Travel – Page 12 – Destination NOW

Morocco, Take Two

We were originally scheduled to fly to Morocco on March 30, 2020. Well, we all know how THAT went. As late as March 3, 2020, we pondered canceling our trip, still uncertain as to whether or not it was safe to travel. Fortunately, the decision was made for us, so we were spared the anxiety and turmoil that other travelers experienced when they had to cut their trips short before everything closed completely down.

We had planned to take three other trips in 2020, our most ambitious travel schedule ever. So much for well laid plans. Like all the other travel enthusiasts out there, we discovered that 2020 would be the year that our big travel plans centered around obtaining groceries.

Fortunately, all our trips were with OAT and the company made rebooking painless, with generous travel credits. In fact, our rebooked trip is even better than the original, because we are including the pre-trip to Chefchaouen, an option that was not offered for our 2020 departure. Our fingers are crossed that in about three months, we will be doing an instant replay: packing and getting geared up for our trip.

So what do you do when you have about a year and a half interlude? If you’re me, you read a whole lot. The photo atop this post shows just some of the books I’ve read in preparation for our trip. These were all purchased from Thrift Books, an on line store that has an abundance of affordable second hand travel books in great shape.

If you are only going to read one book, I highly recommend “Dreams of Trespass” by Fatima Mernissi. Written in 1994, when she was 54 years old, Mernissi takes us back to her childhood and introduces us to two very different harems: the Fez home of her paternal grandparents and the country farm of her maternal grandparents. What I loved most about the book is it is written in the voice of a 9 year old girl. She asks “what makes a harem”? Do you need to have multiple wives (“farm” grandfather had 9) or can you have only 1 wife (like her father and uncle) and still be a harem? Does the harem have to have high walls (like in the city of Fez) or can it be wall-less like in the country? Ultimately, she concluded that unless you are a sultan, a harem was simply the home for an extended family; it offered a refuge for divorced and widowed women.

When Mernissi was a child, Morocco was a French “protectorate”. Remember that famous scene from the movie, Casablanca, where the Germans are out-sung by the French, who stand up and belt out La Marseillaise? Were there any Moroccans in that scene? If you are wondering what life was like for those conquered by the European “Christians”, Mernissi gives us this glimpse: “Christians, just like Muslims, fight each other all the time, and the Spanish and the French almost killed one another when they crossed our frontier. Then, when neither was able to exterminate the other, they decided to cut Morocco in half. They put soldiers near Arbaoua and said that from now on, to go north, you needed a pass because you are crossing into Spanish Morocco. To go south, you needed another pass because you are crossing into French Morocco.” I wonder what song the Moroccans would have sung had THEY been in Rick’s cafe?

Mernisi learned about World War II by listening to her male relatives who “talked about the Allemane, or Germans, a new breed of Christians who were giving a beating to the French and British, and they talked about a bomb that the Americans across the sea had dropped on Japan, which was one of the Asian nations near China, thousands of kilometers east of Mecca. The news about that bomb plunged father, Uncle Ali and my young cousins into deep despair, for if the Christians had thrown that bomb on the Asians who lived so far away, it was only a matter of time before they attacked the Arabs”

That’s the beauty of travel. It allows you to connect with people who, on the surface, seem so very different only to learn how much of our hopes, fears and desires are shared.

The Tesla Chronicles- 4. Service

There are four ways your Tesla can be serviced: The usual ways, by bringing your car to their service center, or through a road call, but you can ALSO get your car serviced over the phone, via wifi, and with a “house call”. During my first 10 months of ownership, I’ve experienced three out of the four.

My first experience with Tesla’s service was a house call to install my garage door opener, ‘Home Link’. I made the appointment using the Tesla app on my phone, got instructions to ensure that the service rep would not be exposed to any Covid danger, and received confirmation of the date and time. Easy and efficient.

One of the many nice things about Teslas is there is so much routine maintenance you will never need, like periodic ‘lube, oil, filter’, tune ups, brake jobs (I rarely use my brakes). The maintenance schedule tells you to check your tires, your fluid levels and your wiper blades. That’s it. And you don’t even have to do that, because your car will TELL you if something is amiss…which it did several weeks ago, with an alert on my screen that the front passenger airbag needed attention, leading me to my second experience, service via phone and wifi.

