#1283 a vacation 'ho

I've started taking my first travel planner/agent class. I only signed up for one because I wanted to see how I would like the online class concept, and so far it's been good. I can go at my own pace, take lots of notes, and take the lessons when I want to take them.

There are seven lessons in this class and each lesson focuses on popular travel destinations. You learn about the best times of the year to go to the places, how to get around (car, bus, train, boat) a bit about the culture and of course, fun things to see and do. To make it more interesting for myself, I like to pull up a map online so I can see the exact location I'm learning about. I also Google the "places to see" and look at pictures and read a little about the place, if I am really interested. I take gobs of notes, too.

Lesson 1 was about three Canadian provinces: British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec. It was during the time I spent learning about Quebec that I confirmed something I already sort of knew about myself: I am a vacation 'ho.

What is a vacation 'ho? I can hear you asking the question. It means that I pretty much want to travel just about anywhere. MT usually picks the places we will visit because I will research it and learn about it and get myself all in a tizzy about a place. I don't think I could do the actual picking of a destination. There are lots of places I want to see.

For example, I don't know if I have ever thought to myself, "Man, I have got to get to Montreal!" Then I spent a couple of hours learning about the city and looking at photos and I thought it might be pretty fun to see it all in person.

The problem, of course, is that I have limited vacation funding, and we are currently deeply in love with the Caribbean and have a strong desire to see and spend time in the islands, so our vacation money tends to be spent there.

I echatted with my travel mentor today and told her my dilemma. She replied that she felt my pain and that explained why she didn't make very much money. But, she travels A LOT!

The lesson I'm working on now is about four states: Alaska, California, Hawaii and Nevada. I just finished the section on Alaska, and yes, there are definitely places there that I would like to see. I'm interested in seeing what is shown about California and Nevada, because I have a little bit of experience with those two states - that is, I have spent time in both places. I already know I want to go to Hawaii one day, so it will be fun to get some info to narrow down (or expand) what I would like to see there.

Time to learn!