Oh the Places You'll Go, by Eleri Grace

After spending such an extended period of time foregoing travel (or limiting to outdoor locations that were within driving distance OR were necessary for whatever reason), I'm particularly grateful to feel free to travel more again. 

This spring I traveled to Washington, DC to visit my daughter during the Cherry Blossom Festival (a bucket list item). She's a student at George Washington University, and this was my first opportunity to experience the wonder of our nation's capital abloom with these gorgeous flowers. Despite the unseasonably cold and wet weather, we had a memorable weekend, enjoying the cherry blossoms at the Tidal Basin and throughout the National Mall and taking in a few museums and great restaurants. 

For summer, I have several trips planned with my son, who is a rising senior and needs to visit college campuses. He wants to major in professional flight and air traffic management, which has narrowed our list quite a bit. So far, we have traveled to Oklahoma to visit OU in Norman and Oklahoma State University in Stillwater. In August, we will fly to Chicago to visit Lewis University in IL and Purdue University in Indiana. 

We are likely making a repeat visit to the aviation mecca that is the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks -- we saw it late last summer, but we may need to see it again (preferably in more typical winter weather conditions so he can really judge for himself how he'll fare in that climate!).

As this posts, we are in Alaska! The trip is primarily to see the University of Alaska at Anchorage, as my son believes Alaska is more temperate than North Dakota (!), but we are also anxious to spend some time land-based in Alaska (we did a cruise many years ago). We are doing a flight bear-sighting tour to Katmai National Park, a day cruise to Kenai Fjords National Park, and will also work in some hiking and kayaking. I also plan to visit some of the WWII heritage sites in and around Anchorage and Seward as two of my planned Arctic novelettes are set in that region -- one in Alaska and one in the Aleutian Islands. If technology and time allows, I will add some photos from our trip so far to the comments section. 

I have many places still on my bucket list -- some of the top international contenders include Wales (I have quite a bit of Welsh ancestry), Italy, Croatia, Norway, Spain, and Portugal. Though I've been to London many times, I haven't been back in nearly 5 years and would love to combine a London and Wales trip soon. Closer to home, I would like to see more of our national parks, especially Yosemite, Great Smoky Mountains, and Arcadia. 

I hope you too are seeing some new and fun places this summer -- happy travels to all!

You can buy my books on Amazon, learn more about me and my writing on my website, and follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. 

Oh, the travels I've enjoyed by Paty Jager

This month on RTG is all about vacations. There were many years in my adult life when a vacation was packing up the tent, hooking up to the old boat we'd bought, and putting a cooler and the kids into the pick-up and away we'd go for a long weekend with friends for boating, knee-boarding, and camping. At the time it was exhausting but the kids loved it and so did my husband. 

Now that the kids are grown up and having vacations with their kids and my husband has taken on a job that requires him to not be too far from the alfalfa fields in the summer, I've been taking a few vacations on my own or with friends. 

Though I have to say the trip we took to Nederlands (Holland) when the kids were still at home was a fun trip to explore another culture, one that is my husband's heritage. He met cousins, aunts, and uncles he'd not seen before. We had fun with his family and enjoyed the many day trips his relatives took us on.

This is a family photo we had taken at a photo shop in the Nederlands.

I couldn't find the photo album with better photos in it. 

I've jet boated the Snake River as research for a book. 

The jet boat I rode on.

A view of the snake river below Hells Canyon Dam.

I also spent a week in Iceland, which turned into fodder for another book.

A photo I took from the top of a church in Reykjavik.

This was bread baked in the ground by the geothermal hot springs in Fontana.

This was the place that started my mind conjuring up a scene for a book.

The Krysuvik mud pots and boiling pools.

And we met Icelandic crime fiction author Yrsa Siguoardottir. 

Most recently, I spent a week in Montana doing research for another book and this past weekend I attended a Powwow to gather more information about the Umatilla culture. 

This is a young grizzly bear we saw grubbing while in Montana. 

And this was the island resort I wanted to see for the next book I'm writing. 

But my favorite place to vacation, usually without hubby and to write, is the Oregon Coast. It is my happy place next to being home. 

Paty Jager is an award-winning author of 53 novels, 8 novellas, and short stories of murder mystery, western romance, and action-adventure. All her work has Western or Native American elements in them along with hints of humor and engaging characters.

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Photo Bucket List Vacations by Paty Jager

 These are places I would like to someday see or participate in:

This first photo is of Australia. I have ogled over the photos author Susan Horsnell has posted on Facebook. I'd like to go see the sites that she has let us see through her photos. 

Ever since reading Nora Roberts trilogy, Born in Ice, Born in Fire, Born in Shame, the Concannon sisters trilogy set in Ireland, I've wanted to visit. 

