The restored hotel where we stayed in Pingyao.  The nights are magical with red hanging lanterns, the air conditioning divine.

I can suddenly post photos, so I will send a few that are in my WordPress media library. Buddha is with me this blue sky morning in Beijing (te...

The problem with writing a travel blog, you spend a lot of time traveling. Our expert guide, Miller, is a history buff and very into temples. Although I negotiated one less temple on the way into Ping Yao, he tacked it onto next day’s drive to Datong. When I got us out...

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Here is the menu from a lunch spot. We had a choice of turtle dove, sparrow, farm pig head meat, mountain rabbit, mountain goat, wild pigeon, mountain fungus, mountain mushrooms, or goat meat. Everything was $4 to $6 for a family style portion. In this r...

“Have you written any blogs yet?” “Yes, I have written 4 blogs but I haven’t posted any.” “What did you write about?” When I read the list of topics from the draft blogs out loud, I realized just how pathetic and trivial the inner workings of my mind are. As I headed o...

All it takes is courage. Courage to leap, put yourself out there, trying not to fall flat on your face. It’s only three months of public humiliation as I try to post an entertaining and insightful travel blog.

Traveling by plane, train, bike, boat, feet, and car, we’ll...

December 24, 2002- July 15, 2015

The vet came at 10 in the morning to put Cody down. I hoped that Cody wouldn’t remember the same vet had come to put Griffey to sleep just a few years ago.

Cody was a macho dog by boder collie stands. He was handsome/ mostly black with a...

The trip doesn’t start the day you get on board the plane. I quit Farm Bureau a year ago to get my mind around where to go if we had the health, wealth, and time to go anywhere we wanted, without three kids in tow. Now we have ten days before we leave. True, I am packe...

Yipee! I’m in the club car, heading to Gallup, New Mexico. The sun’s up; you can see out the roof. Margo created my blog and I’m off as a travel writer. This is the trial train trip in prep for the 3 month, around the world writing sabbatical.

Theme of this blog: why tr...