Welcome to JOYFUL REFLECTIONS. Also welcome to MARCH!!!! My header picture this month is a photo I took of the pretty Crocus blooms in our yard... The Crocuses and Daffodils are the first signs of spring here in Tennessee. I am definitely ready for SPRING...

Friday, February 18, 2011

Let's Talk Fridays: The Worst Vacation EVER

When I was young,  we didn't take many vacations--that I can remember.  I remember being jealous of my older brother, who took his family on long vacations all over the country every year.  I do remember my folks taking me to Daytona Beach when I was a teenager.  And I remember taking some train trips on occasion (since my Dad worked for the railroad and got free passes).   I don't remember any bad vacations back then.



Then, when I got married the first time,  I seldom remember us taking vacations either ---other than to visit family (which is not much of a vacation).   We had 3 kids --so wherever we went,  they went also..  SO--no bad vacations during those years either.



After my divorce and after the kids were all grown and gone from the home,  I started taking yearly vacations with my 3 childhood friends.  We've been doing this off and on since 1992.  Most of these were fabulous vacations with great friends. 



THEN---in May of 2001 (after I had met and fallen in love with George),  I went back to Texas (where I had lived previously for 12 yrs) to attend a wedding and to visit friends there.  I was only gone about 3 days --but was absolutely miserable.  I missed George SO much --and wanted to be with him.  I was on the phone with him 24/7 during that LONG weekend.  The wedding was nice and being with friends was great... BUT--this ole gal missed her MAN.



The hardest part happened on the last day---trying to get back home.  At the airport,  the flight was delayed... I could have cried!!!!  That was the longest day of my life --which I couldn't do anything about except sit and wait.  FINALLY,  I got on the plane and headed back to Nashville.  I was so excited that that weekend was over.  George was meeting me at the airport (it was about 11 p.m. when I finally arrived) ---but he was given some wrong information --so we couldn't find each other once I got off of the plane.  Yipes---where was this man I loved and was desperate to see??????  FINALLY---we were in each other's arms.  That LONG weekend was finally over... (Not a vacation I ever want to take again--at least without George!)



SO--tell me about your worst vacation EVER....

Have a wonderful weekend --and enjoy the mild weather (that we have now here in Tennessee).   See you on Monday!

Hugs,

P.S.  All images and illustrations came from the internet.

66 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Betsy, I can't remember any really bad vacations. When I was young, I suffered with car sickness and spent most family vacations sleeping after taking Dramamine! My siblings used to tease me that I slept through most vacations!!!
Have a great weekend.

Reanaclaire said...

hey Betsy, it is so touching to read that u r so deeply in love!! how i wish i can find a man i love so deeply.. :)
My worst vacation? none that i can think of right now.. so far, they are good holidays!

Ruth Hiebert said...

I guess one has to go on vacation to experience a really bad one.OK,it's not really that bad,my parents did go on a few vacations,all of which brought happy memories.Jake and I went on a few as well and loved them.So I guess I have had only good vacations.Right now I would love to head out on a vacation and hope to have fun,but work is calling,so I had best stick around home.
Ruth

Catherine said...

But I am thinking you have had lots of wonderful vacations with your George to make up for this one! You two are just so cute!

Happy Weekend Betsy!
xo Catherine

Tracy said...

Awww, I like the sounds of that even though it WAS a bad vacation...My worst vacation was last year and not in terms of where or what we did because we went to the beach and rented a beach house together. She was a long time college friend and we went with her kids: 11 and 14 and her 14 year old's friend (girls, I might add). I lost a friend as a result of it and am still trying to figure out what went wrong except I decided I didn't agree with her parenting style, and as a result her children were very self-centered, rude and just not nice kids.
We still don't talk...

RoeH said...

The last vacation I ever took as a married person. We fought the whole three thousand miles there and back. I said then I'd never go anywhere with him again EVER. That was in '95 and the divorce was in '97. I've wished many times I'd just gotten out of the car and found a plane back home. It was just awful.

Ginny Hartzler said...

I have never in my whole life taken a vacation!!! Yes, it's TRUE!! People are always telling me I really need to get away from the phone and all my jobs, especially daughter-in-law.

Connie said...

I don't remember ever taking any bad vacations. We had a flat tire once, but my husband and sons were able to get it fixed and get us on the way again. Hope you have a great weekend, Betsy! :)

Arkansas Patti said...

