Travel 2021 – A Rebound Year

After all my travel plans in 2020 were basically canceled due to the pandemic, I hoped that 2021 would be a rebound travel year.  I certainly did not expect to return to the glory days of my almost unlimited travel as I experienced in 2019 with my 22 separate trips.  But with the roll out of vaccinations in late December 2020, I began to hope to hit the road again.

My wife, being in the professional health industry, received her first dose at the end of December and then her second dose at the end of January.  I just then had to wait until vaccinations for my age and health condition group was opened.  That came early in March and the day before St. Patrick’s Day, I received my first (and only required) shot.

Not having seen our west coast kids, their spouses, and grandkids in over 15 months, the west coast was our first destination.  In April, we took our first flight in over 15 months to Seattle to visit our daughter, son-in-law, and two grandsons.  Our oldest grandson was quite excited to see us for the first time in so long.

Obviously, I well documented this first trip, and you can read the details in this first of two posts published last year, First Flight!

After a long travel drought, it was just a few weeks later that we were heading back out west, this time to visit our son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter and grandson where they live just south of San Francisco.  Here too, we got to see our grandkids for the first time in so many months and with their parents taking off on a 10^th wedding anniversary trip, we got the grandkids all to ourselves (click hereto read this story).

Then in June, my wife and I and our in-town granddaughter drove over to Northwest Arkansas for a two-pronged trip.  First it was our granddaughter’s chance to visit her cousins in their home for the first time.  Although rain impacted some of their weekend plans, the cousins seemed to have a great time together.

On Monday, my wife drove our granddaughter back home and I stayed on with my two sisters and brother.  This part of the trip, we planned as a sibling bike outing and my brother had driven down from Pennsylvania with his bike for us to do that.  There are some great bike trails in the area, and we took well advantage of them (Click here if you want more details).

In July, we drove to the Gulf Coast for a beach vacation with our son, daughter-in-law and our two grandkids.  We rented a condo right on the beach and had a great time the entire week.  Much of that time was spent in the lazy river in our condo complex…

…or watching our granddaughter go down the water slide over and over and over again in what I previously wrote about as our Three Generation Summer Vacation.

September was our busiest travel month.  First up, my brother and I flew out to Seattle for our annual BroGo.  For these trips, the two of us travel to some location of interest, often where there is also a high concentration of craft breweries.  We are both beer lovers and enjoy trying unique beers that we cannot obtain in our hometowns.  And Seattle happens to be where our daughter and her family live, so it was a twofer trip for me.  It was an action-packed visit and filled two posts, the first of which you can access here.

Then just two weeks later, my wife and I started our drive out west on what I referred to in my previous post as a Miniature Road Trip.  The purpose was to deliver the doll house I had built for my granddaughter as it was the only way I thought it could arrive undamaged.  We made it out in three long driving days, had the weekend to visit, and then drove back home over four days.

Then in October, my two sisters, my brother, and I got to redo our cancelled SibSab, our Sibling Sabbatical from 2020 when we drove to our favorite place on Earth—Montreat, NC.  Here the four of us rented a 100-year-old house and had a great visit over four days (click here for the details).

Our last trip of the year was to be in December when my wife and I were to fly back out to Seattle to spend New Year’s with our daughter and her family.  Unfortunately, snowy weather forced the postponement of that trip until sometime in 2022.

So overall, I had seven trips in 2021, a nice rebound from so few in 2020.  Hopefully you were also able to get in some fun travel year last year and will be able to this year as well.

So, cheers to another fun year of travel in 2022!