JOURNEYS OF A LIFETIME

By the 1960’s package holidays had arrived. In 1963, feeling a bit like a pioneer I made my first flight to mainland Europe, with a superb holiday in the sunshine of the Catalan capital, Barcelona.

More European holidays in places like Rimini in Italy and Porec now in Croatia but then the old Yugoslavia followed, before Pauline came on the scene. After we were married, Spain and Majorca were soon added to the increasing list of European destinations visited.

For us the mid 1970’s brought dramatic changes in our travel, when a dream was realised and we went to live in Africa. By that time daughter Lesley and son Anthony made up our family. At that time apartheid was a big problem in South Africa, but we had no problems during our two-year stay in Zambia. During that time we visited Botswana, Kenya, Malawi and South Africa.

It is often said that the best parts of the world are provided by nature. Well I can say that the fantastic game parks and the magnificent Victoria Falls in Zambia are great examples.

By 1980 the smell of aircraft fuel was well and truly in my nostrils and the family made our first transatlantic trip. The first American city visited was Chicago. That was combined with our first visit to the “Entertainment Capital of the World”, Orlando. Surprisingly although the kids were mesmerised by the fantasy of Disney World it was the reality of the Kennedy Space Centre that left the biggest impression. Those were the days of mighty rockets going off to explore space on a regular basis.

Our subsequent visits to the USA have taken us to many of the biggest cities including New York, Washington DC, Boston, San Francisco, Phoenix and Los Angeles as well as the place I regard as Disney World for adults, Las Vegas!

In the nineties we also had two separate holidays in Canada and again got reminders of Mother Nature’s best when we visited the Niagara Falls and drove right through the Rockies to the spectacular emerald green Lake Louise.

Having travelled so much previously, Pauline’s 50^th birthday had to be something of a special surprise. I kidded her up for months that we were going to Turkey, then revealed at the last minute that it was really a case of Hawaii Five O’.

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