by Marcy Gordon
Several people (all French) stop to make sure help is on the way and inquire just how exactly I had managed to plow my car into a ditch. Among them an older couple, both wearing matching concerned looks beneath their white hair, that want to try and dislodge my car by pushing on the front fender. I discourage them and send them on their way. A young man on a motorcycle also stops. I’m tempted, only for a minute, to ride off with him and forget this whole mess.
The noon sun blazes down on me. I can feel my shoulders burning and my mascara mixing with sweat and streaking my face. From my packed trunk, now a jumble of clothes, coffee grounds and dishwasher salt, I manage to pluck out an umbrella, which I use to provide some shade. Eventually a black four-door car pulls up in front of me. I don’t recognize it as Wilna’s but she emerges from the passenger side door. And out of the driver’s side steps a blond woman wearing a coral colored dress and a red-lipstick smile. Oh no.
I quickly wipe my sweaty hand on my dress. At least that part of my plan remains intact. There is no hope for my gooey shoe. “And nothing breaks the ice like a bloody leg,” I think to myself, trying to bolster my deflated ego. I return the smile and feel the dirt and mascara crack on my face.
The blond woman extends her hand.
“Hi. I’m Gwynne.”
Before I can introduce myself she says,
“You look like you could use a beer.”
She reaches down into her shoulder bag and pulls out a Stella Artois.
“I figured Belgian would be your preference,” she says.
Gwynne pops the cap and hands me the cold bottle.
Feeling happy, calm and completely myself, I share with Gwynne my admiration of her book and she asks about mine. We talk about our other travel mishaps and laugh like old friends, two South Africans and an american huddled under an umbrella, sipping Belgian beer and waiting for my German car to be pulled from a ditch in the French countryside.
It’s exactly the first impression I had hoped to make.
Kimberley Lovato is a freelance travel and lifestyle journalist. Her writing has appeared in AFAR, National Geographic, Traveler, Executive Travel, Easy Jet Travel, the San Francisco Chronicle, and online at frommers.com and Leite’s Culinaria. Her culinary travel book Walnut Wine & Truffle Groves about the Dordogne region of France was released in 2010 and has won two awards. Her essay, “Lost and Liberated” was published in The Best Women’s Travel Writing, Volume 8. Visit her at kimberleylovato.com.
JULIAN WORKER
Safari Sickness
He had avoided illnesses caused by microscopic organisms but then took a ride on the largest land animal in the world.
The word “safari” brings to mind the open savannah with vast tracts of blue sky, giraffes eating the tops of trees, lions lying on a low mound observing their prey, and herds of zebras trotting across the plain. For me, however, the word conjures a queasy feeling. Safari means motion sickness, being showered with stream water, and oxygen deprivation.
I had traveled for five weeks in India and managed to stay free of illness the whole time. I put this down to luck more than anything, though drinking four liters of water a day to stay hydrated is definitely a good policy for any visitor. But somehow, as I crossed the border into Nepal, I had a feeling my luck would change. The first inkling came when I realized that Nepal is actually fifteen minutes ahead of Indian time. My first day was spent assuming all the clocks were wrong and that seeing the airport bus disappearing into the distance and having shop doors locked and bolted in my face were unfortunate coincidences.
On my second day, with my watch set correctly after checking with the hotel concierge, I headed to Chitwan National Park to go on safari. This was going to be a special day spent on the back of an elephant looking for rhinos. However, my luck was about to change. There was a shortage of elephants and so we tourists had to go four per elephant plus the mahout on the animal’s back. In other words, there was a tourist at each corner of the elephant, not that our animal seemed to mind as he was a large beast with the most enormous expressive green eyes. Our mahout welcomed us onboard his elephant, whose name was Major. We were given our pre-flight instructions, which essentially were to hang on and make sure that we didn’t fall off. We had to keep our feet braced against a rope hanging from the animal’s saddle and we all sat with another rope looped around us.
After we settled down, the mahout shouted “Major Go” and the elephant departed in search of rhinos. It quickly became apparent that the elephant was very heavy-footed and every foot placement was a shock to the system. He also had one leg that seemed shorter than the others so that he had a rolling gait, which may seem funny but it meant that not only was I being shocked but there was a circular motion which gradually induced motion sickness in me.
