Zooming with the Aces #24, 1/18/24 – Travel in Our Lives

Fred Elder, January 18, 2024

On a frigid day, ice on the windows, Fred Elder convened the 24th Zoom session for the East High Class of 1960. Fred’s technical knowledge (how to manage a Zoom call and how to send mass emails  while protecting your privacy) puts him in charge of Zooming with the Aces. Diane and Marilyn help write the Zoom invitation emails and prepare the summaries that follow, like this one. This month, instead of a photo of all of us in tiny squares,  Fred clipped our pictures as we held forth on the topic of the day: travel. This is the way we were on one winter day in 2024.

Kay Ellen Consolver   We did not travel much as kids, but my dad took two weeks each year, during the off-season from Kiddieland, usually to Arkansas or Colorado. There we were in my parents’ Buick, with parents smoking all the way.  I used my job with Mobil as a travel agency and visited 65 countries. Somehow, I managed holidays along with the job and had a wonderful time. My most exciting experience was being taken into custody by border guards in Angola and held there for a day. One of many adventures. I am hoping to get back to traveling again.

Diane Rusch Zinn   I forgot about talking about childhood trips with my parents. We took a few trips, but didn’t travel much. I concentrated on being fortunate enough to travel some internationally, all of the states, and just around our neighborhood here, where we have interesting sights.  Internationally, we’ve been to Alaska, Canada, Patagonia, the Azores, Germany, and London. They were all wonderful, memorable trips but I wouldn’t choose to go back to any of them because there are so many other places to see, if I have the chance.  As our children were growing up, we normally took three-week vacations in the car, some place in the US and mostly in the West, but a few in the East. We didn’t stay in hotels usually; we stayed in cabins. Most of them were on the rustic side, wood stoves, lots of bugs invading us. The kids enjoyed it, but they don’t travel like that now, believe me!  They fly everywhere and don’t know what it is to be in a car nine hours a day for three days to get somewhere. Around here near Lawrence, we have some interesting sights because we live close to the Oregon Trail and it’s fun to drive the route. We have a farmstead nearby that still has the wagon ruts running through their land. We recently found out that the town of Vinland, a little south of us, was settled by persons from Dracut MA, where three of our grandchildren attended a private school. We visited there last summer when the kids were back, and got to see an old barn the settlers used. Dick’s grandmother had an interesting trip that was unusual. She went to the World Fair in St. Louis in 1904, at the age of twenty-one. I have an Aunt Emma who lived in Benton, KS and was a character from the word go. I accidentally discovered when I looked at an old school reader that I have that it was signed by her and dated “Bozeman, MT, 1913.”  Since we had a home in Bozeman, I followed up on that, and found out that she was a teacher in their school system. I located the office building (still there) where she worked, and enjoyed walking by it when I was there.  It was an exciting, surprising, accidental discovery that I cherish.

Lee Ayres  There are a lot of choices for travels to remember. One of the most fun for me was when my youngest child turned 10, and I realized that we could travel and everyone could carry his or her own suitcase. We chose an Eastern Airlines family package, which took us to many cities, including Boston, New York, and Washington DC. At the Boston airport, Gene Carter picked us up in an enormous 1953 Buick that accommodated all five of us and all of our baggage. In New York, the challenge was to find a room big enough or a cab big enough. Rooms usually accommodated not more than four and the cabs were smaller than Gene’s Buick. Navigating with three kids was a challenge but a lot of fun.

Skip Granger  This is going to be difficult because our whole life has been travel  A lot of you know because of the stories I write about my travels for the website. But early on, I was a tour director during law school and traveled all through the U.S. Then later, I decided that working with lawyers wasn’t the life I wanted and I left and became a full-time travel executive in Hawaii. When I returned to the mainland, I put together the original TWA Get Away packages.  Pan Am was interested in having the same thing, so I met with a fellow several years my senior and I talked to him about nepotism in Pan Am.  He didn’t enjoy the conversation so he took a phone call, which meant, “I’ll never see you again.”  I stepped outside, and  a cute little blonde came over and said, “Aren’t you Skip Granger?”  I said, “You’re Mary Ann Johnson.”  She replied, “I want you to meet my boss.”  I was led back into the same office I had just been thrown out of and I got a chance to meet with Bob Johnson again. We put together the package.  Bob is no longer around, but Mary Ann Johnson is and she’s now Mary Ann Granger.  I felt like I won that one!  My biggest trip is next week. We are going to the Bar Mitzvah of our granddaughter. It will be in Olivehain, CA.  We’ll learn a lot because we aren’t Jewish.  It will be an interesting experience, one that we are anticipating, and it will  go on for several days.  I’ll get to see a lot of family because Mary Ann has a large family and they will all be attending.  I might be old, but it’s not a last hurrah.

