Travels with Palenque Bob - Tales from the Never-Ending Road Traveled!
Travel has been my life and thankfully my work - my travels have taken me to Central America, Asia and zillions of times to Europe - from a trip in my U-M college days - back when students often took summer sojourns to Europe, rarely done now it seems.
But my travels also include very step I have taken - any walk anywhere - including zillions of miles in and around dear old Ann Arbor.
Like I say I started traveling abroad when in college and liked it so much I went just about every year for the next four decades - again thankfully because I led tour groups I and friends created and rode incessantly on trains for months on end in conjuction with writing and editing a European travel magazine and business selling Eurailpasses we also created - again when railpasses were a great deal and very popular - we sold thousands via mail and in our Ann Arbor office.
In 1975, when teaching high school at Romulus High (MI) I took a leave of absence and traveling literally around the world forn 14 months - much of it thru the old USSR and Asia - from Japan to Taiwan to Hong Kong (China was closed to folks like me then) to Macau to Thauiland to Burma and India, Nepal and Pakistan then by bus thru Afghnaistan and trains thru Iran and Turkey back to good ole Europe and Greece.
In 1977, I took another half year of absence and traveled through Mexico and Gauatmala and Belize - being especially fond of Palenque though when I first got there it was dry season and the famed magic mushrooms' were out of season.
On another occasion, prior to that, I took an educational tour of India gratis of the U.S. State Department with a group of fellow teachers (thru Eastern Michigan University and 'Dr' Ranjit Bajwa). On this trip everything was first-class - the best hotels and we even met personally with Indira Gandhi! It was a good foil to a subsequent trip to India a few years later that was completely the opposite - the cheapest hotels and street food and local restaurants, third-class trains and buses, etc. There could not have been two very different experiences of India - mystical but downright poor as could be India in the 1970s.
Throughout my childhood my parents, teachers with summers off, and my brother and I traveled by car and caper trailer to every contiguous 48 states. Subsequently, when teaching one year, I drove with my VW van around the West, hitting just about every national park in existence.
During the years we were doing bike trips to Europe for college kids and selling railpasses to everyone but largely students for a decade I traveled with my lovely VW van criss-crossing the country from one college campus to another, sticking up posters for these things.
In 1977, me and a friend started a tour agency in Ann Arbor called Palenque Associates and did one tour to Palenque - promising 'magical mushrooms' and Mayan ruins amongst other tthings. We only got 2 folks to go but that started our tour business where we switched to biking trips thru Europe for college students. That was more a success and lasted 10 years before we decided to get out of tour business and into selling European railpasses and publishing a European travel rag.
I'll be writing snippets of these sojurns from the most mememorable and weird mind-boggling events.
But my travels also include very step I have taken - any walk anywhere - including zillions of miles in and around dear old Ann Arbor.
Like I say I started traveling abroad when in college and liked it so much I went just about every year for the next four decades - again thankfully because I led tour groups I and friends created and rode incessantly on trains for months on end in conjuction with writing and editing a European travel magazine and business selling Eurailpasses we also created - again when railpasses were a great deal and very popular - we sold thousands via mail and in our Ann Arbor office.
In 1975, when teaching high school at Romulus High (MI) I took a leave of absence and traveling literally around the world forn 14 months - much of it thru the old USSR and Asia - from Japan to Taiwan to Hong Kong (China was closed to folks like me then) to Macau to Thauiland to Burma and India, Nepal and Pakistan then by bus thru Afghnaistan and trains thru Iran and Turkey back to good ole Europe and Greece.
In 1977, I took another half year of absence and traveled through Mexico and Gauatmala and Belize - being especially fond of Palenque though when I first got there it was dry season and the famed magic mushrooms' were out of season.
On another occasion, prior to that, I took an educational tour of India gratis of the U.S. State Department with a group of fellow teachers (thru Eastern Michigan University and 'Dr' Ranjit Bajwa). On this trip everything was first-class - the best hotels and we even met personally with Indira Gandhi! It was a good foil to a subsequent trip to India a few years later that was completely the opposite - the cheapest hotels and street food and local restaurants, third-class trains and buses, etc. There could not have been two very different experiences of India - mystical but downright poor as could be India in the 1970s.
Throughout my childhood my parents, teachers with summers off, and my brother and I traveled by car and caper trailer to every contiguous 48 states. Subsequently, when teaching one year, I drove with my VW van around the West, hitting just about every national park in existence.
During the years we were doing bike trips to Europe for college kids and selling railpasses to everyone but largely students for a decade I traveled with my lovely VW van criss-crossing the country from one college campus to another, sticking up posters for these things.
In 1977, me and a friend started a tour agency in Ann Arbor called Palenque Associates and did one tour to Palenque - promising 'magical mushrooms' and Mayan ruins amongst other tthings. We only got 2 folks to go but that started our tour business where we switched to biking trips thru Europe for college students. That was more a success and lasted 10 years before we decided to get out of tour business and into selling European railpasses and publishing a European travel rag.
I'll be writing snippets of these sojurns from the most mememorable and weird mind-boggling events.
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