Welcome 2012!

Maun Camp - New Year's Eve 2001

In many ways it seems like just yesterday that I was in Maun, Botswana at a camp celebrating the arrival of 2002 at a long table with travel mates from around the world drinking a spiked watermelon and listening to African music while watching a couple of drunk crazy people - at the stroke of midnight - jump into a potentially crocodile and hippopotamus infested river. That was ten years ago. Much has happened since then; I survived cancer, I have three cats and am a converted cat lover (bordering hoarder), I have two books on the market and my hair is much longer than back then when I had a whim to cut it all off before heading off into the African bush. Many things are the same too; my bichon TT is now sixteen but hanging tough, I still live in East Atlanta and my immediate family is still healthy and happy.


Michael and I were just at that very camp; the same camp of my December 31, 2001 New Year’s celebration. It has been updated and added on to, but is still very much the same camp still sitting on the edge of the Boteti River.



The Pier at Sunset December 31, 2001

 Each of the now eleven trips I have taken to Africa; whether it is Kruger National Park in South Africa, Victoria Falls in Botswana, Antananarivo, Madagascar or simply that transient camp in Maun, I treat it as my last trip; my last time seeing that place. Ten years ago I could have never imagined I would be back at that riverside camp in Maun much less with a travel companion; my crazy and so lovable Michael. But there I was. The dock Michael fished off us on our recent trip was a bit more rickety; the grounds of the camp greener than I remembered. I am now ten years older and hopefully ten years wiser but having just as much fun as I did back on that New Year’s Eve 2001!

Michael Fishing at that same pier - Nov. 2011

The irony of being back to that camp in Botswana ten years later made me wonder where I will be when I ring in the New Year of 2022? Perhaps I will be running that camp. Perhaps I will have my own B&B in Africa, perhaps I will have won the lottery and have homes in many great destinations around the world. Perhaps I will still be right here in East Atlanta reminiscing about yet another great trip to Africa or some other amazing destination around the world. Maybe TT will have outlived all Bichons and still be with me at the ripe old age of twenty six hanging out with Boo, Caquita, Bella, Michael and I.

Who really knows what will transpire in the next ten years. All I can do is enjoy and appreciate each and every day that I get always progressing and learning and taking on new challenges that keep me motivated and excited about life; the one and only life I get.

Enjoy 2012. Happy New Year.