Lisa Niver's Blog: We Said Go Travel, page 371

Of Love and Libertad in Mexico

Of Love and Libertad

A lazy cat napping on the sofa in the galeria

A stray dog approaching, head down, tail swaying in an anticipated touch

the rooster that knows not the hands of the clock

the unexpected play of dolphins breaking the skin of the sea

this is the melody of Mexican life

-Wanda St.Hilaire, Of Love, Life and Journeys

This February, I sat writing on the periphery of the plaza in San Miguel de Allende with the stunning La Parroquia church as a backdrop. Percolating under the surface was an emotion that was all too unfamiliar in my Canadian day-to-day life. It was joy. I’d been awarded a grant to attend the annual writers’ conference. I was on my thirty-sixth visit to my beloved Mexico.

Surrounded by like-minded “free range humans”¬–artists, writers, photographers, sculptors, and musicians, my body hummed with 1000 volts of happiness. I was electrified with the energy of people doing what they love in a place they adore.

My first taste of Mexico was at age twenty-two in Acapulco with girlfriends. We rode on the back of motorbikes with Brazilian boys and sailed with Italian clothing designers. Two brilliant new friends from Mexico City challenged us to hop off of the plane on our way home for a visit. Both girlfriends jammed out by the time we landed. I stayed, not wanting the adventure to end.

We spent days climbing the pyramid and investigating Mexico D.F, and enchanting evenings out with a multitude of their welcoming friends. It was Mexican hospitality and culture at its finest. The bliss of being young and ripe with wanderlust was unleashed and I was hooked.

In Oaxaca, the moment I landed I felt a deep love of life. Everyday I sat in the zocolo and chatted with renegade lawyers, curious campesinos, and old Zapotec men who spoke with me in a dialogue I didn’t know, yet understood. Sitting for hours writing in cafés over dark Chiapas coffee, waiters befriended me and we shared stories of our radically differing lives.

There in the lazy afternoons, lovers of all ages congregated. Observing intertwined bodies, kisses, and deep embraces, I voyeuristically yearned to join the uninhibited profusion of love.

Living in small barrios in Puerto Vallarta, fluid days sweetly stretched out with chance meetings on strolls or long, delectable lunches at el fresco cafés. Worth is not determined by the size of your wallet or the busyness of your schedule, but by the richness of your connections with family and friends.

While some visitors find the lack of structure disorienting, I find it wildly liberating. There, my spirit can relax once again from the insidious bombardment of laws, rules, and regulations at home. I don’t want to spend my life worrying about being fined for applying lipstick at a light.

When I need to restore my body, refresh my spirit, or calm my monkey mind, Mexico is the cure. Oceanside, I shed the shackles of heavy clothing and the din of traffic to the delight of walking with the sun on my face, the earth under my feet, and the expansiveness of blue skies over the tropical lushness.

Mexico in not a masculine taskmaster who motivates with heavy-handed will. She is feminine. She is free. She gently inspires. She coaxes you to smile, to dance, to laugh, to play, to create, and to love–deeply.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post Of Love and Libertad in Mexico appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

Walking the Planks at Halifax Canada

Walking along the Halifax waterfront, I don’t see what you see. I can’t describe to you the colours of the small boats and tall ships gently rocking against the docks, the way a sail flutters in the distance as it catches the wind, the looks on the faces of the tourists streaming by. To my eyes, colour is replaced by shades of grey, or so I assume with no colour reference from which to draw. To my eyes, what lies in the distance is reduced to vague shapes and the whim of my imagination. To my eyes, the faces of those around me are blurred, lacking individual personality and made impossible to define in bright sunlight.

Walking along the Halifax waterfront, having made this 4,500 km journey alone, I am released from the tether marked “legally blind” that bound me to the distance my feet could travel, to the kindness of those offering rides, to imagined limitations born from fear of the unknown. Stepping aboard an airplane alone, I have broken this bond and in doing so found courage, strength, confidence, freedom, and the knowledge that I can.

Walking along the Halifax waterfront, I can’t see what you see, but walk with me and share my experience.

