Leaving space for delights & surprises in your travels plans brings big travel bonus adventures!
There are certain techniques I use when I plan a trip. One strategy is to have succinct, reachable –
yet challenging – travel goals. I tend to hit the ground running early, stay
out late and come home from vacation needing a vacation to recover from my
first vacation. I was reminded recently how important it is to leave space open
for surprises and interruptions during travel in order to let unplanned jaunts
delight you in ways you hadn’t expected.
In other words: plan to not have such a densely packed plan that it eliminates chances for spontaneity.
My GPS found a place for dinner on the first night of my
trip to the Washington, DC area. I found myself in a unique sandwich/salad shop
type place in a remodeled house near the corner of two highways. I liked it because it was locally owned and
the people working there were also the owners and nobody could tell I was a
tourist. I was content as I ate in what was more a neighborhood joint than a
place where people from the other coast wander in for a meal. I didn’t know the
trip back to the hotel would be an introduction to one of my favorite surprises
of my trip.
The GPS took me a slightly different way back to the hotel. I
turned the corner and saw a pond: quiet, serene, with platforms jutting into
its waters. “I can literally sit in the pond and write!” I thought.
The park and I were a match made in GPS heaven. I couldn’t stop myself from
parking
So much dense green: an unfamiliar sight for this Californian
Several mornings later, I found myself back at this park – which
I had discovered was called the Ellanor C. Lawrence Park after the wife of a
one-time-magazine publisher who donated the land to the city with a caveat
being they must keep the grounds in their natural, normal habitat.
Little could make me happier. The next time I visited, I had
a plan. Well, I sort of had a flexible, “let’s see what will happen next” sort
of plan.
Unfamiliar birds kept me company along the path in the
untried to me park. I didn't know it at the time, but this park is home to 133 species of birds throughout the year. One of my new bird friends had feathers of deep bright orange, the embers in the
fireplace before you call it a night.
Birdcalls I haven’t heard in decades reach my ears as the
leaves whisper, “Hush…. “ to anyone who was listening.
“Toot a loo à
Toot a loo à”,
says one bird, getting faster and faster until a response comes, “tweet a,
tweet a, tweet a.”
I tucked myself away on this bench to "converse" with some of the 133 bird species at the park.
There was a small, peeping bird. Her call sounded cricket-like and her flight floated up and down and down and up.
I wondered if my hearing had improved or maybe it is just my
listening that has become heightened.
I heard birds' feet: those of a yellow breasted bird chased by another
yellow breasted bird. They feasted on the shavings of a fallen tree, completely
unseen by the jogger who made her way down the same path I was on. The path was moist, not muddy but moist. It called me to the pond but my feet danging
aloft from the high bench where I sat whining inside at the thought. My feet, my butt,
my heart wanted to stay on the bench, listening.
It was a grey bird with a yellow head that became my magnet
as he flew past my ear down the path.
I was surprised as I came out the other side I was at the
same place I started two days ago when I first visited Ellanor C. Lawrence
Park. The pond, the same nearly covered pond, the same bridge over the creek,
the same zen feeling.
I never travel without a notebook. So many insights to record!
When I created a schedule for my trip to the Washington DC
area, I didn’t know this tucked away park existed, yet it became one of the
highlights of my trip.
The next time you travel, leave space for surprising
locations to call you to attention.
These in-the-moment adventures may be the exact jaunt you
really need to take.
#####
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