Although the service rep certainly gave it her all, we ultimately concluded that I needed to bring the car in. Still, our time together wasn’t a waste because I learned that you “reboot” by simultaneously pressing both scroll buttons on the steering wheel, a handy thing to know. (Yes, I also could have read the manual, but what fun is that?)

After the technician determined it was safe to drive, I headed for one of the two Tesla Service Centers in New Jersey, my third experience. Lucky for me, it is a mere 17 miles away.

The loaner I was given was another Model 3. If they had been smart, they would have given me an S, so I could notice all the cool things THAT model had that my 3 didn’t. Instead I got a “standard” 3, which made me congratulate myself on the wisdom of my choice. One difference that I noticed immediately were the shiny metal pedals. I figured those were what you got when you bought the cheaper “standard” model. Nope. I subsequently learned were PERFORMANCE pedals, available for $150 from the Tesla Store. As I mentioned earlier, I RARELY need to use the brake, and I only use the accelerator when I’m not in self driving mode, so I can’t comprehend why ANYONE would pay more for shiny pedals. Does it make the car go faster? Does your foot grip the pedal better? Maybe it’s a guy thing? Speaking of “guy things”, I discovered the car was set to “chill” mode, which prevented me from driving like a 17 year old, experiencing the power and grandeur of a Tesla for the first time. (Okay, that was definitely sexist. There are certainly female speed demons out there.)

It turns out that the problem was with the front passenger seat, which had to be replaced, so a new seat had to be ordered and delivered. The Tesla App on my phone kept me updated on the expected completion date. How wonderful not to be subjected to the annoying prompts on an Interactive Voice Response System: “Press 1 if you want to buy a new car, press 2 if you are considering killing yourself so you don’t have to listen to this annoying music while you wait for what feels like hours…” Another easy, positive experience.

I can’t report back on the fourth experience, road service, because so far I haven’t needed it. I’m thinking that a flat tire might be likely reason for summoning help. Teslas do not come equipped with a spare tire in the trunk, although you could probably buy one if you so desired. I definitely don’t desire, because I haven’t ever changed a tire in my life, and I have no intention of starting now. But for those who have the “do it yourself” itch, there is also something that you can buy from the Tesla store (which will be discussed in a future post). If I DO use road service, you can count on me to report back.

Bottom line, as I approach my first year of ownership (March 5th is our anniversary), I have to give high marks to Tesla for service, especially because of the need to access it infrequently.

Trip Insurance Update

Was it only four months ago that I questioned whether trip insurance was worth the cost? The world was a different place back then, wasn’t it?

Over the past two months, most of us have learned more than we ever wanted to know about insuring our adventures. When we buy a policy, we usually look at the summary of benefits–how much coverage is offered for trip cancellation, trip interruption, medical expenses, lost luggage etc. But how many of us take the time to read the exclusions? Let’s face it, it isn’t easy to get to the exclusion section, let alone the complete policy.

Even if you do decide to try to read the policy on line, it is likely that you will have to click through several screens to get there. Once you arrive, you will find that the list of exclusions is fairly universal among travel insurers. They include things like attempted suicide or other self inflicted harm, criminal acts, pre-existing conditions (unless certain specified rules are followed) AND something that never concerned me before — epidemics.

I have never purchased the more expensive “cancel for any reason” policies so I can’t speak to what those exclusions would be. I assume that it wouldn’t matter. If your spouse was incarcerated for robbing a bank, I imagine you could say that you are canceling because you just didn’t want to go on the trip. But we have no plans to test out my hypothesis.

Right now, so many flight and trip cancellations are truly putting the travel industry under tremendous strain. What happens when the travel company cancels the trip? When an airline cancels your flight? When you cancel and then a few weeks (or days) later, everything is cancelled? What if you cancel far enough in advance that the travel company’s policy is to give you your money back less a change charge, but the company changes their policy? What if the company doesn’t survive? We are all slowly learning the answers to those questions.