The morning fog has lifted, and the harbour stretches out before you, the water rolling gently, slapping lazily at the pier. Stepping from pavement to boardwalk, soft wooden planks muffle your footfalls, the briefest hesitation rising as a loose board quivers beneath your feet. Breathing deeply, the smell of bread and garlic tempts your senses as you pass the waterfront restaurants, while underneath lies the familiar smell of wet wood and the sea.

Passing the Sands at Salter, you notice the sea has receded, leaving bare rocks and the dark fingerprint of water on wooden dock supports. On this boardwalk jutting out into the harbour, surrounded by water and away from the shelter of buildings, the wind joins you on your journey, toying with your clothing and caressing your cheeks, reminding you of sailors embarking bravely, at the whim of water and weather. You walk on, your fingertips trailing along the chain link fence beside you.

A woman sits under a tree on a low brick wall, the radio next to her playing a fiddle tune as spoons slap between her hand and knee in time. In the distance, you hear a bagpipe, and in front of the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, you soon find the culprit. The mournful wail of the pipes fills the air as you move through the small crowd gathered at a safe distance from the kilted young man, his case placed strategically far enough away to encourage payment from those listening. Approaching The Wave sculpture in front of the museum, you marvel at the children climbing the towering art piece, the chiseled stone warning signs at its base at odds with the rubberized surface installed beneath to catch those who might fall.

The smell of fish and chips reaches you as you approach the food stalls, the temptation of a quintessentially Canadian bacon poutine or Beavertail having overcome the fidgeting people standing in line. You navigate through this swell of bodies and approach the Tall Ship Silva as tour guides call out to offer a harbour sail. Trailing your fingers over the thick ropes binding the ship to the dock, you hear her moving, alive in the soft creak of wood gently rising and falling, waiting, ready to be free.

You navigate through a sea of faces, past a family taking pictures with Theodore Tugboat beside the ferry terminal, around diners enjoying the waterfront view on restaurant patios, through the crowd of people gathered to enjoy an ice cream cone.

Now the wave of bodies thins and your pace quickens as you walk alone beside the water, nearing the end of the Harbourwalk. You notice the quiet here as you stroll to a bench at the end of Purdy’s Wharf extending far out into the harbour, surrounding you with water. You sit and breathe in the moist air, the quiet, the sun on your skin, the knowledge that you are here and you are free.

I once considered myself bound by limitations, held by a tether only as long as the generosity of companions with cars, the schedule of city bus routes, the fear of straying from known footpaths. Rarely would I wander far enough to add tension to the line, preferring instead the comfort of the slack coiled at my feet. I once believed this tether to be physical, but in an act of heart-racing courage, I stepped onto that plane, loosed the ropes that bound me, set sail in the world, and found myself free.

About the author: Taking that first solo trip from her home in Saskatchewan to the East Coast of Canada, Heather opened her mind to the possibility of future travel opportunities despite being visually impaired. She has since returned to Halifax several times, and has now ventured as far afield as India.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post Walking the Planks at Halifax Canada appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

Visiting the sites of London

Anyone who visits London will know why it is consistently at the top of the, “Most Visited Cities in the World” list. In 2013, it was the most visited city in the world with nearly 16 million visitors. With attractions such as their numerous museums, Buckingham Palace, and The London Eye, London has something for everyone in the family.

The first step in planning a trip to the UK is to find a hotel. With all the excitement and events around, where are the best places to stay? With so many visitors each year to the capital requiring different needs, there isn’t any one good choice. Business travelers might need privacy while families might need more room. Everyone’s requirements will be different. To make it an easier task to choose which hotel is the best fit, Central London Hotels has made choosing a hotel easier as they have done extensive research as to where the most popular hotels in London are.

After a hotel has been picked, picking out where to go and what to see is next. First of all, the museums that London has to offer are second to none. The most popular museum is the British Museum, which was founded in 1753 and has artifacts that date back over two million years ago. Each year, this museum attractions around six million visitors. Another popular museum to visit is the National Gallery. Here, there are over 2,000 Western European paintings from the middle ages all the way up to the 20th century. Some famous paintings found here were painted by Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, Renoir and Van Goh to name a few. There are many other museums in London and the surrounding areas which can be a great way to spend the day!

