The FINAL Itinerary

What started out as a crazy idea many years ago has slowly grown into a more and more feasible possibility, and finally, a few weeks ago, has become a reality. Sarah and I booked the tickets for the round-the-world flight. That's fun to say. Here's a picture of us celebrating spending 151 days on the road in our sleeping bags:

And here it is:

Jan 3 - 16 Australia
Jan 16 - 26 Thailand
Jan 27 - Feb 3 Bali
Feb 4 - 25 India
Feb 25 - March 10 Katmandu
March 11 - 23 Israel
March 23 - 30 Cairo
March 30 - April 6 Istanbul
April 6 - 16 Morrocco
April 16 - end of May Europe (including Greece, Tunisia and other stopoffs)

So very excited. Check your calendars, see if you can join us somewhere around the world. From now on, we are filling in the itinerary for those destinations and we'll be posting regularly about places we're considering, travels in the meantime, etc. Love to hear your suggestions.

Welcome back to the Big Gray

Steve here - you may remember that I took a trip out to Toronto for a meeting a few months back. My overall impression at the time was that if Toronto was asked its favorite color, it would be gray. Well, I'm back (in June no less!), and guess what:

I'm here for the Canadian Public Health Association meeting, which has been quite fun, and I'll provide some more details later. But for now - wow. Perk up Toronto, it aint as bad as all that.

What do you do with 24 hours to kill on the east coast before a wedding.....?

...go to New York, of course!

And that's just what I did. With just about 24 hours to play with, I hit the city and did such things as:

-Fly a red-eye into Westchester county airport and enjoy the leafy ride to the White Plains Metro North station.
-Happily arrive in Grand Central station and allow myself to be a tourist with a camera for a moment.
-Drop bag off with a friend (yay, Seth!) so you can walk happily without a rolly thing.
-Go to Barnes & Nobles where bathrooms are clean and blank journals are affordable.
-Eat a bagel with egg salad, lettuce, tomato, and swiss cheese while people-watching in Union Square.
-Talk to the squirrels.
-Hang out at dog park.
-Write in new journal.

-By some art from a local artist that contains reclaimed wood from Coney Island boardwalk.
-Wander down University.
-Stop at Grey Dog Cafe.
-Purchase large iced spice chai.
-Try not to scoff at the fact that they changed the recipe for their chai.
-Write in new journal.
-Wander into Washington Square Park.
-People-watch for an hour+
-Write in new journal.
-Wander down Christopher, avoiding crazyscreamingswearing man along the way.
-Like a New Yorker, glance at crazyscreamingswearing man, shrug, and keep walking.
-Take a right on Bleecker.
-Ogle the haggle of dressed up southern belles who are chowing on Magnolia cupcakes and who are clearly on a New York field trip to the opening weekend of Sex and The City 2.
-Write in new journal.
-Head up to Union Square again to grab a quick dinner with a friend (yay, Seth!) at Republic.

-Push through tourists to catch the 6 uptown to Grand Central.
-Hit up a Tasty-D for dessert while bidding farewell to friend who's kindly taking your bags up to his place in the Bronx where you'll be spending the night (yay, Seth!).
-Hop on the 6 uptown to the Met to visit Oberlin Allen Memorial Art Museum exhibit.
-Tear up when Mr. Met ticket sales man says, "visiting old friends, huh?"
-See 2/3 of Oberlin art pieces.
-Get every docent on the 2nd floor involved in locating art.
-Tear up at every single one.
-Get kicked out of Met at 8:45 (15 minutes before closing, damnit).
-Sit on the steps and people-watch for 45 minutes.
-Write in new journal.
-Catch a bus downtown on 5th ave.
-Eat a piece of pizza (come on, even when you're not hungry, you have to when in NY) and have a glass of wine while waiting for Metro North train to the Bronx.
-Arrive at friend's apartment and take a loooooong shower with amaaaaaazing New York water pressure.
-Write in new journal.
-Sleep really well.
-8:00am - wake up.

-Put band-aids on blisters and pack up rolly suitcase.
-Get ride from friend's parents (yay, Roy and Judy!) to the 1 train at 238th Street.
-Write in new journal.
-Attempt to read on subway, but get lost in thought and people-watching.
-Arrive at Penn Station.
-Walk the 3 blocks to a "Luggage Storage" place that you've discovered will hold your bags for $10/day while you wander around rolly-suitcase free! Yes!
-Buy 1:45pm bus tickets to Allentown, PA for friends' wedding (yay, Danny and Alan!).
-Hop on subway up to Columbus Circle.
-Purchase Central park breakfast must: frappacino and sesame bagel with veggie cream cheese.
-Sit in Sheep Meadow for hour+
-Write in new journal.
-Call husband (yay, Steve!) and gush over the wonderful-ness of this city.
-Walk up Columbus, writing travel itinerary in head for when you will meet up with girlfriends (yay, Mah Jongg girls! yay, Vancouver ladies!) in the city in the future.
-Go to Zabar's (80th and Broadway) where you buy two souvenir canvas bags for you and your Mom.
-Walk down Broadway, past Lincoln Center, past Time-Warner building, through old Hell's Kitchen 'hood, grinning all along the way.
-Wander into the store you know sells great shower curtains (because when one needs shower curtains in Vancouver, obviously, you have to go to New York to get them), and don't find any interesting ones, BUT tell a tourist where a specific restaurant is that he's looking for (like the back of your hand got it, baby!)
-Meet friends (yay, Nicholas and Viktor!) for lunch at Westside Diner on 44th and 9th.
-Gush some more.
-Go and get bag out of luggage storage.
-Get on bus and be happy that the bus driver had to double back to Port Authority one time before going into the Lincoln Tunnel, thus giving you one more glance at the city you love.
-Sigh.