But enough of the anxiety provoking questions. Time for some good news and some praise for a company. For the first time ever, I decided to rely on my Chase Sapphire Reserve card to cover our trip insurance needs. Because the Chase Sapphire Reserve card has a rather significant annual charge of $550, (an increase of $100 from when I originally bought it)I had never considered trading in my Chase Sapphire Preferred card (no fee, probably because I had owned that card for more than 15 years, well before they started charging $90 per year). What changed my mind was a post in the Overseas Adventure Travel Forum. One of the posters alerted me to the fact that the Reserve card credits back $300 if you spend that amount on travel, something that we easily do, most years. So, the net cost for the card is actually $200 per year. We clearly could never get trip insurance for $100 per person, per year, so it was time to look a little more carefully at the plan provisions.

Because we have an excellent Medicare supplement, I wasn’t concerned about the skimpy medical coverage of $2,500. It would more than cover any deductible or copay from our Medicare supplement carrier. It also offered $100,000 in emergency evacuation and transportation not already covered by our Medicare Supplement. I also wasn’t concerned about replacement for lost luggage. I never check anything valuable anyway. What REALLY interested me was trip cancellation and trip interruption coverage.

After reviewing the provisions, I felt comfortable that this plan offers coverage as good as I would get elsewhere. The exclusions were standard, but it did have annual maximum benefits of $10,000 per person, $20,000 per trip (since it is only my husband and me, that works) and a maximum payment of $40,000 per year. Our travel expenses easily fit within those parameters. And if it appears that we would be exceeding those amounts, I would simply purchase a supplemental policy. As noted in my prior post, I had always purchased trip insurance from insuremytrip.com and had been pleased with the results. Our cost for very good coverage ranged from $250 per person to a high of $500 per person, which was significantly less expensive than what was offered by the travel company. Still, $0.00 per person seemed like a better deal to me, and that was what we relied upon to cover our costs for our planned Morocco trip the end of March.

In early March, we learned that my husband had a medical condition that was not life threatening, but needed attention, so we canceled. Two weeks later, our travel provider canceled all March and April departures, offering credits toward a future trip. Because our reason for canceling was not due to the epidemic, we were able to get a complete refund from our Chase insurance. And, because treatment has been delayed, I canceled a subsequent trip in June, and the cancellation penalty has also been refunded.

So what do I have to say about my experience with Chase Sapphire Reserve’s vendor, Allianz? Nothing but high praise. Claims can be submitted through their website, by regular mail or by email. The process is EASY and it was FAST. It only took two weeks from the time we submitted the physician’s statement until the time I had my check in hand. Pretty amazing given what has been going on in the travel insurance world.

So, my earlier advice still stands. Do your research, know what you need, and what you are buying when you are able to travel again. I hope it will be soon!

What a Difference Eleven Days Make!

It’s hard to believe that only eleven short days ago, we were weighing the pros and cons of canceling our trip to Morocco. Unless you are living in a cave, on an island, without cell reception, you know how the world has been turned upside down by the CoronaVirus. The tragedies in China, Iran and Italy are all heartbreaking and sobering.

On March 4th, when I last posted, the conventional wisdom (and internet info) said that if you washed your hands, didn’t touch your face, stayed six feet away from sneezers and had a relatively robust immune system, then you were in good shape to win the CoronaVirus battle. Okay, then. The more cautious (or as my mother used to say–the more REASONABLE) member of this traveling duo voted for immediate cancellation, while the other advocated to “wait and see”. My family has absolutely no problem figuring out who was who.

Ultimately we did both. We waited five more days, then canceled. It seemed like every hour, we were getting notified that something else was being postponed or canceled, like basketball, political gatherings, Broadway shows, our speaker series. As it turns out, a few days later, our tour company, Overseas Adventure Travel announced that ALL March and April departures were canceled. Those who had not yet canceled could get a voucher for a future trip.

Some friends are currently out of the country. I just heard from one in Egypt. She said that OAT is cutting her trip short because of all the flight cancellations. Her group will be getting a pro-rated refund. Talk about a positive attitude–the group is already thinking about when they will be able to return. Another friend made it to JFK, then learned that Argentina had closed its borders to all travelers from countries with CoronaVirus outbreaks. HER trip ended before it even started.

