"Better to be looking at it than for it"

Me with Annemarie, the originator of the expression "Better to be looking at it than for it"

One of our fellow travelers on our latest Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT) trip used this expression early is our travels.  

"Better to be looking at it than for it".  

At first I had no idea what it meant and since my learning style it to do it and talk about it, by the end of the 2+weeks together I had a clear understanding of the phrase.

Just now in a text conversation with another fellow traveler I used it and chuckled once more.  Today's situation is a discussion of whether we need a PCR test in order to enter Jordan on our upcoming trip.  The Jordanian website and our detailed materials from the travel company disagree so I called the travel company.  They also referred to the Jordanian official state website that appears we DO NOT NEED A PCR test.  However, the customer service persons at OAT said, sometimes airlines have a different requirement than a country so be safe we are going to get the PCR test.  In other words:

 "Better to be looking at it (the results from the PCR test) than looking for it (a test center in the airport to get a PCR test)"

We must have said this 100s of times in Africa on that trip but I have not really thought about it since until just now.  It is a very worthwhile phrase and has a lot of uses.  

EPIC Road Trip 2022-2023 Sofy's experience

She learned to push the button 5 miles from home on our return

We got back on Friday January 13th from an epic road trip.  Murg collected the statistics on the trip and posted on FB:

"Epic roadtrip complete

Sat 11/19/22 thru 1/13/23

54 Nights in 2 houses, 8 hotels, 3 AirBnB

21 States (one new one for me - Michigan)

8,080 miles

19 families with 45 individuals visited

Sofy lost count of the number of dog parks visited but did learn to open the car window herself during the last three days on the road."

The biggest reason we drove to Tucson was because of Sofy. OK, not the biggest reason but a huge factor.

Our car was a Tetris puzzle and Sofy's block was right behind the passenger seat. Before you start to even feel sorry for her for one single minute, trust me, she had plenty of space. She could not have the window opened on the highway but we opened it a crack or a few inches when on non-highway traveling.

We had her water dish and food dish readily accessible and a few toys to play with which she ignored and looked at disdainfully: 

"You want me to play with that thing AND keep track of every truck, car, RV and squirrel on the horizon?"

On our VERY LAST DAY we found a marrow bone at a truck stop, bought it on a whim and she gnawed at that for the entire day. Why did we not buy her a bone before that? As an aside, truck stop convenience stores are the BEST, and change depending on the part of the country you are in. We could have wasted a lot more time browsing them if we did not have a destination for that evening.  

DOG PARKS: Our most common search on Maps was "Dog parks close to me". We found some terrific ones. The best one was the dog park combined with a Disk golf course. I cannot understand who thought that was a good idea. Sofy only chased and stole one disk from a dog owning player. When we pulled up to this particular course, it was not fenced in like many of the others, and Sofy took off like a bat our of hell across a ravine. She usually kept an eye on us, because who wants to be left in the middle of Oklahoma or Minnesota? Rescue dogs in general worry about being left and apparently Australian cattle dogs are attached to a single family member. Truth be told Sofy kept her eye out for Rod, and if he was not in view she looked for me (chopped liver). As long as we got her a long dog park run, she was tired enough to sleep for an average of 23 minutes in a day of driving. Someone in the car had to keep their eye out for those squirrels.

SLEEPING: Every hotel we booked had a king size bed. The first few nights we brought her dog bed in from the car and gave up after that. She slept some where around us on the king size bed more often than not on Rod's side leaving him about 9 inches of space for his legs.

The very best hotel for Sofy in the entire trip was Magnolia in St Louis. They have a person with a job description of PET CONCIERGE and they do not charge for pets. Sofy got a bag of dog biscuits upon arrival and because she is so special she got some when we left. We had a 20 minute chatty conversation with the pet concierge. They hand out a list of pet friendly restaurants, close dog parks, vets, doggie day care facilities, pet stores etc. Take note all of you hotel owners (usually chains) who charged us $75 as a non-refundable pet cleaning fee. Part of my search for the nightly least expensive hotel, was their pet charge. In a pinch we had to pay $75.

Once we got to Tucson we discovered that our AIRBNB was .5 miles from a really nice dog park. We met a lot of snowbirds, and their dogs. For 6 weeks Sofy was a regular there.

EATING: on our westbound trip Sofy ate one bowl of food for the entire 4.5 day trip. Even at home she is not food driven and does not gobble her food. Eastbound she averaged one bowl per day on the 10 day trip. She did finish ice cubes from drinks and I bought her Slim Jims as her treat.

