Traveling Is...

I have found that since I began traveling around the world at the young age of nineteen, I was completely addicted to it. However, you don't have to own a passport to do it. And you don't really have to watch all those travel shows to experience those places either. The imagination is a great thing. However, you must be able to use it properly.

With the internet, it's become so much easier to travel around the world and never have to leave your home, your lounge room or your office building. Everything's right there on your computer. The fun part of it is choosing where you want to go today! And then, you click your mouse or press your enter key and away it goes happily searching the phone lines to find what you asked for. Wonderful! But sometimes, it's not enough is it?
I've gotten used to not being able to travel too far. So to me, reading about a far away place or traveling three hours to the coast is - in its own way - a real vacation. It gets me away from my home, my suburb and into a place where I'm away from the television and away from everything else. I sometimes hate it... but once I get used to it, I feel okay. I guess it's because I'm so used to having the control over my own environment that I don't like being away from it.

Don't get me wrong... I have actually been outside the protective beauty that is Australia. My first overseas vacation was Vanuatu and I was nineteen years of age. It was incredibly hot, the Vanuatuans were wonderfully kind and the French were rude (even if I did speak French; which I did a little, but they didn't like it). It was Tiger Shark Season and the daytime temperature ranged between 43 - 48 degrees Celsius. In the evenings, it was around 27 - 35 deg Celsius... not very comfortable. The local water had flouride in it and I encouraged not to drink it. But the place was amazing; even if the army was roaming around fully armed for most of the day... and it creeped me out more than a little.

The South Island of New Zealand was the next place I went to. I don't remember much of this place but I do remember that it was freezing, I caught the flu and was sick for most of my tour. Then, one person I was staying with caught chickenpox when I was about to leave to come home. She had to catch a plane with them.

The UK, Scotland and Wales was my last major trip overseas. And it was my most beloved holiday. It was seven weeks long and I visited and met up with friends and relatives I hadn't seen in such a long time! The one thing I didn't want to do was come home... and it was unfortunate that I did because a week after I got back, I lost my job. So, there went my globtrotting for a long time.

But I still travel... in my mind... in my books... the ones I write and the ones I read. I believe that where there's a will there's a way to get to travel. Life is fun... learning to travel in more than one way is even more fun! Like I said, you don't really need to leave the country to travel around the world - or the universe for that matter. It's just how you look at it.