Friends and Family

The Erie Canal, Lock 7
42 49.73 N 073 52.09 W

So why do we keep coming back to the Erie and Lake Champlain year after year.  OK their beauty and hospitality are unmatched.  But there must be more.  OK, I'll confess there is much more.  There are family and friends.  Consider this.

Wednesday: lunch with Paul and Marge, dinner with Pete.  Thursday: meet with Bob and Carol, then had dinner with Fred and Mary.  Friday:  an IEEE lunch meeting with Paul where I met old colleagues, Torben, Dag, Brad, Rodolfo and Kristen.  then dinner with Mary Ann, John, Roger, and Carolyn.  Still to come are meetings with Mari and John, Bud and Nancy, our son John with Cheryl, Sara, Katelyn and Victoria, Gerry and Phyllis, and Dean.  And that's just our bookings so far.  

You get the idea.  Around here we are surrounded by family and lifelong friends.   How could we resist?

While I'm being so honest, let me also point out that the prospect of losing contact with family and friends for so long was a major factor in our wise 2005 decision to cancel dreams of sailing around the world. If we had done so, we would have been cut off for 5-6 years.

What's wrong with that?  Nothing at all.  It is however, an admission that bonds to family and friends are stronger than the lust to wander and explore.   We are not cut from the same cloth as Captain Cook.  So why is that a confession?  Because, I like to portray us as Captain-Cook-like adventurers and it's not entirely true.