboards advertising pecan rolls and cheap cigarettes. From where I lived, […]

By Jove, Where Am I?

September 24, 2010

In 2002, a couple from Great Britain wanted to travel to Sydney, Australia, but somehow found themselves in Sydney, Nova Scotia. That isn’t just on a completely different continent; it’s on the other side of the planet. In the travel business, it’s about as wrong as you can be. This was a peculiar story. Incredible, […]

Caveat Viator (Let the Traveler Beware)

August 7, 2010

My wife and I went on a four-day road trip recently. Our destination was less than three hours from home, yet we had never been to this particular part of the country. We set off, armed with the region’s vacation guide, one of those thick books filled with colorful pictures, maps, and dramatic headlines that […]

“Zabaglione”

June 15, 2010

This is a long essay, more than two thousand words, about an experience I had in Sicily. I created it as a page, rather than a post, because of its length. I hope you’ll read it when you have some time.

Sicily: The People

June 11, 2010

In 2003, on our first trip to Sicily, we spent three nights in an apartment in Palermo, then rented a two-door Alfa Romeo and went exploring. Somewhere between Siracusa on the southeast coast and Piazza Armerina in the mountains, we came around a bend in the road and had to stop as a herd of […]

Can We Afford to Travel?

May 20, 2010

Amiable Amiable’s post about having the financial resources to someday take that trip has inspired still another thought in my brain. (I believe this is my third thought this year, and it’s still only May!) My wife and I don’t really have the money to travel. If one of those financial advisers from television ever […]

Sicily: The Food

May 19, 2010

We’ve been to Sicily three times now, so it seems unnecessary to say we love it. The landscape is overwhelmingly beautiful, the people are friendly and welcoming, and there’s history everywhere you look. I’ll be writing more about this wonderful island, but for now I just wanted to talk a bit about the food. I […]