Tag: traveling

Fun and games–traveling outside the U.S. #MFRWauthor

I admit to not having traveled outside the U.S. very much. And it’s sad because I love going to new places and meeting people and seeing things. However, the U.S. is so beautiful and diverse, there are places here I haven’t seen and should.

My first trip outside the U.S. was when Jack and I were traveling. We went into Canada a fair amount. We didn’t have much time to sightsee or have fun except once, when we rented a car and drove from Calgary to Banff and up the Icefield Parkway to Jasper. What a great time! Besides the scenery, the park at Jasper had opened a little early. We were just about the only guests in the restaurant—where Jack had trout they’d caught in the river practically outside the door. The cabins where we stayed were close enough to hear the rushing water as the spring snowmelt headed downstream. The trip was only for a weekend but it was so special that I remember it as though it were yesterday.

I’ve been lucky enough to have visited Great Britain and Scotland a few Scotland and castletimes. Each has been an enlightening experience. I love Scotland! The people are so friendly and the country feels like home to me. Maybe in another time and another life…? England proper is also wonderful. What a great city York is! So walkable, so historical. I loved my time there. The same for Oxford, where I attended the OxBridge program for teachers one summer. However, I wished Oxford had a few more benches around!

My sister-in-law talked me into going to Italy several years ago. To tell the truth, I wasn’t all that excited to see Italy, but she wanted someone to go with her and Jack encouraged me, so I went. She promised that once I saw Italy I’d want to go back again. The woman spoke truth! We spent time in Venice, Florence, and Rome, Each city was so different, and yet so the same. So much history, so much art. Too much to take in, in any one visit—or two or ten.

So where would I like to go if I were able to travel? I could happily go back to any of those places again. I’d also like to see Croatia and that whole peninsula, and I’d love to meet my pal, Jan in person! Australia and New Zealand, here I come!

I wish!!

What is your dream trip?

Read the next blog in the blog hop by going here.

Dee

Burning Bridges by Anne Krist: old letters put the lie to Sara’s life. Now, mending her past mistakes while crossing burning bridges will be the hardest thing she’s ever done.

One Woman Only
Only a Good Man Will Do
Naval Maneuvers

Traveling on a whim #MFRWauthor

Are you the sort of person who plans every detail of a trip? Or one who takes off with only vague ideas of where you want to stay each night on the way to your destination? Do you even have a destination? Of course, traveling for fun and traveling for business are two different things. I want to talk here about vacationing.

When Jack and I were trucking, we had a given starting point and ending point, and a day we were expected to deliver. Other than those criteria, we were free to choose our own path. Of course, we paid for the diesel, so our “path” was generally as straight a line as we could make it. When we go on vacation now, we usually don’t even pack until the night before we’re leaving. Then we complete the trip as we want to at the time, stopping early in the day if we feel tired or see something we want to explore.

A couple of years ago, we drove from Idaho to Chicago and then came home through Iowa to see my mom and aunt. The only hotel reservations we made were in Chicago. Every other night, we chose a hotel that looked good at the time we wanted to stop. We had one thing we wanted to see specifically: The Iowa 80 truck stop—just to relive our trucking days. While in Iowa, we decided to drive back a different route, and it was fun living on the fly.

I knew a woman once who asked me about the things to see “out west.” We were living in Virginia but of course had trucked extensively in the western states she wanted to see. She pulled out a map and started at the Grand Canyon, then worked her way up through Utah, Colorado, and into the Dakotas. We worked at a school and had the summer off, so I said, “That will be a great month-long trip, You’ll have fun!” “A month?” she said. “We’re doing this in two weeks. I have every minute planned.” Wow! They came back exhausted but I guess had spent at least ten minutes at each attraction, lol. They had fun, and that’s all that really counted. But that’s not the way Jack and I roll. As they say, different strokes for different folks!

How do you travel for fun? Do you have reservations made for each night and plans for each day’s sightseeing? Or do you take the trip as it comes?

Read the next blog in the blog hop by going here.

Dee
Burning Bridges by Anne Krist: old letters put the lie to Sara’s life. Now, mending her past mistakes while crossing burning bridges will be the hardest thing she’s ever done.

One Woman Only, Book 2 of the Good Man series
Only a Good Man Will Do, Book 1 of the Good Man series
Naval Maneuvers

New release! Lust in Dalat: Lisabet Sarai

Lust in Dalat by Lisabet Sarai

LUST IN DALAT Asian Adventures, Book 6 
Lust can be a revelation.

The woman in the window seat to my right had more flesh than I’d usually find attractive, and most of it was on display. But she wasn’t trying to tease. Every detail—the silver hoops in her earlobes, the teakwood clasp in her hair, the anklet decorating her high-arched foot—broadcast confidence and a healthy disdain for anyone else’s opinion. A woman alone, on a public conveyance, in a foreign country, Helen nevertheless looked thoroughly at home.

And me? Traveling outside of the U.S. for the first time in my life, I was nervous, inexperienced, awkward and excited. Especially excited. With Helen in the next seat, who wouldn’t be?

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Excerpt:

She was practically naked.

I tried not to stare as I clambered barefoot onto the bus that would take us from the steamy, crowded streets of Saigon to the Dalat highlands. My sandals stuffed into a plastic bag provided by the management, I peered at my ticket and tried to locate the corresponding seat. Well, “seat” wasn’t exactly the appropriate word. Three double-tiered racks of padded, bed-like recliners ran from the front to the back, one on each side of the bus and one down the middle, with narrow aisles between them. This was a “sleeping bus”, designed for the twelve to twenty hour overnight trips common in Vietnam.

