Twelve years ago today…A precious new little life in the bush…

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Norman and Nina’s daughter Natalie, the striped nyala behind this duiker, from December 12, 2022, who, at that point, had yet to be named based on gender, which we can’t yet determine. Natalie had her first foal a few days ago.

Please click the link below for a video of Natalie’s first foal, taken at Louise and Danie’s home, only a short distance from the Ratel house, where we’ll live for three months in the bush.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Ij7JDeU85Pw

Above is the link to Nina and her baby, born only hours before this video was taken by our dear friend Louise a few days ago. It will be a long time until we can determine the gender of this little one, but once we know, we will give them a name, preferably one that starts with an “N.”

This photo is of Norman, Nina, and Natalie with the bushbuck we named “The Babysitter,” who always wandered the bush with Nina and Natalie.

We can’t wait to get to Marloth Park in three months, especially since our holiday home is only a few bush houses away from Louise and Danie’s home.

On another note, our first post was written and published on March 15, 2012, 12 years ago today. We didn’t begin traveling until October 31, 2012, but we started preparing posts with very few photos as we prepared to leave our old life behind. If you haven’t read that post, please click here.

Today’s post is #4218. It’s hard to grasp the concept of us posting 4218 stories, most containing photos. Initially, we thought more about writing than photos. Still, 12 years later, we certainly appreciate the importance of photos and look forward to the time when we’ll have new photos to share each day, rather than the repeated photos we’ve been sharing lately.

When we discussed the 12 years of posting, it’s hard to believe we began so many years ago. That first post and the day we published it is as clear in our minds as if it was only days ago. We’re both smiling over this milestone anniversary.

We want to thank every one of our worldwide readers for following along with us for so long and for our newer readers who found us online over the years. Your loyalty, friendship, email, and comments are always appreciated. We’ve never felt alone in our travels with all of you beside us.

Our passion for continuing to post hasn’t diminished over the years. But I must admit, having new experiences with photos makes it all the easier to write stories daily. No doubt, it’s been a bit tedious these past several months since we arrived at the less-than-desirable house in Ecuador, where we were so far from everything we seldom took photos.

Here in Lake Las Vegas, which we’ve thoroughly enjoyed, the lack of photo ops has hindered our objective of presenting varied and exciting posts. Soon enough, we’ll be back in Africa. How long we stay there beyond the three months we’ve booked will be determined by the results of my upcoming heart scan on March 27. If the results are good, we can begin planning more adventures. If not, we’ll go from there with a new plan.

Tonight, we’ll be out for dinner and a movie with Richard and his girlfriend, and we hope to take some photos in the process.

Be well.

Photo from ten years ago today, March 15, 2014:

While at PepeNero restaurant for lunch, it was bright and comfortably warm from the sun in the courtyard as we were seated near one of the flowery fountains. For more photos, please click here.

Today’s a very special day in our lives to share with all of our readers…

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This morning as I sat down to begin to prepare our daily post I had little awareness of today’s date. Busily writing and posting photos, something was nagging at me.

When Tom, Julie, and I gathered together in the cozy living room of our condo, coffee mugs in hand, we engaged in idle chatter. For no reason at all, today’s date popped into my head, March 15, 2015. 

With a delightful squeal, I announced, “I think today is the third anniversary of our first post on March 15, 2012!”

They both looked at me in amazement as my fingers flew across the keyboard to hurriedly peruse the archives for our first post. Yes, there it was, our post from three years ago today on this very date.

The three of us looked at one another in amazement. I could easily have missed this date and yet, there was something nagging at me. It was this very date. 

I read aloud the post to Tom and Julie with tears in my eyes, in part, from sheer gratefulness and in wonder over the fact that we’re doing exactly what we set out to do with a mission and state of mind that has remained constant. 

Rather than place a link to that original post, we’ve decided to “post the first post” to share with all of our readers, many of whom have joined us part way through our travels during these past years. We share this today with much love and joy in our hearts and appreciation to all of our readers who have traveled on this journey with us:

March 15, 2012:
Changing clocks…changing life…

Sunday morning we both jumped out of bed at 6 am with a peculiar sense of urgency to begin the painstaking process of changing the myriad clocks in our home. Daylight savings began during the night.  