We are concerned about the impact this is having on the wonderful tour guides we traveled with over the past several years. We hope that they, especially the ones in Italy, are safe and are not economically hurt too badly by this slow down in tourism.

So, where are we now? For the past few days, we have been practicing “extreme social distancing”. Today, we were notified that our local Y is closing for two weeks. We had stopped going two days ago, not because we are panic stricken, but because we wanted to do our part to help keep our community safe. Let’s hope that together we can all take the necessary steps to “flatten the curve”.

To GO or Not TO GO, THAT is the Question

In September of 2018, we signed up with Overseas Adventure Travel for a March 2020 trip to Morocco. Why plan so far in advance? We wanted to travel with friends, OAT limits their groups to 16, and popular trips sell out quickly. We had no difficulty recruiting 11 friends to go on the tour with us. So far so good. Fast forward to today, with departure date rapidly approaching. As my favorite philosopher, John Lennon, once said, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.”

Well ol’ John was right. “Life” has certainly jumped up and slapped us in the face. Within the last two months three travel buddies had to drop out. One member of a couple was diagnosed with a serious medical issue, then another fell and fractured her knee. Their future absence made us realize how much we were looking forward to spending time with them.

Because the trip is so popular, their spots were quickly taken by other OAT travelers –also known as friends we haven’t met yet. So, there will still be 16 of us on the trip. But wait, we aren’t finished. Unless you are in a coma, you have probably heard about the coronavirus. So far, none of us has allowed it to disrupt our plans.

Fortunately, according to our State Department, Morocco is looking safe. Still, we have to fly to get there and back, and our plans include a three day stopover in Paris before we enter Morocco. Although the State Department hasn’t identified France as a “do not travel” country, another source indicated that several cases have popped up in France.

What to do? Sadly, we have to acknowledge that being over 65, we have aged into the “at risk” group. Fortunately, we are relatively healthy, and are up to date on all of our shots. Still, we recently experienced another country’s health care system, and although the outcome was positive, visiting my spouse in the Alice Springs Hospital was not a high point of our trip to Australia. (Clearly, it wasn’t my spouse’s either.) On a positive note, although we learned just how wonderful our medicare supplement coverage is when we are outside of the USA, we hope to never have to use it again!

As of today, according to the US State Department, Morocco and Paris have only the usual warnings about terrorist activities, but that is the world we live in. Given our record of gun violence in schools, churches, shopping malls, movie theaters, we could just as easily be mowed down by a home grown terrorist shooting his assault weapon. I refuse to let terrorists, either here or elsewhere, win. A virus, however, is another matter.

As of today, Morocco has reported its first case of the coronavirus; its victim, a man who returned from a visit to Italy, is being treated in a Casablanca hospital.

In Paris, a protest by workers closed the Louvre for two days, until the Museum staff assured the workers that “proper measures” to ensure their safety were being taken.

What happens if we get to Paris, and Morocco decides not to let anyone into the country from France –or from the USA? Let’s face it, several states have reported outbreaks, with many of the victims having no known source of contact. Our response is being managed by Mike Pence, who is not noted for his expertise in the medical and scientific arena. Maybe other countries will view US as being problematic? What if we make it to Morocco, an outbreak occurs and we can’t fly home? What if we catch a cold or some other nasty thing on the flights, either to or from our destination and we have to be quarantined until we are tested and certified as okay? So many “what ifs”. One thing that’s certain, if we go, my plan to travel with “carry on only” has been abandoned. I want to be sure we have enough clean clothes to get us through any “what ifs” that come our way.

In addition to cancelling all trips to China, South Korea and Mongolia, OAT has allowed travelers that signed up for their Italy trips the option to cancel right up to the date of departure, choosing either to apply their payment to a future OAT trip or to get a refund, minus a small processing fee. That gives us peace of mind.

What will we do? We will prepare as if we are going to take the trip, watch the news, check the internet and wait to see how it all unfolds.

Trip Insurance–Is it Worth It?

Here’s the Cliffs Note version: It all depends. For some, trip insurance is definitely worth it. But there are caveats. Know what you need, know what you are buying, choose a reputable company, consider other options.

