What Was That I Said?...

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:

What Was That I Said?  or, One's Brilliant (mis-) Understanding of Foreign Tongues!...   More Travels / Overseas Edition!

Heartburn and other stomach disorders are not exclusively the province of the elderly, or those of us currently experiencing the joys of GeezerHood!  

SweetHeart was at one point in her various superb careers, a Flight Attendant.  She flew for United Airlines.  As such, in our early years of marriage, we could fly like pelicans, unfettered by such impediments as airfares...  well, practically!

On our honeymoon -- that was prior to the onset of GeezerHood, but, after all, one can still recall those blissful days of callow youth -- we decided to jet off to Greece, or Hellas, visit the glories of Athens, as well a few of the Greek Islands.  What the heck does that have to do with HeartBurn??  Well...   lemme explain.

Athens is replete with what I call "Sidewalk Emporiums," at which one can purchase an array of necessaries, including remedies for the body.  On a particular evening, out for dinner and a stroll near the Acropolis, I had a nasty bout with heartburn.   Never traveling without my handy language guides, including a Berlitz Book of Greek, on this occasion, perhaps needless to add, I looked up "heartburn."  No listing.  I then paged to the index to find "antacids."  No listing.  Trying a few other obtuse combinations of Greek words, I finally settled upon the words, "Heart" and "Fire."  

I announced in my finest baritone broadcast voice, hand over my left chest, "Heartfire"!  The young woman who staffed the emporium looked at me as if I were making an unwanted romantic overture, her face a mask of shock and discomfort.  SweetHeart yanked me by the arm and hustled me away from the young woman and her sidewalk shop.  "She has to think you're some kind of crazed masher," said SweetHeart.  "Let's get the heck away

from here before she calls the local police!"  We departed briskly.

 On a subsequent evening, enjoying an "Athens By Night" adventure, along with an international throng of fellow visitors to that ancient land, we told the story of "Heartfire," with many translations and belated laughter arcing and echoing through the crowd.  As the merriment began to diminish, an English couple approached SweetHeart and me, and deposited several antacids into my open and grateful palm.

********************************************************************************

Our elder daughter spent a couple of years in Estonia during her Peace Corps tenure.  We visited her in the month of February, early in the 2000's.  Estonia was not in full bloom at the time, but seeing our wonderful daughter, a photogravure palette of grey and a continuous whispy snowfall made the entire experience delightful and beautiful, an artwork of muted color.  

We settled into Saaremaa, the island off the west coast of Estonia, in the Baltic Sea, where our daughter was based.  She taught, sang and volunteered her time and talent generously for young and old alike, anyone in need.  After seeing the sights and delights of the Island, we ferried ourselves to the mainland, rented a vehicle and motored off to see her fellow Peace Corps friends in Tartu and Tallinn.

On the road, we passed through a small village, a bit too fast, and were halted in our progress by an Estonian policeman who "waved" us down using a long pole, at the end of which was a circular symbol.  I believe the symbol indicated excessive haste!  I did not have a phrase book of Estonian.  No one spoke.  Using a kind of friendly sign language, the policeman and I, that is, I agreed not to speed anymore while the nice official agreed not to assess an enormous fine!  It was the first time in my driving experience that I was "pulled over" by a standing policeman armed with a long pole and a sign at the top!  

Pannenkoeken!  Oh, and Berries!

Our daughter, Bethie, was with SweetHeart, our Peace Corps daughter, Alie, and me.  Bethie made a great and loving impression on everyone we encountered, building relationships and friendships that have endured, even today, nearly 20 years after the fact!  We met Alie's wonderful and talented friends, learned a bit of Estonian, had a kind of pizza in Tartu and generally enjoyed a delicious and highly memorable adventure.  Oh, and "pannenkoeken"! A kind of bread-y pancake-y treat that's found everywhere in Estonia...  (The Netherlands, too, we're reliably told!)  And, we met Alie's Estonian host family.  Wonderful people who enjoyed Alie, her sense of humor and her sometimes stumbling efforts to learn the Estonian language, something she eventually mastered, still uses speaking with native Estonian friends. 