 Over the 21 years that Tom and I have joyfully enjoyed life together, we seem to have assigned ourselves, which clocks we each change, two times each year. We scurried about the house, mumbling to ourselves as we adjusted one clock after another, realizing that this will be the last time we will change clocks in this house, in this state of Minnesota, and perhaps in this country.  

 In 7 months and 22 days from today, our journey will begin. Tom retires on Halloween after 42 years on the railroad (I retired 16 months ago) and off we go to the adventure of our lives, time being relevant to us in the future only in terms of the time of our next cruise, the time of our next flight, the time of the next ferry, or the time when we move into yet another vacation home.  

As we each finished our last clock, oddly about the same moment, I said to Tom, “We need a domain name for our future website and blog.”  

He chuckled, and said, “Funny, I was just thinking the same thing.”  It’s equally odd how couples often have thoughts simultaneously.  We never cease to be amazed by this phenomenon.

 We had been mulling over some names the past month, as we booked our plans well into the future, knowing the time to document this process was coming near.

 Last year, I wrote my first blog, WorldWideWillie.blogspot.com as our beloved Australian Terrier, WorldWideWillie’s precious life came to an end, finding solace in the process.  With over 400 followers, we found comfort in their invisible, lurking presence as I wrote almost daily from Willie’s perspective, his final days, days filled with love, humor, and tears.  

When Tom returned home each night, I read him the daily postings, often crying a river through the sobs that welled up in my chest.  Tom cried with me, unashamed by his vulnerability, a charming aspect of his manly demeanor that which I have always adored.

We chose to honor Willie by using part of his name, WorldWide, by adding a 3rd word beginning with a “w.”  Sitting at our computers we looked up all the “w” words that may be available as a domain.  We stumbled across “Waftage,” a word that means “travel gently by water or air.”

How perfect a word when in fact this blog will be about us leaving our well-established lives here in Minnesota to travel the world, leaving our grown children, including our six adorable grandchildren, other family members, our longtime friends, our amazing neighbors, and all of our “stuff,” to be sold off at an estate sale… days before we leave on Halloween, 2012. 

This blog will document a journey that at this point knows no end, a journey meticulously planned to be affordable and yet rich in comfort, visually stimulating, surrounded by nature, filled with history, all the while enjoying that which we have enjoyed the most, simply being together.

We’re lousy photographers, but we’ll post photos. We don’t like tourist traps, but we will visit some. We don’t care to buy trinkets, but we’ll surely buy a few.  

Ironically, neither of us has ardently enjoyed “sightseeing” but, we will seek out those that appeal to us. We don’t like crowds, gridlocked traffic, loud noises, or waiting in line but, we will experience all of these.  

We are both gluten-free, wheat, grain-free, and sugar-free. We won’t eat bread, croissants, or pasta. I don’t drink alcohol, Tom drinks a little but doesn’t like wine. Tom doesn’t like to go for walks. I love walks.  Occasionally, we’ll walk.

Then why will we do this? 1. Because we have figured out a way to afford to make this possible with some creative planning, which we’ll share with you along the way. 2. Because we want to!  

More than the concept of world travel in itself, we relish in the concept of stepping outside the box;  getting out from behind our computers with fingers flying across the keyboard with our latest preoccupation; getting out of our comfy chairs while watching one of our big flat-screen TVs playing a popular premium hi-def series; playing another rambunctious competitive game of Wii Bowling or looking forward to the next great homemade meal.  

We have loved every minute of our lives, whether hanging out with family or friends or looking out the window for another delightful morsel Mother Nature throws our way: an eagle swooping into the trees outside our house, a beaver building a den along the shoreline, a pack of coyotes looking for “little dog lunch.” We have loved it all.

So…we registered our domain name early Sunday morning. We poured ourselves a cup of perfectly brewed coffee, topping each cup with a dollop of real whipped cream, and sat down at the bar in the kitchen. We both smiled, eyes locked on each other. The little crinkles around his eyes made a wave of something wonderful wash over me.

We both looked up at the same time to notice we hadn’t changed the time in the big clock in the kitchen. We both jumped up simultaneously and said, “I’ll get it!” We laughed. We have all the time in the world.”

                                         Photo from one year ago today, March 14, 2014:
In the Big Square in Marrakech where the vendors and tourists gather for the sights, the sounds, the food, and the entertainment. Ironically, I’d failed to mention our two year anniversary of posting while wrapped up in life in Marrakech. For details from that date, please click here.