My dad was an airline pilot for TWA from the early 1960s until his retirement in 1990. His job afforded us almost free airfare, even when travelling abroad. During the time i lived at home and wasn't working full time, i took several trips abroad with my parents. We typically travelled in November (dad's vacation time) and rented cars or took tours, or just wandered cities, often travelling on a shoestring budget. These trips, between 1970 and 1977, were to the following countries:
I didn't have a camera until the Morocco trip, and i didn't have the common sense to start keeping a travel diary until i left home in 1978, though i did keep a diary of the Africa trip. That diary is the first entry presented here.
After i left home in 1978, i took my first trips abroad on my own or with friends. Once i settled in California in 1981, i continued to travel abroad as time and budget permitted. My out-of-America sojourns have almost always been three weeks or less, a reprehensibly short period of time to spend anywhere. Such are the curses of American vacations and my lack of daring to just take off for indeterminent lengths of time. But my vacations have been getting longer, the destinations more daring, and the payoff greater.
The purpose of publishing my travel diaries is to share my perspectives and observations on the places i've visited. I wrote the diaries for myself, and so my prose gets quite stream-of-consciousness at times. In the spirit of readability, i have edited out some of the more incoherent passages so the narrative is hopefully useful to someone not accustomed to my brain. I have left in some of my puns, silliness, and self-amusing humor where it suits me and doesn't detract too much from the descriptions. After all, if i was having fun travelling and enjoying my reactions to my environment, you should get to share in some of that as well.
dan carlson 11/22/00