If you read my Australia blog posts, you will recall that my husband had a freak accident, which put him in the Alice Springs Hospital for three days. We missed several days of our trip, but were grateful that everything ultimately turned out well.

Tips for Filing a Claim

Notify the insurance company as soon as you realize you will be submitting a claim. They can email you the claim form, tell you what to include when you submit your claim and provide moral support. The medical team at AIG Travel Guard was wonderful. Although I didn’t need their help, it was nice to know they were available, if I wanted them to check up on me and my husband.
Keep ALL receipts. I immediately bought a spiral bound notebook and scotch tape, so that I could enter every receipt, by day, into the notebook, with notations indicating what the expense was for. It is very easy to lose small pieces of paper, like taxi receipts.
If you can, pay everything with one credit card. It makes documentation much easier. If you are in a foreign country, your credit card statement will have a record of the currency exchange rate for that item. You simply match the receipt against the credit card charge, and you save the claim examiner that extra task, which brings me to the next point.
Make it as easy as possible for the claim examiner to pay the claim. A claim for trip interruption is far more complicated than one for trip cancellation, so more information was needed to process our claim.
I created a “claim package”, with a cover letter and a table of contents. I explained what was being provided and identified the attached exhibits. I also created a spreadsheet showing what I expected to collect. It took me a day to get everything organized, but I didn’t have any back and forth with either insurance company.

This will give you an idea of the paperwork I submitted. Can you see why I wanted to help the claim examiner out?

Know What You Need
Medicare does not cover you when you are out of the USA, so for some people, the main reason for buying trip insurance is to get medical coverage. We are fortunate enough to have a very generous medicare supplement, which DOES cover us for emergency services wherever we are in the world. So, for that reason, I chose the AIG policy that offered minimal medical and dental coverage, and the medical coverage was secondary. (That means they will pay after other insurance has paid first. So, you need to submit to your primary carrier, and then whatever isn’t covered, you would submit to the secondary carrier.) If your health plan has a high deductible, and high out of pocket maximum, then you may want or need more generous travel insurance benefits.

For some people, “cancel for any reason” protection may make sense. This might be true for someone still in the work force, who may have to change vacation plans because of work responsibilities.

Our main concern has been trip cancellation for health reasons (either ours or a family member), or trip interruption. Remember when the volcano in Iceland erupted and people were unable to continue with their original travel plans? That’s the sort of thing that worries me.

You can get plans that offer trip interruption at 100% of the cost of the trip (the amount you are insuring) or 150% of the cost of the trip. Why would you want to purchase coverage for more than the cost of the trip? Well, if your trip is interrupted, you may have to stay in another country longer than planned or you may have to change flight arrangements (which could be very expensive).

But what if you are not on a group tour? What if you are traveling on your own, to hotels that allow you to cancel within a day or two of arrival? You may not need any trip insurance at all.

Know What You are Buying
I use Insuremytrip.com to compare various travel insurance options. There are other companies, such as Squaremouth.com, but I’ve had good luck with Insuremytrip, so they are the only company that I have had experience with.
Others may be more comfortable using an insurance agent to find the plan that best meets their needs. If you DO decide to do it on your own, be sure to download the complete policy and read it carefully so that you know exactly what you are getting.
Things to look out for: Pre-Existing condition exclusion clauses, what qualifies as a covered reason for trip cancellation, what level of coverage is offered for things that are important to YOU and is that coverage primary or secondary?
For example, I never check anything valuable when I travel, so I don’t care about the level of coverage for lost luggage. The airlines offer some coverage for delayed or lost luggage, and the airline is usually considered primary.
If you are uncomfortable purchasing a plan from the internet, you can speak with a representative for Insuremytrip.com. They are not paid commissions, so they do not have a financial interest in your choice of plan. That may be true of similar companies.

Choose a Reputable Company
Take the time to read the reviews. Insuremytrip, for example, includes Better Business Bureau ratings, AM Best ratings, years in business, and reviews by users for each of the companies offered, and allows you to do a side by side comparison of the plans. You can also do a google search.

