A gypsy's life for me -- I'm never so happy as when I'm roaming

Cookie at Oceanside Harbor in southern California, with Nick and Nora, beginning a recent two-week odyssey. 

COOKIE'S MOTHER'S MILK: TRAVEL ENRICHES, ENLIGHTENS, ENERGISES

Cookie, right, age three, sister Peny
with their mother Ellen. Already,
she was a "seasoned" traveler.

I KEEP my  passport renewed and ready to go, and my bag is always packed.  I could be ready to head for the airport with a half hour's notice.
I don't really care where I'm going, as long as I'm on my way.

Keller christens a new adventure with champagne!

When people say "Oh, I've done Paris" (or the Amazon, an African safari or the Antarctic) I cringe.  They've done the place! Impossible.

A Bedouin takes to his transport at the Pyramids in Egypt.

Just as no two days are alike, no two trees exactly the same, or no two people identical, no city, island or place remains static.
We don't eat a single meal and say we're done with dining!
I'VE BEEN on more than 100 cruises and each one offers new excitement and experiences, even if the ports might be repeats.  I've been to Paris a dozen times and never fail to feel its magic anew.  I've been on the Amazon three times and hope I have another three trips in me.
Ditto, my many trips to Ireland, the Hawaiian Islands, and Australia and New Zealand, where I'll return in November.

Two kids with wanderlust:  Cookie and Keller at Belem Castle in Lisbon.

My mother took me on my first road trip when I was just over two and my sister Peny was not quite one.  We drove to Kansas in a green Oldsmobile, with my grandparents, Gus and
Olive Nystul, to visit my great-aunt Lillian and her husband Ronnie.  It was a month of total magic to me and I vividly remember the drive-in stops for milk shakes, the Mount Rushmore sculptures, the motel rooms, menus I collected, stories my grandpa told and movie ticket stubs.  It was my own Yellow Brick Road and I've followed it ever since.
I DISCOVERED a few months back that my great great grandfather was ambassador to the Netherlands from his native England.
That explains both why I am a die-hard Anglophile, and why I have incurable wanderlust.

Cookie, right, and her sister Misha on Mission Bay, San Diego.

Many of my favorite travel memories have to do with water -- bays, oceans, rivers.  Others have to do with theater, and I'm waiting for a play right now in Ashland, Oregon, an all-female production of "Two Gentlemen of Verona."  The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is another ever-changing tradition for me.  Each play is unique -- each "Two Gents" spectacular.
The scholar Augustine of Hippo said, “The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”
MARK TWAIN believed travel to be "fatal to bigotry, prejudice and narrow mindedness."
And Jack Kerouac referred to his love of each "new, crazy adventure  beneath the skies."


Queen Califia's Magical Circle in Escondido was a surprise find,
as our travelers happened upon it while picnicking in Kit Carson Park.

 Many of us love travel and live for each new trip. It enlarges, enlivens, enlightens! It gives energy.  It's mother's milk.
Keller's grandmother was a travel agent in Minneapolis.  She immigrated from Sweden, took many tour groups back to her native land, and was around the world five times by the time Keller was ten years old.
He, too, came by his wanderings naturally, lived in Saudi Arabia and has traveled the world.
OUR BEST times together are on our travel adventures.  Whether it's a day trip to the country (where we often stumble upon magic) or a month-long odyssey to South America or the Far East, we are grateful for each new day together, and the opportunity to share the world's wonders as a team -- partners in life, adventure and this blog.


COMING NEXT:
Cookie and Keller take to a kayak, and manage to stay afloat. A peaceful estuary at Moss Landing reveals gorgeous and graceful clam-crunching otters, huge sea lions belching and making other noises not appropriate to mention in polite company, and dozens of pelicans preening and lunching.
We are about travel with a sense of fun and adventure off the beaten track.
Visit us Wednesdays and weekends at:
www.whereiscookie.com