In 2015, I did a travel blog for my trip to England with the English to England program that I started at the university where I work (http://englishtoengland2015.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-countdown-to-departure.html). I did the blog because that was the assignment I gave my students who were going on the trip. Most of them had never left the country or traveled without their parents, so not only was it a great way to do assignments, but also it was a great way to reflect AND keep their families up to date with what they were doing. Most of them had to learn how to do blogs.

If I was going to ask them to learn something new, I was going to learn it as well. It’s part of my teaching philosophy. They also were more willing once I said I was going to learn since everyone at my university is aware of my poor tech skills and how often weird things happen to me with tech. I’ve lost count of how many times IT has looked at one of my computers and said “I’ve never seen that before!”

Even though it was a lot of work, I never regretted doing that blog. It’s a great memory of the trip. Yes, I took a lot of pictures, but there are details I’m not sure I would have remembered if not for the blog, especially the hilarious and awkward bits.

Because of this, I thought to do a blog the next time I traveled to a different place and keep it up as a way of journaling about my trips and a reminder of my good fortune when work and life get difficult. However, the next time I took a trip–to South Korea in the summer of 2017–I couldn’t figure out how to set up the blog anymore. In fact, I spent the first day and a half in Seoul in my apartment, trying to figure out to blog again instead of actually experiencing my trip, so . . . I gave up. And believe me, the hilarity of my climb up Mt. Hala was worth a blog!

Because I thought it had gotten too complicated for me to blog, I not only didn’t do a blog for that trip nor did I do one for my trips to London in 2018 & 2020 (before the world shut down), and my third trip to Korea in 2019.

My friends who went on the trip to London in January 2020 still randomly thank me for organizing that trip, the last one before the pandemic turned the world upside down. I regretted even more that I hadn’t blogged during that trip, knowing that despite the copius pictures, I don’t remember all of the details that I would have liked and definitely details that would have helped me get through days of doing COVID testing logistics work.

As time passed, I really regretted not doing a travel blog more and more. Yes, my first blog is fairly ugly (why did I pick such a dark background?), but it’s also a nice thing to read when I’m feeling low. It was an especially great way to remember the fun of travel during the height of COVID when there were days that I thought I would never leave the state again let alone the country.

I felt badly, not just for myself but for my mom. My mother has an adventursome spirit, but she doesn’t travel any distance from home anymore. She doesn’t even feel comfortable taking the 5-hour train ride to come see me anymore. I want her to experience my trips, so I posted lots of pictures on Facebook, but it just wasn’t the same. How could I share my travels with her?

So here I am about to take my first big trip since 2020. I am going to be going on a trip that I have dreamed about for years: a trip where I will be sleeping on a train! A train trip for all the train lovers in my family. I decided to take the train from Vancouver, British Columbia to Toronto, Ontario. I’ll be making stops in Jasper and Banff. I’m really excited.

I leave in a week, but I’m setting this up now to make sure that I’m doing it properly and that my mom is able to open the link.

Not expecting anyone to read this besides my mom and my friends, so if you’re just some random reader that accidentally stumbles upon this blog, don’t expect snappy prose or influencer-like pics. Ask my students and my younger daughter; my selfies are terrible.