A Dozen Travel Stories from Our Listeners!

We love travel stories, especially from our listeners! Real tales where the smallest detail can trigger panic, wonder, or a laugh. We move from tracking lions by day to sharing water with penguins and a sea lion that swims up just to play, then jump to gorilla trekking where the rules for staying safe are simple and non negotiable. Along the way, we talk about a surprisingly effective strategy for better travel photos: hiring a local photographer to guide you off the beaten path. 

We share a painful travel scam story that comes down to one habit most people skip. Then we get honest about language barriers, from nearly getting off at the wrong stop in Copenhagen to the reality that Americans often travel with fewer language skills than we should. Add in a Thai tone mistake and a hand gesture that means something totally different in Brazil, and the message is clear: cultural etiquette is part of travel safety. 

The back half goes big with more adventure travel and cultural immersion, ending with a laugh-out-loud tale with a surprise ending. 

If you love travel storytelling with practical takeaways, subscribe, and share this with a fellow traveler. And if you want to share YOUR story, contact Lea at any of the links in these show notes. We'll be sharing more of your stories on the months ahead.

What’s one travel moment you’ll never forget?

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Our storytellers are course members at Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, NY. More

Podcast host Lea Lane has traveled to over 120 countries, and has written nine books, including the award-winning Places I Remember  (Kirkus Reviews star rating, and  'one of the top 100 Indie books of  the year'). She has contributed to dozens of guidebooks and has written thousands of travel articles. Read her weekly essays on Substack.
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Our award-winning travel podcast, Places I Remember with Lea Lane, has produced over 130 travel episodes! New episodes drop on the first Tuesday of the month, on Apple, Spotify, and wherever you listen to podcasts. All episodes are also on the website: placesirememberlealane.com and appear on Lea's Substack, Lane Changes.
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Travel vlogs of featured  podcasts-- with video and graphics -- now also drop on YouTube.  

Transcript

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Speaker 1 0: 0:26

00

Sharing travel tales is a great way to prolong the enjoyment of a trip, and also a lovely way to connect and share with others. Before we listen to a dozen or so travel stories from listeners like you, here are a few suggestions of how to tell a good tale. Why you're traveling? Write down the sounds, the colors, and small conversations while they're fresh in your memory. To tell your travel story, focus on a single transformative moment or emotion. Set the scene, share your destination, your reason for going, who you're with-that kind of thing. Good tales come from challenges you faced, or local people you met, and unexpected turns. End with how you felt when you left, or what you learned from your journey, you can use the same creative techniques that you'd use in writing: 0:29

show, don't tell, cut the clutter, and weave in your facts. With these things in mind, this episode offers a selection of travel tales from passionate travelers who were participants in a travel course I taught at the Osher Learning Institute in Rochester, New York. Like you, there are people who love to travel and enjoy listening to the podcast. So let's begin. Stories about animals are usually a big hit. So here are three. Merle's is in Africa with a bit of suspense.

Speaker 2 1: 0:32

21 Some years ago, on a safari, I don't remember if it was Tanzania or Kenya at the time, but we had spent the whole day following a bunch of lions who were chasing prey, and we watched them dine on their prey when they caught it. I was exhausted and ready to go to sleep at night, so I put on my nightgown, brushed my teeth, and was ready to get into bed when I noticed movement at the end of my bed, and there was a bump or a lump right near the bottom of the bed. And of course, I went into panic mode. I was looking around for a phone. There was no phone. I was living in a tent. I thought, okay, I'll go out and find somebody to help me, because I don't know what's underneath the blanket. And they said, don't go walking in the dark at night. That's when all the animals are out. So I said, I don't know what to do. So I bounced around on the bed and I thought, let's see what happens. The little critter didn't move. It was there at the foot of the bed. I was a nervous wreck, so I grabbed a heavy sneaker, heavy shoe, and I started hitting the bed to see if it would go away. Anyway, it didn't move, so I started to peel back the blanket and peeled it back, and slowly but surely I got to where the bump was, and I lifted up the blanket, and it was a heating pad so you could warm your feet when you get into bed. After I stopped laughing my head off, I finally went to sleep, and I turned the heating pad on, and that was the end of a very interesting day.