After ten minutes Major felt hungry and so stopped and ate a large bush in three trunkfuls. Mercifully, my queasiness eased as Major ate brunch. The driver informed us that Major usually ate around 100 pounds of vegetative matter per day, a very high-fiber diet. We were soon off again and the rolling and shocking started again.
Soon Major was thirsty, so he headed for a small stream and sucked up a ten-yard stretch in a matter of seconds. As an encore he raised his trunk vertically in the air and blew out the last two yards of water so that we tourists were treated to our own mini-monsoon. He trumpeted slightly. He was happy, we weren’t.
Major was off again. After five minutes he stopped once more and this time he raised his tail vertically. What goes in must eventually come out especially with a high-fiber diet. The stench was horrible though I managed to hold my breath for the whole time. However, Major stayed in the same spot after finishing as though he was savoring the occasion and so I had to breathe in this horrible smell. There wasn’t much oxygen around and I began to feel sick; luckily Major moved and some fresh air entered my lungs saving me … for the moment.
The mahout spotted a rhino and off we went at a trot, with the circular motion now giving me a headache. Major stopped abruptly five yards from the rhino, who’d had his horn cut off by the park authorities to save him from poachers. Major was wary of the rhino who sniffed the air suspiciously before continuing to eat.
After ten minutes admiring the rhino we trotted away and entered a jungle clearing. The air was perfectly still. Major stopped again. A profound gurgling came from inside the elephant and he lifted his tail again. This time he broke wind for longer than I could hold my breath. I suffered from oxygen deprivation and the methane entered my lungs, making me gag.
My luck has taken a huge turn for the worse, I thought, being gassed on the back of an elephant—who would have thought it possible? I had avoided illnesses caused by microscopic organisms on holiday and here I was being made ill by the largest land animal in the world. The irony wasn’t totally lost on me as my head lolled on my chest as we headed back to our base. I felt nauseous, had a bad headache, and knew I was going to be sick. I crawled off Major, smiled wanly at the mahout, and almost made it back to my cabin.
The doctor came to see me and thought I might have cholera. He ignored my weak excuses that I had been gassed on the back of an elephant; he said being slightly delirious was a sign of possible cholera and told me to stay in bed for the rest of the day.
The following day I was fine but when I was offered another safari I politely declined.
So, if you ever go into the bush on an elephant, do sit at the front, and if possible measure its legs just to make sure they are all the same length.
Julian Worker has written on architecture for the U. S. magazine Skipping Stones and had travel articles published in The Globe and Mail, Fate Magazine, The Vancouver Sun, and Northwest Travel. He blogs about travel on the In The Know Traveler website and his work has appeared online on the World and I, Offbeat Travel, and GoNomad websites. He has also taken many photographs that have appeared in travel guides by National Geographic, Thomas Cook and The Rough Guides. India is his favorite country as a travel destination.
Meeting Mosquito
She’d always wanted to face her fear of heights—and hang-gliding in Rio allowed her to scratch that itch.
After the raging lunatic that was last night’s thunderstorm, louder and longer than any we see in New York City, the Hilton Fly Rio Hang Gliding Center would undoubtedly shelve our excursion. At least, that’s what the concierge at our Rio de Janeiro hotel had explained. So I choked down another greasy piece of bacon, another spoonful of sour plain yogurt, savored piece after piece of candy-sweet pineapple until I slumped over in my seat at the breakfast buffet. I glanced down at my Chicago Bears t-shirt, which I’d specifically chosen for a day where the odds that I would die were greater than most.
When your parents are as openly acrophobic as mine, you grow up convinced that you’re also acrophobic. Together my husband Jeff and I had surfed, speed-biked down volcanoes, gone scuba diving with sharks as big as sofas, eels, manta rays, and barracuda. But it was no accident that I’d never agreed to adventures involving dizzying heights. That’s why I was puzzled to overhear him telling some new friends: “Hang gliding? Yeah! Sure, we’d love to!”
