Friday, November 30, 2018

If I can't go in person, I'll go my way...

Hi everyone,
As you have probably guessed by now, I can be somewhat of a dreamer.  I plan things out in my head, hoping that all of those motivational speakers ("If you can dream it, you can do it!") are correct.  When I want to do something, I plan it all out, I visualize it happening and I do everything in my power to make it happen.  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes life gets in the way. But that's okay, I've enjoyed the planning part and generally will have learned something new.

So... here goes.  The Viking Cruise Lines trip around the world has been in my head for weeks now.  As I mentioned two days ago, I made an Excel spreadsheet with all of the dates, days of the week, locations the cruise will stop and the tours that I would most like to attend.  Today, I added in the average temperature for each location on that date so I can plan what I would pack. LOL  I know it's silly, but I get all excited about it. And now I know that the lowest average temperature is about 42 degree F. (5.6 degrees C.)  and the highest average temp will be about 90 degrees F. (32 degrees C).  Viking has planned the trip well, arriving in most ports when it's a fairly mild time of year, or when it's summer.  Many of the stops are near the Equator and temps stay around 83 degrees F. (about 28 degrees C.) for most of those dates.

https://www.vikingcruises.com Ultimate World Cruise

The trip begins and ends in London, England, a city I know fairly well after living in England for nearly 8 years.  The embarkation date in August 31, 2019 and then we spend the next day, Sunday Sept 1st touring London before heading off.  The tours I chose for that day were the included tour of Royal Greenwich on foot, or the Chelsea Physic Garden.  Since it's a Sunday, though, I'd probably arrive in England a few days early to spend time with friends and "heart family" before going on the trip and I'd just visit the Physic Garden on my own then.  Sunday I would probably go to church somewhere nearby and meet more of my Worldwide Family there.

What's a Heart Family, you ask? When we lived in England, we only flew home to the U.S. once or twice a year, generally in the summer.  So, holidays were on our own or with our friends who became our family while we lived there.  There are so many dear friends there, especially those who lived in Harrogate at that time, who are more than friends.  They are my chosen family members.  I have some great actual family members, but its hard when you don't see them often.  Since we've traveled around so much since Bob and I got married, (we lived in 8 different houses in the first 7 years of our marriage) we've gathered family as we've traveled.  Our boys had friends who became honorary members of the Stull family. And after being a Juror on a photoshop/photography/multimedia and text website called Worth1000.com for many years, some of my friends there have become heart family.  Bob teases me sometime about the vast number of family members I now have and just says he's thankful that I don't feel the need to buy them all gifts at Christmas.  ha! They are truly loved, though, and I'm adding to my family all the time.  It's a great way to live - and love.

So: Here's my list of Must-Sees in London, based only upon what I've actually done there.
1.  The Tower of London, including the tour to see the Crown Jewels and to see where the Princes in the Tower lived and where Anne Boleyn was brought in to the Tower and where she was beheaded.  The history alone is simply amazing.
The Tower of London



2.  See a West End show if you can.  Last time I was there on my own, ages ago, I went to see Cats.  I got a seat right next to the stage on the end of a row and got patted on the head by the Rum Tum Tugger cat. LOL  It was great. :)
3. The London Dungeon tour was chilling.  Being a History major made the history just come alive for me.  It's horrifying what people will do to each other.

Photo from https://www.city-walks.info

4.  Big Ben - Most people think the clock tower at the Palace of Westminster is Big Ben, but it's not: it's the bell itself. When it was made in the 1850s, it was the largest and most accurate four-faced clock in the world.  Hearing the gong of the bell shakes your chest.  You don't just hear it, you can feel it too, when you're close by.  Definitely go near an hour with several bell peals.
5. The Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace is heart stirring.  Little kids can get bored but I have loved watching it every time.  Be sure to look for the flag to see if the Queen is in residence. Even if you don't get to see her, it's fun to know that she's just beyond the wall.
6.  If you're up for a drive, head up to the Cotswolds to see the quaint thatched roof houses.  Stop in one of the older pubs (the White Stag was delicious when I was there about 10 years ago, and definitely gave you the feel of an ancient public house, since it's about 400 years old.)  Then head to Oxford and Cambridge to see the colleges and Kings College Chapel at Cambridge.  It was built beginning in the late 1400s, I believe, then Henry VIII had his and Anne Boleyn's initials carved in a few places there before their wedding.  You can still see the intertwined initials there.

