Where in the World are Ric and Anne?

... as Ric learns to use Google Blogger. Here's where Devil's Island is, part of French Guiana: Above is a map of the main island, Isle Royale, where prisoners first were taken. This is the only one of the three islands we visited. Papillon managed to "visit" all three, this one harsh but not too hash. Then he graduated to the next, with horrible solitary confinement. (To me, based on the movie, it seemed by far the worst.) But then he was sent to the third, which was reserved for political prisoners and the worst prisoners, but it seemed pretty good to me—clearly I'm missing something. It was this third island from which he escaped, jumping off cliff into the ocean an climbing onto a net bag of coconuts (?) that he and a fellow prisoner had crafted, an letting the tides take him to the mainland. His friend opted out at the last minute. The movie jumps from him laughing in the water to him two or three decades later flying from Venezuela back to Paris. Our tenders...

 

I solved my photo syncing problem, in rather a kludgy way, but it allows me to finally post photos from my Devil's Island post of 9 January. Here they are, but apparently of very low quality compared to actual photos. I'm strictly a beginner with this blogging, and have a lot to figure out. But I need to get this done now, in wee hours of 19 Jan. Notes: The link RikkiTikkiTekki.blog is working again. (Case insensitive). Note: If you leave a comment, please sign it. Otherwise it just reads "Anonymous."

To avoid disappointment, reduce expectations! Ric is really going to have trouble finding time to update our blog while still finding time to enjoy the journey. But, yes, there a Blacksten ATW (Around the World) blog. Things have been too hectic for me to update it until today. So much unpacking, getting oriented, attending lectures, exploring the ship, MS Zuiderdam (pronounced zeederdam), and dining with Road Scholar Group. But finally getting caught up. So here goes report on our travels, in reverse order:   Devil’s Island If you’ve read the book or seen the movie, “Papillon,” the true story of one of the only men to successfully escape imprisonment in the French prison complex in three French Guianian islands. So we toured the larger Isle Royale yesterday. Papillon, as all prisoners, started there. But some sort of misbehavior would send the a person to solitary on another island, where Papillon was lucky to survive (according to his probably embellished autobiography). Another ...

In seven days, if the stars align and the creek don’t rise, Anne and Ric embark on the MS Zuiderdam for their around the world adventure. Or misadventure. (Had we known the effort and angst involved in getting us to this point…) But here we are with at least one show-stopping issue solved—we now have meds for the entire five months duration. But we don’t have our Brazil visas, which we were told were required to board the ship, but then no one else does! The new e-visa system that Brazil initiated recently is not working. Holland America is aware of the problem and working to resolve it, either by getting Brazil to lift the visa requirement so we can sail up the Amazon, or by changing our entire itinerary to skip Brazil! Wow! This problem must apply to anyone trying to visit Brazil, whether for work, school, tourism, … Unimaginable incompetence. Where is Bolsonaro when we need him? The other possible modification to our adventure is rerouting to avoid the Gulf of Aiden, the Red Sea, an...

Around the World? Are We Crazy? So, for our upcoming 50th wedding anniversary, we, Ric and Anne, are taking an around the world cruise. Woo hoo! The closer we get to departure the crazier it seems. How did we come to this? Road Scholar World Academy World Cruise Piqued Our Interest . We always get lots of travel ads, having done a bit of traveling since our retirement. Most go straight into the trash. But, many moons ago, Ric glanced at a Road Scholar flyer for an around-the-world cruise that happened to mainly visit places we had not visited but were interested in. It also happened to cover the longitudinal slice of the globe we had not crossed into , (Burma through India).  Well, against our better judgment, we signed up, tentatively, having months before we had to put down the non-refundable payment. But we got more used to the idea, so coughed up the money, purchasing expensive travel insurance in case of serious health or family contingencies. So, here we are. Ten days from d...