For those not interested in museums, another great attraction London has to offer is Buckingham Palace. This palace is the residence of the monarchy of the UK. Built in the 1700’s, it was originally known as Buckingham House and was built for the Duke of Buckingham. Since then, the royal family has called the palace their residence and is at the center of many national celebrations. A trip here is almost mandatory for anyone whom visits London.

Along with Buckingham Palace, the London Eye is another landmark that makes London famous. The London Eye is a giant Ferris wheel on the South Bank of the Thames River. The Ferris wheel is 40 stories tall (135 meters/440 feet) and has a diameter of 120 meters (394 feet). When it was completed in 1999, it was the world’s tallest Ferris wheel and is still today the highest public viewing point in London. If going with kids, the London Eye is an attraction that cannot be missed.

There are so many other places and attractions to see in London, too many to list. This is truly a world class city that has something for everyone. From history in museums to fun and excitement for everyone, such as the London Eye, London is a city that everyone should visit at least once in their life. No matter what you like, London will have it.

The post Visiting the sites of London appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

USA: A place to feel free.

I would consider myself a free man. And yet I was pleasantly surprised one day to see a senior member in my living group smiling and saying to me: “You do what you want, not caring what others think about you.”

Being thus undoubtedly free within my limited circle of life and work I still wanted to enjoy freedom that comes from moving away, indeed far away, from the same old faces and places and routine phases. After a long time of asking and waiting I got the permission and opportunity to travel far, indeed very far, a distance of about 8000 miles from Secunderabad in central India to California in western USA.

I did not know then the nature of the area as forbidding even for those who would consider themselves progressive enough in their thinking. I was yet to know how I would be churned up having to face best things turned topsy-turvy by the self-styled seekers of spirituality with their—to my mind—bizarre and aggressive opposition to any organized religion with its stand on sacredness of sex.

But I did know what I was going to study at Holy Names College, Oakland in the Institute of Culture and Creation Spirituality founded by Matthew Fox who, I knew, had been barred from teaching for a year by the Vatican authority. Among the sixty-odd classmates I found a former Catholic who, for all her level-headedness, was influenced by the prejudice freely floating in the area; for she was frank enough to confess: “I was drawn to the course convinced that Fox must have said something wonderful to invite ban on himself.” When he came back to teach there was an inaugural lecture by him punctuated by Vatican bashing that was applauded duly by the large audience, all receptive, of course, but all the more captive as I remarked to the College Chaplain. Coming to know Fox during the second semester Bob, one of my companions, had the freedom to think out boldly: “Some of Fox’s ways are exactly what he has condemned in Vatican bureaucracy!” That was a sort of vindication of my own stand for my peculiar freedom in a place where freedom for all was in some way shackled, despite all profession. In the same bold spirit I was the only one to remark in public, frankly and negatively, about Starhawk who, for all her credentials, made a poor show of teaching the Master’s course and, what is more, no one objected. A sure sign, indeed, that there reigned among us the freedom of all shades of opinion. However, anti-Catholicism had the field day rightly enough on occasion though, often enough, more wrongly (as I saw it) and people of my kind had to suffer. But whenever it had good reasons on its side (as in the cases of clerical abuse of children) I would not defend the indefensible but go along with the antagonists.

If, however, a majority of my companions perceived me as a conservative all knew where I stood even if no one else was there to stand by me. Once at the end of her music recital Margaret offered to sing encore what we wanted. All wanted one thing and I alone wanted another! And I was proud when Margaret said from the stage: “Dominic, you have to go against the current!”

Whatever the variety of preferences or divisions in the group all were at one in matters of justice; and all of us participated in the big protest held in San Francisco against the shooting in El Salvador of six Jesuits and theirtwo women helpers. In those days I enjoyed my hour of glory as an Indian belonging to the same group of worldwide Jesuits.