Mary “Mert” Lancaster Curtis  Everything I do is a trip. That’s because of where I live – in rural Kansas. On Tuesday, I went to Hutchinson when the weather broke. Yesterday, I was in Wichita, which is always fun for me. I have traveled extensively in Kansas, all 50 states, 7 continents, and many countries.  I just love to go. And I love to visit people. Kansas is a wonderful place to visit, so many interesting places to see. My last trip was to Bloomington-Normal, Illinois – on the train. This was my first long trip on a train.  It was wonderful fun, because I talked to so many fascinating people. You sit down beside someone, ask a few questions now and then, and they tell you all about themselves. I really enjoyed that trip!

David Robinson  If you can relive one time just for fun, this story comes to my mind. My best buddy’s wedding took place in the early 90’s, and I went with my late partner, who was still in San Francisco. This was wife number 3; this time he made it. They’ve been married 25 years, and have a son Nick.  Anyway, they wanted us to come to the wedding, and we had already met the bride, Laura.  Tim’s from Long Beach and Laura is from New York City.  Tim said he would give us the plane tickets because he had plenty of mileage. We took a red-eye, not a fun thing to do, to JFK.  I’ve always created my fantasy world, living in MGM land. We were going down the escalators to the baggage claim, and there were all the drivers, one with my name. It was like  Wow, we’ve hit the big time. Then we learned how real New Yorkers drive. He was going around traffic – quite eye-opening, but it was fun. It was morning, and I never thought I would see New York City at Christmastime, but the windows and everything were just beautiful. They had taken a couple of floors in a hotel for their out-of-town guests. The first night was the Bachelor party. Even though we were not in the wedding party, and Tim wanted us there. The dinner was at an Upper East Side restaurant where some gangster had been mowed down. I had the best steak I’d ever had. Then, everyone was told to get in a cab. I asked where we were going and he said to Score’s. I about fainted because Score’s is Howard Stern’s favorite strip bar. Tim and I were both avid Howard Stern fans, so it was just getting better and better. We went into one of the VIP rooms where the girls were all doing lap dances and things like that. Tim finally called a halt to this because the credit cards were coming out and the party had already dropped about five grand. The next night was the rehearsal dinner and we were once again included. It was at the UN.  Laura had a friend who was in charge of the dining room, and we had to go through security, but it wasn’t as difficult as today. We got to see the General Assembly room, and then we went into the private dining room where the Pope had dined a few weeks before.  It was just beautiful, and I was living my MGM life.  The wedding was at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens on a rainy night. After the wedding, we went to a room for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. We had dinner then a live band was there for dancing. It was wonderful. The last day, Joe and I went to a Sunday matinee on Broadway.  As we walked back to our hotel, we passed Rockefeller Center. It was getting dark and rather quiet for New York. All of a sudden we could hear the ice skaters. We looked down, saw all the lights on the skaters. The tree was up, but not decorated, so it was like a living Christmas tree. It was spectacular. It was a magic weekend.

Marilyn Tompkins Bellert My travels begin far in advance of getting on planes, trains, and automobiles, because I love to learn. Before visiting a new place, I read about the history, geology, and culture; watch movies set in those places; visit artwork in Chicago museums; and listen to characteristic music. I especially love reading mysteries evocative of places. Some of my favorites are set in Venice, Bangkok, Zagreb, and Santiago. The preparation helps me make meaning of new places, people, and their lives. As a result, travel has enriched my life. Like many of you, my travel experiences started in the backseat of the family car. I sat in the backseat of our Ford station wagon with my brothers as we drove for two weeks each summer on visits to California, New Orleans, Washington DC, and Florida. There was a lot of “Dad, he’s looking at me” and “Are we there yet?”