I should mention that Alie was in Estonia and Saaremaa during the "Nine-Eleven" crisis, and was told to "maintain a low profile," as Americans were thought to be in peril during that period of time.  She didn't.  She wrote and recorded her own compositions, including a couple of Estonian folk ballads, and created a wonderful CD of songs.  She was interviewed and landed on the front page of certain Estonian newspapers.  Not exactly a low profile, but she achieved well-deserved fame and praise, donating the proceeds from the sales of her CD to the Estonian Children's Fund. 

*********************************************************************************

Sometime in the mid 2000's, following her time in the Peace Corps, Alie and her now husband, Tad (a remarkably fine man, I have to admit!), decided to cross the Atlantic and visit her various Peace Corps veteran friends.  She had a place to stay everywhere they went, except for France, where the friend, living with parents, did not have suitable accommodations to house

her family.  She asked if we might be interested in a trip to France, specifically the Dordogne Region, the "Smile of France," demarcated slendidly by the river of the same name.  We billeted in an old bakery building, containing an enormous fireplace, lots of bedrooms for all of us, and even a swimming pool in the back garden.  The "all" included grandson, Coen, at the time not quite three years old, and a terrific traveling companion! 

We, SweetHeart and I, took a few basic lessons in French before departing on our journey.  The airline lost all of our luggage, or most of it, necessitating a shopping episode in Paris.  Thanks to the lessons, we navigated rather successfully through the shops and markets.  At one large department store, we stopped to purchase...   Well, I asked a clerk, "Avez vous une costume du plage?"  To which the patient shop attendant responded in perfect English, "You know, we do have a word for bathing suit, monsieur."  

"Uh, " said I, a bit red in the face, "Ou est le cabine d'essayage?"  I don't think she was impressed, but pointed me to the "fitting room."  I also found the underwear department, with a little help from my phrase book!  "Vetements pour ma femme?...   Tout coton, s'il vous plait!"      

And...   a very memorable occasion on which the use of the French language bore sweet fruit:  SweetHeart drew a warm hug from an older woman in Tremolat, asking first, "Do you speak any English?"  The woman shook her head, confused.  Then, SweetHeart asked in perfect French, "Ou est le bibliotheque la plus proche?"  The old woman beamed, and embraced SweetHeart as if she, SweetHeart, were a long-lost daughter!  (The small village did not have a library, however!). Such are the rewards and wonders of attempting to communicate with native people in their own language, especially meaningful and important when in their own lands!!  The village of Tremolat, by the by,  had some of the most delectable baked goods we'd ever tasted!  "Ou est encore cette le boulangerie?"

(Special Note of Dedication:   To all the good and gracious people of countries visited over the seas whose patience and understanding made our travels so satisfying, gratifying and edifying...  We thank you most sincerely!  You enriched the experiences far more than we can adequately express!) 

Humbly Submitted, 12-07-19 -- Joel K.  

             

The Beer Bottle that Disabled a Mexican Police Vehicle!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:       The Beer Bottle that Disabled a Mexican Police Car!


There are times when, I suppose, one tends to sit quietly and reflect upon things, specific, noteworthy things.  It may be a preoccupation or a proclivity of those of us who can view life from the elevation of GeezerHood, looking back or down upon one's own rich tapestry of life in general.  

Many years and many adventures and mis-adventures ago -- long before GeezerHood occupied my mind and body -- I was a newly enlisted member of the US Armed Services.  Following basic training, I was assigned to a tech or training school in west - central Texas, approximately 150 miles from the Mexican border village of Ciudad Acuna.

(Acuna has a "tilde" about the "n"...  giving it a pronunciation such as "señor" in Spanish.  As such, it is pronounced something like "A-coon-ya," accent on the second syllable!  Thought we should make this clear for our vast reading public!)

Military chums and I would frequently visit that fine little community in Mexico at weekends when we had no other duties commanding our attention.  It was, at the time, an exotic destination, complete with great food, music, cheap beer, more dangerously spirited potables...  other attractions and diversions as well.