Other Options
Check your credit card for any coverage they might offer. You need to read the booklet that they give you when you first enroll, or compare the benefits of the various companies on line.
I had never considered the Chase Sapphire Reserve card, because of its $450 annual fee. Then I read a post from a fellow traveler who explained that Chase reimburses you up to $300 for any travel expenses you incur during the year. They also offer trip interruption and cancellation insurance up to $10,000 per person and $20,000 per occurrence, with a $40,000 per year maximum. That coverage is easily worth the remaining $150 per year charge to us.
Some of my friends swear by one of the premium American Express cards. It is also possible that Citibank has something competitive, but I have had no experience with either.
You may also consider purchasing the insurance that your tour group offers. I always take a look, but so far, have been able to find more attractive options. That may change as we get older.

Bottom Line
It all comes down to how risk averse you are, what you want to spend, what coverage is important to you, how much time you want to spend researching alternatives.
Every situation is different. Make sure you choose the best option for YOU.
Please feel free to share YOUR experiences and trip Insurance knowledge with the rest of us. Happy travels!

Melbourne, Part Two

Okay, I’ll admit it, I felt really, really guilty, when I learned that while I was having a grand old time on the Great Ocean Road, my beloved husband was suffering in a Melbourne hospital, as I confessed in my last blog post.

After seven days in a town that is hotter than hell ( well, maybe not hell, but definitely purgatory), I feel my penance has been completed and I am free to share the rest of the photos from our glorious time in Melbourne.

Originally called The Sow and the Piglets, these rock formations were wisely renamed The Twelve Apostles, despite their originally being only nine of them. One has since crumbled, so now there are only eight. I spent most of my career in marketing, so hey, I get it. Nine was close enough, if you just round up.

Not surprisingly, the gambit worked, and the rest is history. The Apostles are definitely a beloved Australian tourist attraction.

The beach is lovely too, and if you are willing to walk down (and climb back up) eighty steps, you too can get your picture taken on this gorgeous beach.

I was definitely game. My favorite photographer was otherwise occupied, but one of our fellow travelers offered to take my picture. Foolishly, I neglected to check my phone until I got all the way back to the top, only to discover a technical glitch. No photo. Andy, who you will soon meet, wearing a bird for a hat, offered to go back down with me, so he and I got to climb down (and UP) 160 steps!

Given that I’m looking a bit chunky, that extra exercise was probably a GOOD thing!

Our stop at the bird hangout was great fun, although I will admit it’s a bit of a jolt when one of these guys unexpectedly lands on you, but Andy took it all in stride.

Paul, our tour guide, (shown instructing Jenny, a member of our OAT group) , kept us enlightened and entertained during our entire day together.

He told us The Great Ocean Road was built to employ returning war veterans. (Sorta like FDR’s CCC during the Great Depression).

About 3,000 former soldiers labored to build the road for almost thirteen years. Because of what we now call PTSD, dynamite couldn’t be used to break through rock; construction was done with pick and shovel.

This war memorial was built to honor the thousands who never came back from the war.

Other highlights from our time in Melbourne included a visit to the Mornington Peninsula, where we visited the Moonlit Sanctuary.

Unlike the Tasmanian Koala, this guy was awake. These animals sleep twenty hours per day, so somehow we managed to time it just right.

We didn’t have as much luck with the wallabies and kangaroos. They clearly were used to being fed frequently, and weren’t motivated to hop over for a snack. But the ducks and birds were quite happy to take a handout.

And this wombat? All we could see were his feet and hands! I think he had a “Do Not Disturb” tag hanging on his barrel!

Another notable visit was to the Abbotsford Convent. Now art studios and an educational center, it was once a “Magdalen Asylum” where up to 400 women and girls were sheltered. They were either orphans,”fallen women” or had no where else to go. They were also a source of free labor.

For “three hots and a cot”, they worked doing laundry for hotels and the weathy of Melbourne. As you might expect of a Catholic institution, prayer and chapel attendance were mandatory, as was penitence. This went on until 1975.

Today, the convent is beautified by art. I was particularly intrigued by these hand painted fabrics, which were very creatively displayed. I leave it to your imagination as to what this artwork symbolizes. It certainly has meaning for ME.

