The Perfect Vacation?

     I’ve told you I love mishaps. Not every disaster in life is a good thing, but if you write comedy, the little ones are like gold.

          Take our recent trip to Greece, with our grown kids. Day one: There’s a cab strike, so we have to walk multiple miles from our hotel to the Acropolis, arrive sweaty and exhausted, and remember--  we still have to climb the darn thing. And walk back.

          Day two: A downpour. Rushing through the rain for miles again, and getting absolutely soaked. The archeology museum has a line 50 yards long.

          Day three: We take a ferry to Mykonos. Brandon gets a 24-hour flu.

          Day four: Poor Melissa goes to the hotel breakfast where a woman is repeatedly throwing up into a large cup, as if this is an everyday thing. Melissa turns away, and there’s a man mixing fruit into his scrambled eggs, then eating it.

          Day five: Brandon and Melissa leave all their toiletries in Mykonos as we fly to Santorini. Then their blow dryer blows up.

Day six: Brandon has planned a surprise--to propose to Melissa-- but doesn’t want a big crowd. Everywhere we go there are tourists. Finally he hears that the sunset is beautiful at the other end of the island by the deserted lighthouse, so we go to sit and watch this private and romantic scene. Except everyone else has also heard about this nice view, so there are at least a hundred people on the slope above the place where he plans to propose. It looks like Seal Beach:

 

          It couldn’t have been more public if he had chosen a stadium. (The good news is that they all cheered and clapped, which was cool.) Needless to say, this was the TOTALLY perfect and redeeming part of the vacation.

          Day seven: Bob gets sick—stomach flu, fever, lots of fun.

Day eight: We head back to Athens where the hotel bathroom is made entirely of marble. This sounds beautiful until you realize the floor is also marble and the shower has no door. The entire bathroom floor gets wet, and wet marble is a 10 on the Slippery Scale.  Oh, well. Safety Third, right?

Day nine: As St. Bob and I head back, I contract Covid. The others go on excursions to Turkey and Rhodes. (More to come, folks.)

          But you can find travel tips and all sorts of life hacks in short videos on my Youtube Mom channel! And be sure to subscribe.