BELIZE 2026: FLIGHT, A SPLENDIFEROUS HOTEL, CAYE CAULKER, AND MAL DE MER

 March 15, 2026

Spring break was coming up for me and we didn't have a trip planned. We decided rather last minute to take a trip to Guatemala, a country I've wanted to visit ever since I went to Mexico on a summer study abroad program in college. Bob connected with a tour company called Kimkim to work out the details. We decided to start in Belize as an entry point closer to Tikal, the place I was most interested in visiting.  

We left for LAX at 5:15 AM on March 15 and flew 4 hours and 40 minutes to Belize City, a relatively short flight for us. Belize City is the capital and largest city in Belize.

We were picked up at the airport by a driver who took us to the Golden Bay Hotel, a 30 minute drive. The hotel employee checking us in said, "Oh, looks like you got an upgrade."

That was an understatement.

Our very large door (on the right below) should have given us a clue as to what was inside, but we only noticed that later.

INDIA 2025: FROM LOS ANGELES TO AMRITSAR

 November 20-22, 2025

In December 2024, Bob and I and my sister Chris and her husband Stan had a wonderful trip to India that included time spent in Guwahati, Kaziranga National Park, Delhi, Varanasi, Agra, and Jaipur. We checked many things off our bucket list, but one remained: to see a tiger in the wild. In spite of five or six safari drives in Kaziranga National Park, the big cat escaped us.

Foreseeing this as a possibility, Bob had purchased a five-year, multiple-entry visa instead of a 30-day, single-entry visa. I think his plan (unbenownst to me) was always to go back and try again. I think it may have been on the flight home that he suggested another trip.

We reached out to our reliable travel partners from the first trip and also included my brother Dave and his wife Bonnie and proposed traveling over the Thanksgiving holiday when I had a full week off from school and could add a few extra days. Both couples enthusiastically agreed, and Bob started planning.

Dave and Bonnie left three days before we did so that they could squeeze in some of the experiences, like the Taj Mahal, that we had on our first India trip. The plan was to meet up in the Delhi Airport on November 22 and fly from there to our first location: Amritsar.

With a time change of 12.5 hours, it takes two-and-a-half calendar days to get to Delhi from our home. We left the house on Thursday morning, drove the two hours to the Los Angeles Airport, left our car in the LA Hilton underground parking lot, and boarded a Virgin Atlantic flight to London at about 3:40 p.m.

A good omen?

The flight was 10 hours and 20 minutes long, and we arrived in London on a beautiful day with blue skies and a great view of the Thames curlicuing its way through the city.

We could even see the London Eye on the South Bank:

INDIA, DECEMBER 2024: LAX TO GUWAHATI

December 14-16, 2024    

We've been wanting to go to India for a while, but the timing never worked out. A few years ago it was not our year to have everyone home for Christmas, and I made the casual comment to Bob that next time it wasn't our year, I wanted to be traveling instead of sitting around at home. He took that as a green light for India and began planning. Once Bob starts planning, well . . . 

We drove to LAX on Saturday, December 14. We were trying out a new parking structure--105 Airport Parking--and couldn't find it. It turns out it had changed names to South Bay Parking, but no notice had been sent informing us of that change. It turned out to be a bit of a dump, and not a place we would recommend. There was only ONE available parking spot in the whole place, and it was on Level 6, the top floor. Of course, the elevator was broken, so Bob dropped me off and unloaded our luggage before going up (and then taking the stairs down after he parked).  We waited and waited and waited in a decrepit waiting room for a shuttle.  After at least a half hour, we gave up and called an Uber, which cost $18. 

Luckily, we always leave ourselves lots of time when we take international flights out of LAX as we never know what kind of traffic we will be facing on the LA freeways. We had time for a pizza at Wolfgang Puck's before flying to San Francisco Airport, where we again had plenty of time and enjoyed some clam chowder in a sour dough bread bowl. 

The plan was to meet up in India with my sister Chris and her husband Stan, who live in Billings, Montana. While we were in the San Francisco Airport, we got a text from Stan telling us they had missed their first flight from Billings→Seattle, which meant they might be behind 24 hours or more. Later we heard that they found a Billings→Portland→Seattle flight and made it in time to make their Seattle→London flight before their London→Delhi flight. Whew.

When we boarded our Air India flight from San Francisco→Delhi, we were struck by how Indian the plane seemed. Its seats were a yellowish-orange and red, and it smelled like an Indian restaurant. 

IRELAND, DAY 3: MINARD CASTLE, THE DINGLE PENINSULA, AND SLEA HEAD DRIVE

 July 6, 2024

Our plan had been to start the day at Blarney Castle, but when we tried to get tickets online, they were sold out. That's okay--we didn't feel a great need to kiss the Blarney Stone and taking one thing off the schedule made for a more relaxed day.