My usual routine:  I enjoyed an initial visit to "Ma Crosby's" (at least that's the name I remember...  might be wrong!...) It was, maybe still is, a great-looking restaurant designed in classic Spanish or Mexican hacienda style architecture.  It had different levels! They served excellent and authentic Mexican foodstuffs.  Then we'd venture to the less elegant part of the town where drunkenness and other vices prevailed!  I won't burden the reading public with further lurid details...

Upon leaving Ciudad Acuna, on a particular occasion, one of my traveling companions insisted that all so-called contraband had to be discarded for fear of Mexican police intervention, possibly arrest.  I was skeptical, but decided "discretion... " you know the phrase...  I had an empty or near-empty beer bottle in my sturdy 1950 Hudson that I bought for $50.00 and eventually sold for $50.00 just prior to leaving the US for an overseas assignment.  

(On one occasion, my good friend and I were driving along near San Angelo, Texas prior to "going to town."  It was a very cold, wintry day.  We opened a full bottle of frozen beer that subsequently sprayed the windscreen with frozen beer, obscuring our

vision.  We hit a tree that did far more damage to the tree than to the durable 1950 Hudson!!!)  

Apologies for the brief digression!  Anyway, back to Acuna and the beer bottle.  I decided -- not very environmentally responsibly, I confess, but at the time I was quite young and rather irresponsible! -- to pitch the bottle from my hand-painted, light blue 1950 Hudson.  Through the now open driver-side window that I'd cranked down, my left arm and hand extended, I hurled the beer bottle over the top of the car hoping it

would land softly and inaudibly on the other side of the vehicle, into what I also hoped was soft mud, a pool of muck or a grassy expanse. (It was dark when we departed!!) This was prior to crossing the bridge over the Rio Grande River leading back into Texas and the United States.

Shortly following that toss of the fateful beer bottle, I heard a siren emanating from what was apparently a police vehicle.  It was a police vehicle.  I aimed the Hudson to the side of the road to await our fate!  I cranked down the window.  

"¡Has desactivado un vehículo oficial de la policía con tu botella de cerveza!  Eres un

borracho!," said the police person with his head in my window about an inch from my nose.  

"Powdered hand soap?" I queried, confused.

At the time, my knowledge of Mexican-Spanish was not so good.  "¡Ahora te arresto por la destrucción de propiedad policial y por tirar basura!" The beer bottle apparently was a kind of guided missile bomb that had the power to disable or destroy official vehicles!!

My gorgeous hand-painted Hudson was commandeered by the police, their policia coche having been "murdered" by the aforementioned beer bottle.  Somehow the siren still worked, however! An amazing thing!  I was instructed to drive the police persons along with my own fellow servicemen pals to the local Estación de policía! That phrase I understood. They instructed me how to get there via hand signals and bops in the head, indicating a la izquierda, a la derecha, derecho! ("Left turn, Right turn, Straight ahead... tu drunken gringo... y Cuidado!!")

Upon arrival at the estacion, I was placed into a jail cell with straw on the floor. There I spent a relatively uncomfortable night. The cell was never locked, but the presence of a heavily-mustacheioed and rather formidable looking policia officer would have deterred any attempt at escape!! My good friend, PT, kept me company, not inside the cell, but, as I recall, on a comfortable looking chair just outside my cage.  

At some point during the long night of incarceration, or in the early morning hours, a nice Mexican man magically appeared in the station. He both translated and ultimately effected my release from prison. He spoke fluent English. The man told me what the policeman had said, that my launch of the fated beer bottle had somehow broken the police car rendering it inoperable. Seems hard to believe, but that's what the police told him and what he translated in English to my companions and me.  

Surprised and obviously amused by the revelation, PT broke out of his silence, his deep baritone, like an explosive aria suddenly emanating from a clock radio alarm, seemed to shake the officers out of a collective trance. "This is embarrassing," he said. "You mean to say a police car that wouldn't run, probably pushed down a small hill, caught up to the motorized Hudson... such as the ancient Hudson is; miraculous it still runs...?!"  

My fingers wrapped around the jail cell bars, the classic pose of a scofflaw in a cage, eyes only half open and barely alert, I said, "Yeah, but they did have a working siren!" PT grinned and tried unsuccessfully not to chuckle. 

