Out This Door

(originally published 9/26/23 (read the updated attached below…)

I’m putting our TOAL (Trip of a Lifetime) count up to an even 15. You will remember from our last episode in July (2023) that our “Great American Summer Road Trip” had ranked as a .5 of a TOAL which brought our stats up to 12.5 (or maybe 13.5?).

Why then the giant leap to 15? First, we sprinkle on some Midwest Nice–you betcha, we went to Wisconsin. And #15 (yep, I double checked), Germany.

We got asked several times, “Why Germany again?”

And…

“Why the Rhine area again?”

Because we wanted to, ok?!

If that Rhine cruise taught us one thing it is this: You will want to go back.

CT has been to Germany many times, even to one of the stops on this trip’s itinerary. But he loves me and dotes on me and I wanted to go to Baden-Baden so he took me. He erased memories of old while I converted one of the world’s exotic locations from, in my mind, a “castle in the sky” to a “castle made of stone.” And oh, the castles! More on these later.

Sure now, don’t you go forgettin’ about Wiss-CAN-sun, eh!

It holds its own line on the trip-o-meter. Land of Lambeau Leaps, cheese curds, beer brats, brandy old fashioneds, and introductions to old friends and family. A bittersweet return for a long weekend as this year is taking its toll in terms of friends and family passing over the rainbow bridge (and not the one with the trolls under it).

If we learned one thing it is this: Don’t be pulling the trip of a lifetime.

Fill your lifetime with trips so when your time comes… you will have lived.

the 2025 update…

I mean to brag.

And I want you too brag about your travels too.

I want to share in your excitement about your travels. I want to see your thousand pictures and hear your stories about the reality versus the expectation. Drop the names of exotic places and hidden gems. Tell me how much the authentic souvenir coo-coo clock cost you and how much of a deal you got on the silly plaster statue of Pisa’s tower. Vent about your fellow airplane passengers and clogged toilet at the hotel. We who have been bitten by the travel bug are all fellow travelers on this little rock zipping around the sun.

My TOAL count’s at 29. How about you?