We moved so much when I was growing up that the thought of traveling as a vacation never came up.
As an adult, I did every year and never had a bad one.
It is such a breath of fresh air to hear how much you are in love with that neat man.

Thoughtfully Blended Hearts said...

I don't recall any bad vacations...like you didn't have many vacations until I married Michael!!!

From the Kitchen said...

When I was a child, we took the train from Virginia to visit my great grandmother in Kentucky. Since it was overnight, we had a room (really a berth with a curtain) in the pullman car. That was fun. What wasn't fun were the sleeping arrangements in grandmother's sweet victorian home (w/o air conditioning). I had to sleep with my grandmother and great grandmother. I couldn't wait to get back to our air conditioned home!

My father, grandfather and great grandfather also worked for the railroad.

Best,
Bonnie

floweringmama said...

Forget the vacation, girl! This is a LOVE story!!

MadSnapper said...

I am so shocked at Ginny's comment i am having trouble thinking. in all the years i lived at home, the only vacations we had were driving from Savannah to here in FL where I live now to stay with my grandmother or at the beach with my aunt in her beach house. daddy rarely came with us, me, mom and my brother. the ones when daddy came were not all that much fun, he was kind of a vacation killer, not bad but not as fun. i only have one bad vacation and that was when i was 16, daddy decided to do a real vacation, the first and last that was not visitng relatives. he rented a cabin on the altamaha river in GA. a fish camp,no running water, no indoor plumbing, in the woods with nothing to do all day long except fish which my mother and I hated. she and i had taken a stack of books, so all day long we laid on blankets and read book after book, fighting off gnats and mosquitos. at last the day came to go home and we were beyond happy

Pedaling said...

I may not always have time to add my story to these posts, but I am sure enjoying reading them come Friday morning. You two are so adorable together...I've felt that way to. And those comics are perfect....loved the not a good sign one!

Fred Alton said...

It's hard for me to remember vacations that were all bad - but there was one that brought bad results. It was the one we took while living in Nairobi, Kenya. We rented the home of a former British Commissioner on the beach at Kilifi Creek. When we arrived, while Frances was cooking dinner the first evening, she called me into the kitchen and wanted to know what that snake was doing up on the top of the block wall...and was this forked stick in the corner so that we could use it to put the snake outside the house? I offered to go to the nearest tourist hotel on the beach and get us a room there - but my conservative (and brave) wife decided, "No! We have already paid for this place for two weeks and there is no way to get our money back. We're staying." At first I thought it was merely one of those huge African lizards because all we could see was the head and about 4 inches of his body sitting atop that open concrete block wall.... so I took the forked stick and attempted to knock the "lizard" off the wall. When I hit it, it was solid. It barely moved. Somehow now it looked larger.

So I went to the suitcase and came back with a can of pepper spray...got on a chair so that my eyes were level with the snake, and blasted him in the eyes. "Puff Adders do not move quickly" we had been told. But, I promise you, this one moved rapidly down inside the open block wall. NOW - what do we do? Well, we can't see the snake but we know he went down into the wall. Should we sleep in this house? "Well, we have mosquito nets over each bed." said my fearless wife. Getting ready for bed and tucking the mosquito netting under the mattresses, I noticed a small bird nest on an open rafter directly above my bed - from which the bird flew. It came back in just a few minutes and settled into it's nest. "Ah...what can a bird do to hurt me", I thought. "Nothing." Having secured Frances' bed and netting, I lay down and was soon fast asleep. About two hours later I awoke to hear the bird shreiking and chattering, flying about overhead. I did not get up because it was only a bird. As Frances and I discussed this the next morning, we decided that the bird was making all that noise because the snake was trying to get it. We stayed in that place the full two weeks. While cooking, that snake would poke it's head out of the wall and watch.

In addition to all of this my Frances was bitten by mosquitoes. When vacation was over and we arrived back in Nairobi she got sicker and sicker ... until we finally called the missionary doctor. He said, "Frances, you have malaria and dinghy fever!" It was a long road to recovery taking the medicine and hydration fluids.

Yes - that has to be our worst vacation ever!

Sunny said...

The worse vacation was when I was a teenager, camping with my parents in the middle of nowhere in pouring rain with a leaking tent! I still have nightmares, LOL!
Have a delightful weekend.
☼ Sunny

Out on the prairie said...

