The Vacation Report

When planning for a vacation, inevitably things come up and don't quite go as planned. Given my job, lots of things come up and just trying to make sure all of the paperwork is in place can become quite the headache and quite the hassle. I am very lucky to have some great co-workers who were willing to step in and take care of supervising visits for me. Somehow I got lucky enough to not have any court hearings while I was gone - so actually there was one, but since it's in the criminal court I don't have to go that one, it's just that I don't trust these parents to tell me the truth about what's going on. But I digress. One of the great things about my job is the flexibility of the hours. Technically the work week starts on Saturday, so I was able to go in on Saturday to finish up what felt like a lot of things and get some extra, well not really extra, hours toward my work week which meant that I didn't have to use those hours of annual. And at the other job, they very easily let me have the time off.

But, there does always seem to have to be something that comes up. I took my vacation with my parents, Jen and Will, and one of my aunts and uncles, Beth and Donald. In the few months leading up to the trip, things got a little bit chaotic. We had Grandma in the hospital with breathing problems - she got out and was put on oxygen. Jen decided to celebrate five years remission by going to the hospital for shingles and celutis - okay, that's not so much the celebration we all thought of, but she was plenty recovered for the celebration we did have in mind. My uncle was in and out of the hospital with problems with his liver - and doesn't qualify for a transplant. Now he is facing some decisions on what changes he's going to make in his life. Then the week before we left, Grandpa was put in the hospital possibly with pneumonia or bronchitis. We left on Tuesday, 1 March which is also the day he got out - we found that out when we got to New York. However, we also found out that my cousin, Matt, who had dropped his parent off at the airport that morning had been in an accident on the slopes and no one had any details except he was at the hospital - then we had to get on the plane. I think it took about a day and a half before we were really able to get any details about what was going on there. He didn't remember the accident. He had three pretty serious fractures/breaks (not sure which they actually said they were) in his shoulder - and do I mention that he's in his first year of med school at the U? His siblings stepped up to help take care of him and get him where he needed to be. He actually had surgery the Monday before we came home. Plus, while we were gone, my great-uncle Dave passed away. That wasn't a surprise at all, but he was such a sweet man. It really would have been nice to be able to go to his service.

In spite all of that adventure, I really enjoyed myself. We had four trip guides with us - Alan and his wife, Ida Mae, Mark, and Ty. Our group was pretty big - 109 people. We had one family (parents with two kids), but other than them Jen, Will and I were the youngest in our group. We did have a lot of senior citizens and several people who travel a lot with Alan and apparently wouldn't consider booking a vacation unless it was with him. He said later he wouldn't do a group this big again, but at the same time you don't get a trip that has the "big four" places in it like we did (that would be Rome, Athens, Israel, and Egypt).

So, just some tips I learned from this trip (and, yes, it would be observations from our group):

1. When planning your vacation, one should really make note of when that vacation begins. If you miss the start of your trip, you have no right to complain when you have to pay extra to get a new plane ticket to meet up with the group.

2. If you want a certain seat on the bus, you should not consistently be the last person on the bus.

3. It's okay to say no to a vendor - you don't have to bring everything back that's being pushed at you.

4. Just because you say it's your piece of carry on, a regular sized suitcase will not be considered such by the airline

and you will end up checking it at the gate.

5. You are in a foreign country! They most likely will not take US dollars and they do not (just like any business in the US) have to accept your credit card - get some of their currency.

6. The cost of a cruise is not just what you pay to get on the ship. If you want something other than juice or water, you will get to pay for that. You do get to pay for internet service. You do get to pay for your excursions. And, you may want to check to see if your roommate is only planning on spending all of her time in the bedroom napping and reading the Twilight series (okay that one wasn't from our group but from someone else we met on the ship).

7. It is alright to be an adult and be in charge of getting yourself from one place to another - especially when the transportation is provided for you and you only need to get up and get on the bus.

8. There is nothing wrong with paying for shipping on large objects - especially when the store is already providing you with like 50% off things and you are limited in what you can carry on a plane.

9. Even though it may not be posted anywhere you see, at least consider it might not be appropriate to eat inside a religious place (St. Peter's Basilica). (Maybe that one just bothered me.)

10. The time think about whether or not a place (Israel) is safe or not, is not when you are in Israel, but before you book your trip and decide to do the excursion there. When in Greece, you are going to see a lot of rocks - they are called ruins and they are incredible. If you think it's boring to look at them, don't go to Greece.

11. Remember, even if you didn't sign up to be a representative, when you go to a foreign country you are a representative of that country. It's okay to just listen and get questions answered the first time they are asked. You don't need to be offended that people don't take your dollars. And, in Europe at least, a lot of people do speak English, and do understand when you are calling them rude and impolite.

Just a few lessons learned. I did do some selection of pictures for the blog - if you want to see them all, I am going to not edit and just upload on Facebook (at some point in time, looking at the pictures over and over again within the first week of being home stops being fun).