More of the translation revealed... One of the officers labeled me a drunkard! And a litterer

too! Can't say I was or should have been offended, as the characterization of my condition at the time was accurate. And, I was happy to have learned the correct Mexican word or phrase for "drunkard"!... "Borracho." It's a good word... wonderful... one I've gladly added to my Mexican-Spanish vocabulary!!  

The police persons, by the way, were kind and respectful overall, efficient and dutiful too, of course. But, too, they were somewhat put out by my destruction of the coche de policia! We discovered at some point in the proceedings that the nice man, the Mexican who translated into

English my various transgressions, was somehow attached to a Mexican-American consulate, or some such organization. I never found out precisely in what capacity, but it seemed he was a kind of liaison between Mexican authorities and misbehaving, drunken American GIs! It was enough that he was able to end my accommodation in the straw-matted jail cell. A great stroke of good fortune!!

I thanked the man profusely. I also thanked and apologized profusely to the good policemen. They did assess a hefty fine. PT and my other companions and I had to pool our remaining resources in order to be released from Mexico. Um... however, we had to plead with the nice police persons to return some of the fine money so that we could purchase gas for the Hudson in order to motor back to the base, thereby avoiding a charge of AWOL, possibly more incarceration!! Oh yeah, I think there may have been a toll as well to cross the Rio Grande. They grumbled a bit, the nice policemen did, but they grudgingly returned, not much, but a sufficient amount of the fine money! 

I feel it important to append the story, just in moderate fashion, that these days I've mended my ways. My beverage of choice is a brown pop of the diet, but caffeinated variety, with a slice of lime preferably. Mexican-American relations have rarely been so tested, and so amiably as in the case of the kamikaze beer bottle. I've returned to Mexico many times over the years of my GeezerHood, never however, and probably fortunately, back to the beautiful town of Ciudad Acuna. Perhaps some day, if I can find a 1950s Hudson, a proper map... and maybe if Ma Crosby's is still there too!! SweetHeart (dulce Corazon) y me amoramos el gente de Mexico!!

Humbly Submitted 04-17-19 -- Joel K.

  

The Art of Making Great Gobs of Money... Spending It Wisely...!!

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    The Art of Making Great Gobs of Money...  Spending It Wisely...!!  

The famous Pier at Cocoa Beach.  Good food, shops,
volleyball, fish, big waves...  swimming, more shops, beer!

I have no idea how to make great gobs of money! It's a concept that's eluded me most of my life.  However, I know a few people who have or still do make great piles of the stuff.  But that's not the point.  This piece is really about taking holidays or vacations affordably, inexpensively...  you know, on the cheap (if and when possible...  sadly, many lack the necessary financial privileges...)!  So I figured the title might be provocative enough to generate some readership...  maybe?!?

The Rocket's Tail...  Up There!...
Above Our Heads!!  

In July of this year, for example, we spent a week in Florider. You know the place... where every other transplant Flaridian from the Eastern Seaboard is wearing a loud, flowery tunic or a moo moo.  On our first full day in the Sunshine (about 90 or more degrees of glorious heat!), we actually witnessed a rocket launch, right from the sandy shores of Cocoa Beach -- not the rocket launching from that beach, but our viewing point of said rocket! -- where SweetHeart's cousin (with siblings!) owns a condominium.  She, a sweet and generous soul, allows us to rent the place quite affordably, for which we are most grateful.  The rocket launch was a thrilling thing to behold.  It departed the earth from Cape Kennedy Space Center, some 15 or so miles north of Cocoa!

I waived stupidly at the thing, as if expecting some lunatic riding on its nose to waive back.  "Give our regards to Jupiter," I hollered fecklessly! SweetHeart took pictures, or was it our Sweet Alie...?!       

The actual rocket that flew on July 5th
launched from Cape Kennedy...
It carried a communications satellite! 

And a couple of days later, we went boating on the Banana River, a 30-mile-long lagoon fed by the Atlantic and other sources.  Captain Quinn was the boat master, a seasoned and well-schooled Skipper who knows where to find manatees and dolphins!  Wonderful day on the water!  Not terribly expensive.  Oh, and he offers a bit of fishing and shell collecting...  beautiful conch shells in the main, collected from a small island! Alie, Tad, Coen, Lucy, SweetHeart and I thoroughly enjoyed the voyage!   