I have been fairly fortunate. I had my luggage lost on a trip to the Canary Islands so all I had were my heavy work boots and warm winter clothes when it was 85.I bought a few things and got everything back in a few days.I keep a laptop with me when I fly just in case there are delays.

Linda at To Behold The Beauty said...

I can't think of any vacation that was truly bad. On the contrary, I always enjoyed anything called "vacation." My husband, however, would probably say HIS worst vacation was our driving trip to Alaska. That was just too much driving for the poor boy, not to mention our first (and only) trip in an RV.

Adrienne Zwart said...

Hi, Betsy. I'm glad you and George finally connected at the airport. I'm sure you were feeling a little panicked when you didn't see him right away!

We actually laugh about vacations--in fact something always goes wrong to the point where we've started calling it the Butterfield curse. (Unfortunately, getting married didn't break the spell and my husband often asked what he had married into!) LOL

It started when my brother and I were small and my parents decided we would drive to Orlando. In our Chevette. (Do you remember those tiny Chevy cars?) We checked into our hotel and went straight to the Magic Kingdom. After a long, and fun-filled day we came back ready to sleep. We opened the door to the room and as my dad turned on the lights, we noticed the walls were absolutely crawling with bugs. Since we had paid in cash early that morning, the hotel manager refused to refund our money stating we had had the room all day. (Now I think my dad could have made some headway if he had mentioned calling the health department, but he was too tired or so shocked he just didn't think of it.) So we drove to the coast and slept in the car at Cocoa Beach. I say 'slept', but I don't think much sleeping actually got done in that tiny car. When the sun came up, we decided to walk down to the water and my brother and I stepped on a nest of bees which proceeded to chase us through a patch of sand burs. (We were barefooted.) Distraught and crying, we sat in the sand while my dad picked the burs out of our feet.
My dad's aunt & uncle live Orlando, so he called them and we went to stay with them for the next night where my parents were subjected to hours and hours of silent home movies. (My brother and I swam in their pool, so we missed most of that.)

Each time something goes wrong now on vacation, we just laugh about it and blame the family "curse." We don't really believe in such things, but it helps make tense situations a little more bearable.

Pat - Arkansas said...

My recipe:
1- 1974 hot, hot summer during the gasoline shortage;
1- 28' Winnebago that sleeps 6;
1 - blown air conditioning system;
1- on board bathroom we weren't allowed to use because hubby stored 15 gal. gasoline in it;
1 - speed-mad, 800 miles or kidney failure whichever comes first husband;
1- motion sickness-susceptible mother;
4 bored teenagers;
1 - really, really needed a calm vacation me;
7 - days, 3,000 miles

Larry said...

I think it's wonderful that you travel so much... we used to and then our little dog got old... I can't bear to leave her in a kennel so our only trips the past few years have been back and forth to see our kids and grandkids. I have a plaque somewhere that says something to the effect that 'true freedom is when the kids leave home and the dog dies'. It's sad to think about, but part of me longs for the second part so that we can travel again. Cricket is such a sweetheart but life seems to revolve around her to a great extent right now. She is failing though so that won't be the case forever. As much as I love them, it's no more pets in the future... it's just too hard to say goodbye... Larry

Shug said...

Hi Betsy...
I have been waiting with anticipation about your question and discussion today.

I'm not sure I could actually call this a vacation, but two years ago my grandkids were selected as ALL STARS in basketball...Their parents were not going to be able to get off the first day in order to drive them out to Lubbock for the games. So...Shug came to the rescue. Their dad was riding out the next day with someone else and would be there for the rest of the week.
My back had hurt the week prior but I though I would be OK. Needless to say, the 10 hour drive was not a good thing for my back. I took the boys to the games the first day and the longer I sat there the worse my back got. When my son-in-law finally made it out there, I knew I was going to have to come home, but I couldn't drive. My husband and I talked and decided I just needed to fly home. He would pick me up at the airport in Dallas. long story short/my flight got cancelled not once, but 3 times. I sat at the airport all day long. I ended up having to stay the rest of the time and riding home with the family....
All I can say is it was absolutely Miserable.
Have a good day!
Shug

Jen said...

American Airlines..... a three hour trip turned into 12. That was in 2003; I haven never flown on them since.
Flight delayed, missed a connection, denied the next flight out and rude!!! customer service. I happen to then talk to a guy I thought just worked at the airport in DSW and he was he pilot for the next flight --so he made a call and made sure i got on his flight.