In the past 20 years, I have ranged farther. Like Mert, I have visited all seven continents, but I have lost track of how many countries. My husband is a talented photographer, who documents our travels. While he is seeing the sites through his lenses, I try to immerse myself in the people, food, music, theater, architecture, and understanding the culture. One of the most life-changing trips I have taken was to the Galapagos Islands. Last winter, I sent my kids to the Galapagos, which they seemed to enjoy enormously. This was a period of limited mobility for me, but, back home, I loved seeing the photos and notes they sent every day. I hope they caught the travel bug.

In recent years, we have especially enjoyed staying in apartments in France and Italy for several weeks. This allowed us to shop with the locals and do our own cooking, which is way cheaper than hotels and restaurants and helps you get a sense of the culture and the rhythm of life in a neighborhood.  I thought my traveling days were over after dragging my bum hip around Europe last summer and taking a bad fall in November. But, thanks to a hip replacement last week, I can already walk again easily and am feeling positive about seeing more of the world. We just signed up for a trip to India next fall.

Dan Tontz  My memory doesn’t serve me well for all the trips I’ve taken, so I’m going to focus on what I’m doing next, probably in March or April. We’re going down to Padre Island, where I haven’t been for thirty years, but I have fond memories of it. It’s not far from where we live; it’s down on the coast near Corpus Christi. Right now, it’s in the 70’s there, so lots of snow birds there, probably some of Fred and Marilyn’s neighbors. We’ll go after the college kids leave and spring break is over. We have different philosophies of travel. I’m a traditionalist and like to go back to the same place over and over. But Frances wants to see new places. She’s a California girl and has never been to Padre or the coast down there. We’ll see the National Sea Shore, which is federal property. The Gulf Coast of Texas never caught on like Florida and California did for tourism. Good thing I didn’t buy a condo there years ago or I would have lost money. Like most of you, as a child I traveled in the car with my parents. As an adult, I had a travel job and it was two weeks out then one week in. Then, my travel was just a means to an end; it got me to my workplace. Now, it’s all about pleasure. I go where I want to go. One of my main goals in life now is to keep on traveling because I think it shows that I can do things and that I can plan things. I’ve always liked the planning to do before you leave; that can make or break the trip. I guess I’m a wannabe travel agent. Right now I’m limited to car travel because of the two dogs we have.  Frances doesn’t want to be too far from the vet with her little dog, and my dog is twelve, in his senior years, kind of like us. I like to travel, to plan, kind of like Willie Nelson’s “On the Road Again.”

Perry Ann Porter  Travel has been wonderful for me.  When I left Jamaica after my Peace Corps assignment, I traveled around the U.S. for six months by land, visiting friends from the Peace Corps. I took a train from Martha’s Vineyard to New York City, where I saw champion tap dancers at Macy’s and surveyed the sites from the Empire State Building. From there I went on to Maine. In order to get on the train in Maine, you had to stand on the tracks and swing a flag. That worked! Then, I went to Niagara Falls, which was beautiful, and on to Kansas. In order to have summer clothes for this part of the trip, I shipped a box to Marty Bogle, who I was going to visit.  Next stop: Texas.  My second Peace Corps assignment was in Belize. Afterward, I traveled in Mexico, before taking buses and trains back to San Diego. Last stop was Washington State, where I live today. I agree with Mert about the wonderful people you meet when traveling by train.  I met people on the train that I corresponded with for years. 

Glenna Stearman Park  My current trips are to make it from the bedroom to the kitchen. I take naps, and I have an Australian shepherd that sits by my bed. If I’m in bed too long, he barks and leads me out of the bedroom.

