Looking Ahead 2017- Where to next!
by Kathy Klofft Photos by Jeff Klofft
A new calendar is always full of promise, all those empty blocks or electronic lines to fill...what will end up on each day? If you are anything like us, at the end of the year, every block on the wall calendar is filled with scrawled events and appointments, or if you scroll backwards, you don't find more than a day or two without an appointment. I have an idea for a New Years resolution. Take that new, empty calendar and before you put anything in it, block out some time to take vacation and travel someplace, even if it's only in your own backyard! Whether it's your dream trip or seeing what makes people come to YOUR neck of the woods, we hope 2017 is filled with wonderful travel adventures! Please let us know where you are headed in 2017!
New Year Staycation!
Without school age children tied to the academic calendar, we aren't limited to travel during the school vacations, so we sit out the busy holiday travel season, choosing to "staycation" in our "home base" city of Boston. We enjoy some of the same things people travel from all over the globe to see and do, and sleep in our own beds at the end of the day!
It's worth waiting in line with locals shopping for their holiday table to enjoy a Modern's lobster tail or cannoli in Boston's North End.
Some years exciting things are happening in our own hometown, such as last year's NHL Winter Classic outdoor hockey game. Most everyone's hometown has something interesting happening over the winter holidays!
Savannah, GA
Early in the new year, I have plans to visit Savannah Georgia with a friend. More than 20 years ago, my friend Mary and I were tossed together as Girl Scout Leaders to a group of kindergartners. Little did we know then that more than 20 years later we would still be helping with Girl Scouts and still be great friends! While taking advantage of a Jet Blue airfare sale, Savannah came up on the list of cheap, direct flights, and had the added bonus of being the home of Girl Scout Founder Juliette Gordon Low's Birthplace Our plan is to spend a relaxing weekend at a bed and breakfast in the historic district, dining at some of the fine restaruants, walking around town and making a pilgrimage to Julliette Gordon Low Birthplace as a tribute to our long friendship and volunteer committment to the GSUSA
Shanghai, China
Business will bring Jeff to Shanghai, and you can bet he will bring his camera! Look for a photo essay of his time in Shanghai after the New year.
Southeastern Florida
Kathy will make another trip to see relatives in Southwest. I usually make an effort to uncover some unique places to share for those who would enjoy spending sometime in this area in the winter. This year I hope to take in a tour of Jet Blue Stadium, the spring training home of the Boston Red Sox.
A sand castle along our favorite beach in SW Florida
Rhapsody of the Seas Cruise Mexico and Central America
Late winter we will embark on a 7 day cruise aboard Rhapsody of the Seas. We are looking forward visiting some ports we haven't seen before including Roatan Honduras and Belize City Belize, as well as favorites Cozumel and Costa Maya (Mahahual) Mexico. We will be live blogging here, on Twitter, FaceBook and as FamilyGoBoston from the ship, as we always do for a large amount of Cruise Critic followers, sharing our port photos and experiences on board!
A Mayan ruin on Cozumel
During our trip to Honduras, we plan to participate in Pack for Purpose, carrying an extra suitcase filled with school supplies for Familias Saludables, a Roatan non profit that provides care for women and children affected by AIDS. PfP curates lists of needed supplies from NOGO's, connecting generous travelers with a little extra space in their bags with projects in nearly every country and partnering with locals there who ensure items donated are needed and get into the hands of those who need them equitably! We've engaged a private guide, Channin Bodin, who will help us deliver the school supplies, collected from our friends and our local GFWC club members, to the Bananarama Dive and Beachfront Resort which supports the programs and local school and ensures donations are distributed fairly. We learned about this first hand when we were discussing the program with our guide in Antigua and she told us that her own daughter's preschool had benefited from donated items from PfP and support from the local resorts giving programs. For more information on how to Pack for a Purpose click on the link for PfP and see our post about our experiences in St Lucia in 2015.
Azamara Quest Cruise Adriatic and Italy
One of our larger trips towards the end of the year, we plan to sail Azamara Quest from Venice to Rome. Those who follow us know we always have a "folder" for planning a trip, chock full of magazine clippings, notes, and itineraries. This cruise with stays in Venice and Rome, as well as ports of call in Kopor, Slovenia, Hvar and Dubrovnik Croatia, Kotor Montenegro, Corfu Greece, Valetta Malta and Sicily and the Amalfi Coast of Italy will require a lot travel planning leg work on my part!! I'm getting some help from Active Travels, a boutique, membership based travel agency, and hope, with their help, to put together a unique and active itinerary for each port of call! We plan to post along the way and share photos and trip reports from all our ports of call!
Our last trip to Croatia was in the town of Vukovar, where the signs of a terrible war are still visible. We are making good on our promise to the people we met in Vukovar Croatia to visit the beautiful coastline!
Where Else??
Places we don't even know yet!! Our travel plans often come together at the last minute, and we never know which places we may visit at the spur of the moment or need to visit for business...if you follow us on Twitter, we usually tweet out photos from places where we've traveled. If you are planning to go somewhere interesting, be sure to share it with us via email, Twitter, Face Book or in comments here. We'd love to hear where you are going and maybe you'd like to be one of our next "Go See It People" interviews!
Opinions and advice presented here is our own based on our experiences and we have not accepted any free travel or financial considerations for our views. All of the products and services mentioned are those that we've used and had good personal experiences.