It’s been a long time since I’ve posted on this blog. When we took our last European trip, to England and Scotland, the idea that we wouldn’t travel abroad again for four years was unthinkable. But that was the fall of 2019, and you know what happened in 2020.

We had booked a Viking Cruise in Russia for the spring of 2020, and we were really excited about it. The cruise was supposed to go along the Volga, from St. Petersburg to Moscow. We were looking forward to visiting the Hermitage and seeing the Bolshoi ballet, and a river cruise seemed like an easy an safe way to go. Then came the pandemic, and of course, the cruise was canceled. We rebooked for the fall of 2021, but Viking canceled again and rescheduled us for May 2022 (with a couple days in Helsinki thrown in). Then came the Russia invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and we decided we would not go, even before Viking canceled the trip.

Although we are septuagenarians, we’re both relatively healthy, so we did not stay home these last four years. We’ve taken several trips to New York and Boston by bus and train, and we’ve flown to Los Angeles and Chicago to see our son. We’ve been Covid vaxxed (I think it’s five times so far) and we took precautions during our trips including masking and, until recently, not eating in restaurants or bars. We’re still careful, but we’re feeling pretty confident about taking a trip abroad.

At the beginning of the pandemic, when we were all locked down, we coped, as many folks did, by subscribing to more streaming services. One of our favorites is Berliner Philharmoniker, and we fell in love with this orchestra. It made us think about how much we’d like to visit Berlin, and now we’re finally going. I intend to write daily posts on this blog so friends and family can travel with us vicariously and share our adventures.

We leave today from Boston on Icelandair for an overnight trip with a stopover in Reykjavik. If you only see Iceland from the airport, can you add it to your list of countries visited? (Asking for a friend.)