Blake Island Journeys

What We Learned in Singapore, Java, and Bali – and Merry Christmas 2023!

When our Mideast trip went ‘poof’ for obvious reasons, we thought we’d head somewhere warm and relax instead. A cruise to Singapore, Java, and Bali? Sounds good, right? It was…

December 22, 2023

Ancient Egypt: The Bus Wins! Who Knew? More Temples and Padre the Ham

Have you ever been tourist-tired? You know, that point of exhaustion where you’re this close to grumping at someone who doesn’t deserve it (Padre) and you just have to STOP?…

February 17, 2022

The Golden Triangle: Burma, Laos, Hill Tribes, and My First World Assumptions

We were sitting on red ants. We had crossed the border into Laos, and at the local market children had been trailing our every move, pestering us: “Baht! baht!” –…

April 25, 2018

The Epic Journey, With Maps

/ February 5, 2018

We refer to it as The Epic Journey, although it’s not ‘epic’ in the classical sense, celebrating heroic feats of a legendary hero and all that. (One family member I know says Bill is her hero, so maybe that counts?) No, it went epic when it morphed from a ‘short’ three-week cruise, to a meandering two-month cruise/land tour/transpacific cruise multi-staged…

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