This week’s MFRW Blog Challenge is My Hobbies, which in my case means exploring the world, either through reading or actual travels.
My two consistent lifelong habits are reading and traveling. I’ve been an avid reader since childhood, and reading let me explore the world from my home. I’ve had other hobbies through the years — playing the piano, international folk dancing, needlework — but none that lasted more than a decade or so. I haven’t played the piano or danced in quite a while now, and I had to give up needlework when I hit my forties and my eyes changed. It got too hard to see those little holes in the material.
My father had a bad case of wanderlust, and I seem to have inherited it. He loved road trips and we saw quite a bit of the US when I was a child, from our hometown of Pittsburgh to Miami, Florida, then out of California where we settled for good. My dad’s favorite thing was to visit old Western ghost towns, like Tombstone and Bodie.
In my twenties, I made a few trips outside the US. My last year in college I took a student tour of the archeological ruins in Mexico. We went all the way to Tikal in Guatamala. A few years later, I spent three weeks in Australia, including a camping tour of Tasmania, one of the remotest and prettiest places you’ll ever see.
My husband didn’t like to fly, so we confined most of our travels to the US and Canada. Sometimes travel inspires story ideas, which happened when Bob and I toured California’s Gold Country, and I got the idea for my latest release, Lily and the Gambler.
I used to work in the travel industry, and took several familiarization trips, including the Canadian Rockies and Hawaii.
In 2003, I finally made a trip to England, a tour designed for romance writers to the Regency triangle: London, Bath and Brighton. I’d been dreaming (and reading) about the British Isles for years. In 2015, I took a cruise around the isles and finally got to see a bit of Scotland and Ireland.
Buckingham Palace in the early morning
Last year I spent a month touring Europe and I’ve been writing about it in my regular #TuesdayTravels posts. If you’re interested, sign up to follow the blog.
Linda
It’s not too late to join the challenge. Click on the linky list below to read about more author hobbies.
How wonderful that you’ve gotten to travel so much. The Hubs talks about renting an RV or something and taking the kids on a US road trip over the summer. We’ve yet to do it. My daughter did a summer semester in Italy and that gave her the travel bug. She hopes to do more once she graduates.
Road trips can be great fun, Meka, though I do remember a few days when my parents weren’t talking to each other. Hope you get a chance to do it. Hope your daughter gets to do more traveling, too. I’m really fortunate in being able to travel as much as I have.
How great to be able to travel so much. If the ghost towns are anything like the abandoned coal country towns, they are great for setting. Interesting post.
Oh, abandoned coal country towns would be really interesting. I imagine they look different from the Western ghost towns, which were mostly wood shacks that don’t hold up well over time.
That trip to Mexico sounds awesome. I’d love to do some exploring there.
I’m glad I saw Mexico when I did. The ruinas are very interesting.
Sometime I think I could give up writing (and all the related expenses) to travel. Then characters start talking to me…
And sometimes they talk to you while you’re traveling!
The older I get the more restless I’ve become. Unfortunately I’m in Australia and where I want to go most is on the other side of the world. Not an easy or cheap trip. I’ll get there one day.
I hear you, Heather. I flew to Sydney once from Los Angeles and the flight seemed to take forever!
You’ve gone to two of my bucket list destinations–Mexico and the UK. I’m following your blog to check out more of your #TuesdayTravels posts. I hope to visit these and other places someday.
I hope you make it to both Mexico and the UK.