“A or B?”

“What?” She was obviously talking to me. I had to look at her.

The woman in the window seat to my right had more flesh than I’d usually find attractive, and most of it was on display. Her light, floral-patterned sundress had spaghetti straps, one of which had slipped down over her smooth shoulder. Her massive breasts shifted underneath, every time she moved. The short hem rode up to expose her big but surprisingly firm thighs. She was fair-haired with a peaches-and-cream complexion—her accent suggested she was a Brit. The dress was thin enough, though, that I could make out darker patches surrounding her nipples.

“Your seat number.” She gestured at the ticket dangling from my fingers. Her lush tits swayed. “A is down here; B is on the upper level.”

“Oh—um—A. 12 A.” Geez. Working on my PhD and I couldn’t manage a coherent sentence.

“That’s right here, next to me.” She flashed me an easy smile, pointing to the middle row. “A pity, you won’t have as good a view. Of course, if you have any tendency toward motion sickness, the middle is better.”

The other strap flopped down her arm. Idly, she pushed it back into place. “I’m Helen,” she said, sitting up a bit, so that her breasts bounced. She offered her hand—short fingernails, clear lacquer, a silver ring on the thumb.

Her skin was as soft as it looked. “Geri,” I replied, struggling to ignore the accelerating pulse between my legs.

About Lisabet:

Lisabet Sarai has been addicted to words all her life. She began reading when she was four. She wrote her first story at five years old and her first poem at seven. Since then, she has written plays, tutorials, scholarly articles, marketing brochures, software specifications, self-help books, press releases, a five-hundred page dissertation, and lots of erotica and erotic romance – nearly one hundred titles, and counting, in nearly every sub-genre—paranormal, scifi, ménage, BDSM, GLBT, and more. Regardless of the genre, every one of her stories illustrates her motto: Imagination is the ultimate aphrodisiac.

You’ll find information and excerpts from all Lisabet’s books on her website, along with more than fifty free stories and lots more. At her blog Beyond Romance, she shares her philosophy and her news and hosts lots of other great authors. She’s also on Goodreads and finally, on Twitter. Sign up for her VIP email list here.

Staycation or Vacation? #MFRWauthor

StaycationMaybe because after eight years of trucking and never having a home, and then moving every couple of years while Jack consulted all over the country, I’m pretty much a homebody now. So, while even I have my limits as to how much I can stand being a hermit, chained to the house, I often vote for staycation over vacation. That’s not to say that we haven’t been out a bit in the past several years of living in the great American Northwest. We’ve been to Yellowstone and Seattle, and along the Columbia Gorge. I plan to see Glacier National Park this spring…maybe on our way to Alaska!!! But for the most part, I’m happy puttering in my own kitchen, sitting on my own couch, and sleeping in my own bed.

We have had some great vacations, though. Here are some highlights:

  • The two Yellowstone trips. The park is very different in late SeptemberYellowstone National Park than it is in January! Beautiful either way, but more bison that are also closer in winter, bubbling mud and fumaroles surrounded by snow, and frozen waterfalls. In September the trees had turned and blazing aspens stood out sharply on the mountainsides. We combined the September trip with family, by exiting the park at the east gate and driving across Wyoming and South Dakota to see my mom in Iowa.
  • San Francisco. Years ago—before San Fran lost its way—we spent a glorious week at a hotel at the Wharf. The location was perfect! The weather was perfect! The trip was… Yes, you guessed it, PERFECT! It was on that trip that I saw a man walk up to a corner café. They had pushed back the walls to allow the sidewalk tables access to the inside. He sat at a table and had breakfast and coffee while he read his paper. His sockless feet were in loafers, his shirt hung out, his hair was slightly mussed by the breeze. I wanted to be that cosmopolitan in the worst way, and sit at that café for coffee. Years later, when we lived in San Francisco, I did!
  • London. We spent an unforgettable week in London many years ago, doing a lot of the touristy things. But we also found the Old Bailey and made a virtual toast to Rumpole, stumbled around town until we happened on the Globe recreation, and visited the War Rooms before they were so popular. Such a great time!
  • Williamsburg, When you live in Virginia, you’re bound to have gone to Williamsburg. We have, many times. But seeing the historic, restored village is different when you’re staying in a Williamsburg, Virginiatimeshare. You can go to the restored area when the spirit moves you, and you can relax and nap the rest of the time. 😉 There are some great restaurants in Williamsburg (and lots of good pancake houses!), so it’s a wonderful place to experience history, to golf, to explore the coast, and to recharge.

Of course, while we were on the road, driving, it was almost like having vacation times. Once, in a 10-day period we saw the San Diego zoo and Disney World in Orlando because we could take a few days on each end of our trucking trip. The best part of all of it? We were together!

Which do you prefer: staying home or going away?

Wishing you a blessed 2020. May we all find health, wealth, and happiness, one way or another!

Read the next blog in the blog hop by going here.

Dee
One Woman Only: The Good Man Series, Book 2 Jonah’s story! Can a simple mechanic rekindle with his high school love? She says no, but Jonah loves a challenge!

Mystic Desire
Only a Good Man Will Do
Naval Maneuvers