We left the B&B at about 9:30 or 10:00 and headed west towards the Dingle Peninsula.

Our first stop on the Dingle Peninsula was Minard Castle.

To get there from the main road, we drove down a very narrow single-lane road. Every now and then there was a turnout so two cars could pass, but in most spots even our tiny car seemed to hug both sides of the road, and if two cars meet in an area like this, they both have to pull over into the weeds in order to pass.

Eventually, we came upon a windswept hill crowned by a lonely mid-16th century monolithic three-story ruin . . .

. . . that looks over a desolate bay of the cold Irish Sea.

IRELAND, DAY 2: CORK

 July 5, 2024

Our next destination was Cork, located in (what else) County Cork, the largest and southernmost county of Ireland.

With a population of about 225,000, Cork is the second largest city in Ireland. That's a small population for the second largest city of a country! But then, the largest, Dublin, has fewer than 550,000 people.

My first impression of the city came from this fantastic mural, which I have since learned is entitled What Is Home? The artist, a guy named Asbestos, explains, "I painted this figure wearing a cardboard box on its head to start a conversation with the public about what home means to them. As a country we are currently in an existential crisis over housing and our need to put a roof over our heads. There's a fear and uncertainty about finding a safe space, and the system seems to be stacked in favour of the landlords." The mural, painted in 2021, is part of a street art project started during the 2020 lockdown.

It was mid-afternoon and we were hungry. We hadn't eaten much since breakfast. Bob had scoped out a restaurant weeks before the trip located in Cork's English Market--Farm Gate Café. 

We both ordered lamb stew and were a little disappointed. It was only average.

TUNISIA, DAY 2 CONT.: KAIROUAN - MAUSOLEAM SIDI ABID AL-GHARIANI, ZAWIYA OF SIDI SAHIB, THE EL JEM AMPHITHEATER, COUNTRY ROADS, THE MEDINA, AND A PARTY AT OUR HOTEL

March 21, 2024

As we walked deeper into the old town section of Kairouan, we came to the Mausoleum of Sidi Abid Al-Ghariani.

This building was built as a madrasa (school for studying the Quran) in the 14th century by a Kairawani scholar known as Al-Jadidi. After he died while on a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1384 AD, his disciple Sidi Abid Al-Ghariani carried on his work. When Sidi Abid died in 1402 AD, he was buried here, and ever since the school has borne his name. 

It is a spectacular example of the local architectural style.

Check out this amazing craftsmanship:

I think this must be the tomb, but we were not allowed to go into the room itself and this photo was taken from the door.

GERMANY 2000: STUTTGART, ROSENFELD, FREIBERG, AND ALLGAU

December 16-17, 2000

Our next stop was Stuttgart, a city 30 miles east of Pforzheim and where my mother's friend Eberhardt was living. It is the capital of the German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with a population of over 600,000 (and over 5.5 million in its metropolitan area), it is also the largest city in the state. Porsche and Mercedes-Benz headquarters are here.

While Stuttgart was bombed 53 times by the Allies, it didn't suffer the total destruction that Pforzheim did. In total, "only" 58% of the city's buildings were destroyed, and about 4,500 people were killed.

We were there to experience our first Weihnachtsmarkt, or Christmas market. It was spectacular.

INDONESIA: FROM BALI TO CALIFORNIA AND REFLECTIONS ON THE TRIP

 July 14, 2023

Our guide and driver picked us up at our hotel and drove us to the Denpasar International Airport, also known as the Ngurah Rai International Airport. It looks very Balinese in its architecture.

I think this statue by the airport must be Ngurah Rai, a Indonesian Lieutenant Colonel who has been named a National Hero for his role in the Indonesian War for Independence against the Dutch after World War II. He died in the Battle of Margarana and appears on the 50,000 Indonesian rupiah bill.

The airport is very busy, serving over 25 million passengers a year. I love all the Balinese touches. 

PORTUGAL: PORTO, PART IV - ORDEM DO CARMO AND RIBEIRA

 June 28, 2022

We were nearing the end of our crazy, too-fast day in Porto, but we still had a couple of places on our list.

The first was Ordem do Carmo, or the Order of Carmo, a rococo church built between 1756 and 1768 as a convent for the Carmelite Order of the Roman Catholic Church. 

Like several other churches we saw in Porto, the exterior walls are covered in blue tiles that are not original to the structure but added in 1916.

 In this case, the tiles depict the history of the Carmelites.

PORTUGAL: OBIDOS CASTLE

 June 26, 2022

After swooning over the basilica and palace in Mafra, we headed north towards Óbidos, a distance of about 45 miles. (We never had to drive very far in Portugal to get to the next amazing destination.)