Day 2 - Washington DC

We really did have a whirlwind trip to DC with the Sisters (Mavis, Doreen and Karen).  We got up on the second day and ate at a diner really near the Capitol.  We love to find the non-touristy restaurants and through Yelp we found Pete's Diner.  Great breakfast, wonderful customer service and we were fueled for the day.

Bethany told me to make sure to see the Museum of the American Indian and I respect her opinion so I spent most of our three hours there.  From the outside design, to the organization of the inside by tribes, this museum is wonderful.  I found during this museum that I don't go through a museum sequentially.  Rather, I try to spend time on areas with information that I could not look up on the Internet.  I loved the arrangement by partial circles of the tribes, and the themes of what happened to the American Indian.  Rod and I ate lunch in that cafeteria, which was the food from some of the Indian tribes.

We stopped at the Pentagon to view the memorial there.

Our last stop in DC was at Arlington Cemetery.  I have not been there since Mama died in 1993.  Her name is now engraved on the back of her husband's, Grandpa Joe, who I never knew.  The English family toured the Kennedy graves and the tomb of the unknown soldier.

We left DC at 3:40 pm and drove pretty much uninterrupted to arrive at Lexington just after 1am.  We did have one minor mishap around NYC, when our car wanted to go across the GW bridge but we talked it out of that and we toured Teaneck for a few minutes.  Once we got on the Palisades Parkway, we pulled over at an overlook to look back at Manhattan.  This was at about 9:30-10:00pm so the view was wonderful at night.

After this full two days, we decided that once we are both retired, we want to spend a few months around DC taking in all the free museums, concerts, and touring the Civil War battles fields.  House swap anyone?

Day 1 - Washington DC, has it really been 19 years?

As part of our two week visit from the English family, we traveled to Philly and Washington DC.  We spent most of two days very near the Mall, taking advantage of all of those museums that our tax dollars pay for.

We check in at the Hyatt Regency just after 5pm at night.  This hotel is two blocks from the Capitol, so we figured it was convenient, and since they are remodelling we got a great deal on the rooms.  Oh, and it was the weekend so the Government was not around.  I have a question, "Why do all of the big hotels in DC, have prostitutes who walk in front of the entrances in broad day light?"  When Rod and I were "courting" we met in DC in a hotel in Dupont Circle and they were also very obvious.  No need to answer that question!  I think I understand human nature, but it was striking, as we checked in at 5pm at night, and it was way more obvious that in other cities, and hotels that I have stayed in.

The next morning, after a wonderful breakfast at West Wing Cafe, we bought the on-off trolley ticket which was fabulous.  The narrators were really incredible so if you go, choose one with a live narrator.  I had not seen the Holocaust Museum, so after traversing the mall several times on the Trolley we got off there.

I have learned that when I am in a museum, I don't want to be constrained by the pace of others, so we said, "let's meet in 90 minutes!".  I then took off to experience the museum by myself.  I have heard a lot about the Holocaust Museum, and it really was moving.  I was struck by how civil people were, and quiet.  As I walked through, I wondered how many people around me lost family members during that time.  I actually finished the permanent exhibit, and went back to view a few parts in more detail.  I also went through the rooms, that were designed for children.  This was the only place I saw someone taking pictures and she was asked to stop taking them.

We then grabbed a hot dog from the street vendor, ate it standing up, and boarded another trolley to travel to the war museums.  Here I was struck that most of what we saw that day was oriented around a war:  Holocaust, WWII, Vietnam, Korean, Lincoln Memorial.  This is where we also discussed that it has been 19 years since we were sight seers in DC.  My maternal grandfather was killed in WWII so we took pictures at the WWII memorial, of Virginia (His home state), Alaska (where he was killed) and Vermont (Where my other grandfather who served in WWII was from). 

We then boarded another trolley, and did the loop which goes by all of the embassies.  I want to go back and walk those streets, but it was fun to fly by them on the bus.  The National Cathedral is under construction, and it was still magnificant.  Georgetown on the trolley, and then back to the hotel.

We had dinner at Union Station and had arranged for my cousin Kit to join us.  She lives in DC and it was great to catch up with her.

After "The Sisters" went to bed that night, Rod and I went for a long walk, around the Capitol, down to the Washington Monument and back to the hotel.  It was a quiet night on Capitol Hill, and fun to revisit our walking days of DC in 1986.