Speaker 1 3: 0:38

06 Jane tells a charming story of connecting in the Galapagos Islands off the coast of Ecuador.

Speaker 3 3: 0:44

13 In the spring of let's see, 2022, 16 of us went to Galapagos. It was the first trip for the staff since we went over there, and of course we had to be tested many times for COVID before we went over. We were really hoping we wouldn't be caught in keto sudden bout of COVID. We got over there when we were we were snorkeling each day. One of the islands we snorkeled at along the coast. There were both penguins and sea lions, and so I remember the wonderful experience of a young sea lion coming toward me, and then just as it got close, it dove straight down and went on its back and put its crossed its arms like this, and looked up and blew bubbles at me, and then he came up and started doing circles all around me. And I found out later that he wanted to play with me. It was a wonderful experience, just wonderful.

Speaker 1 4: 0:50

17 Ken talks of gorillas in Uganda.

Speaker 4 4: 0:56

20 Two quick stories. A suggestion first. As a photographer, when we go to any foreign city, of course you go to all the tourist places that you read about first. But we've started hiring a photographer in those cities, and you look for a photography tour or something like that online. You could find photographers not to take pictures for us, but to take me to places that tourists don't necessarily go. Interesting places in those cities or that part of the world that are sort of out of the way, off the beaten path, and it's not that expensive and highly worth it. Maybe you're on your second or third or fourth day, you want to. When you've already seen all the tourist places, and then second, we were in Uganda on a gorilla trek. You know they they eat plants within five feet of these gorillas, and what the guides tell you is if they come at you, just stand there, don't attack them, don't try to do anything. We're sitting there. I'm taking pictures with a very small camera. Gorilla comes by, hits me on the arm. They they kind of want to play, and then they just move on. It was scary at first. Then it's like they didn't care about us. I mean, as long as we didn't bother them or try to go for their food, they didn't bother us at all. Highly recommended. It was pretty cool. Great experience

Speaker 1 5: 1:02

37 regarding those mountain gorillas in Central Africa. I have a story I mentioned in episode 81, but I think it's worth repeating here. You know, it's a long, long way from anywhere to get to Rwanda, and you've got to change planes usually. And there's lots of things you have to take tests for, like health and all that. And you're very happy to finally get to the place. Well, I got very close to the gorillas at the park, where they tell you what to do in terms of how you act and what to expect when you see them, and they put the groups together, and I was all excited. And then they tell you before you go and see the gorillas that it's a good idea to go to the bathroom. So I did. Unfortunately, I got locked in the stall, and I couldn't get out. And I thought I came all this way, halfway around the world, and I'm not going to see those gorillas because we're all timed very carefully. And I thought the group was not going to wait for me. They don't even know I'm in here. Luckily, someone came in finally, and after that, men and women came in to help me, and I finally got out the door, and everything. And I got out, and I saw the gorillas, and it was fabulous. But that was a real lesson. I mean, you can do everything you can think of to be ready, and you never know. Anyway, Bill tells a short tale, which many of you may relate to, especially if you're young.

Speaker 5 6: 1:08

59 For some reason, I remember learning the lesson to think before I speak. And one night I was traveling with my friends early college experience in a bar, and we're all talking and having a good time. And we were in Zermatt, Switzerland. We wanted to climb the Matterhorn. A gentleman came up to us and said, "I'm a guide. We can do that. And we hired him, except we stayed in the bar until about 3o'clock in the morning. And when he showed up at five to pick us up, we had to pay him and go back to bed. So I learned quickly to keep my mouth shut.

Speaker 1 7: 1:14

40 Lee has a cautionary tale to tell.

Speaker 6 7: 1:20

43 I have a cautionary tale. I was in Turkey last year, you know, shopping around and trying to get the bargains and such. Twice this happened to me. We led to a certain place by our guide, so I'm just kind of assuming everything is fine and dandy. Such a novice. I didn't look at my receipts when I got home and checked my receipts. I had paid considerably more than what I thought I had negotiated. So my cautionary tale is to always look at your receipt. I had been duped into waiting to the very last second, like everybody was on the bus. I had to get to the bus because I'm holding up the bus now. I was duped out of a couple of $1,000. So yeah, unfortunately, it's kind of soured me a little bit.