No urban sprawl here. We drove through some beautiful country. This windmill looks just like the ones near us.

PORTUGAL, LISBON: GETTING THERE IN THE TIME OF COVID

 June 21-22, 2022

This post probably has a bunch of information in it that no one but Bob and I care about, but since this blog functions as our trip journal, I want to put it down here anyway. Feel free to scan or skip.

Three weeks before we were scheduled to leave for Portugal, when we were babysitting our granddaughters for a week while our daughter and son-in-law were on a getaway to Mexico, Bob started feeling ill. He test positive for Covid on the evening of May 30th. I took him to the Urgent Care the following morning. They did another test, also positive, and prescribed Paxlovid, an antiviral developed to treat high-risk Covid patients. He went into quarantine in our daughter's basement.

Two days later I woke up sick, tested negative, but went to Urgent Care, where I tested positive. Later in the day our oldest granddaughter also tested positive at home. It was clear we needed to go home before we infected everyone. Our daughter and SIL canceled the remainder of their trip and booked a flight home. Feeling that it wasn't right to expose a plane full of people to Covid, we rented a car and drove the 650 miles home.

After three days on Paxlovid, Bob tested negative (at home) for Covid on June 4. It was ten days before I tested negative on June 11. However, Bob had a rebound on June 10, something that occasionally happens with Paxlovid. The rebound commonly lasts three days, but on June 20, the day before our trip, Bob still hadn't had an official negative test, which was required for entry into Portugal. (As far as we could tell, Portugal was one of the last EU countries to require that, and it was on every site we looked at. I see that the requirement was officially lifted on July 1.) It was 21 days since Bob's original positive test. He hadn't had any symptoms for days, so a friend who is a Physician's  Assistant wrote a letter for him that cleared him for travel, but we were still nervous about Portugal's requirements.  We weren't sure if the letter would be accepted as it wasn't on an EU form, which seemed to be required, but visitors from outside the EU can't use the EU forms. So complicated. 

ECUADOR: HACIENDA CACAO & MANGO AND CHURUTE MANGROVES ECOLOGICAL RESERVE

 March 28, 2022

After hours of winding roads and then dirt roads, which were hard on me but didn't seem to affect anyone else (I'm so wimpy), we finally made it to our last destination of the trip, the Charute Mangroves Ecological Reserve and Cocoa Farm. The Ecological Reserve covers about 220 square miles, and is about 25 miles from the city of Guayaquil.

Map adapted from one found here

We stopped first at Hacienda Cacao & Mango, a farm focused on agritourism.

Our first item of business was a stop at the WC. I don't usually mention that in posts, but this one was extra cute.

Next up was lunch. All the food is grown locally and organically (or so they say). I loved the use of tree sections for placemats.

ECUADOR: QUITO-IN-A-DAY

 March 21, 2022

Quito is the capital and largest city in Ecuador. Situated in a valley in the Andean foothills at 9,350 feet, it is the second-highest capital city in the world (La Paz, Bolivia, sits at 11,942 feet) and the capital city closest to the equator. It is the only capital city next to an active volcano, Pichinca, which stands at 15,728 feet. Its last major eruption was in 1660, but it did puff a fair amount of ash onto Quito in 1999. Quito has, however, had a significant number of large-magnitude earthquakes in the last 100 or so years, including two that were stronger than 8.0 in magnitude: 8.8 in 1906, 8.2 in 1979, and nine stronger than 7.0 since 1942. Yikes.

Founded by the Spanish in 1534 on the ruins of an Inca city, Quito proper covers 143 square miles and has a population of 2.8 million, and we had about ten hours to see it all.

In the morning we met up with Terry and Geneil and enjoyed an upgraded breakfast on the "club floor" with them, (Remember, Terry had been upgraded because it was his birthday.)

Beautiful flowers--of course--and passion fruit.

Afterwards we gathered in the lobby with the other two couples who were joining our group, Brian and Renee Bascom and Ward and Norma Robinson, who had arrived in Quito in the last day or so.

A guide and driver picked up the eight of us and we were on the road by 9:00 AM. Our first stop was the Itanim Middle of the World Museum.

Here we all are!

ECUADOR: MINDO, PART 2 - DOWNTOWN, CHOCOLATE TOUR, A STORM, FINE DINING

 March 17, 2022

After our time at the butterfly refuge, we got a cab to take us downtown, where we enjoyed the small markets and noted a few unusual items, such as a whole pig strung up by its snout in a grocery store right behind the eggs and bunches of beautiful roses grown in Ecuador being sold on the street.

"Arroz Viejo" translates as "old rice."  Doesn't sound too appealing to me.

Plantains--a huge staple of the Ecuadoran diet--are for sale everywhere.