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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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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Trip of a Lifetime by Paty Jager

Gullfoss

I just returned from a 6 day trip to Iceland. It was put together by the Authors Guild and Iceland Travel Agency.

Our tour guide said it was the best tour he'd herded in his 30 years as a guide. It was a combination of local sites and literary events. I won't go into detail of what all we saw, because I'll be spacing that out on my own blog this month and next. Writingintothesunset.net

I'm going to give you a brief recap of what I learned on this trip.

1- Iceland is not all ice. But it is mostly lava. Under neath the thick moss and grass are layers of volcanic ash and lava. The volcanoes that boiled and spewed to make the island are still active.

Much of the landscape looked like this.

2- The towns get their hot water and electricity from the steam and water of hot springs that boil out of the ground in many places across the island.

This was one of the several hot springs we stopped to see. Water boiling out of the ground.

3- The only native mammals on the island are foxes. But they have mice and rats that came over on ships early on. The Icelandic horses that were brought over by the Norsemen and have stayed pure to the breed. (more on the horses later) sheep, cattle, dogs, cats, and caribou.
Because they are an island there are no diseases in the animals and to keep it that way, they don't allow animals to be brought in.

4- The Icelandic horse is a pure breed. There has not been another breed on the island. They have 5 gaits- walk, trot, toilt, gallop, and pace. They said this is the only horse with 5 gaits. The toilt, a very smooth trot, looked like something I've seen Paso horses do.  They sell horses to people of other countries, but once a horse leaves the island it can't come back because it could bring diseases. There are 350,000 people in Iceland and 80,000 horses.

We had a show of the 5 gaits of the Icelandic horse.

5- Tourism, fishing, then sheep are the island's biggest incomes. We ate fish every day we were there- either for lunch or dinner or both. And we had lamb twice. Only had beef once. The cows are mainly used for dairy products. One is skyr a thick almost cottage cheese consistency type of yogurt that is made like a cheese. It is more sour than yogurt but when sweeteners like sugar or fruit are added it is good.

This is skyr- The white is plain, the strawberry was with sweetener and berry, and the blueberry was with a berry liquor

6- The first settlers of Iceland were Norsemen- people from the Scandinavian countries. And Viking is not a people or culture - the name meant pirates. Our guide went to great length to say that they are not descendants of Vikings but of Norsemen. Vikings was the name given to pirates of that time period.

This was an exhibit of a boat built to the specifications of a Viking ship and was sailed from Iceland to North America in the 1990s.

7- Icelandic Sagas are full of stories of brutality. Yet, the Icelanders love their sagas as much as we love the fairy tales of our childhood. And as they say, "these are stories made up to entertain".

We attended a play about the sagas

8 - Meeting the Icelandic Authors Union was an honor and an interesting evening. Two authors, a non-fiction and fiction, talked about how the union works and about sales both in their country and abroad. How difficult it is to get books into translation to other countries and that the most popular authors in Iceland are the crime fiction writers. Which brings me to...

9- Knowing we were going to have a meeting with Yrsa Sigurdardottir, a crime fiction author, I had read/listened to her first two books in a series. I loved them and was excited to meet her. She had a different view of translations and genre books in Iceland. The two at the Authors Union were NonFiction and Middle grade/YA authors.  I enjoyed visiting with Yrsa, and we talked about meeting up at Bouchercon in Saramento 2020, though she will be at Dallas this year.

Yrsa signing a book for one of our group.

10- We spent a couple hours at the Blue Lagoon a small lake of hot springs water and silica. I only stayed in the water for about 30 minutes. It wasn't too hot, but even though I sat on the cement bench along the edge in the water, my legs and body would start floating to the top. I float easily in regular water and this water I was unusually floaty.  The water was a light blue and thick. You couldn't see more than four inches into it.

The water of the Blue Lagoon outside the swimming part.

10- While there was talk of trolls (giants) and little people I didn't see... I caught sight of a water nymph while at one of the hot springs.

There is a photographer behind the bush. I think it was an advertisement.

I hope you enjoyed my bullet points of what I learned about Iceland. I would go back in a heartbeat to see more of the island. Maybe one day. And this time I would drag my hubby along.

Have you traveled or visited a place that filled you with awe?

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.

blog / website /  Facebook / Paty's Posse / Goodreads / Twitter / Pinterest   / Bookbub