Here’s a close up of one of the fabrics. They were all different and were all exquisite.

Tomorrow we head for Sydney, our final destination on this slightly modified tour of our seventh continent, so I’ll leave you with one last example of what my new iPhone 11 camera can do.

Alice Springs, Australia

In the early ’80s I was captivated by a Masterpiece Theater Miniseries, “A Town Like Alice”, so much so that I read the book upon which the series was based. Who knew that about 35 years later we’d be spending two nights in this “bonza” town in the Northern Territory, right after our stay in Melbourne.

There is still so much more to say about Melbourne, and I will eventually get to that, but first, I bring you Alice Springs with a summary of why this is a town we will never forget.

Our hotel, the Doubletree, is located right across from the Todd River. Both the river and the mall (among other things) are named after Sir Charles Todd, who brought communications to the area by constructing telegraph wires or stations or something along those lines. (Clearly I wasn’t all that interested). His wife’s name was Alice, and I’m guessing that at one time the area had a lot of natural springs?

Check out the Todd River.

What, you’re having trouble finding it? That may be because the “river” is bone dry. You see, this area can go for YEARS without rain. It actually looks a whole lot better on Google maps, portrayed as a blue ribbon surrounded by green borders. But no. It is all brown and dry. But the walkway is nice.

So, why did Mike and I decide to skip Uluru and the Great Barrier Reef to spend an additional five nights ( count ’em, FIVE nights !!!) in Alice Springs?

It was a nose bleed. Yes, you read that right. But WHAT a nosebleed! Enough to warrant a 3AM ambulance ride, a hospital stay of three nights, with a trip to the operating room thrown in for good measure. Thanks to the wonderful doctors and nurses in Alice Springs, our hero is out of the hospital and on the mend. But he needs to rest up, so we are hanging out in Alice Springs for those extra days, then flying to Sydney, where, if all goes well, we will be able to rendezvous one last time with our wonderful group before we all fly home.

Exactly HOW did Mike get that geyser of a nosebleed?

No, his boomerang did NOT circle back and whomp him in the nose!

It all started in Melbourne. He awoke very, very early with what he thought was strep throat. (It wasn’t). Being the considerate, resourceful guy that he is, he didn’t want to wake me or our tour guide, so he surfed the net to find St Vincent’s Hospital was close by. (Bad idea). I woke as he was headed out the door, unfortunately not alert enough to shout “NOOO. Don’t do it.” But then I figured he knew what he was doing, he’d get his antibiotics, then return to the hotel to spend the rest of the day sleeping off his illness.

While I was enjoying the magnificence of the Great Ocean Road, Mike was having his nasal passage assaulted. A nurse decided to ram a swab up his nose to do a flu test. That caused his FIRST nosebleed. (The afore mentioned nosebleed in Alice Springs was the SECOND one). The doctor cauterized the wound, (but not well enough) kept him in the hospital overnight and discharged him early Saturday morning, clearing him to fly to Alice Springs.

Although if we’d had our druthers, Mike would have skipped learning about another country’s health care system, however there WERE a few positives.

We felt lucky we weren’t in a remote area devoid of medical facilities AND grateful we both understood the local language (sort of).
We HAD purchased trip insurance plus we have high spending limits on our credit card, so we were okay paying (charging) up front.

We learned more than we ever wanted to know about travel insurance, electronic devices (phones, SIM cards, hot spots) which provides me with lots of material for future blog posts.

The hospital was only a mile away, so I got plenty of exercise walking along the “river”, from hotel to hospital and back, a couple of times a day.
I was able to download “A Town Like Alice” to my phone and reread it while waiting for Mike to get out of surgery. I had forgotten that I had liked the miniseries so much more than the book. Still it was a good distraction and it reintroduced me to the word “bonza”. What do YOU think it means?
We discovered how tuned in Australians are to what is happening in America, and how well informed they are about Trump, Pence, even Mike Pompeo! Some of them probably know more than many Americans. The nurses were curious about what Americans think of Trump, so we gave them our views and others’ views. Being liberals, that’s what we try to do. Present the facts. We had no idea how much other countries are counting on us to vote him out, something we heard frequently on our trip.
The hotel has a pool, so I could imagine I was taking a “sit in the sun and do nothing” kind of vacation. It didn’t take long for me to remember why I never go on that kind of vacation any more!