Joel and I always had an interesting arrangement that we could go anywhere we wanted as long as someone else paid for it. His trips were paid for by the Army, Navy, and research facilities. When we were in San Antonio, we were sent to China, Japan, and places like that. We’ve never managed to get more than one trip together;  I went to China for five weeks and Joel for one week.  He later caught up with me at the Terra Cotta Warriors exhibit, and that was a fabulous experience. The one trip we managed to do together was when he was being sent to Lisbon for a science meeting.  My sister and I realized that Lisbon is the only place where architects have done Portuguese Manueline details in window treatments. They make the window frame look like a rope, because it was very much a naval community. I wrote an essay on how important it was for me to see this style as I was teaching. The Holt Foundation gave teachers $5,000 to do something wonderful. So, we coordinated our trip around that. I’ve been to Paris, London, and Florence, where I went to school and studied printmaking for awhile. I’ve been to Spain and to Germany, where I went to Berlin because I wanted to see why the city was considered the location of the hottest art movement in the world at that time. What was fascinating in Berlin was to see the movies about the bombing we did in WWII and destroying major parts of the cities. What I found in Berlin that was moving was the Jewish Museum. That’s an unforgettable experience. When walking through the downtown area, there might be an alley way where only one or two persons could inch their way along. Artists and architects had gone in to those areas and created sculpture of broken glass, or so it appeared. Giant shards, maybe 10-15 feet tall.  That and the area where the wall had been were amazing memories.

When we moved to Korea in 1996, that was the biggest event of my life. I’m impressed with those of you’ve gone all over the world because it’s a lot of work. One of my best friends had just come back. She had worked with the San Diego Zoo and she told me what to expect in terms of housing in Korea. We call the buildings “plop art” because it’s just like the architects plop down giant apartment buildings on cement, maybe 17 stories high.  Joel’s job was with the Korean Institute of Science and Standards. We lived in a mountainside area in Taejon. There were probably forty plop art buildings there. The most interesting thing I found about Korea was that when a siren went off, you pulled your car off the road and got out of the car, leaving the keys in the car, and all automobiles became government property. We went through several alarm times, when the North Korean soldiers approached the South Korean shores. That was shocking.  All highways become runways for plane landings. Our friends there from Europe were closely tracked by their embassies and they had to report in. They even had drills in which the persons had to report in to the place where they would depart Korea if safety dictated that.  The US had no such policy.  We were on our own.

Charles Howard  About highways and pulling off so planes can land — the interstates in the U.S. were also planned to be landings strips at the time when the first ones were being designed, shortly after the end of World War II. My first traveling was with the family. My dad liked to travel, and he saved two weeks every summer for family trips. We visited every state west of the Mississippi. We did not go east very often. I traveled quite a bit on my own, too. Like Perry Ann, I was in the Peace Corps, but I was in the Middle East. I have not gotten to India or the Southeast Asian countries around it. Yes on China. I was asked to help with a university project in an architectural school and worked on a building contest in China. Now, new travel horizons just opened for me. My doctor gave me clearance to be able to drive two months ago, after restrictions while I was in chemo, so I’m going to be on the road again.

Fred Elder  I decided I would limit my discussion to travel when I was eighteen or younger. I remember a Camporee in Boy Scouts.  Lee may have been on this one. It was on Kingman Lake, and the outstanding memory of that was that it rained. So, the esteemed scout leaders decided we were all going home. Ours was the only troop that had to put out our fire. We were the only ones with a fire still burning in the rain, and that seemed important at the time. Another outing was at Tawakoni scout camp on Sante Fe Lake. That was a week of being too darn hot in a tent as I recall. Occasional dips in the lake were fun. Lee and I talked about this a short while ago. We got to go to Philmont Scout Ranch in the summer after the 9th grade. When we arrived I remember distinctly being assigned to a big tent where we spent the night. The next morning they handed us these big pack boards that by themselves were about half of each of our weight. Then we had to put our gear on it and they called us to a bus to take us to a place they claimed was Kit Carson’s home. There was a young man with us, probably two or three years older than us,  and we started walking across this arid plain. We walked and walked and pretty soon stopped at what still looked like an arid plain.  And he saaid for us to dig there, so we dug, and there was water! So, we sat down, ate our lunch, and drank that water. Then we walked on to our next camping spot and we had our tents and all that fun stuff with us. Lee and I were remembering that the next day we were walking up a stream bed that Lee said we crossed seventy times. It may have not been that many, probably about twenty-five times, though. I also remember a family trip, by car of course, going to Washington. DC. I have two outstanding memories of that one. The first was going by boat to Mt. Vernon, George Washington’s home. The second was seeing the Washington Monument, and I decided I needed to walk up it. Other memories of that age are being on my uncle’s ranch in the summer. It was hard work, but a lot of fun. Being outdoors in that ranch environment is really positive.