Busy Bee Suz said...

Does having a bear almost attack you on a camping trip count as a bad vacation?
No?
Oh, then I never had a bad one. :)

Rose said...

How about a little day trip instead...I read this and couldn't think of a bad vacation worth mentioning...then it hit.

When the girls were young, a couple we know through Roger's work wanted to go to King's Island. (an amusement park 4 hours away...in Cincinnatti) They had three kids and we just had the two...

The other guy's mom had just bought a used motor home and the idea was to take it and us all ride in it. Sounds like a good plan, right?

Wrong! To this day I do not know what was in there, but there was something that rattled....every little rough place in the pavement caused a RATTLE, RAttle, rattle...RATTLE, RAttle, rattle....for 4 hours going there. And four hours coming back!

And some kind of exhaust fumes were leaking in...giving us all headaches...

I had never wanted to vacation with anyone...but after that for sure not. I wouldn't mind meeting and doing things, but sure would not want to plan on a whole vacation with someone else.

It is funny now....and we look back at it and laugh. But at the time, it wasn't funny at all.

Karin said...

Interesting stories by all your blog friends! We took a vacation into the Rockies with hubby's older brother and family. We were all sharing their motor home. Beautiful, stunning scenery but absolutely pouring rain for four days made this our most horrible vacation. This was in the years before shopping malls in mountain villages! 4 adults and 6 children - pre-teens - in one RV was no fun. We tried to have good attitude and find things to do, games to play, etc. etc. but the pouring rain put a real damper on all our moods! Fortunately we had many wonderful family and couple vacations before and after that!

I can't quite relate to being on the phone with hubby for 24/7, lol! Hubby and I have even enjoyed separate vacations - where I've visited our children and grands for two weeks and he wanted to stay home, or he flew to Paris & other parts of Europe with our son and I stayed home! Had a good chuckle at your cartoons!

Lynda said...

Probably the return trip from NY to GA with our firstborn who was 10 months old. We were driving. She had a stomach virus. That was our first experience with diarrhea diapers and with a little one so sick. It was scary and a long ride home.

KathyA said...

Love the comics.

You know, I'm sitting here trying to think of a bad vacation and I can't! Even the time at Barnegat Beach when we discovered our son had chickenpox and had to come home wasn't bad -- just short!

Kim@stuffcould.... said...

I Love your worst vacation story but am happy you have George now. I cannot remember my worst yet??
kim

Cheryl @ TFD said...

Hi Betsy, such an interest post! And I love the cartoons. As for me, I never got to go on vacation as a youngster until I was in my teens and went with the parents to Branson a couple of times. They would take trips but left us kids behind. When I married we took a lot of mini-vacations to the Lake of the Ozarks or Branson with the kids and it seems as if my hubby (who is rarely ever sick) would have a tooth flare up or his back would act up...something! Or we had flat tires or the water pump went out. It was always a guess as to what would happen before we got home. There was one memorable trip we took to Florida, but I might blog about that one so I'll save that story. Since the kids have grown and we're on our own, it's been smooth sailing and nice trips without incident...thankfully! Loved your story, it just reaffirmed your love for George in how much you missed him. Have a good day, Cheryl

penny said...

That sounds more like a bad dream than a vacation. Hold tight and never let go! You two are perfect together.
I guess I have been lucky.. no bad vacations here.

hugs,
Pam

I Am Woody said...

Our worst vacation ever was an anniversary camping trip to the Smokies. It poured all weekend. Our tent leaked. Everything was soaked. But we both tend to get a smile on our faces when we think about trying to stave off the flood in the tent and huddling in the car when we failed. So the worst vacation ever was actually one of the best ever:)

Cicero Sings said...

Seems you've been making up for lost time since that one! Ha, ha!

Back in my single days it was always hard to find someone to go on vacation with. One girl in particular was a traveler from hell ... but I still went on THREE vacations with her. Never again. Though I'm still in contact with her and she still asks. I'm happy to stay at home at present anyway.

Another thing I really miss D ... as a traveling companion.

Carletta said...

