“You should really write a book about your trips,” said a number of my friends, who received my trip logs via emails for years.

I started sending these travel emails to my children when I went to Bolivia and Peru in 2000. They worried about me and this way they could follow along. Soon, other family members and friends asked to be included in the posts. In the process, I discovered that I like to write and for about 20 years, I had my travel articles published in “International Travel News” (ITN) magazine. Could I re-work my logs and ITN articles to include only the special adventures and translate them into a book?

I began traveling in earnest in 2000, when I retired.  Since then, I have been to all seven continents.  I have hiked the Milford Trek in New Zealand, the Inca Trail in Peru, the Annapurna Range in Nepal and slept in monasteries in Myanmar.  I have stayed or visited private homes in villages in Bolivia, Myanmar, and Bhutan.  I saw wild life in Africa, the Galapagos, Madagascar and Antarctica.  I learned about other religions and cultures in many, many countries.  Each trip was unique and each one an adventure. There was a lot of material that I could use.

Although I will describe many of the countries I visited, this is not a guidebook. I will not try to be comprehensive or detailed about where to stay or eat.  I will write about the places that I enjoyed and that were meaningful to me, they were all “Special Places”.

Thank you also to all of the family members and friends who “go” on my trips with me, via my emails.  A number of you suggested I write this book.  So here goes: