Travel

In June 2005, I left work at RAF Coltishall for the lst time and began the transition to being a civillian once again.

I ended up spending nine weeks or so, travelling across America; staying with the friend in New Hampshire, driving to Niagara Falls, calling in at Lake Placid and Ben and Jerry's on the way back. Then flying to Seattle, staying their three days, driving then along Route 101 west, then down the Pacific Coast, calling in at Mt Rainier, Mt St Helens, the Olympic Peninsular, Portland, Crater Lake, down the Oregon Coast, San Francisco, the Redwood forests to LA, before flying to stay with friends in Arkansas and as well spending by 40th birthday in Las Vegas.

I have never added up the cost of that trip, and it is detailed somwhere in these posts possibly about a decade ago, but in the following year, I nearly went bankrupt, and in a very low moment said to Mum that perhaps I should have paid off my mortgage rather than travelling.

She disagreed, and said that travel and their experiences can never be replaced, no matter how financially secure I might have ended up.

In the end, it matter not a jot as life turned round quickly, I met Jools and we began to travel, mostly to new places, but to some that we had both been to, or one of us had.

Those experiences are proceless: watching the eclipse from the badlands in the middle of Wyoming for one, and that is something I will never regret.

So, as we are about to embark on life's last great adventure, to stop working and do lots of stuff we want to, a lot of what we will do is travel. Because, we love it.

First up is India in April next year. More details of that to come in the coming weeks, but it is very close now, so close we have actually paid the full cost of the trip.

Then there should be the long-delayed trip to New Zealand, hopefully next winter. We shall see. We won't look into that until after we come back from India and our retirement will have begun by then, but that is what we hope to.

After that, maybe Mexico, Switzerland and maybe Japan again.

We won't stop traveling, or don't plan to, any time soon.