We didn't go on vacations growing up. We did take long Sunday drives.
Hubby and I took vacations when we got married. I remember one in Connecticut and we went swimming in the hotel pool. We had a good time. The next day he had business and I went swimming alone. A couple of guys from the night before were there. From watching us the evening befoe they wanted to know if we were on our honeymoon. I told them we had been married three years. That was the happiest moment.
A few years later on a trip with both our kids heading south I got food poison. Sick in a hotel with two little kids was the worst. :)

Have a lovely weekend Betsy with the man you love!

amelia said...

I've hardly ever had a vacation let alone a bad one. I like to stay home now, too old to go running about and when I was young, my parents always went alone and left me with my Nan!!!

NatureStop said...

Hey Betsy,How sweet and that's a real love story.ENJOY all your vacations with George!!!

Shantana

SquirrelQueen said...

Other than the usual lost luggage, extended layovers or a whiney five year old stepdaughter most of our vacations have been great.

What struck me about your story was how much it sounds like a one of mine.

My hubby and I met in AK just before he moved back to Oregon. We spent a couple of months together before he left. I visited him in Oregon a few weeks later and he proposed. I went back to Anchorage to resign from my job and close up my apartment.

All went well and I was ready to fly back to Oregon and my husband to be. The flight out of Anchorage was delayed by three hours because of mechanical problems. Everyone didn't have a cell phone in those days so I called the friends he had been staying with before meeting me at the airport in Portland, OR. He had already left for the airport (he was excited that I was on my way) and I couldn't get in touch with him. The flight was so late that when I got to Seattle for my connecting flight it was gone and I had to wait for another plane to Portland. My guy was in Portland and they gave him the wrong info about my flight.

To shorten this story I was five hours late and on a different flight but somehow he managed to be standing at the right gate when I finally got off that plane in Portland. We have been together and deeply in love ever since.

Of course after all of that my luggage was late.

Have a great weekend!

Anonymous said...

One of my worst vacations was a trip to Mexico in the early 1970s. Without going into a lot of before-Jesus details I was arrested and was almost sent to a Mexican jail :-(

Hidden Haven Homestead said...

On the way to vacation in Fl with my daughters were young I hit a deer. (it jumped off a bank into the front of my brand new car). It rained all but one day of our vacation, one daughter got a stomach bug and was sick everyday and on the way home I got pulled over for speeding. I was so tired and in a hurry to get home I was doing 75 in a 55. When I saw the blue lights I made the comment they would put me under the jail for speeding. When the officer walked up to my car the girls started crying and begging him not to take their mommy to jail and he just gave me a warning ticket. I was so glad to get back home to my NC mountains!

amy @ Life in Pink Hi-Tops said...

Growing up we didn't go on vacation--just went to see relatives. Rusty and I have been on maybe 4 non-relative related vacations and so far, so good! :)

Unknown said...

My vacations have all been good, but the traveling arrangements have sometimes been challenging. Before the advent of car seats, I remember one car trip to Florida with my mom and dad, my grandmother who smoked, my newly pregnant sister-in-law, my 2 1/2 yr. old niece, and 5 year old nephew and ME. We were in a Mercury Marquis! We were all glad to get to our destination, but the kids did great.

We had another one with my mom, dad, Steve and the girls in a van to South Padre Island ( quite a distance from NW Indiana!). Kendal, our oldest started off with a bad cold, and by the end of the second day we ended up in Beaumont, Texas on Good Friday with a little 2 1/2 year-old who had the beginning stages of pneumonia. Luckily we found a great hospital an nipped it before she became worse. By the end of vacation she was feeling pretty darned good, and we were just there to relax anyway, so all's well that ends well as Uncle Willy once said! ;-)

Wendy said...

I am always amazed at your headers! They are so beautiful!!

I can imagine your frustration at the plane being delayed just when you wanted to jump into your sweetie's arms!!

The worst vacation I ever took was when I was a child. We were at a friends cottage on a lake. Driving back one night, I somehow managed to grab ahold of my brother's fishing hooks (we were in the back seat of course). That hook went right through my finger and it hurt!!! I had to go to the doctor, he pulled it out (somehow) and then I was put on the most awful medicine (must have been penicillin in those days).
Not fun!

Diane said...

I've had so few vacations, mostly a few days here and there. Since being married to Leonard so many of our trips are to see his family. Alaska was right up there in wonderful trips and so was the year I took my three girls to Disneyland.

Diane said...