So, that’s why I haven’t been posting much these past few days. I know. A blog is an unusual way to inform friends and family of a somewhat traumatic event. (Mike’s nose was traumatized, as was my psyche).

Thankfully, all is well now. Happier posts will follow with better photos!

Magnificent Melbourne

What can I say about this glorious city? The OAT Australia itinerary was recently changed to include an extra day in Melbourne and I’m so glad it did. We could have easily spent a week here and not run out of things to see and do. No matter what interests you, you’ll find it in Melbourne!

Incredible Architecture

Melbourne has it all: the old, the new, and everything in between.

This photo of the very futuristic buildings in the Docklands area was taken with the wide angle lens of my iPhone 11, without any editing. The sun just happened to be in the perfect spot.

The beautiful reading room at the Melbourne Library is best viewed from the 6th floor.

Where else can you find a shopping mall built around a preserved tower, where ammunition was once made?

For those yearning to learn more about 19th century ammunition, you can duck through one of the clothing stores in the mall to visit this Museum.

Is this a cool city or what?

Glorious Gardens

It seems like everywhere I looked, there was a park, a square or a garden with jaw dropping plants and flowers. MY digitalis never gets this tall!

The Royal Botanic Garden truly is a special place, which is why it was not surprising to stumble onto this photo shoot. The model was as gorgeous as the setting. once again, my iPhone rose to the occasion and handled very trucky lighting quite well.

Street Art

Walking through a random alley, we came across this wall of remembrance. The plaque tells the story better than I could.

Churches

After traveling for a few years, and making the mandatory church visits, the interiors all start to look alike– but Melbourne’s St Patrick Cathedral had something I’d never seen before–a spectacular entrance–with a water feature.

What I’m calling a “water playground” is right nearby the church. Can’t you picture the kids running through the fountains in their Sunday best, right after Mass?

You all know what food looks like, so I won’t share photos of our meals. Let’s just say Melbourne is like a giant Alice’s Restaurant. “You can get anything you want” as Arlo Guthrie so aptly sang.

There’s more to say about our stay in the Melbourne area, but that will have to wait till the next post.

Getting High Down Under

At OUR age, getting high usually means getting to the top of a mountain, using whatever means available to us. But admit it, the title got your attention.

And, to be honest, some of the scenery we encountered around Cradle Mountain reminded me a bit of a different kind of trip that I took in my youth. No passport required.

We were warned that Cradle Mountain temperatures could be in the 30’s (that’s F, not C) with the possibility of snow.

We were not misled!

A trip with so much variation in temperature demanded that we make hard packing choices. Do I bring my waterproof hiking boots or my Keen Sandals? I didn’t want to lug one while wearing the other. My decision? The snow and cold weather should only last a day or two, so I decided that my keens, fortified with two pairs of wool socks and hotel provided shower caps would do the trick, and they did!

I’m pleased to report that my feet remained warm and dry during all of our treks. I WAS going to bring my silk long underwear, but forgot it but two pairs of pants worked quite well. As Laura, our Patagonia guide, stated, “There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing choices”.

We hiked to the top of that white rock in the distance, then down to the water’s edge. The views were spectacular!

We also earned bragging rights for “experiencing” one of the great walks on this planet: The Overland Trail. Well, at least we posed by the sign…

Our final Tasmanian destination was Launceston, where we visited The Platypus House, Seahorse World and Cataract Gorge.

The platypus were smaller than I expected and challenging to photograph, so I resorted to video. The echidna, however, were quite fearless and were content to waddle among us.

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I had mistakenly thought that after visiting the wonderful Aquarium in Monterey, I wouldn’t be impressed with Seahorse world, but I was wrong. Seahorse World breeds and supplies these wonderful creatures to aquariums throughout the world.

But my favorite was this Sea Dragon.

We will be boarding our flight to Melbourne shortly, so I only have time to upload a shot or two of Cataract Gorge taken during our hike, before we say goodbye to beautiful Tasmania.

No time to proofread for typos!

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