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Friday, September 14, 2012

The "Passport Memories" Story

It was an ordinary day. Trying to find our Passports for our next trip in a few weeks. I probably have them locked in the safe, but first I checked the filing cabinet and found the old ones that we got in April of 2001. On the front cover of each Passport are two holes that were punched in them when they expired and we got new ones. The US Passport is only good for 10 years and then it needs to be replaced. Some countries will not let you travel to their country if you Passport is not good for at least 6 months before you plan to travel to their country. Reason being if you happen to have to stay longer than planned because of health or some other unknown reason, they don't want it to expire while in their country. Well, I started looking through the pages of the expired Passport and trying to read all the stamps that are on the pages. Then Carol and I started to talk about some of the memories we had about the places in the Passport booklet. I'll share some of the memories and lighter moments that I never have talked about before in any of my stories. Check out the scans and see how well you can read some of the stampings. Here goes:

Page 8 has two really neat stamps. The first is in the bottom left corner of the page and comes from the British Virgin Islands. We stayed on Tortola in 2002 after visiting St. Croixduring the first week. Our Resort, the Prospect Reef, was truly memorable, but not for any good reasons you can imagine. Noisy chickens in the morning, terrible pool facilities, and at the end of the day you had to shower with cold water. Our side trips to Virgin Gorda and Peter island were much more memorable than the trip to Tortola. Another stamp on page 8 is marked from Turks and Caicos. That happens to be the island that we will be visiting soon with our traveling companions Jerry and Just Sue. One memory from this island is the beautiful sand. The finest, whitest, softest sand you will ever see or walk on. Just like baby powder!! I also remember Carol and Just Sue wading into the ocean and pulling one big conch shell after another out of the water. We brought a few home, but they really added weight to the suitcases. Also remember trying conch for the first and last time and heading to the Conch Farm to see how they were raised, only to be disappointed because they were closed. Funny thing about that, we were going to go back again this year, but found out a few days ago that the recent tropical storm that hit the island destroyed the Conch Farm.
Page 10 shows a stamp from Jamaica which is the only time we ever traveled to that island. We learned during that visit that photos really do lie. The Sandals Resort we stayed at didn't really resemble the photos in the brochure we had looked at before we went. Beaches wereextremely small and the buildings were much older than they looked in the brochure. We did some fun things during the two weeks, but when leaving the grounds of the resort you had to be very careful to stay with your group because of security. Guards and police with automatic weapons were seen at many street corners. And another stamp from that page is from Sint Maarten where we rented our first of many villa homes for a couple of weeks. Also the year that we purchased our first painting from Paul Elliott Thuleau. As Carol explains about Paul, he's a real hunk. Page 11's favorite stamp is the one marked Frankfurt. That was the year Carol and I traveled with a group from our church to visit Italy. We landed in Germany and then onto another plane to head to Italy. So many tales to tell and have been told if you search my stories, but I never told anyone that we felt like we had the best rooms at every stop we made. Had the top floor rooms with great views and the largest rooms of any other travelers from our group. We got the nice showers and baths when some had to wash at the bathroom bowls. Why? Someone was looking over us we figured.


On page 12 is a stamp from Sint Maarten. This was our 7th trip to the island and the year of the swine flu scare. We had masks that we were prepared to wear in the airport and on the plane, but when we saw that no one else was using them, we put them away. Didn't want to feel like idiots. Told Carol that if we have any more children I would like to name themAnju-Snow. Carol knew that was never going to happen though. One day on the beach we met some people from Lancaster. Actually they were from our neighborhood and were staying in a place even higher up the hill then we were staying. Planned to visit with them in their place to see if we might want to rent it another time. Day before we were to meet them we were sitting around our very private pool getting an overall tan and for some reason looked way up the hill and saw someone waving to us. Wow, did Carol grab her towel quickly. I told her that from that distance they couldn't tell if she had a suit on or not. On page 13 is a stamp marked Port St-Martin and on the bottom of it reads Guadeloupe. On that day we traveled to the English island of Anguilla and had one of the best days we ever had on vacation. Visited the CuisinArt Resort and saw their hydroponic farm run by world-renownedDr. Howard Resh. Then headed to The Dune Preserve and met Bankie Banks who is a world famous musician who is known for his Raggae Moon Splash concerts. Spent the day on the world's best beach, Shoal Bay, then headed to Mead's Bay to find Blanchards Restaurant which was the setting for one of our favorite beach books, A Trip to the Beach by Melinda and Robert Blanchard. What a day.
Oh, the memories. Hope to share more with you again soon. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

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