I enjoyed more what could be termed the monument of Jesuit freedom in San Francisco. Once the College Chaplain took me round San Francisco. Of that trip I remember two things: driving up the steepest street (in the world?) and going up to Mount Diabolo. Standing high up there the whole of the city was far below our feet, crystal clear for one with sharp eyes. Rising above the small and high rise buildings stood the towering Jesuit church. As my good guide pointed it out I noticed it was more prominent than the cathedral. And thereby hangs a tale of freedom of a sort. The Cardinal had expressly wished that the Jesuit Church should not tower above the Cathedral. But, when all was said and done, the new Church was found overshadowing the older Cathedral. And so when the Cardinal came for the blessing of the Jesuit Church he began the homily with these words: “This Church is a monument to disobedience!”

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story

The post USA: A place to feel free. appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

You’ll Find Me on the Lake in the USA

By the time I make it to String Lake around midday the beach is already a mess of tots, parents, visitors, and recent high school grads attempting to tan in the middle of Wyoming like they’re on a beach in Cabo. But it looks like I’ll be the first watercraft on the lake this morning. So far.

I slide past a family with children who’ve staked their claim on a piece of silty sand that lets their kids run safely into the water a few feet before they let out a surprised shriek at the cold and run back to their young, bemused parents. Odds are this blond, curly headed family is just as likely to be German or Dutch as they are to be a third (and fourth) generation of Ohioans who’ve escaped the midwest humidity for our dry air in the mountains. They’ve come searching for a piece of freedom from their lives. Like I have.

I forget them as I push off into the mountain-cold water, with an icy shock that temporarily gives me freedom of thought. Tourists and my life in town don’t matter today. All I think about is the moment: tying my sandals to the board, starting some easy strokes, avoiding the wind as much as possible.

I navigate a rocky barrier on my knees as I paddle against the mild current towards the north end of String. Once I’ve passed the treacherous rocks waiting to grab at the boards fins, I stand up, a slim sail in the wind. I leisurely stroke my way through the sandy turquoise water and pass a canoe camp group just learning how to paddle in sync. I hit the top of String Lake and exit the water, huffing and puffing my way along the portage trail a quarter mile with the paddleboard awkwardly under one arm. I try not to trip down the grand staircase at the portage point, an unlikely piece of man-made assistance mercifully unoccupied by kayakers or Brady-Bunch canoe clans. I’ve make it Leigh Lake.

I am alone. I like it that way, up here. The vastness of Leigh Lake invites solitude, a freedom from the need to be with the crowd, an adventure in a single day. Aside from anyone camping in the backwood’s permit camps along the shores of Leigh, I am alone on a piece of water that far and away dwarfs String Lake.

I quickly strike out lake-left along a wide channel that has carved out an island; or, it is possible that the channel itself was created by the island as it tumbled off the nearby mountain range thousands of years ago. A case of chicken or egg first, and I don’t leave my mind on it for long as I make practiced, steady strokes, intent on any destination taking me away from my life at the moment.

I often come here with a need to be alone. I find the clear water peaceful along this channel, submerged rocks and boulders visible at 20, 30, or 40 feet below my paddleboard. I can’t be sure of how deep it actually is. The water plays tricks with your eyes until you’ve learned what those distances look like through the liquid medium. I pause in my strokes, steady the board and jump in, half of my mind instantly occupied by the crisp water as it shortens my breaths, the other half on the grip I have on my paddle. I kick my legs out and float, my senses blissfully clouded out by the sounds of water filling my ears, the sun blinding me as it comes out from behind a cloud. The mountain runoff that feeds this lakes and the creeks and rivers nearby is still cold. It grasps my lungs in icy hands, and shortens the attention span of my mind to single moments, feeling only my body, suspended in the blue-green glass of Leigh.

In my periphery my paddleboard is considering it’s escape – we’re out of the wind, but it only takes a moment for the current and the wind to catch what little resistance the inflated rubber will give.

I allow myself one more suspended moment of freedom in that water before it gets just too cold, and then I strike out for the paddleboard. I suddenly wonder, irrationally, what might be below me in the rocky depths that I might not see, and I long for the peace of my mind I had been immersed in only seconds ago.