Tug fully restored for quick sale!

"What's that place?" I asked at one point during the cruise.  
"Oh...  that's a boat, barge and tug rehab center," the captain answered.  "They install a huge inflatable balloon-like device under the barge or boat to be rehab'ed, and then they sort of roll it onto the shore of that island we're looking at to begin repairs and rebuilding.  It's quite an amazing technology." 
I responded: "Something akin to what pyramid builders used, I reckon, eh?!" 
"What...?"

SweetHeart and I tend NOT to gravitate to the more obvious, "family" and "child-oriented" touristy destinations. We prefer "Eco-Tour Travel and Eco-Adventures." On one of our visits to Mexico, we learned about the "Sian Kaan Biosphere Reserve!" Extraordinary place! We get bussed to a jumping off point near Tulum, board an open boat and then race across a surprisingly large lagoon. As we approach what looks like land fall, most of us "crew members" are terrified of crashing into said land fall because we aren't slowing...  the pilot does slow eventually and takes us through a serpentine channel into another enormously large lagoon... (Several passengers have near seizures...  gasping...  mumbling...!)

We speed across that lagoon at the same insanely urgent pace, and finally come to a halt at a pier or wharf. We disembark and all of us don life jackets.
"What are we doing here?" I ask.
"We're going for a swim," answers our superb Mexican guide, one "Quetzalcan," also known as "Kukulkán Quetzal." He's a citizen of Mexico, a product of Chilean and Argentinean parentage, a fine-looking and splendidly well-informed individual, a delight in whose company and tutelage we enjoy the entire adventure!

We didn't see those fish...  We might
have if the boat had slowed down!

But I digress...  We then plunge into a smaller body of water. It's steady, modest, a "few kilometers-per-hour" current floats us pleasantly along a narrow and beautiful channel through mangroves, past verdant vegetation.  The entire "float" lasts about half an hour. We swim over at least one manta ray and many tropical fish before coming at last to a wooden pier. We then climb onto the pier connected to a long board walk that leads us through bogs and prairie back to the place at which we first took the plunge! A remarkably fine Eco-Tour, a truly beautiful experience!!

Back on the bus, we motor off to Muyil, site of a well-preserved Mayan ruin, consisting of an  enormous castillo,  temples, dwellings... where we wander about listening to our guide's presentation of the site's history and preservation efforts. And then a traditional Mexican feast at a seaside restaurant follows. In all, a truly magnificent day's outing!!  

In Door County, Wisconsin, a more recent adventure, we witnessed the solar eclipse from

An actual eclipse as seen from special
glasses that enable viewers to see
the spectacle safely! 

Newport State Park. The special glasses were in extremely limited supply, but the "eclipse-niks" with whom we shared the experience were exceptionally thoughtful and generous, each sharing glasses with her or his fellow viewer. And what a sight it was, the eclipse, that is! 

Bethie, Seany, Phi Phi, SweetHeart and I shared an old log cabin in Ephraim, dark interior but welcoming, commodious and comfortable. We swam in the waters of Green Bay at a beach in Sister Bay. The younger travelers kayak'ed and paddle boarded. We biked for 10 miles in Peninsula State Park, to Nicolet Bay Beach and back to the Fish Creek entrance. Oh, and we ate a lot at DC's many fine dining establishments, including Julie's, Wild Tomato, La Puerta and others! (I believe I may have contracted permanent indigestion and breath issues!!)  

Following a brief but beautiful cruise aboard one of the County's fabled passenger and auto ferries -- this trip aboard the Arni J. Richter, I believe! -- Elaine and Jim introduced us to some of the attractions on Washington Island we had previously not experienced -- School House Beach (one of the very best locations for skipping stones!!), the Art and Nature Center, a newly refurbished 100-plus-year-old hotel, the grounds and site of the annual Lavender Festival...  Much more to that island on the other side of Death's Door (or is it actually floating in Death's Door?) than one can imagine.  The ferry ride back to the mainland was equally enchanting, if a bit brisk for some voyagers! 