I knew hang-gliding was a tourist tradition in Rio—since the mid-1970s I’d later learn—with nearly 10,000 tandem flights each year. I’ve never been one to decline a challenge, and this felt like a triple-dog dare. Jeff took me aside to coax. I ultimately conceded. And, instead of my memories flashing before me in a quick-but-painless final instant, I was blessed with hours of panicked reflection in a single sleepless night.
My anxiety, however, was unjustified; after all, this storm would be my savior—or so I thought.
The sliding glass doors of the hotel entryway brushed open and closed as we waited. And then, to our surprise, my dismay, it coasted into the scene: the secret-service-like SUV that would transport us to a 1,700-foot-high hilltop in the depths of Floresta da Tijuca, the world’s largest urban forest. I felt the Ipanema tan drain from my face.
“Too much breeze for you back there?” Jeff asked our friends. “Though then again, given what we’re about to do!” We both crack jokes when we’re nervous, and today they were rolling off his tongue like coconuts. Thud. We continued to land-cruise past the Atlantic Ocean waves, clouded with rainwater and twisted with sand. I squinted and spotted what looked like a toy hang-glider floating in the distance. I reached for his hand.
The vehicle swerved subtly as our driver’s eyes left the road to turn around and introduce himself. But all we understood through his thick Portuguese accent was his nickname: Mosquito. Jeff spouted, “‘Mosquito,’ really? That’s the best you could do? How about Eagle? Or Hawk? Or ….”
“All right, funny man, that oughta do it,” I interrupted.
Mosquito chattered for the remaining twenty minutes of our drive. “We make dreams come true,” he pitched. “You want to fly like a bird? We help you fly like a bird!” He amused himself with the story of an eighty-four-year-old client: “See? Anyone can do it!”
“Mosquito, would you please turn on the radio? I need some music to get pumped for our jump,” I requested sarcastically feeling more than a touch of bacon-and-anxiety-induced nausea. Anything to drown out his transparent “don’t back out now” sales speech. We hadn’t paid him yet.
He cranked some Samba. “But is not a jump!” he scolded. “Never jump. You must run. Your pilot will explain.” The tires crunched as we wound our way up and up and up a narrow, gravel mountain road. And Mosquito rambled on about Rio’s pure air.
When we disembarked on a dusty plateau with a makeshift snack bar, I smelled the stagnant sewage from the out-of-service “sanitarios.” A crowd was gathered on bleachers built into the cliff, and their roof was a fifteen-foot-long ramp of two-by-four floorboards leading off into that pure air. “All the better to trip you with, my dear,” I muttered. I may be athletic, but I’m also clumsy.
Staff members yanked each member of our group in different directions. Rony, my tandem pilot in a bright orange shirt and over-gelled, spiky, black hair, stepped me into the thin, cloth, armless straightjacket that would clip me to what’s essentially an oversized kite. He and I sprinted back and forth together to simulate takeoff, as if we were competing in a three-legged race.
“You will run as fast as you can, yes?” he insisted.
I nodded.
“No nod. Promise,” he insisted.
“I promise.” My stomach churned—yogurt, pineapple and all. Any remaining saliva in my dry mouth tasted metallic.
I wasn’t sure how it happened so quickly but, in my peripheral vision, I saw Jeff in ready position at the top of the wooden runway.
“I love you!” I shouted as if it would be the last time. He glared back at me as if this had been my idea, not his. I watched my husband disappear into the clouds.
“Ready?” my pilot asked. “We must hurry before the weather turns.”
Before the weather turns? I realized that the helmet fasten didn’t hug my chin.
“Is this safe?” I asked as I showed him the gap between strap and skin.
He responded only with a laugh, led me to the ledge and instructed me to keep my left hand on his back and my right hand on a noose hanging from the steering bar at all times. His back sweat on my left hand. The frayed khaki rope splintered in my right.
“And … RUN!” he yelled.
My legs sloshed like water balloons; they weren’t my own. I couldn’t keep up with him. But when we reached the edge, there was no drop—of jaw, of stomach, of limp, freefalling body. We were flying, as promised, like an eagle, a hawk … a mosquito. I gasped. Besides my pilot’s breathing, my breathing and my babbling internal stream of consciousness, all I heard was … nothing. The wind silently echoed in my cold ears. I started to notice details in the Brazilian landscape that I couldn’t possibly have seen from sea level. I wished I could swap out my smelly pilot and swap in Jeff. Or better yet, enjoy my flight in solitude.