I've had so few vacations, mostly a few days here and there. Since being married to Leonard so many of our trips are to see his family. Alaska was right up there in wonderful trips and so was the year I took my three girls to Disneyland.

Marge said...

Hi Betsy! I'm like you - we didn't take many vacations as a family. Most all time was used to visit relatives. But, I've made several trips with the girls! The worst was also one of the best. On the last day, on our way out of town, we decided to drive back to TN by way of Louisana - near New Orleans. Well, the new car broke down and we were stranded in a parking lot for several hours waiting for a tow truck from, gulp, New Orleans. Luckily, we were in a caddy that came with a trip warranty. They put us up for the night at the Hyatt. We were such a sight - three little hicks (one from KY and two from TN) walking into such a fancy hotel! The car was going to take a week to fix and we ended up having to rent a car to get home!

carolina nana said...

My worst vacation was the one after I graduated high school.
2 friends and I went to Myrtle Beach for a week and it rained hard everyday,we couldn't even get out on the beach because it was so cold and nasty. Then on the last day as we checked out of our hotel the sun came out and it was beautiful we all had tans from a bottle that year !!!
Have a blessed weekend
Marilyn

Lisa said...

Hi Betsy,

I enjoyed this post that shared your past. I can't think of a bad vacation, except that now, my best vacation is just to stay home;)

diane b said...

You sounded like a love struck teenager. How refreshing. The worst holiday (we say) was when we went on a group tour of wineries between Adelaide and melbourne.The first night it rained and when we went to board the bus the next morning it was full of water. So we had to wait for another bus to take over the tour. The next day many people didn't turn up for breakfast they were all throwing up with food poisoning. We waited until the last minute before check out time to load all the sick ones on board . Each day some would get better and others would get sick. Finally we arrived at Melbourne airport to fly back to Brisbane. While we were sitting on the tarmac one of our group (from German) was sick. The chief cabin steward said she had to get off the plane as the policy is no one who is sick is to be on board. She refused to get off. We sat there for 20 mins while our tour guide had to convince her that the plane could not take off with a sick passenger. Bill fought it off and I didn't get sick until we arrived home.

Neal said...

I've never had a bad vacation. I've had some where I've wanted to shoot several airline employees. :)

cyclopseven said...

Life itself is a vacation. We are practically vacationing here. Interesting writeup.

mamahasspoken said...

Sad to say I've had a couple of bad vacations as it at least three come to mind. In fact, I dread going on any vactions at this moment because every time something happens weither while we are on the vacation or as soon as we get back. There's the time we went on a cruise and Mike's sister got on my last nerve so badly we didn't talk for the next five years, the time we went to Key West and the transmittion went out of the car (not the place to have this happen I'll tell you), then there's the time we went on vacation, came back and Mike was laied off from his job the next day. Yep, not into the vacationing thing for good reasons.

eileeninmd said...

I can not recall ever having a bad vacation. The closest was when hubby and I went to the Bahamas. We were always being bothered by either someone who wanted to sell us something or braid my hair and worst of all trying to sell us drugs. And one morning we had a burnt breakfast, I think the cook was in a bad mood that day. But the Bahama scenery and beaches were pretty.

Pat @ Mille Fiori Favoriti said...

When I was a child the only vacation we went on was to my grandmother's house in Pennsylvania but I love it as she had a small farm and I loved to help feed the chickens and gather eggs and help her in the garden.

I can't remember a really bad vacation --knock wood! We took the kids to Hershey Park and Gettysburg one summer and it rained the whole time but they still had fun. Another time we drove from NY to Orlando, Florida and my daughter got car sick the last 1/3 of the trip. My husband got a speeding ticket as he was trying to get there faster so my daughter could rest...but we didn't let it ruin our fun of going to Disneyworld!

Janie said...

We've had vacations with unexpected rain or snow storms, temporarily lost kids, and really bad campsites. But overall, if Steve and I are together, especially with the rest of the family, we end up with at least some good memories.

Dar said...

I know mine cannot compare to Fred's Kenya vacation...and 2 wks, yet. Mercy...no way would I sleep knowing a snake was lurking about....
as for My worse vacation...does being in a tent, camping alone with two brave kids, then 5 and 7, and little brother just a kid too about 14, during a tornado count? We could hear the trees and debris twirling, cracking and smashing to the ground all around us, just praying hard as we could, to be spared. Once it was over, and we crawled out of the tent, we could not believe we survived because on each side of our collapsed tent, lay huge virgin pines. We packed up in the pouring rain, very heavy canvas tent and all, barely able to lift them to the back of the truck, and headed for home. We no more than got out of the truck at home, and the sun came out bright as ever, with a gorgeous rainbow. We all just cried. It was close but we were spared.
Great entry Betsy.
BlessYourHeart

Anonymous said...