If there's a point to this piece (What? Finally...?), it's the idea that one can enjoy relatively modest travel adventures to destinations that are affordable and not so far off as to bankrupt the traveler.  Particularly important, delightful and gratifying is travel with one's family members, viewing the sights and sounds through the "fresh eyes" of children and those for whom the experience is brand new, fun-filled and exhilarating. The larger point?  Travel is among the best medicines to maintain healthy Geezerhood!! Dog or cat therapy is another...!! 

Oh! Almost forgot another "must" destination for a great many DC devotees: Wilson's! They have ice cream -- like peppermint stick and "Cookie Doug" -- popcorn too! It's in Ephraim.  Some ice cream consumers fancy flavors such as blue moon and caramel collision, I'm told! (Asked to hold onto cones by certain smaller persons who race to use the area "jungle gym," I find that Blue moon has a tendency to drip and leave stains on a person's white sockies! Stickiness too! I prefer the popcorn!)  

(Special Note of Dedication:    The perpetrator dedicates this posting to his beloved traveling companions...  SweetHeart, Alie, Bethie, Tad, Coen, Seany, Lucy and Phi Phi, Rob and Sue, without whose companionship the aforementioned travel adventures would not be nearly as rewarding, laugh-filled or suffused with delights, discoveries and edification, even!! I once learned about "dirty grids" during a particular travel experience, but that's a subject for another story entirely!  Thank you, and Good Day, Good Night and Happy Traveling!!)    

Humbly Submitted, 08-29-17 -- Joel K.      

  

   

Prairie Chickens and Other Strange Birds... Adventure Travels!

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:      Prairie Chickens and Other Strange Birds...  Adventure Travels!

It's 3:30 in the morning, dark, no sign of a sunrise.  We slog through soggy marshland. April is not always kind.  It's cold, damp.  What the hell are we doing here near Plover, Wisconsin in

Become One with the Prairie Chicken,
Oh Mystical Geezer!

the middle of a freezing night?  Finally, we arrive at a low building, a blind.  If you stand to your full height, even mine!...  you bang you head on the roof boards.  We sit on low benches, peer through slits in the structure. Like a bunker on a battlefield!  And then, daylight pops up like a mylar helium balloon let fly by a child with greasy fingers.  I'd missed it, sunrise; maybe I nodded off...  I look through the narrow window; there they are! Dozens of them. Prairie chickens! Dancing wildly, horny, moaning madly, revealing the full majesty of their gorgeous feathery sex apparatus! (This is "Geezer Travel Adventure" at its positive zenith!) 

  

What a terrific, comic performance!  They puff out brilliant orange sacs beneath their throats, drum their little feet, dance furiously to attract a mate.  Territorial males leap into the air to warn off other males, interlopers. Then attraction happens!...  A successful male bows to a female.  She shakes her ruffled feathers. It's done. They're married, or mated in non-anthropological speak! A field breakfast follows, including thick hash brown potatoes served from an enormous, deep-sided baking pan.  And meaty things!

This was one of a several remarkable trips conjured by and taken with precious friends, Rob and Susie.  All of them unusually different, and all memorable and filled with strange delights in the unique manner of each.  Near Lansing, Iowa, we floated along the Mississippi witnessing great bird migrations.  The were swans and masses of coots, goat prairies, bald eagles, even a mink foraging for food along a wing dam.  Prior to this voyage, I'd never before witnessed

swans in full flight.  Never seen so many coots gathered together on a single slice of river...  (Birds!  Not geezers playing checkers in coffee cafes and saloons!) 

