Saturday, February 3, 2007

Well Traveled


"Well Traveled", I used that term in the post below. Mike, my husband, asked me to define it.

Well now, what did I mean by "well traveled"?

Mike reminds me that an impressive number of travelers we met in Papua New Guinea had been to both Antarctica and the Amazon before exploring Papua New Guinea. They were obviously well traveled.

We met an equally impressive number of travelers who had been to more than 100 countries and were members the Century Club of Travelers. And yes, they were obviously well traveled.

And there was that solo traveler, a flight attendant with a major American airline, who told us she and colleagues were competing to see who could travel to the most countries within a set period of time. Their criteria for being able to say they had "been" somewhere was to do two of the following three: drink a beer, spend US$100, have sex.

The charming flight attendant told us she had drunk a lot of beer and spent a lot of money in her quest to win the competition. And yes, she was obviously well traveled.

Am I well traveled? I've done my share of traveling but I haven't yet been to Antarctica or the Amazon. Membership in the Century Club will surely remain beyond my reach in part because I tend to go back to places I like. And I'd never do well in that flight attendant's competition as I like to travel slowly enough to savour a place.

So I'm not sure if I'm well traveled but I certainly know I like to travel well. And that doesn't answer Mike's request to define "well traveled". Comments would be helpful here.

copyright (c) 2007 - 2011 Mary Jane Murray