photo from https://www.visitcambridge.org


7. And last but definitely not least, if you can take a tour or a drive, head out to Warwick Castle.  It's a masterpiece and one of the most complete of the ancient castles.  I go there every time I'm nearby.  It's like stepping back in time and they have some really interesting diorama-type displays with mannequins dressed in period costume, doing what the people there might have been doing on just a regular day.  I love it.  I've also seen a guy dressed as Henry VIII who will stop and take photos with you, so it's definitely an immersive experience.

There's so much more, but that will do for now.

Wednesday, November 28, 2018

A Worldwide Cruise with Viking

A while back, I read someone's post on Facebook about a worldwide cruise with Viking Cruises that took 245 days (about 8 months) and visited 53 countries.  I was immediately intrigued. I read about it online and thought it would be a really awesome trip, I just didn't have the $113,000 per person, double occupancy, that it would cost to be in a cabin big enough that I'd want to live in for 8 months.

Later that afternoon, I found myself back on their site, reading more about it.  It became a bit of an obsession (in a good way) and I'd go back daily to look at the itinerary and daydream about all of the wonderful places to see and amazing things to eat and do.

https://www.vikingcruises.com/oceans/cruise-destinations/world-grand/2020-world-cruise/index.html

This is a new cruise offered by Viking, who are consistently named the World's Best cruise line and I really, really want to go on it! It starts and ends in London, so I'd get the bonus of being able to visit my beloved friends in England either before or after (or both) if WHEN I get to go.

During this time, the lottery was up over a Billion dollars, yes, that's Billion with a B! So, I figured, 'someone has to win it, it might as well be me!' and I bought a ticket.  As you can see, I didn't win, so I'm back to trying to figure out how I can go.


After looking at the map of the places the cruise travels several times, I found the page that spells out the itinerary day by day.  I also found their curated list of books to read to get ready for the trip.  So, I wrote down the list of books in my journal.  I'd look over it now and again and realize I'd only ever read one of them.  Ha!  Today, I went online to our library's card catalog and noted which books are available in our county library system.  Of the 64 books listed there, only 24 of them are in the county system, with most of those at a local private college's library. Only three of them are available at my local library and they are all currently checked out. Looks like a trip to McDaniel College is in my future today.

On the 12th of this month, I started an Excel spreadsheet.  I made columns for the day of the trip, the date we'd be in that port and the day of the week it was, so I could try to keep the Sabbath a bit more holy on Sundays.  Turns out, thankfully, that many of the Sundays are either a sailing day or in a port where the ship stays for a couple of days.  I also included my top choices - up to three - of their available guided tours or excursions for each port.



Since our Church is a worldwide church, I thought it would be amazing to contact the ward or branch in each city and meet some of my Worldwide Family!  Wouldn't that be fun to meet people all over the world who have the same beliefs and who are already part of my "tribe"?  So I have columns for the ward or branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for the area where we'd dock.  I haven't figured all of that out yet.

So, after I'd done all of this, I was feeling a little silly and obsessed over something that seemed unlikely that I'd ever get to do.  I got in the car to head to work to fill the kiln and a song came on the radio.  It was a very old song that's in my iTunes play list by the B-52's called "Roam"  The lyrics, in part, say:

"...Take it hip to hip, rocket through the wilderness,
Around the world the trip begins with a kiss.

Roam if you want to,
Roam around the world.
Roam if you want to
Without wings, without wheels,
Roam if you want to,
Roam around the world..."

Well, that seemed pretty auspicious and specific!  I laughed and prayed "Heavenly Father, PLEASE let there be a way for me to do this!" and my heart just about pounded out of my chest.  Usually, that's how the Spirit witnesses to me that this is the truth or something I should do.  I've learned to listen to that kind of a prompting. So, I started thinking that maybe I really AM supposed to do this.  It's been in the forefront of my mind now for a couple of weeks, which is pretty unusual in itself.  But how can I possibly get that much money?