That Mississippi River journey may have given us the idea for another.  We four rented a houseboat out of Alma, Wisconsin. Spent one evening in an inlet.  Built a fire, sang "Old Man River."  Wonderful time.  On the second night, after a day of prowling the Great River, passing magnificent-looking barge tugs, we beached ourselves between a pair of wing dams.  In the middle of the night, we were roused twice, once by a thump, once by a passing barge urged slowly along by a brilliantly-lit tug, so beautiful in the darkness of the still river.  The thump was, we thought, a tree branch that had lodged itself

Mississippi Barge Tugs are Truly
Spectacular Sights, Especially when
Fully Illuminated and Plowing
through the Big River at Night!

under our houseboat.  Couldn't budge the "branch" no matter how the four of us tried! Turned out to be an entire tree! Had to summon Captain Jack of the rental service and his powerful motorboat.  He, too, couldn't believe the size of the tree that anchored us to the shoreline. Spotted an eagle's nest so large the four of us could have moved in with kitchen appliances and lounge chairs...  maybe too a Murphy Bed!

Spider Monkeys love
SweetHeart!

In Mexico, we discovered a spider monkey preserve near Akumal.  The four of us spent more than an hour interacting with the monkeys in a large, cage-like enclosure.  We fed them snacks, and they, in turn, picked "artifacts" from our hair and skin (or whatever it was they found and ate!).  Such wonderful groomers!  Inquisitive but almost always gentle (save for a few little nips, occasionally...  ask Sweeheart)!  The seafood restaurant was superior.  The palapas-sheltered "Turtle Beach" was gorgeous to behold!  The ferry boat trip to and from Cozumel was perilous, with huge swells on an angry Caribbean.  We all thought we'd capsize and drown in the roiling azure soup!  But (maybe you read about it in the Playa del Carmen Porque-Pescado!), we survived to sail another day... (Petitions of thanksgiving to Saint Elmo...)!    

Sue and Rob Recline
on a Reclining
Sculpture...  and
are Pictured below
and to the Right on the
Canal Boat Deck!

Mo Powers the Canal Boat Effortlessly!

Most recently, we traveled to Starved Rock State Park in north central Illinois.  A place of magnificent rock formations, waterfalls, streams and wildlife, including funny-looking tourists. Great hiking trails. Prior to our arrival, not far from the park, we stopped in Lasalle, near Lock 16, to ride an authentic canal boat powered by a single mule named "Mo."  By the by, we highly recommend Lock 16 Cafe in Lasalle.  Wonderful food, great people! Starved Rock (named for a Native-American battle site on which the vanquished were starved out of their stronghold!) is located on the shores of the Illinois River.  The lodge and cabins are beautiful, welcoming and comfortable.  What's that?  Oh sure, we'd go back there!
(Mo's been pining for us!)

We've often thought about a possible Geezers' Guide to Great Travel Adventures and Good Restaurants That Cater to a More "Seasoned" and Thus Discerning Traveler. (Working title!) As a sampling, and to whet your appetite (you'll please forgive the obvious attempt...), you should try Greenfire in Rockford, Illinois. It's on our "Big / Lots of Stars" listing of fine commercial cuisine. Here's another...  Cafe McGregor in McGregor, Iowa, just across the Big River from Prairie du Chien, WI.  I think we liked The Blue Heron in Winona, MN where we stopped to dine during our auto excursion along the Great River Road.  And, they have an Eagle Museum and (a kind of) sanctuary in Winona.  Lots of information about the Mississippi River Eagle population, their comeback from near extinction. The place has a pet or mascot eagle that was wounded and now lives in quiet harmony with staff and visitors, and you can have your photo taken with the eagle.  She likes people!  (She once ate an entire fiduciary!...  a minor attempt at avian levity!) 

And, oh yes, lest we forget, that wonderful book by an admitted, shameless self-promoter is still available through the following resources: www.amazon.com; www.barnesandnoble.com. One can view an image of said book's cover at left.  Thank you, and may all your travels bring you edification, new friendships and untold delights!  

Special Note of Gratitude and Attribution:  The perpetrator extends profuse thanks to the wonderful Sue and the equally wonderful SweetHeart for their seemingly endless and outstanding suggestions for travel adventures and ancillary entertainments along the way!  Rob is also due equal thanks and recognition for his astonishing body of knowledge, his generosity and his willingness to share his thoughts and information with his traveling companions.  Thank you again and again, my dear friends.  Looking forward to the next adventure, I remain your humble, devoted and obedient servant...  well, maybe "obedient" is a bit excessive!

Humbly Submitted, 06-10-16 -- Joel K.