Features

by Kaye Olson, DeWitt, MI

After traveling to 41 countries, my husband and I embarked on a self-designed journey that would surpass all the trips we had taken in our lifetime. Over several years we had searched for information regarding the death of my uncle, Staff Sergeant Lewis (Louie) Annear, during the WWII Normandy invasion of 1944. Our mission was firm. After a time lapse of 57 years, we would follow Louie’s footsteps from his D-Day disembarkment on Utah Beach till his death...

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by Robert Juhre, Kettle Falls, WA

Travel in Botswana is limited to a few choices. You can book accommodations through one of many tour operators. Their camps are generally small, accommodating 12 to 15 people, and are remote but well appointed.

The food is gourmet, and the attention to guests’ personal care and comfort is outstanding. Visitors can see an abundance of wildlife in the immediate vicinity of most camps. However, these camps are expensive, ranging from $250 to over...

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by Richard and Elizabeth Welch, Annandale, VA

My wife and I have taken several guided trips to various areas of Great Britain hoping to see as much of this very attractive country as possible. While we had obtained good overviews of many of its regions, Wales had been mostly ignored. Although we searched diligently, we had been unable to find any tour company that offered more than a quick passage through this country on the way to or from Ireland. Consequently, we decided to plan...

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by Lynn Remly, Arlington, VA

Clattering across eight time zones, the Trans-Siberian Railway line traverses one-third of the globe and all of modern Russian history. While continuing to provide basic transportation in an area with few roads, the train also serves as a draw for hard tourist cash to help kick-start the limping post-Soviet economy.

While most people take the Vladivostok-Moscow route in worn-out cars with primitive facilities, I opted to traverse the 5,806 miles (9...

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by Dan Gifford, Arlington, VA (Part 6 in a series of 6)

On the island of Rarotonga, nothing can be built taller than a coconut tree. This inspired bit of zoning regulation sums up why we chose the largest of the Cook Islands over better-known South Pacific destinations like Tahiti or Fiji. No highrise hotels, no megaresorts, no way to accommodate hoards of people.

We owed our stop here to an acquaintance of mine, a remarkable woman named Diana Lockwood. Diana founded Pacific...

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by Lesley Friedsam, Tampa, FL

I am walking on an ice floe atop the Southern Ocean, the most inhospitable sea on Earth. The only thing between me and a thousand feet of water filled with orcas, whales, penguins and seals is a 2-foot-deep crust of white, blue, gray and turquoise ice. The ice is not a flat, shiny sheet. It is raised and humped, crevassed and sculptured. Gigantic icebergs, some multistories high and a city block long, are part of this landscape created by summer meltings...

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by Dennis Cavagnaro, Oakland, CA

Taiwan’s Alishan Forest Railway climbs from 30 meters at Chiayi to 2,274 meters at Alishan in just 3½ hours and gives all the adventure and spectacle any railfan could ever want. Better yet, it takes the nature lover from sea level through tropical, subtropical and temperate forests, each with its distinct flora and fauna. The railway doesn’t quite reach the frigid forest level but makes that possible for the committed hiker.

The railway...

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by Beverly Shaver, El Cerrito, CA

Years of travel have taught my travel companion and me the value of a pause between segments of intensive touring. After a week of “Bags out at 7:00,” we find it wonderfully restorative to spend a quiet interval by ourselves in some interesting city, easily sandwiched into our itinerary.

And so, after a 9-day tour through western Germany in October ’02, we scheduled ourselves a week’s time-out before embarking in Amsterdam on a river cruise...

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