Once in a Lifetime?

Anywhere left?

For the length of this odyssey, I've been making a note in my little blue book each time we've moved on to a new destination.  I totted it all up on the plane home from Vancouver.   17 countries in 188 days required:

26 planes
23 taxis
16 boats
15 minibuses
13 tuc-tucs
10 trains
10 buses
8 lifts with family or friends
7 coaches
3 hire cars
... and 2 campervans.

I never counted the number of departure boards we saw, each flickering with destinations yet to be visited.  Namibians are graceful -- are they the same in Angola?   Northern Laos was mountainous -- but we never reached the plains ... we touched Paraguay, but what about Patagonia?  With each new journey, we were reminded that curiosity feeds curiosity.

Once in a lifetime?   I wonder.  Not for a long while, of course: we are now longing too much to explore our own hall and corridors for that.  We have enjoyed the kindness of strangers, but need the love of our friends and family now, for many years.  And, of course, there is a bank account to be topped up.  But one day, when our nephews and nieces have nephews and nieces of their own, maybe Uncle Henry and Uncle John will find new parts of our planet to send postcards from, on another many-monthed, multiple-vehicled odyssey.  No, not once in a lifetime, we hope -- but the time of our lives, once again.

John