Back on my paddleboard, I kneel for a moment, catching my breath, before I strike out again, farther into Leigh Lake. Measured strokes taking me foot by foot farther away from the masses, closer and closer to myself.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post You’ll Find Me on the Lake in the USA appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game in the USA

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

That’s it; I’ve had a career epiphany. I’m going to be a professional baseball player. It looks pretty easy; there seems to be minimal exertion, which is important to me in any prospective sporting venture. I think even I could run flat out for fifteen metres or so. And hardly any of them hit the ball so I’d be fine when my time comes to bat. I know I don’t have an arm for throwing so I’d be useless as a distance fielder (is that what they’re called in baseball?) but otherwise I think it’s a decent plan. So, I’m going to look into the women’s leagues, do Geena Davis, Madonna and Rosie O’Donnell still play on a team together…?

It is a lot of fun! I am an Englishwoman who has no real interest in sport and yet here I am at the AT&T ballpark watching the San Francisco Giants vs the New York Mets. I think I witnessed every American baseball stereotype there is; vendors throwing peanuts, large men spitting peanut shells onto an ever increasing pile between their feet; an entire stadium singing Take Me Out to the Ball Game; a near fight between a fan and the Giants mascot Lue Seal (a big seal with a big attitude); people diving for foul balls; old ladies yelling “you suck!” at disgruntled pitchers and plenty of corndogs. It was brilliant!

I settled in with a cold beer in what I’m assured is a rare afternoon of resplendent San Francisco sunshine and enjoyed a baffling afternoon of sport. I was under the assumption that I’d understand it all because it’s essentially a game of rounders, which is what the girls at school had to play while the boys played cricket; frankly rounders is far superior to cricket and probably most other sports. But what I was forgetting is that it’s been thirteen years since I played rounders and we frequently twisted the rules to suit the situation and our mood anyway; like the rule about dropping your bat before running, which was always an inconvenience for those girls who preferred to have something with which to hit any nearby fielders in the stomach, it’s very hard to catch a ball when you’re winded, I know. And I’ve never been great at understanding what makes a good pitch, which seems to be what baseball mostly consists of; at least this particular game had very little hitting and running going on. So I was generally quite lost.

It doesn’t really matter, it’s still fun because every other minute there’s music and chanting, interspersed with live video of people enjoying the weather on boats in the bay. The best image was of a cocky, shirtless plonker doing a dance on the slightly slanted roof of his boat and revelling in his glorious self for all of two seconds until he slipped, nearly fell in the water only to be saved by trusty windmill arms after which he very carefully and sheepishly climbed back down to safety. Anyway, despite the fact that the Giants are on a bad streak at the moment, much to the fans annoyance, whenever somebody did score a rounder, I mean point, run, thing, the crowd went crazy and it’s impossible not to get swept up in it all.

That’s the strange thing; I had just come to the end of an epic solo road trip where I’d marvelled at the vast and desolate beauty of Arches National Park, wondered at the eerie quiet during a night time drive along the Natchez Trace and stood at dusk, with not another human being in sight, gazing on the still and roaring red expanse of the Pinto Basin. Each a personal moment I’ll treasure forever but for someone who usually avoids crowds, seeks the quiet and is staggeringly awkward in most social situations it was a surprise that here at the AT&T ballpark, amongst hordes of screaming baseball fans, I felt the tranquillity of liberation. Together we laugh, chant, cheer, sing and groan. Collectively, with bated breath, we watch the next batsman take to the pitch. As one we inch forward when the bowler rears back and we each feel the crack of impact when the ball hits the bat and finally this one goes soaring through the warm air with every pair of eyes in the stadium fixed upon it. It’s there, as the ball hangs at the peak of its arc that I feel it. There’s lightness, a thrill, an unexpected ease and clarity in this smallest shared moment. I was happy. I’d found my freedom in the unity of 41,000 strangers.

About the author: In the spring and summer of 2013 Laura Jane Mellor, at the age of twenty-five and with not a scrap of knowledge or experience regarding independent travel, picked up a small camper-van in New York City and set off on a solo drive to San Francisco. She is currently working on a book about the trip.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post Take Me Out to the Ball Game in the USA appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

London, UK is Constant

There’s nothing that makes you feel insignificant like sitting in the middle of a crowd and being less interesting than the pigeons.

