Travel Bug Events
Events are at 5 pm unless specified otherwise
| Subject | Date | Category | Presenter | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thailand and Laos | Sat Dec 27 | Slide Show | Carl Moore | We took a train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, stopping over night at the town with the well-preserved ruins of Thailand 's first capital, Sukhothai. We crossed over to Laos and floated in a long-boat for two days down the Mekong River to LuangPrabang. Highlights included a visit to the traditional Khmu village of Ban Paksith, rafting on white water in bamboo rafts, mountain hiking, the Kuangshi Waterfall Park (with its sun and moon bears), the vibrant day and night markets in LuangPrabang, the outdoor playground in VangVieng, and a brief stay in the Laotian capital of Vientiane before taking the night sleeper train back to Bangkok. We had lots of time to visit, feed and wash elephants. |
| Canceled - Bolivia and Chile - | Sat Jan 03 | Slide Show | Diane Marron | This South American adventure begins in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, the driest desert in the world, then off to the Salar de Uyuni of Bolivia, the largest salt flats in the world, then a visit to the magical city of La Paz, the highest capital city of the world, and ending in Barranca, the “Soho” of Lima, above the shores of the largest ocean in the world. This journey encompasses the moonlike landscapes of the desert with its dramatic rock formations and expansive sand dunes sculpted by millennia of wind and water erosion; the colorful lagoons of the Altiplanos of Chile and Bolivia where wildlife such as flamingoes, vicunas and llamas thrive and where there is a special feeling one can experience of being on top of the world, perhaps because of the rarified atmosphere at 14,000 feet above sea level. This two-week journey into the sand and the salt and the sea, and to the lagoons and the geysers and the Piedras Rojas, and to the magic of La Paz and its culture, and stepping into the past in Barranca is the “altiplano” of my adventures and I look forward to sharing this with my photographs and videos. |
| Travel Bug Book Discussion | Tue Jan 06 | Book Group | Aimee Gwynne Franklyn | Held by Anne Michaels 1917. On a battlefield near the River Escaut, John lies in the aftermath of a blast, unable to move or feel his legs. Struggling to focus his thoughts, he is lost to memory as the snow fall -- a chance encounter in a pub by a railway, a hot bath with his lover on a winter night. 1920. John has returned from war to North Yorkshire, near a different river. He is alive but still not whole. Reunited with Helena, an artist, he reopens his photography business and tries to keep on living. But the past erupts insistently into the present, as ghosts begin to surface in his pictures: ghosts with messages he cannot understand. Michaels brilliantly links the various threads by exploring the thin divide between the living and the dead and the ways memory can carry her characters between worlds. Her stunning prose sustains the book 's enchanted mood from start to finish. |
| Backpacking Through Wales | Sat Jan 10 | Slide Show | Terry Owen | Have you ever thought of expanding your backpacking or hiking experiences to an overseas locale? There 's no better way to learn about a place and its people than on foot with a pack strapped to your back. Join Terry Owen for his presentation on his recent thru-hiking journey through Wales. He 'll cover planning, logistics, travel and safety, while also sharing his experiences, photos and video from the land of dragons and castles. It might be just the thing to get you to say, "why not? ". Terry is a retired U.S. Navy officer and deep submersible pilot, and subsequently completed an 18-year career at Sandia National Laboratories. An avid hiker, backpacker and climber for nearly 50 years, he 's journeyed to six continents but just recently expanded his horizons to include overseas backpacking trails, because he said "why not? ". |
| GenXMillennial Bookclub | Wed Jan 14 | SPECIAL | Jeff Grossman | The Millennial Gen-X Book Club is a once-a-month fiction book club for anyone in those generations. We skew towards the queer, the tender, and the strange. If you are interested in joining us, drop by on the night of, or direct your interest to Jeff through themillennialgenxbookclub@gmail.com January Book Selection: The End of Drum Time Hanna Pylvainen February Book Selection: |
| A Year in the Outback | Sat Jan 17 | Slide Show | Bill Earl | Have you wondered what the Australian Outback is really like. This is your chance to get a taste. Bill decided to tour and camp through a lot of Australia. He purchased a Land Cruiser and spent almost a year touring and camping. From the cities and coast of New South Wales and Queensland to the most isolated parts of the Northern Territory and Western Australia. This slide show will describe the “process”…Purchasing the car, outfitting, and touring. We’ll cover the how and why of camping and overlanding Australia. We’ll visit a bit of the Australian cities but focus on the beauty and isolation of the Outback. |
| Solo Traveling While Old | Sat Jan 24 | Slide Show | Linda Durham | Linda Durham, writer and storyteller. At 83, she has traveled alone to scores of countries for more than sixty years. Recent solo journeys include Bulgaria, Poland/Ukraine, and Russia, including a month long journey on the Trans-Siberian Railway. At 70, she traveled around the world in 70 days. Drawing on decades of experience, Durham shares stories of continued adventure, the kindness of strangers, and the thrill of discovery that comes with traveling alone at any age. She is the author of Still Moving, The Trans-Siberian Railway Journey, and the forthcoming Naked Women.recent solo travels to Bulgaria, Turkey, Ukraine |
