Recently I had dinner with a group of friends to celebrate a
birthday, and on top of a delightful evening of Italian food and good company,
I was inspired to dream of travel again.
Not that I don’t dream now, it’s just that a conversation triggered me
to think about my next adventure. I love
it when conversations flip a switch in your brain that starts lighting up ideas
that you know were there, but are suddenly creating new ones.
At dinner, I reconnected with an ex-colleague who shares my
love for going places. The last we
spoke, she was off to Vietnam and France for the summer. It turns out that she spent her Christmas
vacation dog sledding in Minnesota and absolutely loved it. How random, right? It was on her bucket list. I have one, too, of course, but I’ve never
written it down, so I thought I would make it official.
1. Hike Machu
Picchu, Peru
2. Stay in multiple treehouses
like this one in Scotland
or Sweden (I can cross off northern
lights, too!)
3. Go on an African
Safari
4. See the northern
lights from Iceland or Norway
5. Ride on a boat
down the Amazon
like Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness,
but in South America please!
6. Cruise the Nile
like Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile
7. Go to Everest Base
Camp thanks to Jon Krakauer’s Into
Thin Air
8. Ride the Trans-Siberian
Railway through part of Russia & visit the Kremlin
9. Visit Petra
in Jordan like Indiana Jones
10. Take a dip in the Ganges
River, India
11. Go on a river
cruise in Europe during the Christmas markets
12. Hike through Denali
National Park, Alaska
13. Stay in an English cottage in the Lake District
14. Explore the Silk
Road east of China & spend the night in a yurt
15. Visit the giant Buddha
in Leshan,
Sichuan, China
What I have crossed off:
1. Rode a camel in
the outback, Australia
2. Bungee jumped off
the original jump site in New Zealand
3. Sailed on a junk
off the coast of Northern Vietnam (Halong Bay)
4. Climbed up and on
the Great Wall & went to the Forbidden City
5. Swam & went scuba
diving in the Great Barrier Reef
6. Ziplined and hiked
through the Costa Rica rainforest
7. Hiked the Cinque
Terre, Italy
8. Stuck a prayer in
the Western Wall, Jerusalem
9. Sailed over lost
and sunken cities in the Mediterranean off the coast of Turkey
10. Explored castles throughout Scotland, like the one in Entrapment
11. Bicycled through
rice paddy fields through the Thai countryside
12. Kayaked off the
coast of Fiji
13. Rode an elephant
through the jungle in Thailand
14. Bargained for a
flying Turkish carpet in Cappadocia
15. Hiked on a
glacier in Norway & New Zealand
16. Visited and
photographed Angkor Wat, Cambodia
17. Wandered Prague,
Czech Republic with the love of my life
18. Attended a World’s
Fair (Expo) in Shanghai, China
All photographs taken by me. 1) Shanghai Expo, Czech Republic Exhibit 2) Hiking the Cinque Terre, Italy
3) Sailing on a junk in Halong Bay, Vietnam 4) Angkor Wat, Cambodia