I wish I had been one of the first to leave a comment so that I could read about everyone's vacations! There are so many comments before mine that I don't have time to read them all in one sitting! I can't think of ever having a bad vacation!

nanny said...

I don't even want to talk about my bad vacation.......
But what I would like to say is....you and George have had so many wonderful vacations that it makes my heart happy.....life is good....when you hold out for it, uh?

Shelley said...

It so nice and heartwarming Betsy that you and George found each other. i love hearing about all the vacations you take together and so far it sounds all great. Sorry to hear about your one experience and missing each other at the airport! Probably one of my worse vacations was in Mexico when I got food poisening and had to go to the hospital when I got home....ugh!
Big hugs to you!
Shelley

Lisa said...

Betsy, I posted pictures of flowers in the garden that I think you might enjoy. Titled Blooms.

Chad said...

Betsy... what a sweet post. I can think back over time and I can related. I go on many vacations alone. My wife isn't into travelling like I am so I go with either just myself or with a good friend. Things usually go pretty good until toward the end. I start missing my kids and family and am ready to get back home. The last few days always take a little longer... and the flight back is always terrible... a two hour flight can seem like an eternity! And if you add a delay, OMG... the feeling in my stomach is indescribable. But, I always make it back and my family is always waiting. I am very luck to have them!

LV said...

Loved reading a part of your life. At least in the end, the grass turned out to a lot greener on the other the other side for you. My worst trip was a cruise. They lost my luggage. Enough said.

~mel said...

Great post ~ and great responses! I've always had good vacations ~ making the most of our situation ... and there have been a few situations! Such as having to drive from Oklahoma City to Ft Worth on a one lane interstate because of ice and snow that they don't have the equipment to remove ~ 2 weeks ago.. and having to change our travel plans which included coming to meet you and George!! Once, being falsely arrested in Missouri for robbing a jewelry store - imagine my surprise to see six state patrol officers holding a loaded pistol and all of them pointing it at me! It's a long story. Being in a campground when a tornado went through and having to watch my Dear Hubby crawl into a smashed camper to pull out a dead little girl ... that was the worse... then going home from that vacation to see our neighbors barn blow past our house in another tornado ... then going back to work to have a co-worker have a massive heart attack. Yes, we've had some bad BAD situations to deal with; but all the vacations were great because ~ like you ... most of them were spent with someone I love ... but would I want to repeat those vacations from hell ... NO!

Mary said...

I've never had any really bad vacations, just a few mishaps along the way:-) I guess the worst was our first trip to visit my sister in Tucson. Our plane didn't get us to Chicago in time to make our connection so we spent a night there and the the next day our luggage didn't make it to Tucson with us. I was able to borrow a few things from my sister...although she is much skinnier than I am, but Mike had nothing. One bag arrived the next day with some of his stuff and enough for me to get by. The second bag went by way of Washington DC and arrived a couple days later. I changed how I packed after that trip, making sure there was always something for both of us in each bag! We avoid Chicago now, also. A horrible airport to go through.

DeniseinVA said...

I was nine and I went away for a week with the school to North Devon. I was okay until one of my room mates started crying because she was so homesick, then another friend joined her, and another and before I knew it all four of us were crying a river. I was never so more glad to get home.

Big Dude said...

I'm always so impressed with your photos but I can't bring myself to turn lose of the cash to get a better camera.

Loren said...

Oh Betsy....You and George just melt my heart! Your love for one another is so evident in your blogs but when you share so specifically it just blesses me!

I was married once before. We were both young and he left me after 2 months and divorced me after 7 months. Needless to say I was heartbroken and very cautious!! When I met my husband I never dreamed love could be so wonderful nor did I imagine I could be treated so wonderfully but God blessed me all those years ago with such a WONDERFUL MAN and I am sooo very thankful!!

Aren't we blessed to be with men that we LOVE to love!

oh wait!...this was suppose to be about vacations wasn't it ;) LOLOLOL