Another trip on my bucket list is to ride a mule down into the Grand Canyon. Hubby said he doesn't want to go, so I'll have to talk my horse-loving daughter into going with me. Hopefully, before I can't sit on a horse for too long.

Another vacation I would like to take is to travel the Nez Perce (Nimiipuu) National Historic Trail. This is the route the Chief Joseph and White Bird Nimipuu bands traveled for 176 days in 1877 trying to find peace in Canada while the U.S. Army chased them. They finally gave up at the Bear Paw Battlefield near Chinook, Montana after starting from Wallowa Lake, Oregon. Every year riders and walkers travel 100 miles of the trail.

These are only a few of the places I would like to go on a vacation. I also wish to visit every one of the states in the United States and would like to take the train across Canada.

What is at the top of your vacation bucket list? 

Oh, the Places I've been by Paty Jager

I love that this month is about travel at Romancing the Genres. This year has and will be one of my most traveled years. In June, I joined other members of The Authors Guild on a trip to Iceland. It was a trip I wouldn't have thought about had it not been for the invite in my email. But I had a great time and came back with an idea for a book!

After 40 years of asking, my hubby and I are finally going to Hawaii. That trip will be in October this year. I've always wanted to see tropical sand, surf, and plants in person. I'm scheduling items into our time there to help me set a book there as well. I'm always thinking about books!

But I will have to say, the trip that opened my eyes and drained me was a trip we took 27 years ago. My husband is 100% Dutch. His parents moved to the U.S. in the 1950's and he was born here shortly afterwards. He'd only been to The Netherlands once as a child, so in 1992 we took all four kids and his mom to The Netherlands.

Our family in the clothing of Volendam

We stayed two weeks. But because the homes are so small, they split us up among family members. My mother-in-law and the two girls stayed with one family, while hubby and I and the two boys stayed with another family in the same town. Each day we would meet up with either the families we stayed with or other family members would pick us up and take us to see the sights.

On one trip, hubby's cousin and her husband rented a van and took hubby, me, and the kids to Belgium. Along the way one of the boys had to go to the bathroom. Over there along the roads there were no rest areas. People just pulled over at wide spots and did what they needed to do. We picked such a spot and the boys took off behind a tree.

The rest of us got out and stretched our legs even though driving from where we were staying in The Netherlands to Belgium was less than two hours.  Hubby's cousin noticed the trees were cherry trees with ripe fruit. We all picked a few and ate them. We called to the boys who were taking a long time and they finally arrived. We noticed their pockets bulging. When they revealed they'd shoved cherries in their pockets, hubby's cousin said, "Stupid boys. You ruin your clothes." We all still laugh about that.

This same couple took hubby and I out on the town one night in Amsterdam. The streets were overflowing with people partying on a Friday night. We were sitting at a sidewalk table sipping a drink and watching the people when a man dress in clothing like a clown, his face painted up, and an inner tube around his middle with a large fake penis sticking out asked me to pet his friend as he shoved the penis at me. I was mortified but everyone else laughed. The cousins told us he was a man about to be married and was out on his bachelor party with friends. The friends dress the soon to be groom up and then take him around to all the bars. There were also women dressed in crazy outfits being herded by other women. These were the brides to be.

Later they took us to the Red Light District. There were women from teenage to in their 80s standing in windows for everyone on the streets to see. And men lined up at some of the buildings ten deep. At that time all we had for a movie camera was a large VHS recorder. It was in my large bag and when hubby wanted something filmed, I would stick the end out and turn it on. I guess one of the bouncers at one of the houses of ill repute saw the red light or something from the camera and started after us. Hubby grabbed the bag with the camera and my hand and we took off running with his cousins laughing and running behind us. We made it out of the Red Light District and  laughed all the way back to their house. When we played the tape, there was very little to see other than the man yelling at us. I didn't have it pointed at the row of windows that hubby had wanted filmed to show his friends back home. But we had a good time running like fugitives! 

 That is a vacation we hope to make again soon before more of his aunts and uncles are gone and his mother is in too bad of shape to make the trip.

Do you have memories that will never fade from a vacation?

Paty Jager is an award-winning author of 40 novels, 8 novellas, and numerous anthologies of murder mystery and western romance. All her work has Western or Native American elements in them along with hints of humor and engaging characters. Paty and her husband raise alfalfa hay in rural eastern Oregon. Riding horses and battling rattlesnakes, she not only writes the western lifestyle, she lives it.


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When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie…

My fantasy vacation is this month’s theme on Romancing the Genres. I love to travel, although I don’t get to take-off as often as I’d like these days. So, for me and all the other armchair travellers out there…this is a perfect excuse to wallow a while in fantasy-land.