If you sit in Trafalgar Square for an hour or two you’ll see the whole world go by. Morris dancers and Elvis impersonators eye each other curiously, whilst two loud tour guides describe exactly the same thing in languages that are similar enough to confuse the unfamiliar but not so similar they could do away with one guide. Nelson watches it all still, as he has for centuries, and the feet pounding the pavements really do so with the same intentions as all the feet since the Romans made Londinium their British capital. Whether their bags are from Hamleys or Harrods, their sandwich from Subway or a streetfood van, it’s the same story.

In the middle of all that, at the furthest point on the timeline for now, you really are a spec. One person in one moment in one tiny but significant part of the capital. How could you possibly hope to make a difference to all of that? Nothing you can do will change the city, or make you seem at all important to anyone else in the amorphous cloud. The pavements have been worn by so many feet, you can only follow along in one of the thousands, millions of paths. You’re not going to damage London, no matter how hard you try.

So you can pick any path you like, and no one will care or even notice. Go up that way, behind the bus, and keep going some more, and you could be in the Ritz taking tea or cocktails. If you forgot to bring your fascinator and closed toed shoes, you could cross the street and head into Soho, where the most amazing little pastry shop stands with its door open and the tables, a mimic of the home of pastry, provide the perfect seat for your own private tea party. If you don’t fancy that there’s the national gallery, or for cheaper art just look up. There’s a dignitary on every corner, some of the finest statuary Britain has produced, and the architecture is the best of every age. Maybe you want to stroll in the park or along the river, or find an obscure museum that will teach you everything about something you never knew existed.

London isn’t expecting you home before dawn. London won’t be home herself before dawn. A famous London band once sang that “sleep is for fools who never see the sun rise”, and as they were famous for the most rock and roll parties of all time they would know. They’d know, after all. The Who used to trash their instruments in pubs all across the city.

I can’t have a favourite thing about London. Even my top ten overflows, with sarcastic messages on the Tube, street food where I least expected it, everything about Camden, the urban foxes you see if you stay up late enough, and a dozen other things. When I sit in Trafalgar Square, knowing my parents don’t expect me home for days, that my shoes are good enough to walk for miles and I can get into my accommodation whenever I like, London is sanctuary. I could be anyone. No one knows me, no one will remember me, and I can’t leave my mark to prove I was there. I’m unaccountable.

So of course I eat too much ice cream, get lost, lust over shoes I can’t carry home, and spend too much time staring at the Tube map trying to pick a destination. Freedom, like London, is what you make of it.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post London, UK is Constant appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

Surf’s Up in Peru

Surf’s up!

I’ve been in utter lust with all things surfing as far back as I can remember. However, it was my choice to make ours a long-distance relationship; I worshipped board-carrying athletes from afar. How I wanted to learn! However, the barriers against me were too formidable.

First off, you have to do this sport in the arch enemy of females: a bathing suit. That precluded me from attempting it for all of my teen years and throughout my twenties.

Body issues aside, my thirties made me wiser. This meant that instead of admitting the truth (fear was making me too terrified to even try it), my reasons to avoid learning became more clever. I’d offer up seemingly rational excuses like not having health insurance, the time and costs involved or, something that anyone can understand: not wanting to humiliate myself. Under my “reasonable” exterior was a scared-y cat. These justifications allowed me to put aside any thoughts of me surfing. Still, I loved the sport. Often I went to the beach and watched, I took in surf movies, but my relationship remained a long-distance one. And so it seemed destined to always be. Until “fate” intervened.

They say that one can often find courage when he leaves his “normal” environment. I am proof of that. Vacationing in Indonesia, board rentals and lessons were only a few bucks. Finally I had summoned up the courage: the waves were perfect and no one knew me here. The day had arrived! I was so excited (and scared). While walking on a plank in the road, it gave way and I hurt my shin. It wasn’t going to happen this trip after all. Worse yet, I had myself believing that it was a “sign” from above to never try this hazardous sport. My love got shelved.