| Guatemala During the High Holidays | Sat Jan 31 | Slide Show | Jack Shlachter | It 's Mayan, Not Yours! Leading Congregation Adat Israel, in Guatemala City for the Jewish High Holidays Rabbi Jack Shlachter is a physicist and ordained rabbi whose long career at Los Alamos National Laboratory provided him with the luxury of galavanting around the world to lead small congregations for the Jewish High Holidays. His travels have taken him to Vienna, Beijing, Warsaw, Bangkok, and most recently, Guatemala City. When home in New Mexico, Rabbi Jack serves as rabbi for the Los Alamos Jewish Center as well as congregation HaMakom in Santa Fe. The Jewish community of Guatemala is small by world standards; Jewish population for the entire country of 18 million people is estimated to be under 1000 or a mere 0.006%. Nonetheless, Guatemala as a country is strongly pro-Israel. The current president lived in Israel for ten years, speaks Hebrew, and received his college degree from Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and Guatemala was the second country in the world to move its embassy to Jerusalem. Rabbi Jack will describe his experiences leading a small, non-Orthodox congregation in Guatemala City for the Jewish High Holidays in 2025 as well as a first-time traveler 's impressions of Guatemala. |
| Travel Bug Book Discussion | Tue Feb 03 | Book Group | Aimee Gwynne Franklyn | Brotherless Night by V. V. Ganeshananthan Jaffna, 1981. Sixteen-year-old Sashi wants to become a doctor. But over the next decade, a vicious civil war tears through her home, and her dream spins off course as she sees her four beloved brothers and their friend K swept up in the mounting violence. Desperate to act, Sashi accepts K 's invitation to work as a medic at a field hospital for the militant Tamil Tigers, who, following years of state discrimination and violence, are fighting for a separate homeland for Sri Lanka 's Tamil minority. But after the Tigers murder one of her teachers and Indian peacekeepers arrive only to commit further atrocities, Sashi begins to question where she stands. When one of her medical school professors, a Tamil feminist and dissident, invites her to join a secret project documenting human rights violations, she embarks on a dangerous path that will change her forever. Set during the early years of Sri Lanka 's three-decade civil war, Brotherless Night is a heartrending portrait of one woman 's moral journey and a testament to both the enduring impact of war and the bonds of home. |
| Bali | Sat Feb 07 | Slide Show | Ellen Kemper | "Around Bali " - Volunteering, sightseeing, and swimming around Bali. Six weeks and twelve accommodations later, Ellen Kemper traveled the island of Bali enjoying its culture, landscape, and seas. |
| Cruising the Bottom of South America | Sat Feb 14 | Slide Show | Marion DuBeau | For our honeymoon we decided to see a part of the world we had never been to before. South America had the right combination of romance and remoteness so we chose a cruise that spans the bottom of South America from Valparaiso Chile to the Magellan Strait and ends in Buenos Aires with many stops in between. |
| Algeria | Sat Feb 21 | Slide Show | Scott Lindenau | |
| Palestinian Olive Harvest | Sat Feb 28 | Slide Show | Dustin Weinreb | The annual olive harvest is one of the most important economic and cultural events for Palestinians in the Israeli occupied West Bank. However, it is frequently impeded by the efforts of violent settlers and soldiers. Dustin Weinreb spent a month with the organization the Center for Jewish Non-Violence working alongside farmers in the village of Burin to harvest olives and support Palestinian efforts to remain on their land. He will present his experience and detail the salient issues people in the West Bank are facing. Dustin Weinreb has a B.A. in religious studies from Reed College where he studied modern Islamic intellectual history and Arabic. He has extensive experience in the Middle East having spent months-long stints in Morocco, Lebanon, and Israel-Palestine. Prior to this visit to the West Bank, he spent three months with CJNV in Masafer Yatta, a collection of West Bank villages chronicled in the Oscar winning film, "No Other Land. " He works as a wildland firefighter across the American West, most recently as a member of the Geronimo Interagency Hotshot Crew. |
| Origins of Florence | Sat Mar 07 | Slide Show | Linda Higgins | The Origins of Florence The Etruscans to the Romans Florence, the glorious Renaissance City. Everywhere you look you see the evidence of her beautiful artistic masterpieces that reflect this extraordinary era. But as you walk the cobble stone streets there is a history of her origins directly beneath your feet. A past that goes back thousands of years to the Mysterious Etruscans whose town Fiesole overlooks Florence and whose marketplace was located on the banks of the River Arno in Florence. A history that tells how the Romans established their city of Florentia in 59 BC to reward the Roman soldiers who fought with Julius Caesar. A Roman city with a forum for the religious and government functions, an amphitheater for “sports”, a theater for music and plays and, of course, baths and aqueducts to bring clean water from the surrounding countryside. Together we will explore the very foundations on which this Beautiful City of Art was built. |
| On the Road with On the Road | Sat Mar 14 | Slide Show | Carl Moore | Robert Frank 's The Americans redefined photography in 1959 and inspired Carl Moore to hit the road with Jack Kerouac 's On the Road. Like Frank, Moore sought to reveal America to Americans—capturing the landscapes, faces, and fleeting moments that echo Kerouac 's metaphorical vision. From Denver, New Orleans, San Francisco, and Los Angeles to a cross-country drive with his son from Santa Fe to New England, Moore, with his Nikon in hand, retraces Sal Paradise 's footsteps. The result is a vivid, contemporary counterpart to Kerouac 's masterpiece—where the photographs themselves feel restless, alive, and haunted by the same hunger for the open road. |
| AVAILABLE | Sat Mar 21 | AVAILABLE |
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Thailand and Laos
with Carl Moore
Saturday Dec 27, 2025 at 5pm
Train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, stopping over night at the town with the well-preserved ruins of Thailand 's first capital, Sukhothai. We crossed to Laos and floated in a long-boat for two days down the Mekong River to LuangPrabang. Khmu village of Ban Paksith, rafting on bamboo rafts, mountain hiking, the vibrant day and night markets in LuangPrabang, and a brief stay in the Laotian capital of Vientiane. We had lots of time to feed and wash elephants.
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