I got out of the car, went into work and started working on the pottery pieces that needed to go in the kiln.  I'm the only one in the studio during kiln time, since the studio is closed on Mondays, so I listen to General Conference talks on my phone.  I had been listening to April 2017 talks, so I clicked to the next talk and turned it on.  As my hands were in the glaze bucket, mixing up the clear glaze by hand, I stopped with my dripping arms in mid air, as I heard the speaker.  It was a talk by L. Whitney Clayton and it was called, "Whatsoever He Saith Unto You, Do It!"  In the silence of the studio, his voice rang loud and clear in the kiln room, telling the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus, who told the servants at the wedding in Cana to do whatever Christ told them to do.  Then he likened that to us, who when the Lord tells us that we should do something, we should do it - immediately.

So, how do I do this?  How can I possibly do this?

I looked on the Viking Cruise Lines page to look for jobs, searched a couple of job sites to see if there was a way I could work for them and go on the cruise in that way.  Nothing really jumped out at me.  So, the next idea I had was that I could contact Viking and see if they'd hire me as a Social Media person to write about this new cruise.  I don't know if that's a good thing to do, but I'm thinking about it.  So, in the meantime, I thought I'd read their booklist and talk about it here, along with the places the cruise will be visiting.  Maybe something will come to me.  Have any ideas?

Until next time!
Judi

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Happy 2018, National Straw Day, Travels and President Thomas S Monson

I decided in the last few days of 2017 that I'd start blogging again and try to be more consistent about it.  Since I'm still not going to be able to finish up This Crazy Trip any time soon, I thought I'd write about something else.  So, what to write about?  Traveling in general?  Local places that I could travel to in a day?  Pottery and techniques for being creative within our studio?  Religion?  Things I've learned?  Bullet Journals, which I use daily?  I didn't know.

So, then I came across the National Day Calendar and after writing down some of the things for the first six months of the year, I found that every single day from January through June 30th has a "National" something or other Day attached to it.  The rest of the year probably does as well, I didn't look yet.

So, since this is January 3rd, we've already missed:

January 1st - New Year's Day, of course.  It's also National Hangover Day, National Bloody Mary Day, and National Thank God Its Monday Day.  Ummm, OK.  Not sure about that one, but the others are fairly self-explanatory for New Year's Day.

January 2nd - was National Buffet Day - I guess people are sick of holiday cooking?  It's also National Cream Puff Day; National Personal Trainer Awareness Day, of course, and National Science Fiction Day, which seemed more fun.

And today is National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day, which I would be happy to participate in if I wasn't on a diet; National Fruitcake Toss Day, which makes sense since not too many people actually EAT the fruitcakes that show up on Christmas and this seems a good day to toss them; and National Drinking Straw Day!  National Drinking Straw Day?  That's a funny day.  (Thanks to www.NationalDayCalendar.com for the use of their photo.)  #DrinkingStrawDay is paying homage to the day someone named Marvin C. Stone took out a patent on this date in 1888 for a paper drinking straw.  The website also mentions the Sumerians using straws around 3000 BCE.  I seemed to remember reading about the Egyptians using straws made of reeds around that time, too, so it seemed logical that the Sumerians had them, however, the one they had was apparently a gold tube with blue inlay!

Our grandsons like to use a straw with everything they drink, so I bought some stainless steel ones last year to use instead of continuously using plastic ones.  I'd like to think that I'm doing a little more to help save our planet's resources.

And congratulations to Marvin C. Stone who 130 years ago, took out a patent for a paper straw.  And congratulations to the Sumerians who created a gold tube straw thousands of years prior! :)



The other thing that happened this morning was that we found out that our Prophet, Thomas S. Monson passed away last night at the age of 90.  What a wonderful man he was!  I learned about cheerful service from him.  I loved his stories and how he could recite a poem from memory.  I loved that he cared so much about doing the Lord's work and how he loved the people he served.  He missed his wife terribly and I'm sure they are having a grand reunion.  Thank you, President Monson, for your life of service.  We will miss you.  

That's it for today!  See you tomorrow!
Judi