Two years later, I was again on holiday, but this time in Mancora, a lovely beach town in Peru. I was doing what I do well. Sitting on the sand and observing the amazing athletes. Something caught my eye. A teensy bikini-clad girl, lugging a board that was bigger than she was, ran past me. Fearless, she dove into the ocean, paddled out and waited for the wave. She looked so confident and regal atop her surfboard. I couldn’t believe it. That little girl was keeping up with the much older and more experienced guys! She inspired me so much that I decided to get a lesson, even as my sage self reiterated old obstacles, pointing out that she was young and limber.

Melo, my gorgeous instructor was charming, but his promise that “If you don’t stand up, you don’t have to pay” clinched the deal.

He made the whole thing like a fun adventure. The moment that I stood up remains one of my happiest memories.

“Yessssss!” I screamed. Ah, shoot. Now I’d have to pay the owner.

Melo looked at me and beamed. He high-fived me, “Mi Reina!”

Could it be that I was a natural? The next time, when I almost kicked Melo in the face, I realized he was behind me, holding the board, stabilizing it for me. We both had a good laugh.

Without his assistance, it was much harder. After a few tumbles, I did eventually get the hang of it and was able to stand up on my own. The peacefulness, the sense of accomplishment, the feeling of being one with the ocean. The moments that I am surfing are the most liberating I have ever known.

When surfing, you are forced to be in the moment. If you start to let all that monkey chatter take over, you lose your concentration and go down. You could crash against rocks or bam into another surfer. Surfers die every year; I don’t want to be one of them.

Admittedly, as much as I had enjoyed our long-distance relationship, this new development takes my love with surfing to a whole new dimension. To have overcome the self-made obstacles at middle age makes the entire affair even sweeter. I recommend surfing to anyone. It’s a road to a freedom that so many never get to experience.

About the author: JC Sullivan has been to over 110 countries and every continent and loves the freedom found in backpacking. Since Peru, she’s surfed in Panama and the Galapagos Islands (Isabella). An award-winning author, JC constantly challenges herself creatively believing that comfort zone is a euphemism for “rut”.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post Surf’s Up in Peru appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

Returning to Belfast, Ireland

Somehow, I have lost a quarter of a century between trains.

Back in the 1980s, the train from Lurgan to Belfast shuddered and creaked its way to the city. The seats were blighted with cigarette holes and knife slits, the floors covered in litter, the walls plastered with graffiti. Disaffected youths smoked in the no smoking compartments and no one dared challenge them. This was Northern Ireland at the height of the troubles: troubled, angry, defiant.

You ascertained where you were on your journey by peering through grimy windows. To disembark, you had to pull down the window, reach outside and twist the metal handle, pushing the heavy door outwards with all your might.

Here I am twenty-five years later, back on the train to Belfast. The new stock is state-of-the-art: shiny, clean, comfortable, smooth, fast. Rolling neon lights flash up the destinations along the line. A soothing English voice tells us our next stop. Automatic doors slide open effortlessly. The female voice recites the remaining destinations. Surely I must be in the home counties, not in my homeland?

But the names are the same: Moira, Lisburn, Hilden, Lambeg, Derriaghy, Dunmurry, Finaghy, Balmoral, Adelaide and Great Victoria Street. They roll off the tongue like poetry.

I breathe out slowly, and soak in the past and the present. Across the way, a couple are speaking in the tongue of my childhood. A language half forgotten. They punctuate every sentence with a verbal full stop.

“I’ve just got back from Australia – so I have.”

“I didn’t know that – I didn’t.”

“Loved it out there – aye.”

“You’re still in Finaghy – are you?”

“I am – aye.”

I smile to myself. When did my birthplace become a foreign country?

In Belfast, I met a friend at the City Hall. We dodge the ‘tour-of-the-troubles’ operators, touting for business.

Back in the eighties, you entered the main shopping area through a gated terrapin to be given a thorough body search – repeated in every store you entered. Shopping in the city wasn’t for the faint hearted. People in Derry refused to go to Belfast because they felt it was too dangerous. Belfast citizens wouldn’t go to Derry for the very same reason.

There is such an air of freedom and optimism now, I feel dizzy. We continue on to Victoria Square and the new centre with its glass dome offering 360 degree views: of the city, the river Lagan, the Lough, the sea beyond, and the Black Mountain on the skyline.