If I had to choose only one perfect vacation spot…I’d choose two. Ha! I cheated. It’s my fantasy and I’ll make up the rules as I go along. Italy and Spain are at the top of my list of amazing countries I’ve visited. Any fantasy vacation would have to include visiting those two destinations again…

That’s amore!

Once I had my bags packed and managed to round up my husband and two boys, I’d be off to Italy. In First Class, of course. I’ve never actually sat in First Class but it’s on my bucket list. Why not travel across the globe in style, sipping Champagne, then actually lie down on an overnight flight?

Photo of Florence – the city at sunset

The city of Florence in Tuscany, Italy, is arguably the most gorgeous and romantic city in the world. I had a chance to travel there twice so far, once in 1999 as part of a university study tour to several European companies. I spent a lot of my spare time there just wandering through cobblestone alleys and winding streets and eating gelati ice-cream.

Then in 2005, I got to travel back with my husband on our honeymoon. One of my favourite things to do there is climb the hill on one side of the river Arno, for the view right over the famous bridge, Ponte Vecchio, and the whole city. I took some photos and stumbled across a small chapel with a group of monks inside singing Gregorian chants, like I'd stepped back in time to the middle ages.

Both times I visited, the city hit me with a double-whammy of romance and history. I’d go back to the Uffizi gallery in a heartbeat to admire one of my favourite paintings in the world – Botticelli’s Primavera. And of course I’d say hello to the statue of David and tour the renaissance buildings such as the palaces and old monasteries in the Tuscan countryside.

Detail of woman in a Botticelli painting

Since this is my fantasy, I’d also eat as much as possible without putting on any weight. The best gelati ice-cream in the world, delicious pasta and steak, and the Chianti wine made by traditional winemakers in the hills. While I’m imagining, I’d stay at a luxurious palazzo with a swimming pool and enjoy the summer sunshine without the heat we get in Australia.

Fiestas of fun

I visited Spain for a month in 2010 when a family member got married there. On this trip I had both my husband and our little 13 month old son in tow! He actually learned to walk in the El Retiro Park in central Madrid, toddling around on the grass. Later, he had hours of fun running up and down the pedestrian mall outside our hotel.

Royal Palace – Madrid

On my fantasy trip, I’d spend hours or maybe days wandering around the Royal Palace in Madrid, before making my way down south to the equally magical south of Spain. I’d let my boys run wild in the acres of park land and then take a trip down to the wonderful Medieval hilltop city of Toledo about an hour away by train. We'd stay somewhere with banquets of paella and Spanish flan, then go see some flamenco dancing.

When I visited Barcelona with my family, the city was in full-swing summer festival mode. A massive stage had been setup by the waterfront for free concerts, the popular boulevard La Rambla was packed with people rambling each night, browsing market stalls and eating tapas. And there were random art shows and performances around every corner. I loved wandering around discovering things such as a parade of giant marionette puppets representing historical characters.

I’d take my boys to the Gaudi-designed cathedral, La Sagrada Familia, which looks like something conjured from a fairytale. We’d buy swords from the traditional armour-makers in some of the old parts of the city and play pretend knights in an old-world hotel that used to belong to nobility.

La Sagrada Familia  – Barcelona

No fantasy trip of mine would be complete without shopping, so I’d be ready with indestructible credit cards to hit all the Italian and Spanish boutiques. Especially shoes, boots and handbags. Don’t ask how many pairs of shoes I brought back from my last European trip…but considering I only have two feet, and I had to buy a new suitcase, it was a few.

Finally, I’d stop off at a few places I didn’t get enough time to see last time, like the seaside resort town of Malaga or the island of Majorca and just relax at the beach.

P.S. – Remind me to actually finish writing the book I have in draft, with a few chapters set in Spain!

P.P.S – My debut novel, Girl on a Plane, has a lot of travel in it too. It's on sale now for 99 cents US! Buy links - www.books2read.com/girlonaplane 

 

About Cassandra O’Leary

**Winner of the global We Heart New Talent contest run by HarperCollins UK. Nominated for BEST NEW AUTHOR in AusRomToday 2016 Reader's Choice Awards for excellence in Australian romance fiction**

Cassandra O’Leary is a romance and women’s fiction author, communications specialist, avid reader, film and TV fangirl and admirer of pretty, shiny things. Her debut novel, Girl on a Plane, was published in July 2016. 

Cassandra is a mother of two gorgeous, high-energy mini ninjas and wife to a spunky superhero. Living in Melbourne, Australia, she’s also travelled the world. If you want to send her to Italy or Spain on any food or wine tasting ‘research’ trips, that would be splendiferous. 

Read more or sign-up for Cassandra's newsletter at cassandraolearyauthor.com