Speaker 1 8: 1:26

30 The next three stories deal with language and people. Chris's story is set in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Speaker 7 8: 1:32

37 I usually like to travel with an organized group like Road Scholar or Smithsonian or something. But my very first international trip was when I was right out of college, and a friend of mine and I were in Copenhagen, and we were on a city bus. We had a map of the city, and I don't remember where we were going, but we were chatting back and forth about how this is the stop we need to get off at, and it looks like the closest one, and all. And there was an elderly woman on the bus who started to look very agitated, and she got up and started walking around to different people, and I couldn't figure out what she was doing. And finally, one man spoke up and said, "She overheard you. She understands enough English to realize that you guys were going to get off at the wrong stop, but she didn't know how to speak enough English to tell you. So she was going around the bus trying to find someone who knew enough English to explain to these two young women that they were going to get off at the wrong stop, and they needed to wait for the next one, and that would get them closer. And I've always remembered that because I thought, as I say, it was my first experience with international travel, and I remember thinking, "Gee, you know how really nice it was of her to do that. And it was also, I think, the first time in my life that I realized how. Isolated, we are sometimes in the United States. We were on a boat tour in Copenhagen as well, and the tour guide asked people what language they wanted the tour in. She ended up giving it in four different languages, and it was clear from the fact that she was answering questions that she didn't have a prepared speech. She knew those languages, and I remember looking at my friend and saying, "You know, we're really stupid when it comes to being international. We just we don't have we don't have the language abilities. And I remember coming home and feeling somewhat less, I guess, about myself. Unfortunately, I have no ear for language, and I still haven't learned another one, but I always feel guilty about it.

Speaker 1 10: 1:38

44 Ken comes back with a story from Brazil and the specifics of language.

Speaker 4 10: 1:44

50 There's an award-winning Broadway musical called the Band's Visit. In the last 10 years, an Arab band that was invited to play in an Israeli village, and the city they were supposed to go to was called Petach Tikva. Well, they got off the bus at the wrong exit at a city called Bet Hatikva. Pretty similar. So they spend an entire day and a half in this Bet Hatikva because there's no more bus to get back to where they were going. So be very careful, like someone else said before, of the stop you're supposed to get off at to make sure that you can get to the next stop. It's like getting off at a highway and there's no entrance to get back on the highway at that exit. So be very careful. As you all know, not every country is as English friendly as we would like to think, right? So we were having a little bit of trouble in Brazil. So we figure every time we we decide we're on the same track, you go like this. Yeah, we're we're fine. And people would look at us funny when I'm doing this. I'm like, finally what? And some waiter comes up says, don't do this. That means you like men. He says, "Do this. Don't, no, none of this. He says, "Do this. I'm like, "Okay, language barrier, not a problem.

Speaker 1 12: 1:50

09 I had my tale about mistaken words in Thailand. I was living in Thailand for a few months doing a project for the government. It was a language project. It was the very first beginning of interactive. It was 1989, I think, and we had a budget from the military and all. We were doing this project, and I was running it. It was designed to teach Americans to learn Thai. Problem was, I didn't speak any Thai. The military and diplomats. Okay, so we did a little story about it, and I was involved, but I myself couldn't speak much except hello and thank you and so forth. So I would be driving along, and I was with this one helper. They called him a fixer there. He was a helper. He was helping me to do things, and I would be in the car with him and other people, and I'd say, "I remember I was driving along the countryside, and I'd say, 'Oh, I knew one word, kwai, because the bridge on the river quai remembered it means buffalo. So I said, Oh, look at the kwai. Oh, there's a kuai. Look at that big kwai over there. Oh, I love the kwai, kwai, kwai. It was my only word, so I kept saying, and we said a lot of buffalo. So he was finally turned around and he said, Miss, would you please stop saying that we are a 12-tone language, and you are not saying buffalo. You are saying bleep. I can't say what I was saying, but starts with a P and ends with a K. That's the word he used. Bad situations often lead to good stories. Jamie tells one set among ice skating stars