That inner peace lasted about a minute until it hit me: more than 1,000 feet between me and the unforgiving ground. That’s all. Rony repeatedly clicked a button with his thumb and grinned into a camera at the front right edge of our kite. I gave it dirty looks.
Are the clips holding me to the glider made of metal or plastic? What if they forgot about one of the clips altogether? What would I do if I heard the sound of splitting fabric or tearing Velcro? Could I hold my full body weight from this thin rope and, if I could, what would happen during landing? LANDING? We never even discussed landing!
I remembered reading once that bird bones are hollow; human bodies aren’t built to fly. As we circled, I didn’t feel weightless; I felt every ounce of my mass, multiplied. It pushed against the material of my straightjacket as if I were as large and dense as a Chicago Bears linebacker. Brian Urlacher. Refrigerator Perry even.
Would it be better if I were to plummet into that block of trees over there? Into the pool behind that mansion? Into the ocean? Is it true that your body goes into shock during free fall—that you don’t feel the pain of impact? Would it be quicker if we crashed into a cliff?
Without warning, over the same Atlantic Ocean waves we’d driven past earlier, my pilot ripped off my leg straps. My feet dangled with awkward freedom.
“Again, you will run. Stand up very straight,” he coached.
He pulled back and, as our speed slowed, we hovered over the shoreline.
Touchdown!
Jeff, also grateful for solid ground, proudly waved to me from the shade of a nearby palm tree. I wobbled, then felt a manic rush of adrenaline, and we swapped stories. His pilot had taken four cell phone calls—in flight—and their out-of-control beach landing had involved a gritty tumble. But he loved it.
“I’m really proud of the bragging rights, but I can’t imagine doing it again,” I confessed.
“Come on, you wouldn’t?” he prodded.
Are we mere men, or are we mosquito? I asked myself. I flashed back to the spectacular sight of R
io de Janeiro from above in all its glory—the mountains, the mansions, the ocean, the favelas, forest, beach—and I couldn’t come up with a better way to take in the sweeping view. I caught a glimpse of the next aircraft approaching the sand.
That was me. I did that. Maybe I don’t have a fear of heights after all. Or maybe I do, but I’m brave enough to face it. Yes. I would do it again. I am mosquito.
Josey Miller is on-camera and voiceover talent, a singer-songwriter, and a respected travel and lifestyle journalist. Her travel writing credits include the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, Time Out New York magazine, The Nest magazine, Concierge.com, Epicurious.com, and BBC Travel. She lives in the West Village of New York City with her husband, Jeff, their son, Mason, and their cats, Gray and Benji. Learn more at joseymiller.com.
JILL K. ROBINSON
Wasted in Margaritaville
A bad trip can be made better with tequila.
I almost didn’t take this trip. The idea of traveling around Mexico’s tequila country in a van, drinking from morning until well, morning, seemed the type of vacation I should have taken in my 20s. But after a few margaritas one night, I listened to the stories of friends who had gone the previous year, and my curiosity got the better of me. Had I known that I’d spend the trip imagining how to knock off two of my fellow travelers and make it look like an unfortunate accident, I might have reconsidered.
There were nine of us on the weeklong trip touring distilleries: Julio (our well-connected leader), Paco (our sober driver) and seven fans of tequila. While we’d been friends with Julio for years, many of us had only just met each other. Drinking began after we checked in at our hotel in Guadalajara and from there on, only stopped for sleep and breakfast. Needless to say, breakfast consisted of quiet, non-crunchy fare. Due to Julio’s friendships in the liquor industry, the week was a unique blur of food, tequila and distilleries. The flood of food and drink seemed to be endless. Meals provided by our distillery hosts were banquets with options beyond the corner taqueria: smoky chipotle carne asada combined with the creamy texture of spicy guacamole, green-bean tasting nopales (cactus) and sweet grilled green onions were additions to warm corn handmade tortillas, crispy chicharrones were served with earthy black beans and sharp cheese. All were washed down with crisp, oaky tequila.