We walk on to the waterside. I had no idea it was so close to the city centre. During the troubles it was a forgotten wasteland.

By the Lagan, we gaze up at the Ring of Thanksgiving. The locals prefer to call it ‘The thing with the ring,’ ‘Nuala with the Hula’ or ‘The doll on the ball’. They have a way with words here. Peace and conciliation is the statue’s message.

I carry my fragile bundle of hope onto the train. Then it’s ten stops and home.

About the author: Helen Moat is an award winning travel writer and guide book author. She also blogs for Wanderlust magazine.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post Returning to Belfast, Ireland appeared first on We Said Go Travel.

India in a wheelchair

India was always somewhere that I want to visit but being in a wheelchair I didn’t think it was going to be possible. However I met someone who regularly works in India and together we formed a plan. We had two weeks to explore as much of Rajasthan as possible with a little diversion Utter Pradesh to visit the Taj Mahal to round the trip off.

We started off in Jaipur in a lovely family run guest house. It was the Festival of colour while we were there, which is celebrated by people throwing coloured powder all over each other. I was carried up three flights of stairs in my chair so that I was able to join everyone else and try and cover them all while trying to avoid getting covered myself The wheelchair I travelled in still has pink tinged wheels! The only downside to that hostel was that it was right next to the railway and the rooms would shake with the noise every time a train went past.

Next on our hit list was Pushkar, which felt like Glastonbury in the middle of India, lots of people in baggy pants with dreadlocks doing yoga. A weird mix of the peaceful and the commercial. One of the most beautiful places we visited was Udaipur, the lake city probably most famous for featuring in the James Bond film Octopussy. The service pretty much anywhere in India is enough to make anyone feel like a film star temporarily.

One of the main associations with India is the idea that it is a really meditative place. For me that wasn’t what I found, instead I was thrown into things so I didn’t have time to think about the usual barriers as often solutions were found as quickly as problems arose. At the Animal Aid animal shelter in Udaipur there was a large fence to one of the enclosures and I was simply lifted over it so that I could interact with animals. I’m not very good at being in situations where I feel even slightly helpless, but being in a situation where I knew wasn’t going to have the opportunity to have that experience again really helped me and made me overcome some of my inhibitions. I may not have been able to be independent in the traditional sense, but I have always felt like if you are able to ask for the help you need and be given it without any problem then that is as good as being independent

We also visited Bundi, which is only just beginning to make it onto the tourist map as somewhere that has some amazing forts, which may have provided the inspiration for by Rudyard Kipling when he was writing the Jungle book. I may not have been able to see inside these forts but I can see why their crumbling majesty would inspire someone to create a story around them.

People’s attitudes towards me as a wheelchair user felt very different, because everyone was very up front about asking questions and saying exactly what they think. People would just ask “What’s the problem?”. This happened a lot. I didn’t mind. I would much rather that someone asked rather than continue with misconceptions. The extra attention we got also meant that there were always people who were willing to help.

In Ranthambore we went on Safari and I may not have been lucky enough to see any tigers, but I was still given all the help I needed to have the best experience possible. In the UK people would have been reluctant to change things and allow me to sit in the front of the Jeep (the only place I could hold myself upright so that I could see everything) in India there was no problem because people just want to do whatever they can to make sure everyone has the best experience possible. People care about giving good service not in a cheesy American or understated British way they just come across as being really genuine.

We saved visiting the Taj Mahal one of India’s most famous landmarks until the end of our trip. It was built in the 1630s as a mausoleum and memorial for the wife of Shah Jahan and is now a UNESCO world heritage site. It was refreshingly accessible, with ramps all around the building, a good job because we visited on one of the hottest days, ten minutes after we bought some water felt like it had come from a kettle. It felt very odd actually being at the Taj Mahal, the awesomeness of it in the blinding sunshine just made it seem even more surreal, I found it difficult to persuade myself that I wasn’t on a film set.

About the Author: June Craven is a Writer and Study Coach who lives in Manchester, England. She reads too many books and likes to travel whenever possible.

Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Independence Travel Writing competition and tell your story.

The post India in a wheelchair appeared first on We Said Go Travel.