Additional Comments

Perry Ann asked Fred if that was snow in the window behind him. Yes. we recently had over a foot. Diane has a little less, but all of us in the Midwest and north have been below zero for several days.

Mert: I have stayed home for eight days because of the cold, and that’s really rare for me.

Skip: It’s 72 here today. On a trip to Sedona AZ once, it snowed so hard we could hardly get out and do anything. We went to another place, then back and inquired what it would be like around Valentine’s Day when we wanted to visit again.  We got into a snowstorm then, too. at dinner, and could hardly make it back. 

Kay Ellen:  I was trying to get to Los Alamos, NM last winter for a memorial service for a sister in my KU sorority. I got to the airport at 5:30 AM, flew to Chicago and my flight was cancelled after sitting in the plane ready to take off for an hour. So, I got off.  Do you remember Lake Afton? That was one of our family highlights. My mom and we kids would spend two weeks there in the summer.

Perry Ann:  About Kansas historical sites, I wanted to tell Mary that I took a history course at WSU and one of my projects was a course on “Notorious Bandits Buried in Kansas.”  I went all over Kansas taking pictures, making folders, etc. That was fascinating.

Diane:  I would agree with Marilyn that traveling with your adult children is really a treat, too. I’ve had the pleasure of one trip with each of our four children. Rebecca and I spent a week and a half in London quite a few years ago. Our son Rob treated me to a week in the Azores for my 75th birthday.  Daughter Lauri and I took a trip by car for two weeks to the canyon lands in Arizona. Two years ago, our daughter Jenni and her three kids went with us to Colorado to visit all the places she had seen growing up and wanted her kids to experience them.  It was our third trip to Mesa Verde – a little overkill.  The kids cherished it all, even the car time.

Marilyn: I’ve really enjoyed a couple of trips with grandchildren. It was a surprise when I took a 14 year-old  to France. She’d been asking for that trip for her birthday for years, and couldn’t believe it when she actually got to go. You get a whole different perspective when you are looking through the eyes of a child. They think about things differently, they eat different foods; we had a chocolate mousse tour of France. They have such a vitality in their responses, and it’s so unexpected.

Kay Ellen:  I don’t have children, but I took my nieces when they turned sixteen to Paris, where I’d been quite a bit.  But, it was a whole different perspective.  They still remember it very vividly.

One Sentence Farewells

Marilyn:  I’m hoping to be walking without a walker in six days.

Dan:  I thought I was going to sneeze and I would blame it on the snow behind Fred.

David:  We need some new faces on our Zooms. I’m getting tired of seeing the same old ones. Have some of the ones who used to join lost interest?

Fred:  Linda McKay was going to join, but had a meeting. I wonder if I asked for a show of hands, how many have doctor appointments this week.  (Answer: most of us)

Mert:  You just get up every day, be positive, and if you’re lucky you don’t have to see a doctor. Just keep busy doing things.

Dan: Somehow, my appointments have all gotten scheduled in the same months. The next ones are all in April.

Skip: I’ve lost fifteen pounds since January 1, and since we’ve moved here, I’ve lost fifty pounds.

Diane: You all are a bright spot in the doldrums of January.

Lee:  Saturday morning, I’m getting on an Amtrak to visit my son in Orange County.

Perry Ann:  This has enlightened me and I’ve enjoyed all the information given. I’m glad you are travelers. I’m looking to go to Alaska next, and I’m more than halfway there already.

Glenna: I might make it outside to the car today.

Charles: I’m glad to be here.

Kay Ellen: I hope to be traveling again soon and want one of my first trips to be to Washington DC to see Glenna and Gene, and maybe some of you at some point. That would be good.

Fred:  Thank you all for joining and please consider writing a story for the website.

Editor’s Note: The above is a summary, not a verbatim transcript. If your remarks need to be corrected, contact Diane (ddzinn@aol.com) or Marilyn (mbellert@niu.edu).