Speaker 8 13: 1:56

43 in October of 2006. I'm a big figure skating fan, and I went to Hartford, Connecticut, for the Skate America competition and stayed at the official hotel. And there had been several fire alarms, which we learned through the course of speaking with the concierge and staff would happen a lot when the hotel was at capacity because the laundry room was going full tilt, 24/7, and the smoke detectors, the dryers, and such would set them off. And on the final morning, after a late night, not much sleep at six a.m. the alarm goes off again, and knowing it's a false alarm, kind of it's a cold, rainy night. You know, not wanting to go down, but the noise became unbearable, and I go down 21 flights of stairs to come out at the hotel entrance, which is on concrete pillars, and in various states of mismatched clothes and undress and barefoot, there's the crowd of hotel guests gathered, you know, trying to escape the rain. And it is a surreal crowd of figure skaters, their coaches, literal who's who choreographers. TV personalities. I think Dick Button was there, but I did not see him myself. And we finally get you know loud back in. They turn off the alarm, hurried to the elevators, and packed in there real tight. And I look up, and it's a powerhouse of women's figure skating. The reigning world champion Kimmy Meisner from the U.S. Japan's Mickey Ondo, who would become the next world champion, and she's clutching her figure skates so they didn't burn, and a very young Mawasada who would become the world champion the year after Mickey and would win the silver medal at the Olympics in 2010. Groggy, freezing morning, you know, very grumbling that turned into a story I share with figure skating, my friends, and other fans. Even Kimmy Meisner, whenever I see her in person or I comment on something about this six a.m. fire drill, she laughs and reacts and remembers.

Speaker 1 16: 2:02

01 Jane's in South Africa and makes the best of getting sick.

Speaker 3 16: 2:08

06 I'm just thinking about the fact that the worst situations in travel often provide you with really memorable experiences. There were 12 of us, and I had organized this trip to South Africa, we'd gone up to Victoria Falls and visited there, and then we were in Johannesburg. The second day there, I got awfully sick. I ached all over. I couldn't move. I didn't want to move. I I just felt like I wanted to die. I just was so sick. I it was hard to explain. I just had no idea what it was, but even the thought of flying home and trying to go through an airport was just too much for me. The group went on without me around Johannesburg. Well, the next morning I met the two guys that were going to take us on the 18 day drive, and I told them it was six in the morning. I said, "I'm so sick. I just don't think I can do this trip. And they said, "Listen, come with us. The first two nights we're staying near one of the parks, and we've got the managers there are wonderful. So I rode along with my head down the whole time, and the bus got there, and the husband and wife. The wife called her doctor at Saturday night, got a hold of them, and Sunday morning she took me at 10 a.m. in to meet him. He diagnosed me, and it was a bacterial thing, and got me the medications. And I went back with her. She drove all the way. It was like 40-minute drive each way to the doctor, and then we came back, and everybody else was doing a a drive in the park. Kruger, and I sat with her, and we talked, and she told me about working with the Aborigine because she was from Australia, how she met her Afrikaner husband, and we had the most wonderful conversation. And to this day, she told me, she said, "I never get to know people who come here like this, and this has been such an experience for me. And I felt the same way about her. It was a really rewarding, a wonderful, wonderful experience.

Speaker 1 18: 2:14

22 I'll end with the kind of tale that people love-one with a surprise ending. I'll throw one in here. I may not have mentioned in Malawi. I was in Africa in about 1990, I guess, and I was on a press trip. It was a very interesting trip. We Malawi was trying to gain tourism, and they were asking lots of questions. They were very kind to us, and they gave a very nice banquet at the end. and And they were dancing Malawian dances, and I was watching them and very delighted. And all of a sudden, one of the dancers came over to me and took my hand. And I'm not one who likes to do that when people dance at clubs, and you come up to the stage and so forth. So I was kind of shy, but I thought I'm going to do this. They were so nice. I'm going to go up on stage with them. So he pulled me up, and danced around me, and made hand motions, and I made hand motions back, and he sat me down, and and he talked to me, and he made more hand motions, and I made hand motions back, and everybody started to laugh. And I thought, are they laughing? I'm not sure what what's going on here. And finally, at the end of this dance, I came back down, and people were still laughing. I said, "Why are you all laughing? And they said, "You two are now married, And and your name is Ngo, and I said really, and and he never calls, he never writes, oh well. But he's a good dancer. Thanks for listening to our travel stories. We'll record other episodes of travel tales from listeners. In a few months, if you have a travel story you'd like to share on places I remember, contact me, Leah Lane, at one of my links in the show notes. Meanwhile, enjoy sharing your travel stories with family and friends. They really do like to hear them.

Transcribed by https: 2:20

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