Travel Show

Carrie (left in the top picture), Melinda (middle in the top picture), and Brian (our camera man) went to the Travel Adventure expo with me on Saturday. I had never been to the expo before and was surprised by the layout. I thought that there would be a bunch of vendors there showing the latest and greatest travel gear. I was somewhat disappointed they weren't there. I always like to know what people have so I know what to put on my list.

We gathered tons of brochures about different countries. Yesterday I went through them and threw out the ones I did not want. Specifically, the nudist colony brochure. I was walking by a booth and was interested in a give away they had on their table. I couldn't tell what it was. Well, this women at the booth asked me if I wanted a brochure. I said sure. When I looked at the brochure I found that it was for a nudist colony--though I was told that is not what they are called anymore. I was trying to extricate myself gently, but it took a little while. When I finally got away and joined my friends they were totally laughing. They knew what the booth was for and wanted to see how I was going to react. We had a good laugh.

The highlight (besides hanging out with my friends) was Samantha Brown was there. It was so fun to hear her talk. If you don't know who she is, she is on the travel channel and travels the world. She is very witting, charming, and fun.

She told one story of how in China she was visiting the one year old panda bears. The panda handler and the interpreter were with her. She was told the handler didn't know any English. Well, he turned to her and said 'keep moving.' She asked her interpreter what he meant by that. It was explained that they were bears. Well she said, her producer wanted her to stay still so as she is in with the pandas she is hearing in her ear--stay still and with the handler--keep moving--back and forth. She said she turned and made eye contact with one of the pandas and it charged her. The handler comes running around her yells at her-Run- and picks up the panda and throws him. It was a great story--one you wouldn't see on tv. She told other stories which I wish I would have written down because her stories were pretty amusing.

We were at the convention center in DC. The second picture above is one of their art features in the convention center. It was really cool. The other ones you can't see is a circle of guitars and one that had tennis rackets. I like fun art like this.