We took this trip for many wonderful reasons, and most of them played out just as we had hoped. Being able to Skype with the kids and friends allowed us to keep connected to those at home...a feeling that would not have been possible a decade ago. Thank goodness! While we thought we had left at a calm time in our family's life most everything changed while we were gone.
We made unexpected detours to Tasmania, Lake Como and St. Andrews in Scotland from our scheduled itinerary. Margo suggested all of them and I am very thankful she did. Each unplanned stop added a great dimension to our trip.
We learned the US is morphing into a new phase in its history. Our position in the world is definitely evolving. We are no longer THE superpower. It was very interesting to talk to people about their country and the US. Their opinions of the U.S. and its politics were very varied. Everyone had an opinion...down to the driver from the airport. And they were passionate. We felt the rise of countries such as Turkey, Australia, and Brazil just by observation. Countries with natural resources are gaining power. No surprise... particularly oil. We learned how completely interconnected the world is today...more than ever.
The people you meet along the way make all the difference in a trip (and in life) and the fact that we are relatively extroverted allowed us to make a lot of new friends. We especially enjoyed meeting our new Hong Kong/London friends on the Milford Track, our visit with the Zinks in their beautiful home in Sydney, the Langleys for dinner in Sydney, Jane Fairley in Melbourne who also lives in Sun Valley, the Handkes and Cathcarts from Cleveland in Tasmania, the most generous Rosenbergs in South Africa, Sylvia, a native of Santiago, Chile showed us her city and the Schultzs coming to our villa on the Riviera and, of course, Scotty visiting us was an added bonus. Wished we could have had a visit from Taylor and Morgan. The difference between knowing friends in a new city and not made all the difference.
The breathtaking beauty of the places that we were lucky enough to visit- among them the Grand Canyon in Kuaui, the Milford Track in New Zealand, the unspoiled beaches of Tasmania, the vast savannah plains of South Africa's Phinda game reserve, the powerful historically important location of the Bosphorus and Istanbul and its amazing juxtaposition in world history and the magical, mystical Machu Picchu stunned us.
I loved speaking Spanish throughout South America, savoring a Malbec or two with Margo and reliving the summer of 1970 when I researched my senior thesis in Peru and spent a week in the shadow of Machu Picchu reading the history of Peru in Spanish. I was dumbfounded that the same type of expropriation of Peru's sugar plantations in the late 1960's was still going on in countries such as Argentina and Bolivia today. Countries were still taking back companies without reimbursing the companies for their value. Basically, a form of eminent domain.
Re-entry was all the more sweet by visiting friends in Dallas, Sea Island, Hilton Head and Palmetto Bluff on our way home to a Welcome Home party at the Beach Club. God Bless the U.S.A.!
We had a magical four months holding hands and seeing many of the world's wonders, countries and their people. We became closer than ever as a result and highly recommend this experience to those who are thinking about it. "Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward in the same direction."-Antoine de Saint-Exupery
